The Mysteries of Paris, Volume 6 of 6

Martial entered the cell, the door of which was left open that those without in the corridor might be within hearing, if summoned by the old soldier, who still remained with the prisoners.

Through the gloom of the corridor, lighted only by the faint beams of the early morning, and the dubious twinkling of a single lamp, several soldiers and gaolers might be seen, the former standing in due military order, the later sitting on benches.

Martial looked as pale and ghastly as his mother, while his features betrayed the mental agony he suffered at witnessing so afflicting a sight. Still, spite of all it cost him, as well as the recollection of his mother's crimes and openly expressed aversion for himself, he had felt it imperatively his duty to come and receive her last commands. No sooner was he in the dungeon than the widow, fixing on him a sharp, penetrating look, said, in a tone of concentrated wrath and bitterness, with a view to rouse all the evil passions of her son's mind:

"Well, you see what the good people are going to do with your mother and sister!"

"Ah, mother, how dreadful! Alas, alas! Have I not warned you that such would be the end – "

Interrupting him, while her lips became blanched with rage, the widow exclaimed:

"Enough! 'Tis sufficient that your mother and sister are about to be murdered, as your father was!"

"Merciful God!" cried Martial. "And to think that I have no power to prevent it! 'Tis past all human interference. What would you have me do? Alas! Had you or my sister attended to what I said, you would not now have been here."

"Oh, no doubt!" returned the widow, with her usual tone of savage irony. "To you the spectacle of mine and your sister's sufferings is a matter of delight to your proud heart; you can now tell the world without a lie that your mother is dead, – you will have to blush for her no more!"

"Had I been wanting in my duty as a son," answered Martial, indignant at the unjust sarcasms of his mother, "I should not now be here."

"You came but from curiosity! Own the truth if you dare!"

"No, mother! You desired to see me, and I obeyed your wish."

"Ah, Martial," cried Calabash, unable longer to struggle against the agonising terror she endured, "had I but listened to your advice, instead of being led by my mother, I should not be here!" Then losing all further control of herself, she exclaimed, "'Tis all your fault, accursed mother! Your bad example and evil counsel have brought me to what I am!"

"Do you hear her?" said the widow, bursting into a fiendish laugh. "Come, this will repay you for the trouble of paying us a last visit! Your excellent sister has turned pious, repents of her own sins, and curses her mother!"

Without making any reply to this unnatural speech, Martial approached Calabash, whose dying agonies seemed to have commenced, and, regarding her with deep compassion, said:

"My poor sister! Alas, it is now too late to recall the past!"

"It is never too late to turn coward, it seems!" cried the widow, with savage excitement. "Oh, what a race you are! Happily Nicholas has escaped; François and Amandine will slip through your fingers; they have already imbibed vice enough, and want and misery will finish them!"

"Oh, Martial," groaned forth Calabash, "for the love of God, take care of those two poor children, lest they come to such an end as mother's and mine!"

"He may watch over them as much as he likes," cried the widow, with settled hatred in her looks, "vice and destitution will have greater effect than his words, and some of these days they will avenge their father, mother, and sister!"

"Your horrible expectations, mother, will never be fulfilled," replied the indignant Martial; "neither my young brother, sister, nor self have anything to fear from want. La Louve saved the life of the young girl Nicholas tried to drown, and the relations of the young person offered us either a large sum of money or a smaller sum and some land at Algiers; we preferred the latter, and to-morrow we quit Europe, with the children, for ever."

"Is that absolutely true?" asked the widow of Martial, in a tone of angry surprise.

"Mother, when did I ever tell you a falsehood?"

"You are doing so now to try and put me into a passion!"

"What, displeased to learn that your children are provided for?"

"Yes, to find that my young wolves are to be turned into lambs, and to hear that the blood of father, mother, and sister have no prospect of being avenged!"

"Do not talk so – at a moment like this!"

"I have murdered, and am murdered in my turn, – the account is even, at any rate."

"Mother, mother, let me beseech you to repent ere you die!"

Again a peal of fiendish laughter burst from the pallid lips of the condemned woman.

"For thirty years," cried she, "have I lived in crime; would you have me believe that thirty years' guilt is to be repented of in three days, with the mind disturbed and distracted by the near approach of death? No, no, three days cannot effect such wonders; and I tell you, when my head falls its last expression will be rage and hatred!"

"Brother, brother," ejaculated Calabash, whose brain began to wander, "help, help! Take me from hence," moaned she in an expiring voice; "they are coming to fetch me – to kill me! Oh, hide me, dear brother, hide me, and I will love you ever more!"

"Will you hold your tongue?" cried the widow, exasperated at the weakness betrayed by her daughter. "Will you be silent? Oh, you base, you disgraceful creature! And to think that I should be obliged to call myself your parent!"

"Mother," exclaimed Martial, nearly distracted by this horrid scene, "will you tell me why you sent for me?"

"Because I thought to give you heart and hatred; but he who has not the one cannot entertain the other. Go, coward, go!"

At this moment a loud sound of many footsteps was heard in the corridor; the old soldier looked at his watch.

A rich ray of the golden brightness, which marked the rising of that day's sun, found its way through the loopholes in the walls, and shed a flood of light into the very midst of the wretched cell, rendered now completely illumined by means of the opening of the door at the opposite end of the passage to that in which the condemned cell was situated. In the midst of this blaze of day appeared two gaolers, each bearing a chair; an officer also made his appearance, saying to the widow in a voice of sympathy:

"Madame, the hour has arrived."

The mother arose on the instant, erect and immovable, while Calabash uttered the most piercing cries. Then four more persons entered the cell; four of the number, who were very shabbily dressed, bore in their hands packets of fine but very strong cord. The taller man of the party was dressed in black, with a large cravat; he handed a paper to the officer. This individual was the executioner, and the paper a receipt signifying his having received two females for the purpose of guillotining them. The man then took sole charge of these unhappy creatures, and, from that moment, was responsible for them.

To the wild terror and despair which had first seized Calabash, now succeeded a kind of stupefaction; and so nearly insensible was she that the assistant executioners were compelled to seat her on her bed, and to support her when there; her firmly closed jaws scarcely enabled her to utter a sound, but her hollow eyes rolled vacantly in their sockets, her chin fell listlessly on her breast, and, but for the support of the two men, she would have fallen forwards a lifeless, senseless mass.

After having bestowed a last embrace on his wretched sister, Martial stood petrified with terror, unable to speak or move, and as though perfectly spellbound by the horrible scene before him.

The cool audacity of the widow did not for an instant forsake her; with head erect, and firm, collected manner, she assisted in taking off the strait-waistcoat she had worn, and which had hitherto fettered her movements; this removed, she appeared in an old black stuff dress.

"Where shall I place myself?" asked she, in a clear, steady voice.

"Be good enough to sit down upon one of those chairs," said the executioner, pointing to the seats arranged at the entrance of the dungeon.

With unfaltering step, the widow prepared to follow the directions given her, but as she passed her daughter she said, in a voice that betokened some little emotion:

"Kiss me, my child!"

But as the sound of her mother's voice reached her ear, Calabash seemed suddenly to wake up from her lethargy, she raised her head, and, with a wild and almost frenzied cry, exclaimed:

"Away! Leave me! And if there be a hell, may it receive you!"

"My child," repeated the widow, "let us embrace for the last time!"

"Do not approach me!" cried the distracted girl, violently repulsing her mother; "you have been my ruin in this world and the next!"

"Then forgive me, ere I die!"