"He has not spoken since I put him in his cell," answered the man."He is sitting down with his head in his hands and is either sleeping or reflecting about his crime.The French say he'll get his reckoning to-morrow morning and be shot in twenty-four hours."That evening I stopped short under the window of the prison during the short time I was allowed to take exercise in the prison yard.We talked together, and he frankly related to me his strange affair, replying with evident truthfulness to my various questions.After that first conversation I no longer doubted his innocence; I asked, and obtained the favor of staying several hours with him.I saw him again at intervals, and the poor lad let me in without concealment to all his thoughts.He believed himself both innocent and guilty.
Remembering the horrible temptation which he had had the strength to resist, he feared he might have done in sleep, in a fit of somnambulism, the crime he had dreamed of awake.
"But your companion?" I said to him.
"Oh!" he cried eagerly."Wilhelm is incapable of--"He did not even finish his sentence.At that warm defence, so full of youth and manly virtue, I pressed his hand.
"When he woke," continued Prosper, "he must have been terrified and lost his head; no doubt he fled.""Without awaking you?" I said."Then surely your defence is easy;Wahlenfer's valise cannot have been stolen."Suddenly he burst into tears.
"Oh, yes!" he cried, "I am innocent! I have not killed a man! Iremember my dreams.I was playing at base with my schoolmates.Icouldn't have cut off the head of a man while I dreamed I was running."Then, in spite of these gleams of hope, which gave him at times some calmness, he felt a remorse which crushed him.He had, beyond all question, raised his arm to kill that man.He judged himself; and he felt that his heart was not innocent after committing that crime in his mind.
"And yet, I AM good!" he cried."Oh, my poor mother! Perhaps at this moment she is cheerfully playing boston with the neighbors in her little tapestry salon.If she knew that I had raised my hand to murder a man--oh! she would die of it! And I AM in prison, accused of committing that crime! If I have not killed a man, I have certainly killed my mother!"Saying these words he wept no longer; he was seized by that short and rapid madness known to the men of Picardy; he sprang to the wall, and if I had not caught him, he would have dashed out his brains against it.
"Wait for your trial," I said."You are innocent, you will certainly be acquitted; think of your mother.""My mother!" he cried frantically, "she will hear of the accusation before she hears anything else,--it is always so in little towns; and the shock will kill her.Besides, I am not innocent.Must I tell you the whole truth? I feel that I have lost the virginity of my conscience."After that terrible avowal he sat down, crossed his arms on his breast, bowed his head upon it, gazing gloomily on the ground.At this instant the turnkey came to ask me to return to my room.Grieved to leave my companion at a moment when his discouragement was so deep, Ipressed him in my arms with friendship, saying:--"Have patience; all may yet go well.If the voice of an honest man can still your doubts, believe that I esteem you and trust you.Accept my friendship, and rest upon my heart, if you cannot find peace in your own."The next morning a corporal's guard came to fetch the young surgeon at nine o'clock.Hearing the noise made by the soldiers, I stationed myself at my window.As the prisoner crossed the courtyard, he cast his eyes up to me.Never shall I forget that look, full of thoughts, presentiments, resignation, and I know not what sad, melancholy grace.
It was, as it were, a silent but intelligible last will by which a man bequeathed his lost existence to his only friend.The night must have been very hard, very solitary for him; and yet, perhaps, the pallor of his face expressed a stoicism gathered from some new sense of self-respect.Perhaps he felt that his remorse had purified him, and believed that he had blotted out his fault by his anguish and his shame.He now walked with a firm step, and since the previous evening he had washed away the blood with which he was, involuntarily, stained.
"My hands must have dabbled in it while I slept, for I am always a restless sleeper," he had said to me in tones of horrible despair.
I learned that he was on his way to appear before the council of war.
The division was to march on the following morning, and the commanding-officer did not wish to leave Andernach without inquiry into the crime on the spot where it had been committed.I remained in the utmost anxiety during the time the council lasted.At last, about mid-day, Prosper Magnan was brought back.I was then taking my usual walk; he saw me, and came and threw himself into my arms.
"Lost!" he said, "lost, without hope! Here, to all the world, I am a murderer." He raised his head proudly."This injustice restores to me my innocence.My life would always have been wretched; my death leaves me without reproach.But is there a future?"The whole eighteenth century was in that sudden question.He remained thoughtful.
"Tell me," I said to him, "how you answered.What did they ask you?
Did you not relate the simple facts as you told them to me?"He looked at me fixedly for a moment; then, after that awful pause, he answered with feverish excitement:--"First they asked me, 'Did you leave the inn during the night?' Isaid, 'Yes.' 'How?' I answered, 'By the window.' 'Then you must have taken great precautions; the innkeeper heard no noise.' I was stupefied.The sailors said they saw me walking, first to Andernach, then to the forest.I made many trips, they said, no doubt to bury the gold and diamonds.The valise had not been found.My remorse still held me dumb.When I wanted to speak, a pitiless voice cried out to me, 'YOU MEANT TO COMMIT THAT CRIME!' All was against me, even myself.
