The Mohicans of Paris
Drama in Five Acts
by Alexandre Dumas père, 1864
Translated and adapted by Frank J. Morlock
Translation is Copyright © 2001 by Frank J. Morlock. Reproduction in any form is prohibited without explicit consent of Frank J. Morlock. Please contact frankmorlock@msn.com for licensing information.
For more information on this play, click here.
Table of Contents
Characters
A kitchen giving on a park.
(Leonie & Bresil resting on a sofa. Orsola entering.)
ORSOLA
(aside)
Still that child.
(aloud)
Go, Leonie, go play in the garden.
LEONIE
(leaving with the dog)
Come Bresil, come.
ORSOLA
(going to Gerard's bedroom and opening the door)
He's still sleeping! And this morning, when he wakes, he will, as usual, forget all the promises he made me last night when he was drunk. Truly, I don't know why I give myself so much trouble. I am still young and still pretty while this man -- and all this worry for five or six thousand pounds of income! Oh -- he owes me a fortune, like the one these miserable children will have one day -- playing by the pool. They will have a million and a half each -- for taking the trouble to be born while I, after struggling in poverty and shame for fifteen or twenty years arrive at thirty having been the mistress of Mr. Gerard with the immense ambition of becoming the wife of a man of fifty, who the day the thing occurs will be the envy of all the ladies of Viry sur Orge and its environs. Magnificent future indeed worth the trouble of being being jealous over.
(Enter postman.)
POSTMAN
(outside)
Hey. Anybody home?
ORSOLA
Who's there?
POSTMAN
(entering)
Me, the postman, it's a letter.
ORSOLA
Give it here.
POSTMAN
Can't do that!
ORSOLA
Why can't you?
POSTMAN
Because it is for Mr. Gerard.
ORSOLA
Well, Mr. Gerard or me -- isn't that the same thing?
POSTMAN
Not quite yet, although they say in town that one day pretty soon it will be. Say, Madame Orsola, the day it happens you'll be a pretty picture!
ORSOLA
Come on, stop the idle talk and give me this letter. Don't you know, I receive all Mr. Gerard's correspondence?
POSTMAN
Yes, but not registered letters which must be signed for.
ORSOLA
(frowning)
Look here, Jerome.
POSTMAN
Madame Orsola?
ORSOLA
I believe that you wish to renew the lease on the little corner house that you rent from Mr. Gerard?
POSTMAN
Certainly, I do.
ORSOLA
Well, you won't, taking this tack with me, I warn you. Good-day, Jerome, take back your letter.
POSTMAN
Now, now, Madame Orsola, I am not opposed myself to giving you the letter if you would sign in place of Mr. Gerard?
ORSOLA
And why shouldn't I sign in his place?
POSTMAN
Heck, I don't know. Here, here's the register. Only since the letter is for Mr. Gerard, sign "Gerard."
(Orsola takes a pen and signs.)
POSTMAN
(aside)
She signed all the same. Oh, she's a real boss-lady.
(aloud)
Here's the letter.
(Enter Victor on the stone steps.)
ORSOLA
(aside looking at the letter)
A black seal! What does this mean?
VICTOR
Mr. Mailman, do you bring us news of papa?
ORSOLA
(unsealing the letter cautiously)
Perhaps!
POSTMAN
Ask Madame Gerard, Monsieur Victor, she's the one who has received the letter.
(Exit postman.)
(Enter Leonie with the hound, Bresil.)
VICTOR
You mean to say "Madame Orsola" -- Come Leonie, it's time to take our lesson with Monsieur Sarranti.
(he leaves with his sister and the dog by the door opposite that of Mr. Gerard)
ORSOLA
(alone watching the children leave)
Yes, there is news of your father and good! Dead during the crossing! A will.
(the door to the bedroom opens)
Gerard!
(Enter Gerard.)
GERARD
(hesitating)
What time is it, Orsola?
ORSOLA
Ten o'clock. Wait.
(the clock striking)
GERARD
What time did we go to bed?
ORSOLA
Almost midnight.
GERARD
And you're up already?
ORSOLA
As usual. Isn't it necessary to take a look over the house in the morning?
GERARD
The mistress?
ORSOLA
I am your servant, Monsieur Gerard! And if you please to order I will obey, but meanwhile, I really ought to tell you something -- or rather someone is preoccupying me.
GERARD
Who?
ORSOLA
This man.
GERARD
What man?
ORSOLA
The one your brother imposed as tutor of the children, your Corsican!
GERARD
Sarranti!
ORSOLA
Yes!
GERARD
And why does he preoccupy you?
ORSOLA
God prevent that no evil befalls us because of him.
GERARD
Why do you tell me this?
ORSOLA
First, a man who under your name has deposited one hundred thousand francs with a notary.
GERARD
That proves he has confidence in me, who since he cannot deposit the money in his name deposits it in mine.
ORSOLA
And who, possessing that amount would be content to work for fifteen hundred francs as a tutor to the two children! What these children are to him I cannot say.
GERARD
But these children are my brother's and Sarranti has been his friend.
ORSOLA
And today, do you know what your brother's friend is doing?
GERARD
What's he doing?
ORSOLA
I am going to tell you, I am, if you don't know, he's a conspirator.
GERARD
Sarranti.
ORSOLA
Yes, or I am much deceived. Needless for me to get up at dawn, he's up before me. Then he insists on having the pavilion, doesn't he?
GERARD
He's a studious man who likes to work at his ease.
ORSOLA
And one never knows at all with whom or at what he works.
GERARD
Oh, I recognize you well in that -- always suspicious.
(Enter Jean.)
JEAN
I ask your pardon, sir, to come without being called, but Mr. Sarranti desires to speak to you and you alone --
GERARD
Tell him I'll be down.
ORSOLA
No, tell him to come up.
GERARD
(after looking at Orsola)
Yes, let him come up.
JEAN
I'll go do it, sir.
(Jean exits.)
GERARD
Now, Orsola, if you would leave us.
ORSOLA
Ah, then you have got secrets from me?
GERARD
No, but Mr. Sarranti's secrets are not mine but his.
ORSOLA
With your permission, Monsieur Gerard, the secrets of Sarranti are ours or he can keep his secrets.
GERARD
Here's Sarranti.
ORSOLA
(hiding in a cabinet)
I warn you, I am listening.
(Sarranti enters.)
SARRANTI
(looking around)
Are we alone, my friend? Can I speak in complete confidence?
GERARD
We are alone and you can speak.
SARRANTI
Above all, dear Mr. Gerard, I must assure you of one thing: it's that all I am going to say to you was known to your brother from the first day I saw him, so that he knew perfectly well that it was to a conspirator that he opened his door to, when he charged me with the education of his children.
GERARD
Why, is it true that you conspire?
SARRANTI
Alas yes, Mr. Gerard, but be easy, I've taken every precaution not to compromise you. In two words, here are the facts. A conspiracy is organized; today at four o'clock, it goes off. I cannot tell you who the leaders are, their secret is not mine. What I can tell you, what I can swear to you is that the most illustrious names will try to ruin the government.
GERARD
How unfortunate!
SARRANTI
Will we succeed? Will we fail? If we succeed, we will be acclaimed as heroes -- if we miscarry -- the scaffold awaits us.
GERARD
The scaffold.
SARRANTI
One more time. Don't fear of being compromised. Here is a letter that I address to you as if no confidence had been placed in you and in which I recount that important business calls me to leave you. If the conspiracy fails, I will save myself if I can -- now will you help me to the end? Give me Jean who is a faithful servant -- let him keep two saddled horses for me all day with the hundred thousand francs in the saddlebags that I confided in you and that you have withdrawn from the notary. The whole length of the route to Nantes I have helpers who will hide me. At Nantes I will embark for the Indies.
GERARD
You won't find my brother there because three months ago I received a letter from him in which he announced that, his fortune having reached the figure he desired, he was starting on his way back to us.
SARRANTI
No, but I will find another friend there, General Premont. Now dear Monsieur Gerard, you hold my life in your hands. Don't rush to reply. I am going to my apartment to burn all the papers that could compromise me and in five minutes I will return to learn your response.
(going to leave)
No need to tell you who this secret must be kept from.
(Gerard replies by a motion of his head. Sarranti goes off. Orsola enters from the cabinet.)
GERARD
Have you heard, Orsola?
ORSOLA
All!
GERARD
What's to be done?
ORSOLA
Do what he asks.
GERARD
What -- you whom I've always found to be the enemy of Sarranti?
ORSOLA
I say you must give him Jean. I tell you you must keep two horses ready and pray to God or rather the Devil, that he fails -- for never will a like occasion present itself to make us millionaires.
GERARD
Millionaires -- what are you raving about?
ORSOLA
Nothing. Work on one thing at a time. It is to take back your counter-letter. Me, I am going to send it before any time is lost. I'll take care of the rest.
GERARD
What do you mean "the rest"?
ORSOLA
Ah, that's right. You don't know yet. Read this letter, which just came for you this morning. Here it is. Read it after he leaves.
(Orsola exits crossing in front of Sarranti and getting him.)
(Enter Sarranti.)
SARRANTI
Well, dear Gerard, have you thought about it?
GERARD
Jean is at your disposition. The horses are saddled and are waiting for you with the money in the saddlebags.
SARRANTI
Fine! Here's your letter. From today I regard myself as having the hundred thousand crowns returned since the money has been withdrawn from the notary. I cannot return through Viry and if I am neither taken prisoner nor killed, a word from me will tell you where to hold my money.
GERARD
It will be done point for point according to your wishes, dear Monsieur Sarranti.
SARRANTI
Monsieur Gerard count on my eternal recognition. Till we meet again. Perhaps goodbye!
(Exit Sarranti.)
GERARD
What did Orsola mean, "Never a better chance for us to become millionaires?" This woman never does anything without reason, and does nothing without -- This letter bordered in black that she left me in parting and told me to read -- it carries a stamp from Marseille. Ah -- I am not the first to open it. A second hidden sheet. My brother's signature. "This is my holographic will." Jacques is dead.
(Gerard falls into an armchair. Orsola appears slowly climbing the steps outside the house, and while Gerard reads, comes without being seen nor heard to peer over the back of his armchair.)
GERARD
Let's see the letter first.
(reading the letter)
"To Monsieur Gerard, proprietor at Viry sur Orge" indeed, it's for me. "Monsieur, I have sad news to announce to you. Your brother Jacques embarked aboard La Mouette, merchant brig from Marseille under my command, took a pernicious fever, and in passing the Cape of Good Hope died at the latitude of Saint Helena, 12 June last, at five o'clock. He left a will in duplicate, the original to be taken to his notary, Mr. Barrateau, Rue de Bac #31, the other to be sent to you, so that you will know directly the dispositions he took. His last words in expiring were, 'My God, care for my children.' With regret at being the bearer of such bad news, I am, etc., Captain Lucas." His last words were, "My God, care for my children."
(He remains motionless.)
ORSOLA
Let's see -- read the rest.
GERARD
(jumping)
You were there, you!
ORSOLA
Yes.
GERARD
(reading)
"At sea, 1st of January 1820, sensing that my illness is mortal, and that it pleases the all-powerful Lord to recall me to him, I intend, being in full possession of my facilities, to divide my fortune between my sole remaining relative, my good brother, Gerard, and my dear children, Victor and Leonie. This division is simple. I leave one and a half million to each of my children. I desire that save for the expense of their education and upbringing, the revenue of this three million shall accumulate until their majority; it is to my brother, Gerard, that I have given charge of watching over them."
(he stops a moment and wipes his face)
"As to him, I know the simplicity of his tastes, I leave to him his choice of a sum of three hundred thousand or an annual income of twenty-four thousand francs a year. If one of my children dies, I want his share to be given to the survivor -- if both die -- "
(stopping)
Oh!
ORSOLA
Keep on, what's so astonishing that both might die?
GERARD
(continuing in a trembling voice)
"If the two children were to die, my brother shall become the sole heir."
ORSOLA
(low voice)
The sole heir.
(louder)
You understand, Gerard?
GERARD
Yes, but they will live.
ORSOLA
Who knows -- children are so fragile!
GERARD
My poor brother.
ORSOLA
What do you want? You must support with courage these misfortunes that you cannot combat. Death is one of those misfortunes. Today, his turn, tomorrow ours.
GERARD
Yes, I know that quite well. My brother was nothing to you, you never saw him, and then -- are you happy, ambitious one? -- these are our riches!
ORSOLA
We -- rich?
GERARD
Certainly, since my poor brother left us three hundred thousand francs.
ORSOLA
You call that being rich?
GERARD
Without doubt.
ORSOLA
It's the children who are rich -- three million!
GERARD
Orsola! Orsola!
ORSOLA
What?
(Jean enters.)
JEAN
Monsieur Gerard, the two horses are saddled; but it remains for you to give me what is in the suitcases.
GERARD
That's right.
(low, to Orsola)
You know what it's about?
ORSOLA
Several hundred thousand shillings.
GERARD
And you are still of the opinion I should give them to him?
ORSOLA
To the last sou?
GERARD
(going to his desk)
Wait Jean -- take one of these sacks. I will take the other!
(to Orsola)
You understand, I intend --
ORSOLA
Go! Go! The air will make you feel better. You are pale as a cadaver.
GERARD
(after looking at Orsola)
Come Jean! Come!
(He goes out.)
ORSOLA
Oh -- debate with yourself as much as you like. I am like one of our mountain bears -- I hold you between my claws. You will not escape me.
