“The knife!”
One of the assistants brought a case which Deibler opened, and Fandor instinctively shrank as a flash from the bright steel fell full in his eyes, that sinister triangular knife that presently would do the work of death.
Deibler leant calmly against the guillotine, fitted the shank into the grooves in the two uprights, and, setting the mechanism to work, hoisted up the knife which glittered strangely; he looked the whole thing over and turned again to his assistants.
“The hay!”
A truss was arranged in the lunette, and Deibler came up to the instrument and pressed a spring. Like a flash the knife dropped down the uprights and severed the truss in two.
The rehearsal was finished. Now for the real drama!
While the guillotine was being set up Juve had stood by Fandor nervously chewing cigarettes.
“Everything is ready now,” he said to the lad. “Deibler has only got to put on his coat and take delivery of Fantômas.”
The assistants had just arranged two baskets filled with bran along each side of the machine; one was destined to receive the severed head, the other the body when that was released from the plyer. The executioner pulled on his coat, rubbed his hands mechanically, and then strode towards a group of officials who had arrived while the guillotine was being erected, and were now standing by the entrance to the prison.
“Gentlemen,” said Deibler, “it will be sunrise in a quarter of an hour. We can proceed to awaken the prisoner.”
Slowly, in single file, the officials went inside the prison.
There were present the Attorney General, the Public Prosecutor, his deputy, the Governor of the prison, and behind these, M. Havard, Deibler, and his two assistants.
The little company passed through the corridors to the third floor, where the condemned cells are.
The warder Nibet came forward with his bunch of keys in his hand.
Deibler looked at the Public Prosecutor.
“Are you ready, sir?” and as that gentleman, who was very white, made a sign of assent, Deibler looked at the Governor of the prison.
“Unlock the cell,” the Governor ordered.
Nibet turned the key noiselessly and pushed open the door.
The Public Prosecutor stepped forward. He had hoped to find the condemned man asleep, and so have had a moment’s respite before announcing the fatal news. But he drew back; for the man was awake and dressed, sitting ready on his bed with mad, haggard eyes.
“Gurn,” said the Public Prosecutor. “Be brave! Your appeal has been rejected!”
The others, standing behind him, were all silent, and the words of the Public Prosecutor fell like a knell. The condemned man, however, had not stirred, had not even seemed to understand: his attitude was that of a man in a state of somnambulism. The Public Prosecutor was surprised by this strange impassivity and spoke again, in strangled tones.
“Be brave! Be brave!”
A spasm crossed the face of the condemned man, and his lips moved as though he were making an effort to say something.
“I’m not—” he murmured.
But Deibler laid his hands upon the man’s shoulders and cut the horrid moment short.
“Come now!”
The chaplain came forward in his turn.
“Pray, my brother,” he said; “do you wish to hear mass?”
At the touch of the executioner the prisoner had trembled; he rose, like an automaton, with dilated eyes and twitching face. He understood what the chaplain said and took a step towards him.
“I—not—”
M. Havard intervened, and spoke to the chaplain.
“Really, sir, no: it is time.”
Deibler nodded approval.
“Let us be quick; we can proceed; the sun has risen.”
The Public Prosecutor was still bleating “Be brave! Be brave!”
Deibler took the man by one arm, a warder took him by the other, and between them they half-carried him to the office for his last toilette. In the little room, dimly lighted by a winking lamp, a chair had been set close to a table. The executioner and his assistant pushed the condemned man into the chair, and Deibler took up a pair of scissors.
The Public Prosecutor spoke to the prisoner.
“Would you like a glass of rum? Would you like a cigarette? Is there anything you wish to have done?”
Maître Barberoux, who had not arrived in time for the awakening of the prisoner, now approached his client; he, too, was ghastly white.
“Is there anything else that I can do for you? Have you any last wish?”
The condemned man made another effort to rise from the chair, and a hoarse groan escaped from his throat.
“I—I—”
The prison doctor had joined the group, and now drew the Public Prosecutor’s deputy aside.
“It is appalling!” he said. “The man has not articulated a single word since he was awakened. He is as though sunk in a stupefied sleep. There is a technical word for his condition: he is in a state of inhibition. He is alive, and yet he is a corpse. Anyhow he is utterly unconscious, incapable of any clear thought, or of saying a word that has any sense. I have never seen such complete stupefaction.”
Deibler waved aside the men who were pressing round him.
“Sign the gaol book, please, M. Havard,” he said, and while that gentleman affixed a shaky signature to the warrant authorising the delivery of Gurn to the public executioner, Deibler took the scissors and cut a segment out of the prisoner’s shirt and cut off a wisp of hair that grew low down on his neck. Meanwhile an assistant bound the wrists of the man who was about to die. Then the executioner looked at his watch and made a half-bow to the Public Prosecutor.
“Come! Come! It is the time fixed by law!”
Two assistants took the wretch by the shoulders and raised him up. There was a horrible, deep, unintelligible rattle in his throat.
“I—I—”
But no one heard him, and he was dragged away. It was practically a corpse that the servants of the guillotine bore down to the boulevard Arago.
Outside, the first rosy tints
