第 77 页

having pounded anybody, the train at last stopped alongside the

mattresses, pillows, and cushions lying hither and thither, and the

bewildered, whirling groups of people. The carriage doors opened and a

torrent of travellers alighted, whilst another torrent climbed in, these

two obstinately contending currents bringing the tumult to a climax.

Faces, first wearing an inquisitive expression, and then overcome by

stupefaction at the astonishing sight, showed themselves at the windows

of the doors which remained closed; and, among them, one especially

noticed the faces of two remarkably pretty girls, whose large candid eyes

ended by expressing the most dolorous compassion.

Followed by her husband, however, Madame Maze had climbed into one of the

carriages, feeling as happy and buoyant as if she were in her twentieth

year again, as on the already distant evening of her honeymoon journey.

And the doors having been slammed, the engine gave a loud whistle and

began to move, going off slowly and heavily between the throng, which, in

the rear of the train, flowed on to the lines again like an invading

torrent whose flood-gates have been swept away.

"Bar the platform!" shouted the station-master to his men. "Keep watch

when the engine comes up!"

The belated patients and pilgrims had arrived during this alert. La

Grivotte passed by with her feverish eyes and excited, dancing gait,

followed by Elise Rouquet and Sophie Couteau, who were very gay, and

quite out of breath through running. All three hastened to their

carriage, where Sister Hyacinthe scolded them. They had almost been left

behind at the Grotto, where, at times, the pilgrims lingered forgetfully,

unable to tear themselves away, still imploring and entreating the

Blessed Virgin, when the train was waiting for them at the

railway-station.

All at once Pierre, who likewise was anxious, no longer knowing what to

think, perceived M. de Guersaint and Marie quietly talking with Abbe

Judaine on the covered platform. He hastened to join them, and told them

of his impatience. "What have you been doing?" he asked. "I was losing

all hope."

"What have we been doing?" responded M. de Guersaint, with quiet

astonishment. "We were at the Grotto, as you know very well. There was a

priest there, preaching in a most remarkable manner, and we should still

be there if I hadn't remembered that we had to leave. And we took a fly

here, as we promised you we would do."

He broke off to look at the clock. "But hang it all!" he added, "there's

no hurry. The train won't start for another quarter of an hour."

This was true. Then Marie, smiling with divine joy, exclaimed: "Oh! if

you only knew, Pierre, what happiness I have brought away from that last

visit to the Blessed Virgin. I saw her smile at me, I felt her giving me

strength to live. Really, that farewell was delightful, and you must not

scold us, Pierre."

He himself had begun to smile, somewhat ill at ease, however, as he

thought of his nervous fidgeting. Had he, then, experienced so keen a

desire to get far away from Lourdes? Had he feared that the Grotto might

keep Marie, that she might never come away from it again? Now that she

was there beside him, he was astonished at having indulged such thoughts,

and felt himself to be very calm.

However, whilst he was advising them to go and take their seats in the

carriage, he recognised Doctor Chassaigne hastily approaching. "Ah! my

dear doctor," he said, "I was waiting for you. I should have been sorry

indeed to have gone away without embracing you."

But the old doctor, who was trembling with emotion, interrupted him.

"Yes, yes, I am late. But ten minutes ago, just as I arrived, I caught

sight of that eccentric fellow, the Commander, and had a talk with him

over yonder. He was sneering at the sight of your people taking the train

again to go and die at home, when, said he, they ought to have done so

before coming to Lourdes. Well, all at once, while he was talking like

this, he fell on the ground before me. It was his third attack of

paralysis; the one he had long been expecting."

"Oh! _mon Dieu_," murmured Abbe Judaine, who heard the doctor, "he was

blaspheming. Heaven has punished him."

M. de Guersaint and Marie were listening, greatly interested and deeply

moved.

"I had him carried yonder, into that shed," continued the doctor. "It is

all over; I can do nothing. He will doubtless be dead before a quarter of

an hour has gone by. But I thought of a priest, and hastened up to you."