(looking out the window)
Cursed children -- whom I've always detested from instinct. There they are. They're playing at the side of the lake. Victor unties his boat and makes Leonie get up. The dog follows them to the shore and when I think that if the boat capsized. It's true the dog is there. First I must get rid of the dog.
GERARD
(outside)
Victor! Victor!
VICTOR
Uncle?
GERARD
I've already forbidden you to go out in the boat because you don't know how to steer it. Look, you see, your sister almost fell in the water.
ORSOLA
(to Gerard)
Oh, let the children alone; they are having fun.
(aside)
He never forgets to take precautions against good luck -- the imbecile.
(Gerard enters.)
GERARD
That's done with. Now, Sarranti can come.
ORSOLA
Did the air make you feel any better?
GERARD
Admit that you read this will and letter before I did?
ORSOLA
Well, since it was there -- have I committed a crime?
GERARD
My poor brother.
(He puts his handkerchief to his eyes.)
ORSOLA
Bah! -- you know the song of our mountains.
Happiness is for the Gods
Who leave pleasure to men
Bless the dead who are in heaven
But console the hearts of those
Who remain on Earth where we are.
GERARD
Shut up! Shut up! To sing at such a moment is impious.
ORSOLA
Impious? Get out.
GERARD
From charity leave me alone for a while.
ORSOLA
Oh, I ask nothing better. You are not very gay company.
(going, singing)
The dead in their graves
Feel neither cold nor hunger.
(Gerard closes the door after her.)
GERARD
Oh, this woman is my evil genius.
(Enter Victor followed by the dog, Bresil.)
VICTOR
Here I am, uncle.
GERARD
Victor.
VICTOR
You see I am good and I obey you carefully.
GERARD
Yes, you are a good little child.
VICTOR
Then hug me my good uncle.
GERARD
(aside)
His good uncle.
VICTOR
My sister can pick some flowers, right?
GERARD
As many as she likes.
VICTOR
The postman came this morning -- did he bring news about papa?
GERARD
(hesitating)
No, my child, why?
VICTOR
Oh, it's because Madame Orsola received a big letter outlined in black.
(Gerard chokes)
What's wrong, uncle?
GERARD
(rising)
Nothing, my child, nothing.
(He goes into his room.)
VICTOR
It's funny. You would say my uncle is crying. I always thought only children cried.
ORSOLA
(outside)
Leonie! Have you already finished picking my flowers?
LEONIE
These flowers are not for you, they are for my uncle.
VICTOR
(at the window)
And my uncle just told me that my sister can pick all she wants.
ORSOLA
It is possible that your uncle said that, but I say otherwise.
VICTOR
Pick away, Leonie! You don't have to take orders except from my uncle.
ORSOLA
Take care, Leonie.
LEONIE
Of what?
ORSOLA
Of making me come down -- for it you make me come down, you will have it out with me.
LEONIE
Come then, nasty woman.
ORSOLA
(rushing towards the garden)
Devil's child.
VICTOR
You know that if you touch my sister, Bresil is there!
(noise of a little girl screaming; Bresil jumps through the window)
Uncle! Uncle!
GERARD
(entering)
What is wrong, my God?
VICTOR
It's that mean Orsola who is beating Leonie because she's picking some flowers. Didn't you permit Leonie to pick the flowers -- do they belong to Madame Orsola?
GERARD
Orsola! Orsola!
ORSOLA
Here I am -- sir!
(She shows Gerard her bloody arm.)
GERARD
Who did that to you?
ORSOLA
Bresil! I hope you will punish your niece and you will kill the dog.
VICTOR
Why kill Bresil? He was protecting his mistress -- and you were beating her. Bresil was doing his duty.
GERARD
Victor, go put Bresil on his chain.
VICTOR
I am going, uncle, but you won't kill Bresil will you?
GERARD
No, child -- rest easy.
VICTOR
Oh! Oh!
(Victor goes out.)
ORSOLA
On the contrary, they will caress him, the poor animal! What's he done? He's murdered Orsola. What's Orsola? A serving maid to be thrown out the door when one is angry with her. But she won't wait to be kicked out, this servant, she's going by herself. Goodbye, sir.
GERARD
Orsola, where are you going?
ORSOLA
I'm going to find a master who will do right by me -- and a dog who won't murder me.
GERARD
Come on, let me see! The blood is flowing, but the wound is not dangerous.
ORSOLA
You would much prefer if I had a broken arm, right?
GERARD
Listen, Orsola; Sarranti has gone. We will part from the children. We will put them in a pension.
ORSOLA
Oh, if I stay here, I will take care of the children.
GERARD
Why not stay here? You know very well, I cannot do without you. What do you lack here? The right to command? You have. For fifteen years, you've called yourself Madame Gerard. Look, Orsola, today is a day from the devil -- sad as it is don't make it terrible.
ORSOLA
Oh! You know how much influence you have over me.
DOMINIQUE
(in the garden)
Mr. Gerard! Mr. Gerard!
GERARD
Listen, isn't someone calling me?
(Dominique Sarranti in lay costume.)
DOMINIQUE
(entering quickly)
Mr. Gerard! Aren't you Mr. Gerard?
GERARD
Yes. What do you want from me?
DOMINIQUE
Have you seen my father? I am the son of Mr. Sarranti. They just came to my home to arrest him. They are pursuing him like a conspirator.
GERARD
I hear the gallop of a horse.
DOMINIQUE
Ah! There he is.
SARRANTI
(entering, covered with dust)
Dominique here! So much the better. I can embrace you at last.
DOMINIQUE
(jumping on his neck)
Father.
SARRANTI
The conspiracy is discovered. I have to flee is all ready.
DOMINIQUE
Father, I am going with you.
SARRANTI
No, no! You will compromise yourself uselessly.
DOMINIQUE
What difference?
SARRANTI
You would compromise us. Betrayed! Denounced! Ah the wretches! A plot so well constructed, a conspiracy so well set up.
DOMINIQUE
Then flee right now; flee without waiting; your safety above all!
SARRANTI
And you, return to Paris; take a detour so none know you've come -- my security, the peace of Mr. Gerard depends on it.
ORSOLA
(aside)
Fine. We will be alone.
GERARD
(calling)
Jean, the horses.
JEAN
They are ready, sir.
DOMINIQUE
Leave, leave, Father.
SARRANTI
Goodbye!
(to his son)
Come!
(to Gerard)
My friend, between us -- it's life and death.
DOMINIQUE
(pulling him)
Well, come then!
GERARD
Be careful!
SARRANTI
Oh -- don't worry. I am well armed. They won't take me alive.
(He leaves with Dominique.)
GERARD
Fatal day.
ORSOLA
(preparing the table)
On the contrary -- happy day.
GERARD
What are you doing?
ORSOLA
It's four in the afternoon, and you've had nothing all day.
GERARD
I'm not hungry -- I won't eat -- I'm suffocated.
ORSOLA
Oh go on! People say that every time they feel sad and they always end by eating. Get some strength.
GERARD
Yes, I know that what you want me to do requires strength.
ORSOLA
Drink this glass of Madeira, first.
(Gerard drinks while Orsola goes out to prepare the table.)
GERARD
I don't know what this woman mixes in my drinks; this isn't wine I've just had -- it's liquid fire.
(Orsola returns with two plates)
Why do you bring two places?
ORSOLA
Because we are dining tête-à-tête.
GERARD
But the children.
ORSOLA
Let them be served on the lawn. As they have no liking for me, they will prefer that.
GERARD
Who will serve them?
ORSOLA
The gardener; I already told him; after which he leaves for Morsang.
GERARD
It's five leagues from here to Morsang.
ORSOLA
Also -- he won't be back until tomorrow.
GERARD
And what's he going to do at Morsang?
ORSOLA
An errand.
GERARD
For whom?
ORSOLA
For me -- can I not give an errand to the gardener?
GERARD
Surely -- but then the house will be empty.
ORSOLA
(giving him a glass)
That's what necessary.
GERARD
Why this glass?
ORSOLA
Didn't you ask me for a drink?
GERARD
No.
ORSOLA
I thought --
(She wishes to take the glass back.)
GERARD
Give it to me! When once I've had this cursed wine -- and why must the house be empty?
ORSOLA
I'll tell you when the moment comes.
(she lets a plate fall -- it breaks)
When we are millionaires, we will eat in the money.
(she picks up the pieces and throws them in a corner)
And if the plates break at least the pieces will be expensive.
GERARD
Millionaires! Never!
(He rises and intends to go to his room.)
ORSOLA
What are you doing? What are you doing? Sit down there.
(She forces him to sit before a full glass.)
GERARD
My throat is dry. My mouth is burning.
ORSOLA
Drink then.
GERARD
Orsola, why is that having had hardly half a bottle, my head is swimming, and what I see runs with blood.
ORSOLA
Really, Gerard, you are not a man.
GERARD
No, it's true. A man has his reason, a man has his free will, a man says to himself, "God forbids doing evil" and doesn't do it. Where as I --
ORSOLA
Well -- you?
GERARD
No, I am a brute, an animal without understanding, a ferocious beast. Is it blood or wine you've given me to drink? I am thirsty.
ORSOLA
Drink then.
(Gerard empties a glass of wine, fills it, and wants to empty a second)
Enough -- you won't be good for anything.
GERARD
Yes, you know quite well that now you can propose what you wish and that I am ready for anything.
ORSOLA
Are you sure?
GERARD
(holding his head between his hands)
Oh!
ORSOLA
You've figured out what we are going to do, right?
GERARD
(rising and calling)
William! William!
ORSOLA
What do you want?
GERARD
I see it clearly. I am calling the gardener.
ORSOLA
To do what?
GERARD
To take the children away.
ORSOLA
Come on. I thought it was agreed.
(aside)
I was mistaken. He hasn't had enough to drink.
(aloud)
Millionaire -- you understand, millionaire!
GERARD
O serpent with the face of a woman.
(He drinks and passes violently to stupidity.)
(Orsola opens the desk which the money was kept. Then with a scissors, she breaks the lock.)
ORSOLA
There -- it's better this way.
GERARD
What is better?
ORSOLA
You understand. It will be better if it seems Sarranti committed the act.
GERARD
What act?
ORSOLA
You don't understand.
GERARD
No.
ORSOLA
Sarranti brought you yesterday to steal from you the sum your notary brought you; yesterday to steal it he forced the secretary, when he was doing it, the children entered by chance and so as not to be denounced by them, he killed them. Do you understand now?
GERARD
(drunk)
Yes, I understand, but he will deny it.
ORSOLA
He will return to deny it? Does he dare to return to France where he will be condemned as a conspirator, as a thief, and an assassin.
GERARD
No, he wouldn't dare.
ORSOLA
Beside, we will be millionaires; and one can do many things with three millions.
GERARD
But how will we be millionaires?
ORSOLA
Since you take care of the little boy, and I take care of the little girl.
GERARD
(recoiling with fear)
I didn't say that! I didn't say that.
ORSOLA
You said it.
GERARD
Never! Never! Ah, my poor Victor.
(Enter Victor and Leonie holding each other by the hand.)
VICTOR
You called me, Uncle?
ORSOLA
Yes, your uncle wanted to know if the gardener is still here.
VICTOR
No, he left, and he has closed the gate to the park.
(Orsola goes into Gerard's room.)
GERARD
(follow her with eyes full of terror)
Where are you going?
ORSOLA
(from the room)
You are going to find out!
GERARD
(looking at the children)
Oh, if I take the two of them in my arms and if I escape with them.
(Orsola returns with Gerard's rifle and gives it to him.)
GERARD
What is that?
ORSOLA
You can see quite well.
(She puts the rifle into his hands.)
VICTOR
Oh -- Uncle, are you going to shoot something?
ORSOLA
Yes, we are going to have a lot of company tomorrow, so it's necessary for your uncle to kill a little game.
VICTOR
Oh, I am going with you, Uncle, may I go with you?
(He runs ahead.)
GERARD
No -- no.
ORSOLA
Well -- decide, coward, you know very well by tomorrow there will be no more time.
VICTOR
(outside)
Come, Uncle.
ORSOLA
Do you hear that child calling you? But go with him then since he's the one who wants it.
(She pushes Gerard out.)
LEONIE
(stamping her foot)
I want to go with my brother, I want to go!
ORSOLA
Go to your room, Miss.
LEONIE
I will go without you, thanks.
(She leaves.)
ORSOLA
(alone - night has fallen)
The hour has come. Riches and vengeance at once. They are going to pay for all the humiliations these cursed children have caused me for the past four years -- so long as he doesn't lose heart.
(looks out the window)
What's he doing? Getting in the boat with the child. He crossed the lake. Ah, I understand. The noise of the rifle worries him. He prefers -- the coward.
VICTOR
(in the garden)
Oh, Uncle, what are you doing? My good Uncle. I have never done wrong to anybody. My good Uncle, don't murder me.
LEONIE
(in her room)
They are killing my brother! Help! Help!
ORSOLA
(rushing into the room)
You will shut up, wretch!
(The stage remains empty.)
VICTOR
Uncle -- my good uncle! Ah!
(The furious snarling of the dog who breaks his chains and who comes on stage dragging his chain.)
LEONIE
(in her room)
Help -- help! Bresil! Bresil!
(The dog hurtles through the door breaking a bottle -- disappearing into the room.)
ORSOLA
(in the room)
Cursed dog.
(she screams)
Ah!
(Gerard appears in the rear, pale, eyes haggard, his rifle in his hands. Silence on all sides.)
