The four men, for the landlord was invited to drink, did not hear her go to bed, but later, during the intervals of silence which came into their talk, certain strongly accentuated snores, made the more sonorous by the thin planks of the loft in which she had ensconced herself, made the guests laugh and also the husband.Towards midnight, when nothing remained on the table but biscuits, cheese, dried fruit, and good wine, the guests, chiefly the young Frenchmen, became communicative.The latter talked of their homes, their studies, and of the war.The conversation grew lively.Prosper Magnan brought a few tears to the merchant's eyes, when with the frankness and naivete of a good and tender nature, he talked of what his mother must be doing at that hour, while he was sitting drinking on the banks of the Rhine.
"I can see her," he said, "reading her prayers before she goes to bed.
She won't forget me; she is certain to say to herself, 'My poor Prosper; I wonder where he is now!' If she has won a few sous from her neighbors--your mother, perhaps," he added, nudging Wilhelm's elbow--"she'll go and put them in the great red earthenware pot, where she is accumulating a sum sufficient to buy the thirty acres adjoining her little estate at Lescheville.Those thirty acres are worth at least sixty thousand francs.Such fine fields! Ah! if I had them I'd live all my days at Lescheville, without other ambition! How my father used to long for those thirty acres and the pretty brook which winds through the meadows! But he died without ever being able to buy them.
Many's the time I've played there!"
"Monsieur Wahlenfer, haven't you also your 'hoc erat in votis'?" asked Wilhelm.
"Yes, monsieur, but it came to pass, and now--"The good man was silent, and did not finish his sentence.
"As for me," said the landlord, whose face was rather flushed, "Ibought a field last spring, which I had been wanting for ten years."They talked thus like men whose tongues are loosened by wine, and they each took that friendly liking to the others of which we are never stingy on a journey; so that when the time came to separate for the night, Wilhelm offered his bed to the merchant.
"You can accept it without hesitation," he said, "for I can sleep with Prosper.It won't be the first, nor the last time either.You are our elder, and we ought to honor age!""Bah!" said the landlord, "my wife's bed has several mattresses; take one off and put it on the floor."So saying, he went and shut the window, making all the noise that prudent operation demanded.
"I accept," said the merchant; "in fact I will admit," he added, lowering his voice and looking at the two Frenchmen, "that I desired it.My boatmen seem to me suspicious.I am not sorry to spend the night with two brave young men, two French soldiers, for, between ourselves, I have a hundred thousand francs in gold and diamonds in my valise."The friendly caution with which this imprudent confidence was received by the two young men, seemed to reassure the German.The landlord assisted in taking off one of the mattresses, and when all was arranged for the best he bade them good-night and went off to bed.
The merchant and the surgeons laughed over the nature of their pillows.Prosper put his case of surgical instruments and that of Wilhelm under the end of his mattress to raise it and supply the place of a bolster, which was lacking.Wahlenfer, as a measure of precaution, put his valise under his pillow.
"We shall both sleep on our fortune," said Prosper, "you, on your gold; I, on my instruments.It remains to be seen whether my instruments will ever bring me the gold you have now acquired.""You may hope so," said the merchant."Work and honesty can do everything; have patience, however."Wahlenfer and Wilhelm were soon asleep.Whether it was that his bed on the floor was hard, or that his great fatigue was a cause of sleeplessness, or that some fatal influence affected his soul, it is certain that Prosper Magnan continued awake.His thoughts unconsciously took an evil turn.His mind dwelt exclusively on the hundred thousand francs which lay beneath the merchant's pillow.To Prosper Magnan one hundred thousand francs was a vast and ready-made fortune.He began to employ it in a hundred different ways; he made castles in the air, such as we all make with eager delight during the moments preceding sleep, an hour when images rise in our minds confusedly, and often, in the silence of the night, thought acquires some magical power.He gratified his mother's wishes; he bought the thirty acres of meadow land; he married a young lady of Beauvais to whom his present want of fortune forbade him to aspire.With a hundred thousand francs he planned a lifetime of happiness; he saw himself prosperous, the father of a family, rich, respected in his province, and, possibly, mayor of Beauvais.His brain heated; he searched for means to turn his fictions to realities.He began with extraordinary ardor to plan a crime theoretically.While fancying the death of the merchant he saw distinctly the gold and the diamonds.His eyes were dazzled by them.His heart throbbed.Deliberation was, undoubtedly, already crime.Fascinated by that mass of gold he intoxicated himself morally by murderous arguments.He asked himself if that poor German had any need to live; he supposed the case of his never having existed.In short, he planned the crime in a manner to secure himself impunity.The other bank of the river was occupied by the Austrian army; below the windows lay a boat and boatman; he would cut the throat of that man, throw the body into the Rhine, and escape with the valise; gold would buy the boatman and he could reach the Austrians.
He went so far as to calculate the professional ability he had reached in the use of instruments, so as to cut through his victim's throat without leaving him the chance for a single cry.
[Here Monsieur Taillefer wiped his forehead and drank a little water.]