Then, turning towards Abbe Judaine, M. Chassaigne added: "Come with me,

Monsieur le Cure; you know him. We cannot let a Christian depart

unsuccoured. Perhaps he will be moved, recognise his error, and become

reconciled with God."

Abbe Judaine quickly followed the doctor, and in the rear went M. de

Guersaint, leading Marie and Pierre, whom the thought of this tragedy

impassioned. All five entered the goods shed, at twenty paces from the

crowd which was still bustling and buzzing, without a soul in it

expecting that there was a man dying so near by.

In a solitary corner of the shed, between two piles of sacks filled with

oats, lay the Commander, on a mattress borrowed from the Hospitality

reserve supply. He wore his everlasting frock-coat, with its buttonhole

decked with a broad red riband, and somebody who had taken the precaution

to pick up his silver-knobbed walking-stick had carefully placed it on

the ground beside the mattress.

Abbe Judaine at once leant over him. "You recognise us, you can hear us,

my poor friend, can't you?" asked the priest.

Only the Commander's eyes now appeared to be alive; but they _were_

alive, still glittering brightly with a stubborn flame of energy. The

attack had this time fallen on his right side, almost entirely depriving

him of the power of speech. He could only stammer a few words, by which

he succeeded in making them understand that he wished to die there,

without being moved or worried any further. He had no relative at

Lourdes, where nobody knew anything either of his former life or his

family. For three years he had lived there happily on the salary attached

to his little post at the station, and now he at last beheld his ardent,

his only desire, approaching fulfilment--the desire that he might depart

and fall into the eternal sleep. His eyes expressed the great joy he felt

at being so near his end.

"Have you any wish to make known to us?" resumed Abbe Judaine. "Cannot we

be useful to you in any way?"

No, no; his eyes replied that he was all right, well pleased. For three

years past he had never got up in the morning without hoping that by

night time he would be sleeping in the cemetery. Whenever he saw the sun

shine he was wont to say in an envious tone: "What a beautiful day for

departure!" And now that death was at last at hand, ready to deliver him

from his hateful existence, it was indeed welcome.

"I can do nothing, science is powerless. He is condemned," said Doctor

Chassaigne in a low, bitter tone to the old priest, who begged him to

attempt some effort.

However, at that same moment it chanced that an aged woman, a pilgrim of

fourscore years, who had lost her way and knew not whither she was going,

entered the shed. Lame and humpbacked, reduced to the stature of

childhood's days, afflicted with all the ailments of extreme old age, she

was dragging herself along with the assistance of a stick, and at her

side was slung a can full of Lourdes water, which she was taking away

with her, in the hope of yet prolonging her old age, in spite of all its

frightful decay. For a moment her senile, imbecile mind was quite scared.

She stood looking at that outstretched, stiffened man, who was dying.

Then a gleam of grandmotherly kindliness appeared in the depths of her

dim, vague eyes; and with the sisterly feelings of one who was very aged

and suffered very grievously she drew nearer, and, taking hold of her can

with her hands, which never ceased shaking, she offered it to the man.

To Abbe Judaine this seemed like a sudden flash of light, an inspiration

from on high. He, who had prayed so fervently and so often for the cure

of Madame Dieulafay without being heard by the Blessed Virgin, now glowed

with fresh faith in the conviction that if the Commander would only drink

that water he would be cured.

The old priest fell upon his knees beside the mattress. "O brother!" he

said, "it is God who has sent you this woman. Reconcile yourself with

God, drink and pray, whilst we ourselves implore the divine mercy with

our whole souls. God will prove His power to you; God will work the great

miracle of setting you erect once more, so that you may yet spend many

years upon this earth, loving Him and glorifying Him."

No, no! the Commander's sparkling eyes cried no! He, indeed, show himself

as cowardly as those flocks of pilgrims who came from afar, through so

many fatigues, in order to drag themselves on the ground and sob and beg

Heaven to let them live a month, a year, ten years longer! It was so

pleasant, so simple to die quietly in your bed. You turned your face to

the wall and you died.