GERARD
Oh, wretch or infamous creature that I am. Oh, this voice, this prayer - it will pursue me through eternity. My God, I guess I dared pronounce the name of the Lord. And the other, the other who cried inside. No, I cannot remain another minute in this house. I want to flee. I want to leave France. Let us flee! Orsola! Orsola!
ORSOLA
(in the room)
Help! Help! I'm dying.
(Leonie can be seen escaping through the window.)
GERARD
Orsola! It's Orsola who is dying who calls for help! Orsola --
(he opens the door of the room)
What his happened then?
(He goes in and returns with a wounded Orsola.)
ORSOLA
(hand to her throat)
The dog! The dog!
(She falls dying.)
GERARD
Strangled! Justice of heaven! And I, to what am I reserved, if this woman has received such a punishment? And Leonie, where is she? Escaped without doubt. It's a fire in my brain. I am going mad!
(falls in an armchair)
But if she has escaped she will speak; she will denounce us.
(jumping towards Orsola)
Why did you allow her to flee? Speak! Speak! Dead! She is dead! Some air! Some air!
(he tears his shirt and tie)
I am suffocating.
(falling on his knees, his arms extended toward the window)
Some air!
(suddenly his look becomes fixed)
What do I see down there? The dog! The dog! What's he doing? He's turning around the lake. He's following the same route we took. He's plunging in. He reappears in the water. There he is. What's he dragging after him -- the body! Horror! We are at the day of the last judgment. The abyss surrenders its dead.
(he grabs his rifle and fires at the dog)
Dead! Good. Leonie now. I must find Leonie again.
(He hurries out of the room.)
(curtain)
At Bornier's (in La Halle)
(Jean Taureau and others. A pierrot sleeping on a table.)
JEAN TAUREAU
(striking the table with a bottle)
Some wine! Some wine! Wine!
WAITER
Here's the wine you asked for.
JEAN TAUREAU
I see the wine but I don't see the cards.
WAITER
As for the cards, you must be in your mourning, Mr. Jean Taureau, because you know very well no one gives cards at these hours.
TOUSSAINT
And the reason?
WAITER
Because it is forbidden by the regulations.
JEAN TAUREAU
What are your regulations to me?
WAITER
To you, nothing, but something to us.
SAC A PLATRE
But then if one cannot gamble, what do you want to do with us in your place?
WAITER
Fine. No one is forcing you to stay, Mr. Sac a Platre.
JEAN TAUREAU
Ah, indeed! Do you know you appear to me to have a pretty comic air. Hell's bells! Some cards or with a blow I will demolish the place.
WAITER
No one's afraid of you, Jean Taureau though you may be.
(Enter Petrus, Jean Robert, Ludovic.)
PETRUS
Here we are!
LUDOVIC
The cabaret appears to you sufficiently sleazy?
JEAN ROBERT
I could find it even if I were blind.
PETRUS
In that case, let's go in.
JEAN ROBERT
Are you sure?
PETRUS
Why not?
JEAN ROBERT
Because it is always time to stop when youth goes to embark on stupidity.
LUDOVIC
A stupidity -- in what?
JEAN ROBERT
By God, in that instead of going to supper tranquilly, or to Verys or to the Rock or to the Provincial Brothers, you want to spend the night in an ignoble hole where we will drink from the infusion of logwood in place of wine of Bordeaux, and where we'll eat cat instead of wild rabbit.
SAC A PLATRE
Do you hear, Jean Taureau? He said a hole.
TOUSSAINT
He said logwood.
SAC A PLATRE
He said "some cat."
JEAN TAUREAU
Let him say it. He who laughs best, laughs last.
LUDOVIC
Do what you please, gentlemen, but me, I declare that I didn't get an invitation to dine at Bordier's this evening. I am here and I sup.
PETRUS
As for me, in my capacity as painter, I who have not always had wine from logwood to drink or even a cat to eat, I who frequently have models of both sexes, types of living cadavers that, unlike the dead, have inferior souls, I who have slept in a hole belonging to a bear or the lair of lions, throwing myself with the quadrupeds when I hadn't even three francs to go home to Papa Cadmoor or Miss Rosive, the blond, I am not disgusted, and I agree with Ludovic and I say: I am staying.
JEAN ROBERT
My dear Petrus -- you are only half drunk, but you are completely Gascon.
PETRUS
Gascon! Right! I am from Saint Lo. If there are Gascons at Saint Lo, there are Normands at Tarbes.
JEAN ROBERT
Well, I say to you, Gascon from St. Lo, you boast some faults that you haven't got to hide the qualities which you possess. You act the rake for fear of appearing naive. You pretend to be wicked for fear of blushing to appear good. You've never entered a lion's den or a bear's cave, you've never put foot in a cabaret in La Halle, any more than Ludovic, any more than I, any more than the young people who respect themselves or the workers who toil.
SAC A PLATRE
Good! So we don't work, I suppose?
JEAN TAUREAU
But let them talk.
PETRUS
Have you finished your sermon? In that case, so be it.
(He yawns.)
TOUSSAINT
Do you understand a word they are saying?
SAC A PLATRE
Not a traitorous word!
JEAN ROBERT
(continuing)
Then you want to sup in a rug. Let us sup, my friend, that at least will have a result; it will disgust you for the rest of your life.
(striking the table with his switch)
Boy!
WAITER
(from below)
Coming, sir, coming.
JEAN ROBERT
Look, there's a menu, make your choice. We will be like princes here.
LUDOVIC
Yes, all we lack is breathable air.
PETRUS
Good. Have them open a window.
(A Polichinelle enters and goes to a sleeping Pierrot.)
POLICHINELLE
Hey! Vol-au-Vent!
PIERROT
Is it you? And Mr. Jackal?
POLICHINELLE
He will be here at two in the morning. That's the time for the rendezvous.
(Pierrot leaves. Polichinelle sits down. Let's his head fall on the table and appears to sleep.)
LUDOVIC
(to Jean Robert)
Have you seen?
JEAN ROBERT
What?
LUDOVIC
(pointing with his head)
There!
JEAN ROBERT
Yes.
LUDOVIC
It's comic.
JEAN ROBERT
No. There are men on the lookout for some thief. We are in what they call a mousetrap -- Boy!
WAITER
(entering)
(looking at Polichinelle)
Huh, I thought it was a Pierrot but it's a Polichinelle. I was mistaken. What do you want, gentlemen?
JEAN ROBERT
(to Petrus)
Have you finished with the menu?
PETRUS
Yes -- six dozen oysters, six muttonchops, and an omelette.
WAITER
And some wine, gentlemen -- what kind?
PETRUS
Three Chablis -- the best -- with seltzer water if there is some in this establishment.
WAITER
And some fine stuff, rest assured, you will be served.
PETRUS
(retaining the waiter)
One moment, young man! Whose voice was that I heard, accompanied by a drum that I noticed on the first floor?
WAITER
It's the little gypsy! Rose Noel, pupil of Brocanti.
PETRUS
What a coincidence, a gypsy! And here I was, dreaming of a picture of Mignon! Is she young, your gypsy?
WAITER
Fifteen.
PETRUS
Pretty?
VICTOR
I think so -- but you know --
PETRUS
What?
WAITER
She's forbidden fruit.
PETRUS
So much the better. You will bring her for dessert. Here's a crown for her.
WAITER
Oh well, yes, for her -- you mean for Brocanti?
PETRUS
That's not my concern. I am giving a crown. No matter in whose pocket it falls.
SAC A PLATRE
Six dozen oysters, six mutton chops, an omelette, three chablis -- the best, seltzer water if there is any -- a gypsy for dessert, even if there isn't any. Nice. We have an affair with these fops.
TOUSSAINT
With these sons of the wealthy.
PETRUS
(going to the window and opening it)
And now let us get rid of the carbonic acid! Yuck!
JEAN TAUREAU
Excuse me! These gentlemen are opening the window or so it appears.
PETRUS
As you see my dear friend.
JEAN TAUREAU
First of all, I am not your friend, since I don't know you from Adam or Eve. Close the window!
PETRUS
What's your name, sir, if you please?
JEAN TAUREAU
I am called John Bull -- since I can kill a bull with a single blow of my hand.
PETRUS
This last detail is useless and I don't want to know your name. Now that I know it, Mr. Jean Taureau, or John Bull, here is my friend Dr. Ludovic, a distinguished physician, who is going to explain to you briefly what the air must consist of to be breathable.
JEAN TAUREAU
What do I care what the air consists of?
LUDOVIC
He's saying, Mr. Jean Taureau, that for the atmosphere not to be noxious to the lungs of an honest man, it must be composed of seventy-nine parts nitrogen and twenty-one parts oxygen, and of a certain quantity of dissolved water -- the quantity varies according to the climate and temperature -- for example in Senegal.
SAC A PLATRE
Say, Jean Taureau, I think he's talking Latin.
JEAN TAUREAU
Good! I am going to make him speak French, I am.
SAC A PLATRE
And if he doesn't understand?
JEAN TAUREAU
(showing two fists)
They kill.
(he takes three steps forward)
Go -- close the window! And be quick about it.
PETRUS
(turning his back to the window and crossing his arms)
Perhaps that's your opinion, Mr. Jean Taureau, but it isn't mine.
JEAN TAUREAU
What! It isn't yours? You mean you have an opinion? You?
PETRUS
And why cannot a man have an opinion when a brute pretends to have one?
JEAN TAUREAU
Say my friends, Do you think this unlucky fop is calling me a brute?
SAC A PLATRE
Damn! That's what I think.
JEAN TAUREAU
Well -- what's to be done?
TOUSSAINT
He must be made to close the window first -- because it's your opinion -- and then kill him.
JEAN TAUREAU
Fine! Now you're talking.
(to the young men)
Thunder! Get going. Close the window.
PETRUS
There's neither thunder nor lightning. The window is staying open.
JEAN ROBERT
Let's see, Petrus.
(to Jean Taureau)
Sir, we have just come from outside, and coming in this room we have been suffocated by the change in the temperature. Permit us to leave the window open for a short while to refresh the air -- then we will close it.
JEAN TAUREAU
You opened it without my permission.
PETRUS
Well?
JEAN TAUREAU
You must ask permission. Perhaps you would have received it.
PETRUS
That's it, enough. I opened the window because it pleases me, and it will remain open so long as it pleases me.
JEAN ROBERT
Shut up, Petrus.
PETRUS
(half laughing, half threatening)
No, I won't shut up. If the gentleman's called Jean Taureau, I am called Pierre Herbel de Courtney -- and I am not accustomed to being led around by clowns like this.
(At the word "clowns" five men rise and take a step forward.)
JEAN ROBERT
Before fighting, let's see if we can have an explanation; after that it will be too late.
(rising in his turn)
What do these gentlemen want?
JEAN TAUREAU
He's still insulting us; he calls us gentlemen!
SAC A PLATRE
We are not gentlemen, understand?
PETRUS
You are right, you are not gentlemen, you are rednecks.
SAC A PLATRE
They call us rednecks. Oh, there it is. They give us out as rednecks.
TOUSSAINT
(separating from the others)
But let me pass --
JEAN TAUREAU
Shut up -- all stay where you are -- this is my concern.
SAC A PLATRE
Why's it your concern more than mine?
JEAN TAUREAU
First of all -- because there's no need for five against three when one suffices. To your seat Sac a Platre. To your seat Croc en Jambes.
(the take seats)
That's better. And now my little loves -- let's sing that song again -- first verse. Do you intend to close the window?
THE THREE YOUNG MEN
No!
JEAN TAUREAU
(exasperated)
Then you want me to pulverize you?
JEAN ROBERT
Try!
PETRUS
Get out of the way, Jean Robert. This is my affair.
JEAN ROBERT
(pushing him away softly)
Keep the others in respect, you and Ludovic -- I will take care of this one.
(He puts his finger on Jean Taureau's breast.)
JEAN TAUREAU
(frowning)
I believe you are speaking of me, my prince?
JEAN ROBERT
Of you yourself!
JEAN TAUREAU
And to what do I owe the honor of being chosen by you?
JEAN ROBERT
I might say that being the most insolent you deserve the rudest lesson -- but that's not the motive.
JEAN TAUREAU
I am waiting for the motive.
JEAN ROBERT
It's that having the same first name, we are naturally alike. You are called Jean Taureau, and I am called Jean Robert.
JEAN TAUREAU
It's true, I am called Jean Taureau, but you are called Jean --
JEAN ROBERT
You lie!
(Hits him in the eye. Jean Taureau takes three steps back and falls on a table which he breaks in two. Petrus trips up Sac a Platre and rolls him near Jean Taureau. Ludovic whacks Toussaint, who falls in the lap of Croc en Jambes whose hands are at his side.)
POLICHINELLE
(raising his head)
Bam!
(He falls back to sleep.)
JEAN ROBERT
Round one.
JEAN TAUREAU
(heavily)
That's what happens when you are taken unawares; a child will beat you.
JEAN ROBERT
Well, this time, take your time, Jean Taureau, for my intention is to break you in pieces like the table.
JEAN TAUREAU
We are going to see.
(fist raised, he stalks towards Jean Robert, who takes the carpenter's blow on his arm and with a half turn, kicks Jean Taureau in the chest who falls in the chimney)
JEAN TAUREAU
Oof!
POLICHINELLE
(rising)
Bam!
(He goes back to sleep.)
TOUSSAINT and SAC A PLATRE
To knives. To knives.
JEAN TAUREAU
Well, since they are forcing us -- to knives!
JEAN ROBERT
Then to barricades.
(The waiter comes in carrying the oysters.)
WAITER
Wow! It seems it is not the time.
