The Secret of the Night

  XVII. THE LAST CRAVAT

  The gentleman of the Neva said to him: "If you have nothing further tosay, we will go into the courtyard."

  Rouletabille understood at last that hanging him in the room wherejudgment had been pronounced was rendered impossible by the violence ofthe prisoner just executed. Not only the rope and the ring-bolt had beentorn away, but part of the beam had splintered.

  "There is nothing more," replied Rouletabille.

  He was mistaken. Something occurred to him, an idea flashed so suddenlythat he became white as his shirt, and had to lean on the arm of thegentleman of the Neva in order to accompany him.

  The door was open. All the men who had voted his death filed out ingloomy silence. The gentleman of the Neva, who seemed charged with thelast offices for the prisoner, pushed him gently out into the court.

  It was vast, and surrounded by a high board wall; some small buildings,with closed doors, stood to right and left. A high chimney, partiallydemolished, rose from one corner. Rouletabille decided the whole placewas part of some old abandoned mill. Above his head the sky was pale asa winding sheet. A thunderous, intermittent, rhythmical noise appraisedhim that he could not be far from the sea.

  He had plenty of time to note all these things, for they had stoppedthe march to execution a moment and had made him sit down in the opencourtyard on an old box. A few steps away from him under the shed wherehe certainly was going to be hanged, a man got upon a stool (the stoolthat would serve Rouletabille a few moments later) with his arm raised,and drove with a few blows of a mallet a great ring-bolt into a beamabove his head.

  The reporter's eyes, which had not lost their habit of taking everythingin, rested again on a coarse canvas sack that lay on the ground. Theyoung man felt a slight tremor, for he saw quickly that the sack swatheda human form. He turned his head away, but only to confront anotherempty sack that was intended for him. Then he closed his eyes. The soundof music came from somewhere outside, notes of the balalaika. He said tohimself, "Well, we certainly are in Finland"; for he knew that, if theguzla is Russian the balalaika certainly is Finnish. It is a kind ofaccordeon that the peasants pick plaintively in the doorways of theirtoubas. He had seen and heard them the afternoon that he went toPergalovo, and also a little further away, on the Viborg line. Hepictured to himself the ruined structure where he now found himself shutin with the revolutionary tribunal, as it must appear from the outsideto passers-by; unsinister, like many others near it, sheltering underits decaying roof a few homes of humble workers, resting now as theyplayed the balalaika at their thresholds, with the day's labor over.

  And suddenly from the ineffable peace of his last evening, while thebalalaika mourned and the man overhead tested the solidity of hisring-bolt, a voice outside, the grave, deep voice of Annouchka, sang forthe little Frenchman:

  "For whom weave we now the crown Of lilac, rose and thyme? When my hand falls lingering down Who then will bring your crown Of lilac, rose and thyme?

  O that someone among you would hear, And come, and my lonely hand Would press, and shed the friendly tear-- For alone at the end I stand.

  Who now will bring the crown Of lilac, rose and thyme?"

  Rouletabille listened to the voice dying away with the last sob of thebalalaika. "It is too sad," he said, rising. "Let us go," and he wavereda little.

  They came to search him. All was ready above. They pushed him gentlytowards the shed. When he was under the ring-bolt, near the stool, theymade him turn round and they read him something in Russian, doubtlessless for him than for those there who did not understand French.Rouletabille had hard work to hold himself erect.

  The gentleman of the Neva said to him further:

  "Monsieur, we now read you the final formula. It asks you to saywhether, before you die, you have anything you wish to add to what weknow concerning the sentence which has been passed upon you."

  Rouletabille thought that his saliva, which at that moment he had thegreatest difficulty in swallowing, would not permit him to utter a word.But disdain of such a weakness, when he recalled the coolness of so manyillustrious condemned people in their last moments, brought him the laststrength needed to maintain his reputation.

  "Why," said he, "this sentence is not wrongly drawn up. I blame itonly for being too short. Why has there been no mention of the crime Icommitted in contriving the tragic death of poor Michael Korsakoff?"

  "Michael Korsakoff was a wretch," pronounced the vindictive voice of theyoung man who had presided at the trial and who, at this supreme moment,happened to be face to face with Rouletabille. "Koupriane's police, bykilling that man, ridded us of a traitor."

  Rouletabille uttered a cry, a cry of joy, and while he had some reasonfor believing that at the point he had reached now of his too-shortcareer only misfortune could befall him, yet here Providence, in hisinfinite grace, sent him before he died this ineffable consolation: thecertainty that he had not been mistaken.

  "Pardon, pardon," he murmured, in an excess of joy which stifled himalmost as much as the wretched rope would shortly do that they weregetting ready behind him. "Pardon. One second yet, one little second.Then, messieurs, then, we are agreed in that, are we? This Michael,Michael Nikolaievitch was the the last of traitors."

  "The first," said the heavy voice.

  "It is the same thing, my dear monsieur. A traitor, a wretched traitor,"continued Rouletabille.

  "A poisoner," replied the voice.

  "A vulgar poisoner! Is that not so? But, tell me how--a vulgar poisonerwho, under cover of Nihilism, worked for his own petty ends, worked forhimself and betrayed you all!"

  Now Rouletabille's voice rose like a fanfare. Someone said:

  "He did not deceive us long; our enemies themselves undertook hispunishment."

