Thérèse Raquin (18 page)

"Oh! no, not on that part. There is blood."

She sank down on the low chair, trembling, with her forehead between
her hands. Laurent remained where he stood for a moment, looking stupid.
Then, all at once, with the clutch of a wild beast, he grasped the head
of Therese in his two great hands, and by force brought her lips to the
bite he had received from Camille on his neck. For an instant he kept,
he crushed, this head of a woman against his skin. Therese had given
way, uttering hollow groans. She was choking on the neck of Laurent.
When she had freed herself from his hands, she violently wiped her
mouth, and spat in the fire. She had not said a word.

Laurent, ashamed of his brutality, began walking slowly from the bed
to the window. Suffering alone—the horrible burn—had made him exact a
kiss from Therese, and when her frigid lips met the scorching scar,
he felt the pain more acutely. This kiss obtained by violence had just
crushed him. The shock had been so painful, that for nothing in the
world would he have received another.

He cast his eyes upon the woman with whom he was to live, and who sat
shuddering, doubled up before the fire, turning her back to him; and he
repeated to himself that he no longer loved this woman, and that she no
longer loved him.

For nearly an hour Therese maintained her dejected attitude,
while Laurent silently walked backward and forward. Both inwardly
acknowledged, with terror, that their passion was dead, that they had
killed it in killing Camille. The embers on the hearth were gently dying
out; a sheet of bright, clear fire shone above the ashes. Little by
little, the heat of the room had become stifling; the flowers were
fading, making the thick air sickly, with their heavy odour.

Laurent, all at once, had an hallucination. As he turned round, coming
from the window to the bed, he saw Camille in a dark corner, between
the chimney and wardrobe. The face of his victim looked greenish and
distorted, just as he had seen it on the slab at the Morgue. He remained
glued to the carpet, fainting, leaning against a piece of furniture for
support. At a hollow rattle in his throat, Therese raised her head.

"There, there!" exclaimed Laurent in a terrified tone.

With extended arm, he pointed to the dark corner where he perceived
the sinister face of Camille. Therese, infected by his terror, went and
pressed against him.

"It is his portrait," she murmured in an undertone, as if the face of
her late husband could hear her.

"His portrait?" repeated Laurent, whose hair stood on end.

"Yes, you know, the painting you did," she replied. "My aunt was to have
removed it to her room. No doubt she forgot to take it down."

"Really; his portrait," said he.

The murderer had some difficulty in recognising the canvas. In his
trouble he forgot that it was he who had drawn those clashing strokes,
who had spread on those dirty tints that now terrified him. Terror made
him see the picture as it was, vile, wretchedly put together, muddy,
displaying the grimacing face of a corpse on a black ground. His own
work astonished and crushed him by its atrocious ugliness; particularly
the two eyes which seemed floating in soft, yellowish orbits, reminding
him exactly of the decomposed eyes of the drowned man at the Morgue.
For a moment, he remained breathless, thinking Therese was telling an
untruth to allay his fears. Then he distinguished the frame, and little
by little became calm.

"Go and take it down," said he in a very low tone to the young woman.

"Oh! no, I'm afraid," she answered with a shiver.

Laurent began to tremble again. At moments the frame of the picture
disappeared, and he only saw the two white eyes giving him a long,
steady look.

"I beg you to go and unhook it," said he, beseeching his companion.

"No, no," she replied.

"We will turn it face to the wall, and then it will not frighten us," he
suggested.

"No," said she, "I cannot do it."

The murderer, cowardly and humble, thrust the young woman towards the
canvas, hiding behind her, so as to escape the gaze of the drowned man.
But she escaped, and he wanted to brazen the matter out. Approaching the
picture, he raised his hand in search of the nail, but the portrait gave
such a long, crushing, ignoble look, that Laurent after seeking to
stare it out, found himself vanquished, and started back overpowered,
murmuring as he did so:

"No, you are right, Therese, we cannot do it. Your aunt shall take it
down to-morrow."