(puts the oysters on the table)
Help! Help!
(He leaves running.)
MR. JACKAL
(appearing at the door dressed like a Turk)
Oh, that's all. They said someone was being strangled here.
(to Polichinelle)
Give me your place and leave quickly.
POLICHINELLE
Why, is that you, Mr. Jackal?
MR. JACKAL
Hush!
POLICHINELLE
(giving up his seat)
Bam!
(He leaves.)
JEAN TAUREAU
(and his companions)
To knives! To knives!
MASKS
Bravo! We are going to laugh!
(The young men take their tables and form a barricade. Petrus tears a stick from the curtain. Ludovic brings the oysters into the fortifications.)
LUDOVIC
Some snacks and some projectiles.
(He throws the shells at his adversary.)
JEAN TAUREAU
Let me pulverize the guy in black!
(He pulls his carpenter's compass from his pocket.)
JEAN ROBERT
(jumping over the table, switch in his hand)
But you still haven't had enough.
MASKS
Bravo! Bravo! The guy in black!
JEAN TAUREAU
No, I won't have enough until I've put six inches of my compass in your torso.
JEAN ROBERT
Meaning, not being the strongest you are the most treacherous! Since you cannot win, you intend to murder.
JEAN TAUREAU
Thunder! I intend to avenge myself.
JEAN ROBERT
(his little switch in his hand)
Take care, Jean Taureau, for on my honor you have never before run such a danger as the one you are running now.
(to the crowd)
My friends, you are men -- make this fellow listen to reason, you can see I am calm and he is out of his head.
JEAN TAUREAU
(escaping from those who wish to calm him down)
Oh! I have never run such a danger as I now run? Do you intend to protect yourself with that switch against my compass?
JEAN ROBERT
You are deceived, John Bull! For my cane is not a cane, it's a viper and if you doubt it, there -- see it's fangs.
(he pulls a short sword from his cane. He puts himself on guard)
JEAN TAUREAU
Ah! You have a weapon. I didn't expect that!
(He gets ready to jump on Jean Robert where one hears a shivering in the crowd. A young man, dressed as an errand-boy, but with every elegance of costume enters, breaks through the crowd and seizes the compass from Jean Taureau.)
JEAN TAUREAU
(turning)
Oh, -- traitor!
(stupefied, recognizing the young man)
Mr. Salvator!
CROWD
Mr. Salvator!
(The Turk raises his head, opens an eye, then immediately goes back to sleep.)
PETRUS
There's a fellow whose name augurs well. Let's see if he will do honor to his name.
SALVATOR
(to Jean Taureau)
You are always drunk and quarrelsome?
JEAN TAUREAU
Mr. Salvator, let me explain.
SALVATOR
You are wrong.
JEAN TAUREAU
But let me tell you --
SALVATOR
You are wrong.
JEAN TAUREAU
But still --
SALVATOR
You are wrong, I tell you.
JEAN TAUREAU
But how do you know that since you weren't here?
SALVATOR
Do I need to be here to understand how things happen?
JEAN TAUREAU
It seems to me -- still --
SALVATOR
(pointing to the three young men)
Look!
JEAN TAUREAU
Well, I'm looking, so?
SALVATOR
What do you see?
JEAN TAUREAU
I see three fops to whom I promised to give a thrashing and who are going to get it, one day or another.
SALVATOR
You see three young men, elegant, well-dressed, who are wrong to come to a dive; but it's no reason to quarrel with them.
JEAN TAUREAU
Me -- try to pick a quarrel? I'm incapable of it, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
Look! You are not going to say that they are the ones who provoked you, you and your companions!
JEAN TAUREAU
But still, you can see very plainly that they were in a state of defending themselves.
SALVATOR
Because right was on their side. You think strength is everything, you who changed your name from Barthelmy Lelong to Jean Taureau. You have just had proof to the contrary, God let the lesson profit you.
JEAN TAUREAU
But since I tell you that it was they who called us clowns, rednecks, brutes --
SALVATOR
And why did they call you that?
JEAN TAUREAU
They said we were drunk.
SALVATOR
I ask you why they said that.
JEAN TAUREAU
For nothing, that's why.
SALVATOR
Come on?
JEAN TAUREAU
Because I wanted to make them close the window --
SALVATOR
And you wanted them to close the window because?
JEAN TAUREAU
Because -- because I don't like drafts.
SALVATOR
Because you were drunk, as these gentlemen told you, because you wanted to start a dispute with someone and you seized the occasion by its hair, because you had some quarrel at home and you wished to make these innocents pay for the caprices and infidelities of Miss Fifine.
JEAN TAUREAU
Be quiet, Mr. Salvator! Don't pronounce that name. The wretch; she's killing me.
SALVATOR
Ah! You see plainly that I have touched you where it hurts. These gentlemen did well to open the window, the air in here is infected, and as there isn't enough with two open windows, you are going to open the second this instant.
JEAN TAUREAU
Me, go open a window when I asked someone to close the other -- me, Barthelmy Lelong -- my father's son.
SALVATOR
Yes, you Barthelmy Lelong, drunk and brawler, who dishonors the name of your father, and who has done well to take a second name! I tell you, you are going to open this window as punishment for having insulted these gentlemen.
JEAN TAUREAU
Thunder could explode around my head and I would not obey you.
SALVATOR
Then, I don't know you under any name, you are only a worker -- huge and insulting, and I will kick you out from wherever I happen to be. Leave! Well -- did you hear me?
JEAN TAUREAU
Yes, but I am not going to go.
SALVATOR
In the name of your father, whose name you invoked just now, I order you to go away.
(He walks toward him.)
JEAN TAUREAU
Mr. Salvator, Mr. Salvator -- don't come near me!
SALVATOR
(stamping his foot)
You are going to leave!
JEAN TAUREAU
You know very well that you can make me do whatever you wish and that I would cut my hand off rather than strike you. So -- you see --
(recoiling, leaving)
I leave --
(by the stairs)
Oh -- but if I ever meet them, they will pay me.
TOUSSAINT
Mr. Salvator, your very humble servant.
(He leaves.)
SAC A PLATRE
Mr. Salvator, I have indeed the honor -- you have orders to give me?
SALVATOR
(grabbing his arms)
Indeed! You are the least drunk of all.
SAC A PLATRE
You think so?
SALVATOR
You are going to stay at the door and if you see a man dressed like a magician who looks like he's going to enter the cabaret, you will say to him, "Mount Saint John." He will know what that means and go. If he needs you, you will put yourself at his orders.
SAC A PLATRE
Yes, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
To prove that you have my commission, you will imitate the rooster's crowing which you imitate so well, when you go to place a flag on a house.
SAC A PLATRE
As you say, Mr. Salvator. Au revoir, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
Au revoir -- and don't let me hear it said that you are mixed up in such a mess. Go!
(During this exchange, the Turk has raised his head but was unable to hear. At the moment Salvator returns, he lets his head fall on the table.)
JEAN ROBERT
(extending his hand to Salvator)
Thanks, sir, for delivering us from that drunken fiend.
SALVATOR
It was nothing to speak of, only if you will allow me to give you some advice from a friend? Never put your foot in here again, Mr. Jean Robert.
JEAN ROBERT
You know me, Mr. Salvator?
SALVATOR
As everyone does. Aren't you one of our celebrated poets?
(turning to the crowd)
And now folks, you should be content. You've seen something for your money, right? Do me then the courtesy of moving on. There's not air enough in here for four men to breathe. Which means my good friends that I wish to be alone with these gentlemen.
(the crowd leaves shouting -- long live Mr. Salvator, raising their caps)
(Salvator to the Turk, who is sleeping on the table)
And you too -- sir, like the others.
(The Turk replies with loud snores.)
JEAN ROBERT
Oh, my word, Mr. Salvator, that one there's sleeping so majestically one hasn't the conscience to wake him.
SALVATOR
(to himself)
Yes, perhaps it would be better for him to remain here than others. So, he doesn't irritate you, Mr. Jean Robert?
JEAN ROBERT
Not the least in the world.
SALVATOR
Nor you, Mr. Petrus?
PETRUS
Ah! Ah! You know me, too?
SALVATOR
Nor you, Mr. Ludovic? But what are you looking at?
LUDOVIC
I am looking to see if you haven't one leg shorter than the other.
SALVATOR
Yes, because, in that case, you would greet me by the name of Asmodeus. Tell me, why is it so astonishing that I know a painter who last year had a very nice exhibition, and a young doctor who three months ago passed his examinations with flying colors?
JEAN ROBERT
But you, sir, who know everyone and who appear to be known by everyone, would it be indiscreet to ask you who you are?
SALVATOR
Me, sir? You have heard my name: Salvator. As for my position, I am an errand-boy in the corner of the Rue aux Fers. If you need a sure person to carry your letter and a solid fellow to carry your trunks, I ask your business.
LUDOVIC
What, sir, this costume is not a disguise?
SALVATOR
Not the least in the world. Rather ask the waiter who brought your supper?
WAITER
(with the supper looking at the Turk)
What? I thought it was a polichinelle -- it's a Turk. I am always making mistakes.
SALVATOR
What's wrong with you, and why don't you serve these gentlemen?
WAITER
Here, gentlemen, here it is. The cutlets are a bit dry and the omelette is a little thick but it's not the fault of the cook.
PETRUS
Mr. Salvator, would you do us the honor of supping with us?
SALVATOR
Thanks, gentlemen, but I am going to ask your permission to retire.
PETRUS
No manners!
SALVATOR
I am very cognizant of the honor that you are doing me, gentlemen, but it's impossible to accept.
(the young people bow -- Salvator, low to the waiter)
You don't have some corner from which I won't lose sight of the Turk?
WAITER
On the landing to the right. There's a door which gives on a room. It is empty, you can see from there everything you wish to see.
SALVATOR
That's fine.
(to the young men)
Gentlemen!
MR. JACKAL
(aside, raising his head)
He's pretending to go, but he's not going. Good! He's in the closet. The curtain has risen.
(He snores.)
WAITER
Do you gentlemen still wish to hear the gypsy sing? According to your orders, gentlemen, she's waiting below with her honorable mother La Brocanti, the most celebrated card-reader of the Faubourg St. Germain, who will do big or small readings for you, and her young brother, Babolin, boy of high hopes, who executes the three postures of body, swallows swords and eats flaming torches.
PETRUS
Yes, it's true, and I was forgotting my painting of Mignon! Indeed I should say we are still asking for her; and more than ever.
WAITER
(calling)
Eh! La Brocanti, they are asking for you here.
LA BROCANTI
(from below)
We'll be there.
(Babolin enters with a series of capers and flips.)
BABOLIN
Hop!
ROSE NOEL
(entering after him)
Oh! I thought Mr. Salvator was here.
PETRUS
Oh, the charming child! But look, gentlemen!
JEAN ROBERT
(at the sight of La Brocanti)
Oh -- the horrid witch -- don't look gentlemen.
LA BROCANTI
What do these gentlemen want? Do they want to know the past, the present, or the future? They have inheritances awaiting them. Will they have a good marriage? Will they have a lot of children? Three francs for the big readings and thirty sous for the small ones.
LUDOVIC
Thanks, old lady. We have forgotten the past, we thank God for the present and consequently we are in no hurry about the future. We love our relatives to the twenty-fifth degree and consequently, in no hurry to inherit from them. No Brocanti, my love, what we wish to see and hear is this charming child.
LA BROCANTI
What do you want her to sing? The complaint of Montebelolo. Brave Frenchmen, spill your tears.
LUDOVIC
Thanks, I have cradles with that.
JEAN ROBERT
Can we speak to Rose Noel?
LA BROCANTI
Without doubt.
PETRUS
Disturb her the least possible. I am devouring her. She's my Mignon.
BABOLIN
Do you hear, Rose Noel? -- he's eating you!
(looking at Petrus' notebook)
Ah, that's what she is all the same!
JEAN ROBERT
Listen, my pretty child.
ROSE NOEL
I am listening, sir.
JEAN ROBERT
Do you not know some gypsy song -- something original and poetic?
ROSE NOEL
In German, English or French?
JEAN ROBERT
What, my child, you speak three languages?
LA BROCANTI
God be thanked! Nothing was neglected for her education.
BABOLIN
Oh -- what a mother -- how expensive that was for her, her eduction, it's like mine. Say, Rose Noel, La Brocanti is speaking of the education that she gave us, if that doesn't make you shhivverr!
ROSE NOEL
Would you like to hear Marguerite's song from Faust?
BABOLIN
Or the Queen Mab from Shakespeare?
JEAN ROBERT
You know the Queen Mab?
ROSE NOEL
Yes -- Mr. Salvator translated it for me.
JEAN ROBERT
What -- he's a poet, our errand-boy?
ROSE NOEL
He does what he pleases.
LUDOVIC
Is this some disguised Prince?
PETRUS
Imbecile! He cannot compose verse.
JEAN ROBERT
Queen Mab. I wouldn't mind hearing verse by the errand-boy.
BABOLIN
Go for it.
LUDOVIC
Queen Mab! Queen Mab!
JEAN ROBERT
What is this Queen Mab!
ROSE NOEL
(recites)
She is the fairiesÂ’ midwife, and she comes
In shape no bigger than an agate-stone
On the fore-finger of an alderman,
Drawn with a team of little atomies
Athwart menÂ’s noses as they lie asleep;
Her wagon-spokes made of long spidersÂ’ legs,
The cover of the wings of grasshoppers,
The traces of the smallest spiderÂ’s web,
The collars of the moonshineÂ’s watery beams,
Her whip of cricketÂ’s bone, the lash of film,
Her wagoner a small grey-coated gnat,
Not so big as a round little worm
PrickÂ’d from the lazy finger of a maid;
Her chariot is an empty hazel-nut
Made by the joiner squirrel or old grub,
Time out oÂ’ mind the fairiesÂ’ coachmakers.
