At the moment that I write this, I do not know what was the real nature of the events of that July night when death threatened me, but I will not forget that lesson as long as I live.
If the initiated believe that I was then exposed to a plot woven by human hands, let me tell them that I feel anger against no one, for I know now that another stronger Hand, unknown to them, guided those hands against their will.
On the other hand, if there was no plot, I must suppose that my own imagination conjured up these chastising spirits for my own punishment. We shall see in the sequel how far this supposition is probable.
On the morning of my last day (as I suppose) I rise in a resigned frame of mind, which might be called religious; I have no more ties binding me to life. I have put my papers in order, written necessary letters, and burnt what had to be burnt. Then I go to bid farewell to the world in the Jardin des Plantes.
The Swedish block of lodestone before the mineralogical museum gives me a greeting from my native land. I greet the acacias, the cedars of Lebanon, and the monuments of great epochs when botany was still a living science. I buy bread and cherries for my old friends. The old bear knows me well, for I am the only one who brings him cherries morning and evening. I give bread to the young elephant, who spits in my face after he has eaten it—the young, faithless ingrate!
Farewell, ye vultures who had to exchange the sky for a dirty cage! Farewell, bison and behemoth, thou chained demon! Farewell, ye loving pair of seabirds whom wedded love consoles for the loss of ocean and its wide horizon! Farewell, stones, plants, flowers, trees, butterflies, birds, snakes, all creatures of a good God! And you great men, Bernadin de Saint-Pierre, Linnaeus, Geoffroy Saint-Hilaire, Haüy, whose names shine in gold on the front of the temple—farewell! but we meet again. So I part from this earthly Paradise, and Séraphita’s noble words come to my mind, “Adieu, pauvre terre! adieu!”
When I re-enter the hotel garden, I become aware of the presence of a man, who must have come in my absence. I do not see him, but feel him. What increases my confusion is the visible alteration which the adjoining room has undergone. A cloth hung over a rope obviously conceals something. On the mantelpiece are metal projections isolated by wooden panels, and on each there lies a photograph album or some other book, in order to give these diabolical machines, which I am inclined to think are accumulators, an innocuous appearance. Moreover, on a roof in the Rue Censier, exactly opposite my summerhouse, I see two workmen. I cannot make out what they are doing, but they seem to have an eye on my glass-door and are busy with objects which I cannot distinguish.
Why do I not escape? Because I am too proud, and must bear the inevitable. I therefore prepare myself for the night. I take a bath, and am especially careful to wash my feet, for my mother has told me when a child, that there is something disgraceful in dirty feet. I shave and perfume myself, and put on the underclothes which I bought three years ago in Vienna for my wedding—the toilet of a man condemned to die. I read the psalms in the Bible in which David invokes the wrath of the Eternal upon his enemies. I do not read the penitential psalms. I have no right to remorse, for it is not I who have guided my destiny. I have never requited evil with evil, except when I had to defend myself. To be remorseful is to criticise Providence, which imposes sin on us as a suffering, in order to purify us through the disgust with which each evil deed inspires us.
The summing up of my reckoning with life is as follows: If I have sinned, on my word of honour, I have been sufficiently punished. That is certain. As to the fear of hell, I have wandered through a thousand hells, without trembling, and have experienced enough of them to feel an intense desire to depart from the vanities and false joys of this world, which I always despised. Born with a heavenly homesickness, I wept as a child over the filthiness of life, and felt strange and homeless among relations and friends. From childhood onwards I have sought for God and found the Devil. I have borne the cross of Christ in my youth, and have denied a God who delights to reign over slaves who love their tormentor.
As I let down the curtains of my glass-door, I see a number of ladies and gentlemen sitting at their champagne in the private drawing-room. They seem to be strangers just arrived this evening. But they are not a merry company; their faces are all serious, they discuss, seem to form plans, and speak in an undertone with each other, as though it were a conspiracy. To intensify my mental torture, they turn round on their chairs, and point with their fingers in the direction of my room. About ten o’clock I extinguish my lamp, and go to sleep quietly, resigned as a dying man.
I wake up. A clock strikes two; a door is fastened, and—I am out of bed, as though someone had applied an air-pump to my heart and drawn me out so. At the same time an electric stream strikes my neck, and presses me to the ground. I rise again, seize my clothes and rush, my heart beating violently, into the garden. When I have dressed myself, my first clear thought is to go to the police and have the house searched. But the