"Drink, O my brother, I implore you!" continued the old priest. "It is

life that you will drink, it is strength and health, the very joy of

living. Drink that you may become young again, that you may begin a new

and pious life; drink that you may sing the praises of the Divine Mother,

who will have saved both your body and your soul. She is speaking to me,

your resurrection is certain."

But no! but no! The eyes refused, repelled the offer of life with growing

obstinacy, and in their expression now appeared a covert fear of the

miraculous. The Commander did not believe; for three years he had been

shrugging his shoulders at the pretended cases of cure. But could one

ever tell in this strange world of ours? Such extraordinary things did

sometimes happen. And if by chance their water should really have a

supernatural power, and if by force they should make him drink some of

it, it would be terrible to have to live again--to endure once more the

punishment of a galley-slave existence, that abomination which

Lazarus--the pitiable object of the great miracle--had suffered twice.

No, no, he would not drink; he would not incur the fearful risk of

resurrection.

"Drink, drink, my brother," repeated Abbe Judaine, who was now in tears;

"do not harden your heart to refuse the favours of Heaven."

And then a terrible thing was seen; this man, already half dead, raised

himself, shaking off the stifling bonds of paralysis, loosening for a

second his tied tongue, and stammering, growling in a hoarse voice: "No,

no, NO!"

Pierre had to lead the stupefied old woman away and put her in the right

direction again. She had failed to understand that refusal of the water

which she herself was taking home with her like an inestimable treasure,

the very gift of God's eternity to the poor who did not wish to die. Lame

of one leg, humpbacked, dragging the sorry remnants of her fourscore

years along by the assistance of her stick, she disappeared among the

tramping crowd, consumed by the passion of being, eager for space, air,

sunshine, and noise.

Marie and her father had shuddered in presence of that appetite for

death, that greedy hungering for the end which the Commander showed. Ah!

to sleep, to sleep without a dream, in the infinite darkness forever and

ever--nothing in the world could have seemed so sweet to him. He did not

hope in a better life; he had no desire to become happy, at last, in

Paradise where equality and justice would reign. His sole longing was for

black night and endless sleep, the joy of being no more, of never, never

being again. And Doctor Chassaigne also had shuddered, for he also

nourished but one thought, the thought of the happy moment when he would

depart. But, in his case, on the other side of this earthly existence he

would find his dear lost ones awaiting him, at the spot where eternal

life began; and how icy cold all would have seemed had he but for a

single moment thought that he might not meet them there.

Abbe Judaine painfully rose up. It had seemed to him that the Commander

was now fixing his bright eyes upon Marie. Deeply grieved that his

entreaties should have been of no avail, the priest wished to show the

dying man an example of that goodness of God which he repulsed.

"You recognise her, do you not?" he asked. "Yes, it is the young lady who

arrived here on Saturday so ill, with both legs paralysed. And you see

her now, so full of health, so strong, so beautiful. Heaven has taken

pity on her, and now she is reviving to youth, to the long life she was

born to live. Do you feel no regret in seeing her? Would you also like

her to be dead? would you have advised her not to drink the water?"

The Commander could not answer; but his eyes no longer strayed from

Marie's young face, on which one read such great happiness at having

resuscitated, such vast hopes in countless morrows; and tears appeared in

those fixed eyes of his, gathered under their lids, and rolled down his

cheeks, which were already cold. He was certainly weeping for her; he

must have been thinking of that other miracle which he had wished

her--that if she should be cured, she might be happy. It was the

tenderness of an old man, who knows the miseries of this world, stirred

to pity by the thought of all the sorrows which awaited this young

creature. Ah! poor woman, how many times; perhaps, might she regret that

she had not died in her twentieth year!

Then the Commander's eyes grew very dim, as though those last pitiful

tears had dissolved them. It was the end; coma was coming; the mind was

departing with the breath. He slightly turned, and died.

Doctor Chassaigne at once drew Marie aside. "The train's starting," he