And in this state she gallops night by night
Through loversÂ’ brains, and then they dream of love;
OÂ’er courtiersÂ’ knees, that dream on courtÂ’sies straight,
OÂ’er lawyersÂ’ fingers, who straight dream on fees,
O’er ladies ‘ lips, who straight on kisses dream,
Which oft the angry Mab with blisters plagues,
Because their breaths with sweetmeats tainted are:
Sometime she gallops oÂ’er a courtierÂ’s nose,
And then dreams he of smelling out a suit;
And sometime comes she with a tithe-pigÂ’s tail
Tickling a parsonÂ’s nose as aÂ’ lies asleep,
Then dreams, he of another benefice:
Sometime she driveth oÂ’er a soldierÂ’s neck,
And then dreams he of cutting foreign throats,
Of breaches, ambuscadoes, Spanish blades,
Of healths five-fathom deep; and then anon
Drums in his ear, at which he starts and wakes,
And being thus frighted swears a prayer or two
And sleeps again.
ALL
Bravo! Bravo!
JEAN ROBERT
But this Mr. Salvator is a poet, gentlemen.
(takes a saucer for a collection, it produces three coins)
Here, my child, this is for you.
BABOLIN
Three gold coins! Say, mom, it's better than the big reading.
PETRUS
Where do you live, Brocanti?
LA BROCANTI
Rue Triperti #8, my good sir.
PETRUS
That's fine. That's all I wanted to know.
LUDOVIC
What will you do at Brocanti's?
PETRUS
I will play the grand game.
LUDOVIC
And now, Brocanti, I have some advice to give you, as a doctor, which is to go home and let this child sleep -- and take care of her -- she isn't in good health, your child!
BABOLIN
Do you hear, Brocanti? This the same story which Mr. Salvator repeats to you ceaselessly.
LA BROCANTI
Fine, we'll watch over her. Come, little loves.
JEAN ROBERT
Waiter, the bill.
(Rose Noel, Babolin, and La Brocanti leave.)
ROSE NOEL
(to waiter as she leaves)
You haven't seen Mr. Salvator?
WAITER
No, Miss Rose Noel -- no.
JEAN ROBERT
The bill.
WAITER
Here.
JEAN ROBERT
Thirty-five francs for six dozen oysters, six cutlets, an omelette and three bottles of Chablis?
WAITER
And -- a broken table and two broken chairs.
JEAN ROBERT
That's fair. Here's forty. The rest is a tip.
PETRUS
Well, are you happy with your night, Jean Robert?
JEAN ROBERT
Admit there was a moment where you would have preferred to be at the Rock than here?
LUDOVIC
My word, I confess it, and you Petrus?
PETRUS
No, there I would not have met Rose Noel, and thanks to Rose Noel, my picture Mignon is finished.
JEAN ROBERT
You are going to to put her in it?
PETRUS
As of tomorrow.
LUDOVIC
And the portrait of Miss de Valgeneuse?
PETRUS
The two things go together. One is work, the other is art.
JEAN ROBERT
And when can we see the rough draft?
PETRUS
In three days, at two in the afternoon at my workshop, Rue de l'Ouest.
LUDOVIC
(pointing to the Turk)
Should we do this brave man the service of waking him before we leave?
JEAN ROBERT
For what? He dreams he's in Mohammed's paradise. Let him dream -- the hours are rare.
(They hear the rooster crowing.)
PETRUS
My goodness -- it's the cock singing.
JEAN ROBERT
Which proves it is two in the morning.
(They leave.)
SALVATOR
(enters and goes to Mr. Jackal)
Now, Mr. Jackal, you can wake up, take off your false nose, put on your glasses and have some tobacco. The one who was waiting for you will no longer do so.
(Mr. Jackal raises his head, puts on his spectacles, takes out some tobacco and offers some to Salvator.)
MR. JACKAL
Do you use this, Mr. Salvator?
SALVATOR
Never.
MR. JACKAL
Let's go. I'm done up.
SALVATOR
Console yourself -- only strong men can admit things like that.
MR. JACKAL
Because they hope to take their revenge.
SALVATOR
(ready to leave)
After you -- honor to those who deserve it.
(curtain)
Petrus' workshop. Very elegant with trophies, armor, pictures, etc.
(Suzanne poses on a couch. Loredan is amusing himself with a flower. Jean Robert is seated writing some verse in a notebook.)
PETRUS
It is with the most profound regret, Miss, that I must tell you our sitting will be curtailed today.
SUZANNE
And why will our sitting be curtailed today -- if you please, Master Van Dyck?
PETRUS
Because I was waiting for you yesterday and not today.
SUZANNE
What do you want? Yesterday I couldn't come. Ah, you think that the pensioners of Madame Adrienne Desmarest are free like the students of Mr. Gros or Mr. Horace Vernet? No, know this, what fame ought to have taught you: it was Madame's party yesterday like they said at Vanvres, and we were ordered to be gay under pain of punishment. They dined in families with three extras -- cabbage in the soup, parsley around the beef, and eggs in the salad. They drank her health with some wine d'Argenteuil, and then for dessert, she was taken on foot to stroll with Diogenes' lantern -- with permission to pick the daisies but forbidden to strip the leaves from them to tell fortunes. We were very amused -- go!
PETRUS
You would be much more amused here?
SUZANNE
Indeed, I think so. First of all, I find you charming.
PETRUS
(to Loredan)
You hear, sir. Your sister has made me a declaration.
LOREDAN
Let her do it and don't believe a word she says; Suzanne is the greatest coquette I know.
SUZANNE
But at least wait until I tell you why I find you charming.
PETRUS
Oh -- there's a reason.
SUZANNE
Right! You think it's because you call yourself Pierre de Courtney; you think it's because your uncle the Marquis de Herbel lets you have fifty thousand pounds; you think it's because you are dressed by the best tailor in Paris -- that I find you charming? No -- it's because you let me stay still while I'm posing, it's because your friend, Mr. Ludovic gives me powder for my teeth and rouge for my lips. It's even because Mr. Jean Robert is of an agreeable conversation, when he isn't composing verse -- Mr. Jean Robert!
JEAN ROBERT
Miss?
SUZANNE
For whom, please, are you composing verse?
JEAN ROBERT
For a gypsy girl, miss.
SUZANNE
What! you know a gypsy girl?
JEAN ROBERT
A dramatic author has to know everybody.
SUZANNE
My dear brother, Loredan, do me the favor of reading over Mr. Jean Robert's shoulder the verse he's composing, and if they can be repeated to a girl like me, tell them to me.
PETRUS
Would you be good enough to turn a little more to the right, Miss? I want to see your left eye.
SUZANNE
Don't forget my wink; it's the best thing I've got in my face.
PETRUS
You make a good bargain with the rest!
LOREDAN
Mr. Jean Robert's verses are charming.
JEAN ROBERT
Only you know they are not mine.
SUZANNE
And whose are they?
JEAN ROBERT
Goethe's. Do you know the novel, "Wilhelm Meister"?
SUZANNE
A young woman named Miss de Valgeneuse and who is Madame Desmarest's pension, does not read novels, sir, and is unfamiliar with "Wilhelm Meister." By chance, are you translating the song of Mignon?
JEAN ROBERT
Exactly. But if you don't know the novel how do you know the song?
SUZANNE
Who doesn't know the song "Kennst du das Land?" Read your translation, Mr. Jean Robert, so I can see if it is exact.
JEAN ROBERT
I would like nothing better, but the last four verses are not finished.
SUZANNE
Finish your last four verses and during that time, Mr. Petrus will explain to me why he cannot accord me a full sitting today.
PETRUS
Because I am waiting for this same gypsy for whom Jean Robert is writing verses.
SUZANNE
A true gypsy?
PETRUS
Oh, as to that, there's no way to be sure, is there?
SUZANNE
It seems there's a novel here; and ought one to take an interest in it?
PETRUS
For us, until today, the story or rather, what we know if it, is very simple.
SUZANNE
May I hear it?
PETRUS
Of course.
SUZANNE
Speak, I am listening. What a misfortune that Mr. Jean Robert hasn't finished his song. He would have made this simple story into a very complicated drama.
JEAN ROBERT
Help me to rhyme "beloved," Petrus, I am stupid today.
SUZANNE
"Charmed."
JEAN ROBERT
Thanks, Miss.
PETRUS
You see, you must be satisfied with my narrative.
SUZANNE
Did you notice that if King Louis XIV failed to wait, I, I am waiting.
PETRUS
Imagine then that Tuesday in the midst of the Ball at the Opera, the idea came to us -- to Ludovic, Jean Robert and myself -- the stupid idea of having supper in a cabaret at la Halle.
SUZANNE
What are you saying?
PETRUS
In a cabaret.
SUZANNE
In la Halle?
PETRUS
In la Halle.
SUZANNE
I compliment you on that.
LOREDAN
It was very well done in the time of the Regency.
SUZANNE
Yes, but in the year 1827 under His Majesty Charles X?
LOREDAN
I wish I had known; I'd have gone with you.
SUZANNE
Fie! And in this cabaret?
PETRUS
From the opinion that you are manifesting, I don't know if I should continue.
SUZANNE
Keep talking! This interests me a great deal. Only, I find there are delays in your story.
PETRUS
I am hastening to the denouement. In this cabaret we met a ravishing little gypsy.
SUZANNE
Gypsies are always ravishing to painters. It's only women of the world who are ugly.
PETRUS
You cannot say that of me, Miss, since I've tried to paint your portrait. I cannot complain of anything except that you are too pretty!
SUZANNE
Should I get up and curtsy to you?
PETRUS
One doesn't curtsy except to liars.
SUZANNE
Well, you met a ravishing little gypsy?
PETRUS
Who sang, who dances, who recited poetry -- the true type of Mignon.
SUZANNE
And when she turned her head toward you, you decided to do a painting?
PETRUS
Right-o!
SUZANNE
And she's the one who's coming today?
PETRUS
It's she.
SUZANNE
So that it's simply this little vagabond who's shortening my sitting?
PETRUS
The poor child will earn a crown, more perhaps than she could earn in a month.
SUZANNE
And she's coming all alone like that, to find her money?
PETRUS
Not at all, on the contrary! She's tied to the skirts of her mother, a horrible witch named la Brocanti, who reads cards -- not to mention her brother, who's nourishing the ambition to become a clown.
SUZANNE
Well, while you are painting the daughter, I will have my fortune told by the mother.
LOREDAN
That's an idea!
PETRUS
Well, but what will Madame Desmarest say?
SUZANNE
She's not here -- I am under the protection of my brother.
LOREDAN
And I permit the fortune telling.
(A knock on the door.)
SUZANNE
Is that your gypsy?
PETRUS
I don't believe so. That's Ludovic's knock. Can he come in?
SUZANNE
I know him well. Enter!
LOREDAN
(entering and going to Suzanne)
Miss, although I never hoped to meet you here, I am going to prove that I executed your orders. Here's the powder for your teeth and the rouge for your lips.
SUZANNE
Mr. Ludovic, I promise to be your client as soon as I am better.
LOREDAN
Have you fallen ill?
SUZANNE
The conventions require that I go to an old doctor of seventy, who will kill me. The same conventions don't permit a doctor of twenty-five to treat a sick girl of nineteen.
LUDOVIC
Fine! You must outrage the conventions and get better!
(to Petrus)
My dear Petrus, I have just seen a long way off and I just heard a carriage stop at your door, which seemed to me to have the honor of conveying Miss Rose Noel and her respectable family.
SUZANNE
She's called Rose Noel?
PETRUS
Yes, don't you find the name pretty?
SUZANNE
Indeed.
PETRUS
It is indeed them. I hear them coming up. Excuse me, Miss.
SUZANNE
I hope you aren't going to deprive us of this ravishing person?
PETRUS
On the contrary, I am going to put her in a costume of my choice which is waiting in a neighboring room -- and I am going to present her to you in all her splendor.
(Petrus goes out.)
SUZANNE
Well, are those verses ready, Mr. Jean Robert?
JEAN ROBERT
Alas, yes, miss.
SUZANNE
Why "alas"?
JEAN ROBERT
Because they are not good.
LOREDAN
Shut up! They are charming.
LUDOVIC
Which of these two to believe?
SUZANNE
Give them here. I promise you a judgment whose impartiality will rival that of Solomon.
LUDOVIC
Let us hear.
JEAN ROBERT
You know -- it's Mignon's song.
SUZANNE
We know.
(reading)
Do you know the land where the orange blossoms bloom,
Where the orange ripens under its green leaves
Where the days are burning and the nights are tepid,
Where Spring reigns, and exiles Winter?
This sweet land where the solitary myrtle thrives
Where the laurel grows in a perfumed air.
Tell me, do you know where it is? No? Know, well it's the earth
That I want to return to with you, beloved!
Do you know the house where my eye opens
Where those gods of granite who terrify me,
As they see me return, with their stony lips
Murmuring: "Child, what have they done to you.
Each night, like a beacon, in my dream shining
It's pane which ignites the enflamed sleeper.
Tell me, do you know that house ? It's the one
Where I would have wanted to live with you, beloved!
