FullReads

“Aha!” I thought to myself: “so that is why I am what I am…. That is where blood tells!” I stood beside the corpse and gazed and waited, to see whether those dead pupils would not stir, whether those benumbed lips would not quiver. No! everything was motionless; the very seaweed, among which the surf had cast him, seemed to have congealed; even the gulls had flown away–there was not a fragment anywhere, not a plank or any broken rigging. There was emptiness everywhere … only he–and I–and the foaming sea in the distance. I cast a glance behind me; the same emptiness was there; a chain of hillocks on the horizon … that was all!

I dreaded to leave that unfortunate man in that loneliness, in the ooze of the shore, to be devoured by fishes and birds; an inward voice told me that I ought to hunt up some men and call them thither, if not to aid–that was out of the question–at least for the purpose of laying him out, of bearing him beneath an inhabited roof…. But indescribable terror suddenly took possession of me. It seemed to me as though that dead man knew that I had come thither, that he himself had arranged that last meeting–it even seemed as though I could hear that dull, familiar muttering…. I ran off to one side … looked behind me once more…. Something shining caught my eye; it brought me to a standstill. It was a golden hoop on the outstretched hand of the corpse…. I recognised my mother’s wedding-ring. I remember how I forced myself to return, to go close, to bend down…. I remember the sticky touch of the cold fingers, I remember how I panted and puckered up my eyes and gnashed my teeth, as I tugged persistently at the ring….

At last I got it off–and I fled–fled away, in headlong flight,–and something darted after me, and overtook me and caught me.

XVI

Everything which I had gone through and endured was, probably, written on my face when I returned home. My mother suddenly rose upright as soon as I entered her room, and gazed at me with such insistent inquiry that, after having unsuccessfully attempted to explain myself, I ended by silently handing her the ring. She turned frightfully pale, her eyes opened unusually wide and turned dim like his.–She uttered a faint cry, seized the ring, reeled, fell upon my breast, and fairly swooned there, with her head thrown back and devouring me with those wide, mad eyes. I encircled her waist with both arms, and standing still on one spot, never stirring, I slowly narrated everything, without the slightest reservation, to her, in a quiet voice: my dream and the meeting, and everything, everything…. She heard me out to the end, only her breast heaved more and more strongly, and her eyes suddenly grew more animated and drooped. Then she put the ring on her fourth finger, and, retreating a little, began to get out a mantilla and a hat. I asked where she was going. She raised a surprised glance to me and tried to answer, but her voice failed her. She shuddered several times, rubbed her hands as though endeavouring to warm herself, and at last she said: “Let us go at once thither.”

“Whither, mother dear?”

“Where he is lying…. I want to see … I want to know … I shall identify….”

I tried to persuade her not to go; but she was almost in hysterics. I understood that it was impossible to oppose her desire, and we set out.

XVII

And lo, again I am walking over the sand of the dunes, but I am no longer alone, I am walking arm in arm with my mother. The sea has retreated, has gone still further away; it is quieting down; but even its diminished roar is menacing and ominous. Here, at last, the solitary rock has shown itself ahead of us–and there is the seaweed. I look intently, I strive to distinguish that rounded object lying on the ground–but I see nothing. We approach closer. I involuntarily retard my steps. But where is that black, motionless thing? Only the stalks of the seaweed stand out darkly against the sand, which is already dry…. We go to the very rock…. The corpse is nowhere to be seen, and only on the spot where it had lain there still remains a depression, and one can make out where the arms and legs lay…. Round about the seaweed seems tousled, and the traces of one man’s footsteps are discernible; they go across the down, then disappear on reaching the flinty ridge.