He resumed his walk up and down, with bowed head, feeling the portrait
was staring at him, following him with its eyes. At times, he could not
prevent himself casting a side glance at the canvas; and, then, in the
depth of the darkness, he still perceived the dull, deadened eyes of the
drowned man. The thought that Camille was there, in a corner, watching
him, present on his wedding night, examining Therese and himself, ended
by driving him mad with terror and despair.

One circumstance, which would have brought a smile to the lips of anyone
else, made him completely lose his head. As he stood before the fire, he
heard a sort of scratching sound. He turned pale, imagining it came
from the portrait, that Camille was descending from his frame. Then
he discovered that the noise was at the small door opening on the
staircase, and he looked at Therese who also showed signs of fear.

"There is someone on the staircase," he murmured. "Who can be coming
that way?"

The young woman gave no answer. Both were thinking of the drowned man,
and their temples became moist with icy perspiration. They sought refuge
together at the end of the room, expecting to see the door suddenly
open, and the corpse of Camille fall on the floor. As the sound
continued, but more sharply and irregularly, they thought their victim
must be tearing away the wood with his nails to get in. For the space of
nearly five minutes, they dared not stir. Finally, a mewing was heard,
and Laurent advancing, recognised the tabby cat belonging to Madame
Raquin, which had been accidentally shut up in the room, and was
endeavouring to get out by clawing at the door.

Francois, frightened by Laurent, sprang upon a chair at a bound. With
hair on end and stiffened paws, he looked his new master in the face, in
a harsh and cruel manner. The young man did not like cats, and Francois
almost terrified him. In this moment of excitement and alarm, he
imagined the cat was about to fly in his face to avenge Camille. He
fancied the beast must know everything, that there were thoughts in
his strangely dilated round eyes. The fixed gaze of the animal caused
Laurent to lower his lids. As he was about to give Francois a kick,
Therese exclaimed:

"Don't hurt him."

This sentence produced a strange impression on Laurent, and an absurd
idea got into his head.

"Camille has entered into this cat," thought he. "I shall have to kill
the beast. It looks like a human being."

He refrained from giving the kick, being afraid of hearing Francois
speak to him with the voice of Camille. Then he said to himself that
this animal knew too much, and that he should have to throw it out of
the window. But he had not the pluck to accomplish his design. Francois
maintained a fighting attitude. With claws extended, and back curved
in sullen irritation, he followed the least movement of his enemy with
superb tranquillity. The metallic sparkle of his eyes troubled Laurent,
who hastened to open the dining-room door, and the cat fled with a
shrill mew.

Therese had again seated herself before the extinguished fire. Laurent
resumed his walk from bed to window. It was thus that they awaited
day-light. They did not think of going to bed; their hearts were
thoroughly dead. They had but one, single desire: to leave the room they
were in, and where they were choking. They experienced a real discomfort
in being shut up together, and in breathing the same atmosphere. They
would have liked someone to be there to interrupt their privacy, to
drag them from the cruel embarrassment in which they found themselves,
sitting one before the other without opening their lips, and unable
to resuscitate their love. Their long silences tortured them, silence
loaded with bitter and despairing complaints, with mute reproaches,
which they distinctly heard in the tranquil air.

Day came at last, a dirty, whitish dawn, bringing penetrating cold with
it. When the room had filled with dim light, Laurent, who was shivering,
felt calmer. He looked the portrait of Camille straight in the face,
and saw it as it was, commonplace and puerile. He took it down, and
shrugging his shoulders, called himself a fool. Therese had risen
from the low chair, and was tumbling the bed about for the purpose of
deceiving her aunt, so as to make her believe they had passed a happy
night.

"Look here," Laurent brutally remarked to her, "I hope we shall sleep
well to-night! There must be an end to this sort of childishness."

Therese cast a deep, grave glance at him.

"You understand," he continued. "I did not marry for the purpose of
passing sleepless nights. We are just like children. It was you who
disturbed me with your ghostly airs. To-night you will try to be gay,
and not frighten me."

He forced himself to laugh without knowing why he did so.

"I will try," gloomily answered the young woman.

Such was the wedding night of Therese and Laurent.