(Rose Noel in Mignon's costume enters by the side door, pushed by Petrus then stops without Suzanne seeing her. Babolin and La Brocanti enter as well.)
(Suzanne continues to recite)
Do you know the mountain where the avalanche glitters
Where the mule travels along a misty footpath
Where an old dragon crouches with its brood,
Where the foaming torrent leaps on the rocks?
That mountain must cross it in the clouds,
It's from its summit that the charmed gaze
Discovers on the horizon the familiar land
Where I want to die with you, beloved.
ROSE NOEL
Oh! It's Mignon. It's Mignon's song. Oh -- Miss, for the love of God, give it to me -- I have heard it sung in German, when I was little and I've never been able to find it since.
(Suzanne gives it to her.)
PETRUS
Now, my sweet Rose Noel, will you come pose as Mignon?
SUZANNE
For Mignon. I want to.
(Petrus puts her in an agreeable position.)
BABOLIN
Ah, I wish they'd paint my picture, too.
LA BROCANTI
Mr. Babolin, the society in which we find ourselves is not that in which we are accustomed to travel, so you are going to do me the pleasure of waiting for me outside.
BABOLIN
But if Rose Noel can stay in your society, why can't I?
LA BROCANTI
Because Rose Noel is an artist.
BABOLIN
I am not an artist. Well, that's new!
(He leaves, grumbling)
LOREDAN
(to his sister)
Do you know this child is truly charming?
SUZANNE
You're not going to become amorous, too?
LOREDAN
Why not?
SUZANNE
Say, Madame Brocanti! That's your name isn't it?
LA BROCANTI
To serve you, my pretty miss.
SUZANNE
They assure me you tell fortunes.
LA BROCANTI
That's my business.
SUZANNE
And in what manner do you do it?
LA BROCANTI
In every way: with cards, with coffee stains; in your hand -- and infallibly. Mrs. Lenormand was my aunt, you know who predicted to Madame de Beauharnais.
LOREDAN
That she would marry Bonaparte and become Empress?
PETRUS
(satisfied with Rose Noel's pose)
She's charming like that, isn't she Jean Robert?
JEAN ROBERT
Charming!
SUZANNE
(drawing off her glove)
Here's my hand, good woman.
LUDOVIC
(to Suzanne)
May we listen?
SUZANNE
Yes, for those who, like me, want to waste their time.
LA BROCANTI
What do you want to know; the past, the present, or the future?
LUDOVIC
You see, you have choices.
SUZANNE
What do you advise me?
LUDOVIC
The future. At your age you don't have a past.
SUZANNE
That's what you think! I have one and I wish to be told about it. Let's hear about my past.
LA BROCANTI
Here -- aristocratic hand, long, fine, without connection to the phalanges, straight nails, hand of a duchess; idle but prodigious hand.
SUZANNE
Ought I to take all that as so many compliments?
LA BROCANTI
I though you asked for the truth?
SUZANNE
Continue.
LA BROCANTI
You are rich! Very rich.
SUZANNE
What news! You saw my coachman and voiture at the door.
LA BROCANTI
Although rich, you are ambitious for fortune, although noble, you are ambitious of honors.
SUZANNE
Eh -- well, that is true enough.
LUDOVIC
You admit ambition.
SUZANNE
Oh -- I am very frank.
LA BROCANTI
You have, in the last eighteen months lost a close relative.
SUZANNE
That's true enough.
(pointing to her brother)
Then I suppose I'll marry this gentleman?
LA BROCANTI
(to Loredan)
Give me your hand, if you please, young man.
(she takes a magnifying glass from her pocket and looks at his hand with it)
Similar hand -- family line. You try to deceive me, Miss. This gentlemen is not your husband. He is near relative -- probably your brother.
LOREDAN
What do you say to that Suzanne?
LUDOVIC
This is becoming very interesting, it seems to me.
SUZANNE
For that reason, I give you your liberty, gentlemen.
LUDOVIC
You chase us --
SUZANNE
Just a bit farther off.
(Ludovic bows and separates himself.)
LOREDAN
By chance, is this La Brocanti a real witch?
LA BROCANTI
Must I say all that I see in your hand?
SUZANNE
All.
LA BROCANTI
But suppose you get angry?
SUZANNE
I won't get angry.
LA BROCANTI
I told you that, although rich, you were ambitious of fortune, that, although noble you were ambitious of honors, and I am going to add although young and pretty, you have never loved, and probably --
SUZANNE
Probably?
LA BROCANTI
You will never love.
SUZANNE
Where do you see that?
LA BROCANTI
The line of the heart is barely indicated -- and that of the head cuts the line in two.
LOREDAN
(laughing)
Go on, go on, Mother. You are in the right.
SUZANNE
(to Loredan)
Wait.
(Brocanti)
But suppose I have never loved because I've never been loved.
LA BROCANTI
You have been loved -- and a lot. You have been loved too much!
SUZANNE
Is anyone ever loved too much?
LA BROCANTI
Do you want to turn to the present?
LOREDAN
Not at all. The past is very interesting. I knew nothing of all this. I was on a trip with my tutor and I stayed away five years. Well, my sister proves the maxim: "Men keep others' secrets best, but women keep their own best."
LA BROCANTI
I would prefer not to continue my pretty miss.
SUZANNE
And why is that?
LA BROCANTI
Science cannot be mistaken and sometimes it says things that are displeasing.
SUZANNE
There, let's finish! I have been loved too much -- and what as the result of this love?
LA BROCANTI
A great misfortune!
(brother and sister look at each other)
A death, here's a star beside the life line.
SUZANNE
Well, what does this star say?
LA BROCANTI
I cannot be mistaken, Miss. Think it over carefully.
LOREDAN
My sister is asking you what this star means.
LA BROCANTI
What it means --
SUZANNE
Speak, will you!
LA BROCANTI
Very well, since you absolutely insist, Miss -- it means that someone who loved you killed himself for you!
SUZANNE
(rising)
Enough!
LOREDAN
What are you talking about?
SUZANNE
I say this woman is probably from the police. Give her a crown, and let her go.
LA BROCANTI
Saving your respect, Miss, I cannot go until Mr. Petrus has finished with little Rose Noel.
SUZANNE
(giving her a crown)
Here!
LOREDAN
(low to Suzanne)
Could she be speaking of our cousin Conrad?
SUZANNE
I don't know who she means.
(She goes to the window and leans her face against it.)
BABOLIN
(popping his head in the door)
Pardon everyone! Which one of these gentlemen is called Jean Robert?
JEAN ROBERT
I am.
BABOLIN
The errand-boy from the Rue aux Fers has a letter for you.
JEAN ROBERT
Salvator?
BABOLIN
Yes.
ALL
Salvator.
ROSE NOEL
(joyously)
Salvator.
JEAN ROBERT
(to Suzanne)
Miss, you were asking me for a novel just now. I have better than a novel to offer you. I have an enigma. An errand-boy who -- day before yesterday, in the cabaret Petrus was telling you of, saved our lives, who has the manners of a gentleman and who writes verse like Lamantine. Would you have him come in?
SUZANNE
Willingly. I love enigmas when I don't have to solve them.
PETRUS
(without leaving his palette and his brush)
Dear Mr. Salvator, do us the pleasure of entering!
SALVATOR
(entering)
Mr. Jean Robert, I have only a letter to bring to you; but I was urged to bring it myself. The lady will look for her reply at your place at five o'clock this evening, Rue de l'University. Now that my commission is performed, and the postage paid --
SUZANNE
This is strange. That voice.
PETRUS
But no, no, no. We won't let you go so easily. Come in. Come in.
LOREDAN
(in a low voice)
Much ceremony for an errand-boy.
SUZANNE
(aside, seeing Salvator)
Conrad!
SALVATOR
Suzanne!
ROSE NOEL
Good day, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
Good day, my child.
JEAN ROBERT
You don't know who this letter is from?
SALVATOR
It doesn't contain anything irritating, I hope?
JEAN ROBERT
No.
(to Ludovic)
It is from that poor Dominican monk who was in pension with us.
LUDOVIC
Dominique?
PETRUS
Dominique! The one whose father was involved in that strange and terrible affair! What was his family name?
LUDOVIC
What -- wait --
JEAN ROBERT
Sarranti, by God.
ROSE NOEL
Sarranti.
SALVATOR
What's wrong with you?
ROSE NOEL
Nothing. Nothing's wrong with me!
LUDOVIC
And he writes you?
JEAN ROBERT
To tell me that he will be at my house today at five o'clock.
SALVATOR
As he wrote, "Rush" on the letter and I knew you were here, I came.
JEAN ROBERT
He says he needs all my friendship.
LOREDAN
(searing in his turn)
Sarranti! Sarranti! I have heard that name. A Bonapartist who was accused of having stolen a hundred thousand crowns and murdering two children -- the nephews of a certain Mr. Gerard.
ROSE NOEL
(putting her hand to her heart)
Ah!
LOREDAN
The affair made enough noise, so that it is easy to remember.
SUZANNE
Mr. Gerard. I knew him. A saintly man who contributes to the Prix Montoyon.
ROSE NOEL
(interrupting)
Mr. Petrus if you would permit me.
PETRUS
What's wrong, Miss?
LA BROCANTI
What's wrong?
ROSE NOEL
I don't know if this setting is tiring me, but --
PETRUS
Brocanti, take your child to the room where she changed. You will find water, sugar and orangeade.
ROSE NOEL
(prayerfully)
Don't go, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
No, be tranquil, my child.
BABOLIN
(stupefied)
Ah, Rose Noel feels ill!
(sitting in the armchair she vacated)
As for me I don't feel too bad -- On the contrary.
(Rose Noel leaves with Brocanti.)
SALVATOR
Did you notice that this child repeated the name of Mr. Sarranti?
JEAN ROBERT
Yes.
SALVATOR
That she went pale at that of Mr. Gerard?
LUDOVIC
Yes.
LOREDAN
But you who are, or appear to be, her confidant, if the thing upsets you, she will tell you.
SALVATOR
(dreamily)
Perhaps.
BABOLIN
Say, Mr. Petrus, there's a scratching at your door.
LUDOVIC
Exactly like the King's.
BABOLIN
(opening the door)
Oh -- a dog who is big as the elephant at the Bastille.
(Shuts the door.)
SALVATOR
It's Roland who followed me. I left him in the street but when someone came in, he slid in.
PETRUS
Babolin, I name you introducer of Ambassadors -- let Roland enter. Who loves the master, loves the dog.
BABOLIN
(announcing)
Mr. Roland.
JEAN ROBERT
Oh -- the beautiful beast.
SALVATOR
You can indeed say "oh, the fine beast." Go say good day to these gentlemen, Roland.
LUDOVIC
(feeling the sides of the dog)
Really, he's received a nasty wound, your dog, Mr. Salvator -- and I don't know a Christian who wouldn't return it.
(to dog)
You were at war, my boy.
SALVATOR
It seems.
PETRUS
What do you mean "it seems."
SALVATOR
On that point I know no more than you, gentlemen. I hunted for five or six years in the environs of Paris.
LOREDAN
(with surprise)
You hunted?
SALVATOR
I mean I was poaching; an errand-boy doesn't hunt. I found this poor animal all bloody, dying in a ditch. His beauty and his suffering excited my compassion. I took him to a fountain. I washed him with fresh water. He appeared reborn from the care I took of him -- that night I treated his wounds -- and cured by me, Roland has vowed me recognition which would shame a man -- right Roland?
(Roland comes to rub against Salvator and puts his two paws on his breast. The door of the room opens. Rose Noel and Brocanti enter.)
SUZANNE
Ah -- here's the lady of the vapors -- who's getting better so it seems.
SALVATOR
What's wrong with you, Roland?
LA BROCANTI
What's wrong with you, Rose Noel?
ROSE NOEL
(suffocating with joy)
Oh -- my good dog -- is it you?
(Roland escapes from Salvator and rushes to Rose Noel.)
ALL
Roland! Roland!
(They try to stop Roland.)
ROSE NOEL
Oh, gentleman, don't harm Bresil.
SALVATOR
You know Roland!
ROSE NOEL
He's not called Roland. He's called Bresil.
SALVATOR
And where did you know Bresil? Tell me that.
ROSE NOEL
Where did I know Bresil?
SALVATOR
Yes -- can you tell me that.
ROSE NOEL
(frightened)
No, no, no! Impossible! My brother! My poor brother! Oh, Madame Orsola -- Madame Orsola! Don't kill me!
ALL
Madame Orsola?
(Rose Noel faints. They group around her.)
(curtain)
La Brocanti's loft. To the right a garret reached by a staircase. Midnight.
(La Brocanti, counting some money. Babolin is making a pack of clothes.)
LA BROCANTI
Let's see. What are you doing rummaging about, vagabond?
BABOLIN
I am putting my clothes together.
LA BROCANTI
And what for?
BABOLIN
To remove them.
LA BROCANTI
What! You're moving?
BABOLIN
My lease isn't up, I'm well aware, but I'm in a hurry.
LA BROCANTI
You are going away, wretch?
BABOLIN
Ah, fine! You don't believe I am going to stay here when Rose Noel is no longer here. Not in this life.
LA BROCANTI
But, ingrate, weren't you lodged, nourished and clothed?
BABOLIN
Yes, let's talk of that. Lodged in the attic -- that means freezing in the winter, roasted in the summer, nourished with cabbage stalks, the shells of peas, and carrot tops. "Waiter, a toothpick for Mr. Babolin so we can go over the bill together." Dressed! When one thinks what my Sunday dress was, it would give me a vivid idea of the old days, huh? What misery! What misery!
