The Dedalus Book of French Horror: The 19th Century (12 page)

‘I do not delude myself that Apolline loves me as much as I do her. She admires me as a father. She sees me more as a benevolent teacher or a sympathetic friend. She is attracted to me in part because until now she has only encountered those who are selfish and ferocious. She is good, sensitive and wise, entirely sensible, what more could I ask for? She has declined every present I have brought her: she cannot do otherwise, she says, her honour demands it. Decent girls will only accept presents from their husbands. I have promised her that we shall be married shortly, and this thought fills her with joy. It was for that reason – so that we may discuss preparations for the marriage, though who knows what else might happen – that I have made an appointment with her for tomorrow night. I’m not lying about it, here is her letter.’

My Dear Bertholin,

I can only presume that it is because you are so busy that you have chosen such a late hour to visit me. But I shall obey your wishes, my dearest husband. I shall extinguish my lamp so as not to give rise to any gossip from evil-minded neighbours. Come stealthily.

Your devoted bride.

‘I have decided to depart without telling her anything in order to spare her a painful farewell. If I see her, I suspect that I shall not have the heart to go. I shall write on arrival and, once I am established in my new position, I shall come back and marry her clandestinely. We shall then settle in Auxerre, where I shall tell my associates that we have been married for some time in order to avert suspicions.

‘But come tomorrow depart I must. First, though, I must send some money so that the poor girl doesn’t die of starvation while I am away.

‘Good Lord! Eleven o’clock already! I must be on my way, de l’Argentière!’

On these words, Bertholin rose and went to the door. The public prosecutor, who had listened to his friend’s story attentively, though his face had remained cold and impassive, accompanied him to the bottom of the stairs, still asking questions.

‘I believe you mentioned that Apolline is very beautiful?’

‘Indeed, she is, my friend. I have known many women, but I have never met one as beautiful as this. Picture to yourself Bertin’s Eucharis, Parny’s Eléonore, a nymph, Egeria and Diana all rolled into one! She is tall, gracious and slender; she is as pale and melancholic as an invalid; her hair, which she wears in coils, makes her look even more virginal; her eyebrows are jet black and she has large, languorous, blue eyes.’

‘And she lives at the same address as you?’

‘The same, at the end of the corridor above mine.’

De l’Argentière gripped Bertholin as if he were a dish of food. A strange gesture on his part, he who was usually so cold and disdainful.

Nine o’clock was tolling from the Carmelites, the Luxembourg, Saint-Sulpice, the Abbaye-au-Bois, and Saint-Germain-des-Prés as if to serenade the falling night with a frightful din.

At that moment, in the rue Cassette, a man slipped into a house of noble appearance and stole up the stairs like a wolf. He turned into a dark corridor at the top and came to a halt. Through the panels of a door a voice could be heard. He put his ear against the keyhole. A gentle voice was reciting a good-night prayer. He tapped lightly with his finger.

‘Who is it?’

‘Quick, Apolline, it’s me!’

‘Who?’

‘Bertholin!’

Immediately, she half-opened the accursed door which creaked worse than an old pair of shoes, its hinges groaning like a weathervane.

‘Bertholin! My darling!’

‘Apolline! You look adorable!’

‘Forgive me for receiving you so inadequately, without even a light. But my window has no curtains, and you can see straight in from across the street. But what brings you here so late?’

‘My mind has been distracted with business all day; besides that the sunshine is little given to effusions of love. What is love without the night? What is love without its mystery?’

‘I cannot hold you to blame for that, for I myself never feel closer to God than at night, in a dark church. Was that a cough?’

‘Yes. While cooling my heels waiting for the minister, I picked up a cold and a sore throat. I am quite exhausted.’

‘Then that is why your voice sounds so strange and hoarse. But let us talk seriously. Why put off our marriage any longer? If people see us together, I will get a bad reputation.’

‘Have patience, my love. Today I received official confirmation on my posting to the prefecture of Mont-Blanc and I must leave tomorrow. I promise you that as soon as I have settled in and everything is running smoothly, I shall return to celebrate our engagement publicly. We shall leave Paris at once and I will introduce you to my new colleagues as my wife of long standing.’