The following nights proved still more cruel. The murderers had wished
to pass this part of the twenty-four hours together, so as to be able
to defend themselves against the drowned man, and by a strange effect,
since they had been doing so, they shuddered the more. They were
exasperated, and their nerves so irritated, that they underwent
atrocious attacks of suffering and terror, at the exchange of a simple
word or look. At the slightest conversation between them, at the least
talk, they had alone, they began raving, and were ready to draw blood.

The sort of remorse Laurent experienced was purely physical. His body,
his irritated nerves and trembling frame alone were afraid of the
drowned man. His conscience was for nothing in his terror. He did not
feel the least regret at having killed Camille. When he was calm, when
the spectre did not happen to be there, he would have committed the
murder over again, had he thought his interests absolutely required it.

During the daytime he laughed at himself for his fright, making up his
mind to be stronger, and he harshly rebuked Therese, whom he accused of
troubling him. According to what he said, it was Therese who shuddered,
it was Therese alone who brought on the frightful scenes, at night, in
the bedroom. And, as soon as night came, as soon as he found himself
shut in with his wife, icy perspiration pearled on his skin, and his
frame shook with childish terror.

He thus underwent intermittent nervous attacks that returned nightly,
and threw his senses into confusion while showing him the hideous
green face of his victim. These attacks resembled the accesses of some
frightful illness, a sort of hysteria of murder. The name of illness,
of nervous affection, was really the only one to give to the terror that
Laurent experienced. His face became convulsed, his limbs rigid, his
nerves could be seen knotting beneath his skin. The body suffered
horribly, while the spirit remained absent. The wretch felt no
repentance. His passion for Therese had conveyed a frightful evil to
him, and that was all.

Therese also found herself a prey to these heavy shocks. But, in her
terror, she showed herself a woman: she felt vague remorse, unavowed
regret. She, at times, had an inclination to cast herself on her knees
and beseech the spectre of Camille to pardon her, while swearing
to appease it by repentance. Maybe Laurent perceived these acts of
cowardice on the part of Therese, for when they were agitated by the
common terror, he laid the blame on her, and treated her with brutality.

On the first nights, they were unable to go to bed. They waited for
daylight, seated before the fire, or pacing to and fro as on the evening
of the wedding-day. The thought of lying down, side by side, on the
bed, caused them a sort of terrifying repugnance. By tacit consent, they
avoided kissing one another, and they did not even look at their couch,
which Therese tumbled about in the morning.

When overcome with fatigue, they slept for an hour or two in the
armchairs, to awaken with a start, under the influence of the sinister
denouement of some nightmare. On awakening, with limbs stiff and tired,
shivering all over with discomfort and cold, their faces marbled with
livid blotches, they contemplated one another in bewilderment astonished
to see themselves there. And they displayed strange bashfulness towards
each other, ashamed at showing their disgust and terror.

But they struggled against sleep as much as they could. They seated
themselves, one on each side of the chimney, and talked of a thousand
trifles, being very careful not to let the conversation drop. There was
a broad space between them in front of the fire. When they turned their
heads, they imagined that Camille had drawn a chair there, and occupied
this space, warming his feet in a lugubrious, bantering fashion. This
vision, which they had seen on the evening of the wedding-day, returned
each night.

And this corpse taking a mute, but jeering part, in their interviews,
this horribly disfigured body ever remaining there, overwhelmed them
with continued anxiety. Not daring to move, they half blinded themselves
staring at the scorching flames, and, when unable to resist any longer,
they cast a timid glance aside, their eyes irritated by the glowing
coal, created the vision, and conveyed to it a reddish glow.

Laurent, in the end, refused to remain seated any longer, without
avowing the cause of this whim to Therese. The latter understood that he
must see Camille as she saw him; and, in her turn, she declared that
the heat made her feel ill, and that she would be more comfortable a few
steps away from the chimney. Pushing back her armchair to the foot of
the bed, she remained there overcome, while her husband resumed his walk
in the room. From time to time, he opened the window, allowing the icy
air of the cold January night to fill the apartment, and this calmed his
fever.