LA BROCANTI
So! You abandon me.
BABOLIN
Why not? You are rich. You've sold Rose Noel for two hundred pounds of income for life, and a thousand shillings down -- and that on the sole condition you have no rights to her and that Mr. Salvator will be her tutor. Rose Noel is in a grand pension, where she will become a great lady, and which she will leave to marry a millionaire; her future is assured. It is time I thought of mine.
LA BROCANTI
Do you want me to predict your future?
BABOLIN
Known already, mother. I will end in the galleys. I will die on the scaffold. That's it, isn't it?
LA BROCANTI
Yes, that's it!
BABOLIN
Well, let's leave that and without bitterness. Goodbye, Brocanti.
LA BROCANTI
But first what are you taking in that package?
BABOLIN
Aren't you afraid that it's your gold? I'm not taking anything which is not mine! My rug, for making the leap. My candlestick to make a split pear and my wooden bowl to receive the offerings of society. You don't count on making the jump or a split pear, right, Mother? Well, I leave you your establishment, leave me mine.
LA BROCANTI
Go away! I give you my curse!
BABOLIN
Thanks! It's the first time you've given me something.
LA BROCANTI
May the devil break your bones!
BABOLIN
(on the stairs)
Phooey! Pay no attention, it's Babolin, who tumbles.
(opening the door)
Say, La Brocanti, now you have income, you must put lights on the stairs.
VOICE
(from below)
(imitating an English accent)
Hola -- in the loft! Can you give me a light?
BABOLIN
Ah, an Englishman. La Brocanti receiving an Englishman at midnight. That's going to be funny. I'm not going yet. Come up, Milord.
(Enter Gibassier disguised as an Englishman.)
GIBASSIER
Isn't this the apartment of Madame La Brocanti?
LA BROCANTI
Yes, sir.
BABOLIN
(aside)
He must be an Englishman to call this an apartment.
GIBASSIER
Oh -- I want cards read for me.
LA BROCANTI
That's easy, Milord. Three francs for a short reading, six for a long.
GIBASSIER
Oh -- I thought it was thirty sous for the short and three francs for the long?
BABOLIN
Yes, but for the English, it is double. Please sit down, Milord.
(he sits on his trunk)
Tell for him! Tell for him.
GIBASSIER
I will make a sacrifice to have the long reading.
BABOLIN
And Milord is right, you can't bargain with the cards.
GIBASSIER
Milord wants nothing to do with that.
LA BROCANTI
What does Milord wish then?
GIBASSIER
(low and in his natural voice)
First, I want you to send that maggot, who irritates me, away.
BABOLIN
(aside)
I thought he called me a maggot -- oh, if I was sure of it.
(He goes behind Gibassier and threatens him from behind.)
GIBASSIER
Well, my boy!
BABOLIN
It wasn't "maggot" -- it was "my boy" -- a compliment.
GIBASSIER
(how to la Brocanti)
Well, send him off then.
LA BROCANTI
(aside, astonished)
I know this voice, I know it.
BABOLIN
(aside)
He whispered in her ear. What did he say?
GIBASSIER
It was three days ago, no -- four days ago or rather four days when at the Opera ball, they stole a considerable sum from me.
BABOLIN
It wasn't me -- I wasn't there. I was at Bordier's in La Halle. I can prove an alibi.
GIBASSIER
(low to Brocanti)
Send this kid away, as I told you.
BABOLIN
(aside)
He spoke to her again, very low.
LA BROCANTI
Babolin, you see that door there?
BABOLIN
Certainly, I see it.
LA BROCANTI
Well, you understand when one shows the door to someone, it's so he will leave.
BABOLIN
That's fine! Let's get going. I would already have been on the Rue Rivali if you hadn't kept me.
(aside)
They have some secrets together. Oh, he's a fake Englishman. He didn't say "Goddamn" even once.
(aloud)
Time to go.
LA BROCANTI
Fine. And let me hear you close the street door.
(Babolin leaves.)
GIBASSIER
While waiting --
(looks to make sure Babolin is not listening at the door)
Let's close this. Two precautions are worth more than one.
(he closes the door, then returning to Brocanti)
Ah, since you have already recognized my voice, I hope you will recognize my face as well.
LA BROCANTI
Gibassier! I think you were in the Midi.
GIBASSIER
Indeed, I was there. For the last three days, I've been at Paris. I travel.
LA BROCANTI
And what do you do at Paris?
GIBASSIER
I come to put up with La Brocanti for a night and a day. Tomorrow, at the same hour, I will take leave of you, my pretty hostess, is it agreed?
LA BROCANTI
You know I can refuse you nothing.
GIBASSIER
Yes. I know it. But first and above all, you are going to remember something. It's that I arrived here at ten-thirty precisely.
LA BROCANTI
But midnight just tolled at Saint Sulpice.
GIBASSIER
All the more reason.
LA BROCANTI
I don't understand.
GIBASSIER
You don't need to understand, only if by chance someone wished to ask you, "Woman Catherine Couturier, called La Brocanti, at what time on Sunday the twenty-eighth of February did Jean Chrysostome Gibassier enter your house?" you will reply simply: "At ten-thirty that evening."
LA BROCANTI
Meaning at ten-thirty tonight you did something?
GIBASSIER
Perhaps.
LA BROCANTI
Something bad?
GIBASSIER
It's possible, but I am not uneasy. I know your address, my chicken, and I said to myself, "I have a good friend where they'll never look for me since we've been separated for five years and no one's ever seen me in Paris with her." Without which you understand there's a fellow who frequents the quays: a certain Mr. Jackal, whose motto is "Cherchez la femme." Hush!
LA BROCANTI
What?
GIBASSIER
It seems to me someone is coming up.
LA BROCANTI
I heard nothing.
GIBASSIER
I hear a crack on the stairs.
LA BROCANTI
What do you mean, Jean! I am getting old --
GIBASSIER
Are you trying to make me believe you've never been young -- where can I hide?
LA BROCANTI
In the attic.
GIBASSIER
Is there a way out?
LA BROCANTI
On the roof, through the skylight.
GIBASSIER
The devil! At this time of year, the roofs are slippery. But I can take off my shoes.
(He hides in the attic. A knock.)
LA BROCANTI
Are you all right up there?
GIBASSIER
Yes. Don't forget, ten-thirty.
LA BROCANTI
Agreed.
(more knocking)
Go away. Who can come at this hour?
(she opens the door. Mr. Jackal enters with a cellar light in his hand)
(stupefied)
Mr. Jackal!
MR. JACKAL
Yes, respectable Brocanti, Mr. Jackal in person, at such an unreasonable hour. But, what do you want? The malefactors give me so much business during the day, that only the night remains for me to consecrate to honest people.
GIBASSIER
Mr. Jackal!
LA BROCANTI
Mr. Jackal at my house. It's such a great honor, I can't believe it.
MR. JACKAL
And that's what troubles you, I suspect.
(he puts on his spectacles, looks at La Brocanti, and takes a step)
Didn't you ask yesterday that you renew your license as a card-reader?
LA BROCANTI
Yes, Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
Well, I signed your license and I brought it myself.
GIBASSIER
(aside)
That's not natural. Take care, Gibassier.
(He raises the skylight.)
LA BROCANTI
Who's moving around up in the attic?
LA BROCANTI
It's the rats.
LA BROCANTI
You have rats?
LA BROCANTI
A whole lot, Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
That's astonishing in an apartment so well decorated. But let's leave the rats and return to the sheep. Did you know, oh, seven or eight years ago, about a fourth of a league from Essone a certain Catherine Couturier?
GIBASSIER
(aside)
The devil. This is becoming interesting.
LA BROCANTI
Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
Answer yes or no!
LA BROCANTI
Yes.
MR. JACKAL
You knew her. Fine.
(takes a step)
Wasn't she a cook to the used furniture dealers in the Faubourg St. Antoine, retired after two years?
LA BROCANTI
Yes, Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
Didn't she have a lover?
LA BROCANTI
Oh -- Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
Reply yes or no. Didn't she have a lover -- and this lover, wasn't he called Jean-Chrysostome Gibassier?
GIBASSIER
(aside)
Wow!
LA BROCANTI
Alas, yes, Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
There's an "alas" which is a good augur for the future. Let's continue. This lover, didn't he come in the house through the first floor window?
LA BROCANTI
How do you know all that?
MR. JACKAL
The important thing is that I do know it.
GIBASSIER
(aside)
Is he informed! Is he informed!
MR. JACKAL
One night -- it was a Friday or Saturday, a night when the masters were absent, Catherine, as was her custom, opened the window to her lover, only this time Master Jean-Chrysostome Gibassier was followed by three friends who entered after him, garrotted Catherine, and visited the entire house, reaping from their visit twenty-four gold plates, a dozen sweets, more or less of little coffee spoons and five thousand francs, thirty thousand bills of exchange, the rest in gold or silver. All this -- is it correct?
GIBASSIER
(aside)
There must have been one among the four who was a chatterbox.
LA BROCANTI
All this is true, Mr. Jackal, but you know I took -- you know that I gained nothing from the theft.
MR. JACKAL
Ah -- ah -- it was you then, Catherine Couturier?
(He raises his spectacles, looks at Brocanti and takes a step.)
LA BROCANTI
Eh! You know very well it was me, but you know also that I am not a thief.
MR. JACKAL
No, but you left with the thieves. Do you remember the date?
LA BROCANTI
It was the night of May 20th, 1820.
MR. JACKAL
Come, I see that you have a good memory! Let's continue. You left around eight at night in a wicker carriage with a fast horse so that towards 11 p.m. you were already near Juvrier. The carriage stopped. The men got out to get provisions.
GIBASSIER
(aside)
There's no way to deny it.
MR. JACKAL
While you were alone you saw a little girl of eight or nine running across the fields, pale, frightened, breathless, who threw herself in your arms, crying "Save me, they want to kill me." This little girl was losing blood from a wound she had received under her clavicle.
LA BROCANTI
(pointing with her finger)
Here, right here. The scar is still there.
MR. JACKAL
So much the better! You had pity on her, you took her, you hid her in the straw of the carriage?
LA BROCANTI
Did I do wrong, Mr. Jackal?
MR. JACKAL
One never does wrong to perform a good act, Brocanti! And it is that good action which protects you from me.
LA BROCANTI
Oh, Great God, Mr. Jackal, if I have you for a protector, I need fear no one, and all goes well.
MR. JACKAL
I never told you things were going wrong, Brocanti.
LA BROCANTI
Oh -- you warm my heart.
GIBASSIER
What the devil is he getting at?
MR. JACKAL
You reached Entretat -- you took a fishing boat to Holland, from Holland to Germany, from Germany to Bohemia. It's there your lover abandoned you with little Rose Noel. But as she was inclined to music and dancing, you taught her to sing, dance and play the guitar. For your part, in your relations with the Bohemians, you learned to read cards and tell fortunes, which means living at the expense of imbeciles. Imbeciles have to be good for something. So long as you preferred to remain out of France, it was no business of mine. But then there came a time you returned to Paris, where you told fortunes and read cards at your home or in town -- and whatever happens on the streets of the King is my concern. I need to know for the moment whose daughter Rose Noel is -- who gave her the knife wound of which she bears the scar on her neck -- and who she was afraid of when she fled Viry sur Orge.
LA BROCANTI
Damn, Mr. Jackal, only Rose Noel can tell you that.
MR. JACKAL
It's to see her that I came to see you. Where is Rose Noel?
LA BROCANTI
Rose Noel is no longer here, Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
What, she isn't here?
LA BROCANTI
No.
MR. JACKAL
And since when?
LA BROCANTI
Since the day before yesterday.
MR. JACKAL
Brocanti! Brocanti!
LA BROCANTI
Really, I tell you she is not here.
MR. JACKAL
And where is she?
LA BROCANTI
I don't know.
MR. JACKAL
Take care, Brocanti, take care!
LA BROCANTI
My good, Mr. Jackal, I swear that I tell you the truth. God's own truth. Here's how the thing happened. On the night of the Mardi Gras, three young men were supping at Bordier's at La Halle. They asked for Rose Noel.
MR. JACKAL
I know that.
LA BROCANTI
They made her recite verse.
MR. JACKAL
I know that.
LA BROCANTI
And they gave her two crowns.
MR. JACKAL
No, three.
LA BROCANTI
What? Were you there, too?
MR. JACKAL
Continue.
LA BROCANTI
After Rose Noel recited verse, one of the three men -- a painter.
MR. JACKAL
Mr. Petrus.
LA BROCANTI
Yes! He offered me three crowns for a setting if Rose Noel would pose in his studio. I saw no problem and the next day we went there. There were two friends of Mr. Petrus and another gentleman with his sister. Mr. Salvator came bringing a letter to Mr. Jean Robert. He came with his dog. Rose Noel was afraid of the dog and fainted. I don't know what took place between these gentlemen and this lady, who are united in a spirit of friendship. Anyway, when Rose Noel came to her senses, they told me Rose Noel couldn't stay with me anymore, that she was too weak to do the job I made her do, that they would be responsible for her -- and that they would place her in a boarding school and that Mr. Salvator would watch over her; where she would be educated at their joint expense. As for me, to put a little balm on my poor heart, they offered me a twelve hundred pound income as a pension. Mr. Salvator responded in the name of the group and they took Rose Noel away.
MR. JACKAL
Where?
LA BROCANTI
But I just told you, I don't know.
MR. JACKAL
You think rightly that I won't take this on your word?
(He lights his cellar light.)
LA BROCANTI
What are you going to do?