‘My love, how happy you make me. But you won’t be away long, will you? Alone here, my hopes will be too much for me to bear.’

‘Don’t quibble! If you only knew how much I love you!’

‘But, Bertholin, what are you thinking of? … How dare you kiss me like that!’

‘Darling!’

‘You seem to be intent on using me in a singularly ungentlemanly fashion tonight!’

‘Not at all. I am treating you as a man should treat his wife.’

‘Wife! Am I that already?’

‘When two beings who love each other have made a promise, it does not require the approval of the town hall to render it sacred. The law can only ratify it. We have sworn to love each other for ever, this makes us man and wife. And if we are man and wife why should we not …’

‘Because without God’s blessing it is a sin.’

‘God, like the law, only ratifies.’

‘I cannot fight with you. I am not skilled in debate. I do not deny my weakness. But treat me with generosity.’

‘But I am!’

‘Let go of me, Bertholin! You are unworthy of yourself tonight! What do you want of me? … Monster! How can you abuse me like this? I shall scream!’

‘Do so.’

‘I shall stamp on the floor and the servants will come up.’

‘Oh, Bertholin! You shouldn’t have done that. It was wrong.’

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‘And now you will despise me, you will drive me away and have nothing more to do with a woman so lacking in her duty as to have lost her virtue.’

‘Don’t be silly, Apolline. Have you such a low opinion of my honour. Me, hurt you? Never! The very thought sticks in my throat.’

‘You still love me?’

‘For ever!’

‘But your voice suddenly sounds so different. Heavens, is it really you, Bertholin? What a fool I am! What a strange foreboding I have! What if I have been deceived? It really is you, isn’t it, Bertholin? Answer me!

‘Let me touch your face. Bertholin does not have a beard. Oh, what if I have been deceived!’

‘Young lady,’ said the enigmatic figure in a clear voice, ‘the moral of all this is that one should never receive one’s lovers in the dark.’

At the sound of this strange voice, Apolline fell to the floor in a faint.

When she regained consciousness, she dragged herself noiselessly across the floor to the window where a ray of moonlight shone into the room falling across the head of a man soundly asleep in the armchair. Apolline, trembling, examined his features: he was dressed in black; his head, which rested on his chest, was pale and covered in long flowing red hair; his eyes were cavernous, his nose long and pointed, his cheeks bedecked with red whiskers trimmed squarely like a gaiterstrap passing beneath his chin.

‘Who is this man?’ the unhappy girl asked herself. ‘Oh, base Bertholin. You are behind this infamy! Who would believe it! How terrible to have been taken in like this.’

In the breast pocket of the unknown man she could feel a wallet. She would have given anything to be able to remove it in the hope of discovering the identity of her seducer. But this was impossible as his coat was tightly buttoned.

Confronted by so much mortal anguish, she cursed Bertholin and God.

At last, overwhelmed with grief and tiredness, she crouched down on the floor again which was drenched with her tears.

When she awoke, it was broad daylight. The armchair was empty, and she was alone, face to face with her shame.

In the course of the next day the porter went up to Apolline’s room to deliver a purse of money. It was the money that Bertholin had thought to leave anonymously for her after his departure, for he feared that before his return the poor girl, entirely lacking in resources, would be sorely in need.

‘Who is this from?’

‘I don’t know, miss. A stranger asked me to give it to you, without saying another word.’

‘Take this money back!’

‘I cannot. His instructions were quite clear: for Miss Apolline.’

‘Take it back, I tell you.’

The poor man was completely dumbfounded.

Apolline, proud and haughty, dismissed him all the more harshly since in her heart she presumed that the purse represented the price of her virtue and that the man in the night was offering her money in order to humiliate and debase her still further.

But the porter, excusing himself, tossed the purse on the table and turned on his heel.