  "It was I," cried Rouletabille, radiant again. "It was I who wound upthat career. I tell you that was managed right. It was I who rid you ofhim. Ah, I knew well enough, messieurs, in the bottom of my heart I knewthat I could not be mistaken. Two and two make four always, don't they?And Rouletabille is always Rouletabille. Messieurs, it is all right,after all."

  But it was probable that it was also all wrong, for the gentleman of theNeva came up to him hat in hand and said:

  "Monsieur, you know now why the witnesses at your trial did not raise afact against you that, on the contrary, was entirely in your favor.Now it only remains for us to execute the sentence which is entirelyjustified on other grounds."

  "Ah, but--wait a little. What the devil! Now that I am sure I have notbeen mistaken and that I have been myself, Rouletabille, all the time Icling to life a little--oh, very much!"

  A hostile murmur showed the condemned man that the patience of hisjudges was getting near its limit.

  "Monsieur," interposed the president, "we know that you do not belong tothe orthodox religion; nevertheless, we will bring a priest if you wishit."

  "Yes, yes, that is it, go for the priest," cried Rouletabille.

  And he said to himself, "It is so much time gained."

  One of the revolutionaries started over to a little cabin that had beentransformed into a chapel, while the rest of them looked at the reporterwith a good deal less sympathy than they had been showing. If hisbravado had impressed them agreeably in the trial room, they werebeginning to be rather disgusted by his cries, his protestations and allthe maneuvers by which he so apparently was trying to hold off the hourof his death.

  But all at once Rouletabille jumped up onto the fatal stool. Theybelieved he had decided finally to make an end of the comedy and diewith dignity; but he had mounted there only to give them a discourse.

  "Messieurs, understand me now. If it is true that you are notsuppressing me in order to avenge Michael Nikolaievitch, then why do youhang me? Why do you inflict this odious punishment on me? Because youaccuse me of causing Natacha Feodorovna's arrest? Truly I have beenawkward. Of that, and that alone, I accuse myself."

  "It was you, with your re
volver, who gave the signal to Koupriane'sagents! You have done the dirty work for the police."

  Rouletabille tried vainly to protest, to explain, to say that hisrevolver shot, on the contrary, had saved the revolutionaries. But noone cared to listen and no one believed him.

  "Here is the priest, monsieur," said the gentleman of the Neva.

  "One second! These are my last words, and I swear to you that after thisI will pass the rope about my neck myself! But listen to me! Listen tome closely! Natacha Feodorovna was the most precious recruit you had,was she not?"

  "A veritable treasure," declared the president, his voice more and moreimpatient.

  "It was a terrible blow, then," continued the reporter, "a terrible blowfor you, this arrest?"

  "Terrible," some of them ejaculated.

  "Do not interrupt me! Very well, then, I am going to say this to you:'If I ward off this blow--if, after having been the unintentional causeof Natacha's arrest, I have the daughter of General Trebassof set atliberty, and that within twenty-four hours,--what do you say? Would youstill hang me?'"

  The president, he who had the Christ-like countenance, said:

  "Messieurs, Natacha Feodorovna has fallen the victim of terriblemachinations whose mystery we so far have not been able to penetrate.She is accused of trying to poison her father and her step-mother,and under such conditions that it seems impossible for human reason todemonstrate the contrary. Natacha Feodorovna herself, crushed by thetragic occurrence, was not able to answer her accusers at all, and hersilence has been taken for a confession of guilt. Messieurs, NatachaFeodorovna will be started for Siberia to-morrow. We can do nothing forher. Natacha Feodorovna is lost to us."

  Then, with a gesture to those who surrounded Rouletabille:

  "Do your duty, messieurs."

  "Pardon, pardon. But if I do prove the innocence of Natacha? Justwait, messieurs. There is only I who can prove that innocence! You loseNatacha by killing me!"

  "If you had been able to prove that innocence, monsieur, the thing wouldalready be done. You would not have waited."

  "Pardon, pardon. It is only at this moment that I have become able to doit."

  "How is that?"

  "It is because I was sick, you see--very seriously sick. That affair ofMichael Nikolaievitch and the poison that still continued after he wasdead simply robbed me of all my powers. Now that I am sure I have notbeen the means of killing an innocent man--I am Rouletabille again!It is not possible that I shall not find the way, that I shall not seethrough this mystery."

  The terrible voice of the Christ-like figure said monotonously:

  "Do your duty, messieurs."

  "Pardon, pardon. This is of great importance to you--and the proof isthat you have not yet hanged me. You were not so procrastinating with mypredecessor, were you? You have listened to me because you have hoped!Very well, let me think, let me consider. Oh, the devil! I was theremyself at the fatal luncheon, and I know better than anyone else allthat happened there. Five minutes! I demand five minutes of you; it isnot much. Five little minutes!"

  These last words of the condemned man seemed to singularly influence therevolutionaries. They looked at one another in silence.

  Then the president took out his watch and said:

  "Five minutes. We grant them to you."

  "Put your watch here. Here on this nail. It is five minutes to seven,eh? You will give me until the hour?"

  "Yes, until the hour. The watch itself will strike when the hour hascome."

  "Ah, it strikes! Like the general's watch, then. Very well, here weare."

  Then there was the curious spectacle of Rouletabille standing onthe hangman's stool, the fatal rope hanging above his head, his legscrossed, his elbow on his knees in that eternal attitude which Arthas always given to human thought, his fists under his jaws, his eyesfixed--all around him, all those young men intent on his silence, notmoving a muscle, turned into statues themselves that they might notdisturb the statue which thought and thought.