Throughout the rest of the day Apolline was on tenterhooks. Although she could hear nothing, she listened out for any sounds coming from the apartment of Bertholin below, that of footsteps, a piece of furniture being moved, the opening of a door or a window. In vain. She spied in this manner for several days in a row without any more success. At last, one evening she dared to go down and knock; but there was no answer. Bertholin had taken his servants with him.

The imbroglio intensified, and poor Apolline lost her head. Has he moved out? she wondered. Surely I would have heard something. Had he left Paris after plotting this dastardly crime with one of his associates? But no, that was impossible. How could he be capable of such duplicity, such wickedness? No, Bertholin was a sensitive and honest man. Then what is the explanation for all this? In her confusion, she even began to doubt herself, and wonder whether she had not been mistaken in the dark, and that the man her over-wrought imagination had taken for a stranger was none other than Bertholin. But their features were so different. She couldn’t have been dreaming. Nor did the stranger sound like Bertholin or possess his manners. No, it surely wasn’t Bertholin.

About a week after her misadventure, Apolline received a letter from Mont-Blanc. It was from Bertholin, and ran as follows:

My Darling Bride,

Forgive me for having left without kissing your hand. I only wished to spare us the pains of taking leave. Nominated to the prefecture of Mont-Blanc, I have come to take possession of my kingdom. I hope to fly back to you within the next fortnight and celebrate our union secretly. Afterwards, we will immediately return to the countryside near here which I am sure will not disappoint you. I hope you have not had the false pride to refuse the small sum that I had remitted to you through invisible hands: you are my bride-to-be, and I would be sad if I thought you were in need.

This letter did nothing except to increase Apolline’s perplexity. After such a fine demonstration of his affection, she could no longer accuse Bertholin of the blackest perfidy. And yet, at the agreed time of their rendezvous, someone else, perfectly informed, had come in his stead and raped her. Insoluble mystery! The only possible explanation was that his note to her had somehow found its way into the hands of a stranger.

A short while after this letter, she received another in which Bertholin informed her that due to the pressure of some unforeseen work he had been forced to postpone his return.

It was towards this time that a sense of general malaise took hold of Apolline. Unable to bear the sight of food, she became subject to stomach cramps and vomiting. A doctor prescribed saffron, but without effect. He then pronounced her pregnant. At this news, Apolline was seized with consternation and despair.

Night and day, she wept bitterly. Her situation was indeed a cruel one. Bertholin had at last informed her of his imminent return and, hour after hour, she waited for him. What should she do at this fatal conjuncture? To pretend that nothing was wrong would not only be difficult but dishonest; while to admit what had happened involved enormous risks, though her natural delicacy left her no other option. So she resolved to confess everything to him as soon as he arrived, in the hope that his generosity would perhaps forgive her for such an appalling crime – one which had, after all, been committed for him and, in a sense, by him.

At last, Bertholin made his appearance. He immediately noticed the great change which had taken place in Apolline, her sadness, her constrained manner in his presence, her altered and emaciated appearance. He showered so much affection on her that, despite her resolution to the contrary, she did not dare begin her confession. Twenty times the opening word died on her trembling lips. How could she utterly disillusion a man who was so in love with her? Bertholin sensed something was wrong too, but could make no guess as to the cause of her tears.

The fatal hour struck. All the arrangements had been settled. The wedding was fixed for the following Saturday. It was to be at Saint-Sulpice, at midnight, and in front of no more than two or three witness that they would receive the briefest of nuptial blessings before leaving the next day.

That Thursday evening, Bertholin invited Apolline down to his apartment, joyfully showing her into the living room: the round table and the sofa were draped with fine materials, shawls, dresses and jewellery.

‘A few presents, my darling, from the bridegroom, humble though he may be, with the hope that they do not displease you.’

Apolline, hesitating sadly in the doorway, began to weep.

‘What is the matter, dearest? Come, all this is for you. How do you like this blue velvet dress, this gold cross, these coral bracelet, this rather unusual cashmere?’

Apolline sank to her knees.

‘Oh, Bertholin! Bertholin! If only you knew!’

‘What is the matter, my love?’