MR. JACKAL
A little domestic visit to see if you haven't hidden the child in some corner.
LA BROCANTI
Mr. Jackal, when I swear to you --
MR. JACKAL
You know the more you swear, the less I will believe you.
GIBASSIER
(aside)
It seems to me it's time to decamp.
MR. JACKAL
Let's look in this closet first.
LA BROCANTI
You will see her poor bed, which they left me, as it wasn't worth the trouble to be taken.
MR. JACKAL
Nothing! Let's visit the little attic.
GIBASSIER
(removing his slippers and hauling himself to the roof)
Has he got a nose!
LA BROCANTI
(coughing)
Hum! Hum!
MR. JACKAL
You are catching a cold, Brocanti, I'm warning you, not surprising the skylight's open! Huh! To whom do those legs belong?
GIBASSIER
To someone who knows how to use them -- happily.
(He disappears over the roof.)
MR. JACKAL
(pushing half his body out the skylight)
Sir! Sir! My word, bon voyage!
(shuts the skylight)
Wait, he left his shoes.
(taking a slipper and examines it)
If that brigand of a Gibassier wasn't in the galleys, I would say it was his foot. Let's keep this specimen like a piece of evidence. It's probable that one day or another, I will have a bone to pick with this big bloke.
(takes his Gazette from his pocket)
Star-Evening Paper.
(wrapping the shoes)
Who can ever deny the utility of the newspapers?
(who puts them in his pocket)
Now, us two, Brocanti! Wait, someone is coming up the stairs.
BABOLIN
(on the stairway)
Brocanti! Eh! La Brocanti!
LA BROCANTI
Who's coming here again, this poltroon, at such an hour.
BABOLIN
(closer)
Here's an event -- a terrible one.
MR. JACKAL
Not a word of me, you understand, Brocanti?
LA BROCANTI
Oh, my God, my God -- what a night!
BABOLIN
(enters)
A chair, a chair, and a cushion. I am going to be sick, like Rose Noel.
LA BROCANTI
Look -- what's wrong with you? Speak imbecile! I thought I was rid of you.
BABOLIN
You haven't the least drop of something? Of kirsch or a love potion?
LA BROCANTI
(pulling him by the arm)
Will you speak?
BABOLIN
Oh la la! Oh la ha!
MR. JACKAL
(listening)
He was marvelously able to listen to all we said, that gentleman.
LA BROCANTI
But what's wrong with you, speak.
BABOLIN
Well, Rose Noel has been carried off.
LA BROCANTI
What do you mean carried off? And by whom?
MR. JACKAL
(to himself)
Carried off? That complicates matters.
LA BROCANTI
By whom, I ask you.
BABOLIN
By one of the four gentlemen from the other day, probably.
LA BROCANTI
And how do you know she was carried off?
BABOLIN
Luck, pure luck!
LA BROCANTI
But will you get to the point?
BABOLIN
Oh! Don't eat your blood -- we are going to tell you in two words. I was crossing the place Maubert, I thought I heard the glass break in a carriage and my name, Babolin, Babolin! I recognized the voice of Rose Noel. I turned and a paper fell at my feet. I took it and I escaped. Next moment, a gentleman jumped onto the pavement and ran after me. I made two or three dodges. That was the distance. A gentleman jumped to the pavement and tried to run after me. Outran him. Rose Noel cried for help, but you understand, Brocanti, at 2:00 in the morning on the place Maubert, there wasn't a crowd. The gentleman got back in the carriage and whipped the coachman toward the Rue St. Jacques! Seeing that no one ran after me, I stopped, I clambered up a street lamp and I read, "They are kidnapping me, Mr. Salvator, save me. Rose Noel" written in a hurry on a scrap of paper. I ran to Rue Mason #4 -- Mr. Salvator's -- to wake him for it wasn't long, he was already dressed. "Rose Noel kidnapped?" he cried, "Quickly! Quickly!" "Where are you going?" I asked him. "To find Mr. Jackal. He's the only one who can get her back," he said.
MR. JACKAL
(aside)
There's a flatterer.
BABOLIN
Good. Only Mr. Jackal wasn't there, Brocanti. You know he's like the bat, he leaves at night and doesn't return until morning.
LA BROCANTI
You intend to shut up, wretch!
BABOLIN
Why should I shut up? "Then," Mr. Salvator said, "let's go to Brocanti. She may perhaps know something." I told him in reply, "I don't think so, but never mind. Come anyway. I'll run ahead to get lights."
MR. JACKAL
(coming down)
Then get lights, imbecile, since you came for that.
BABOLIN
(aside)
Mr. Jackal, where can I hide?
MR. JACKAL
(taking the candle)
This way, Mr. Salvator. This way.
(Mr. Salvator enters.)
SALVATOR
Mr. Jackal, I was looking for you.
MR. JACKAL
I know it.
SALVATOR
Rose Noel has been kidnapped.
MR. JACKAL
I know it.
SALVATOR
What is to be done?
MR. JACKAL
Where was she?
SALVATOR
At the pension of Madame Desmarest, at Vanvres.
MR. JACKAL
Then to the pension of Madame Desmarest.
SALVATOR
Ah, Mr. Jackal, if you find her.
MR. JACKAL
I hope indeed to get her back -- I must find her -- where can we get a carriage?
SALVATOR
I have one below.
MR. JACKAL
In that case, en route.
(He lights her hand lamp.)
BABOLIN
(coming from under the table and following them)
Good! I will be right behind you! You didn't see that in your cards, Mother?
(He leaves behind Salvator and Jackal.)
LA BROCANTI
(alone)
Oh -- what night! What a night! Hopefully, they'll continue to pay my pension.
(curtain)
The Courtyard of the pension of Madame Desmarest. At the right a large wall which extends and is lost in the trees. To the left, the pavilion in which Rose Noel's chamber is situated, visible to the public. The door of this room faces opposite the entry gate. Window in the rear. Small bed of pensioner, slippers at the foot of the bed, candle on a table. At the rear, a house whose windows give on the garden of the pension. It is around 7:00 in the morning.
SALVATOR and BABOLIN
(outside at the gate)
Hey somebody -- hey! hey!
BABOLIN
Wait, Mr. Salvator. I am going to climb a tree.
(climbing)
I'm up. I can see the interior of the house.
SALVATOR
Well?
BABOLIN
One would say it's the Castle of Sleeping Beauty. No one is stirring. Knock -- keep it up -- someone must come!
SALVATOR
(rapping)
Hey! Hey!
BABOLIN
Want me to come down and let you in?
SALVATOR
Eh! Wretch -- it's breaking and entering you are proposing.
BABOLIN
Then knock!
(Salvator knocks)
SALVATOR
Ah, there's a door opening.
BABOLIN
Ah, good idea! Good day, sir!
SALVATOR
Madame Desmarest! Madame Desmarest!
PIERRE
Hey -- up there! Who do you want, at such an hour!
BABOLIN
Open the door. We're going to tell you.
SALVATOR
Open! Open!
PIERRE
First of all -- who are you?
SALVATOR
I am Salvator, the tutor of the young girl who was put in pension here day before yesterday.
BABOLIN
Ah! Mr. Salvator! There a window in the house which is blinking and opening. I see inside an old woman.
MADAME DESMAREST
(from her window)
What is it, Pierre?
PIERRE
Madame, it's the tutor of Miss Rose Noel, who insists on speaking to you.
SALVATOR
Immediately, Madame! And one a matter of the highest importance.
MADAME DESMAREST
Open, Pierre, I'm coming down.
SALVATOR
(entering)
Thanks, my friend.
PIERRE
Can I shut the door again?
SALVATOR
Useless. I'm waiting for someone, but you can go back inside, my friend. I will watch to see no one comes in or leaves.
BABOLIN
And I, I will give warning!
MADAME DESMAREST
You're asking for Rose Noel.
SALVATOR
Rather, Madame, I've come because of her.
MADAME DESMAREST
Must I wake her?
SALVATOR
She isn't here.
MADAME DESMAREST
What do you mean?
SALVATOR
That she was carried off during the night.
MADAME DESMAREST
Impossible! I escorted her at 9:00 p.m. last night to her room or rather I left her with Miss Suzanne de Valgeneuse.
SALVATOR
Well, I repeat, Madame, she isn't in the room you escorted her to.
MADAME DESMAREST
And are you certain?
SALVATOR
Read this letter which I received at three o'clock in the morning.
MADAME DESMAREST
(after having read)
Oh, sir, what can be done?
SALVATOR
Wait and watch, so no one can penetrate either the room, or the court or the garden.
MADAME DESMAREST
Wait for whom?
SALVATOR
The police officer who stopped at the Mayor's to warn him to hold himself read at the first call.
MADAME DESMAREST
What, sir, is the law coming?
SALVATOR
Without any doubt.
MADAME DESMAREST
Here?
SALVATOR
Here.
MADAME DESMAREST
But if such a thing happens, my establishment is ruined.
SALVATOR
What do you want me to do? It's up to you to watch your pensioners.
MADAME DESMAREST
But sir, this carrying off is impossible. The walls are higher, the windows solidly shut, if Rose Noel was kidnapped against her will, she must have cried out, and I would have hard her as I live above her.
SALVATOR
Well, Madame, there are ladders for the tallest walls, jimmies for the best locked windows, and gags for young girls' mouths.
MADAME DESMAREST
Shall we go into Rose Noel's room, sir?
SALVATOR
On the contrary, Madame, we are forbidden to enter it, for fear of erasing evidence of the rape.
MADAME DESMAREST
Let's look in the garden, then, perhaps we can see how someone got through the window.
SALVATOR
Pardon, Madame, but entry to the garden is forbidden to everyone.
MADAME DESMAREST
Even to me?
SALVATOR
To you just like the rest, Madame.
MADAME DESMAREST
But still, sir, I am in my own home.
SALVATOR
You are mistaken, Madame. At this time, the law is at your home, and wherever it is, the law is at home.
BABOLIN
(form the top of the wall)
Mr. Jackal! There's Mr. Jackal.
MADAME DESMAREST
Who is Mr. Jackal?
SALVATOR
The police officer we are waiting for, Madame.
MR. JACKAL
Do you intend to get down from your perch, scoundrel?
BABOLIN
Right away; Mr. Jackal, right away.
(Jackal enters humming -- without paying attention to anyone, he tours the court. Babolin hides in the corner of the door.)
MADAME DESMAREST
Sir.
MR. JACKAL
Madame Desmarest, I suppose? Very good.
(he continues to hum)
Where is Miss Rose Noel's room?
MADAME DESMAREST
There it is, sir.
MR. JACKAL
Whose house is that which gives on your garden?
MADAME DESMAREST
That of Mr. Gerard.
MR. JACKAL
Oh! Oh! Mr. Gerard. The honest man. Isn't that the way he's known?
MADAME DESMAREST
Ah, sir, he deserves it greatly.
MR. JACKAL
Who before coming to Vanvres lived at Viry sur Orge?
MADAME DESMAREST
I believe so.
MR. JACKAL
And I, I am sure of it.
(He starts humming again.)
SALVATOR
Gerard! That's the name that had such an effect on Rose Noel the other day.
(to Madame Desmarest)
Is Mr. Gerard married?
MADAME DESMAREST
No, sir.
SALVATOR
Do you know someone around Mr. Gerard who bears the name "Orsola?"
MR. JACKAL
Dead at least seven years, killed by a dog -- let's get back to business. What does this wall give on?
MADAME DESMAREST
On a small deserted street.
MR. JACKAL
Go outside, Mr. Salvator, run along the wall and see if you don't find at the base of the wall, some bit of plaster fallen off. If you do, note its place.
SALVATOR
Be easy.
BABOLIN
Would you like me to go with you, Mr. Salvator?
SALVATOR
Come!
MR. JACKAL
Now, just the two of us, Madame.
MADAME DESMAREST
Question me, sir, and I am ready to reply.
MR. JACKAL
At what time to your pensioners go to bed?
MADAME DESMAREST
At eight o'clock in the winter.
MR. JACKAL
And the sub-mistresses?
MADAME DESMAREST
At nine o'clock.
MR. JACKAL
And you, Madame, at what time did you go to sleep yesterday?
MADAME DESMAREST
At ten o'clock, sir.
MR. JACKAL
And you saw nothing, heard nothing?
MADAME DESMAREST
Saw nothing, heard nothing.
MR. JACKAL
Then, you noticed nothing unusual.
MADAME DESMAREST
Nothing unusual.
MR. JACKAL
Nothing unusual! That's unusual.
SALVATOR
(pointing to the tile from the wall)
This is what you want.
MR. JACKAL
My word, yes. You marked the place carefully!
SALVATOR
Exactly.
BABOLIN
And there, I threw a stone, to the side of the wall.
MR. JACKAL
Let's go there or rather let me go there first by myself. Ah! Ah! Here are traces of footprints of the same length and a larger one -- could a single man have done this?
SALVATOR
No.
MR. JACKAL
What makes you think that?
SALVATOR
The prints are arranged differently. One of the two men leaned on his right foot -- the footprint of the right foot is deeper than that of the left.
MR. JACKAL
Have you been in the profession, Mr. Salvator?
SALVATOR
No, but I've done some hunting.
MR. JACKAL
Look here.
SALVATOR
What?
MR. JACKAL
A ray of light.
(He pulls out of his pocket the shoes of Gibassier.)
SALVATOR
What's that?
VICTOR
A lobster clue, I bet!
MR. JACKAL
(measuring the impression)
Exactly the same. The same position of the nails. No need to bother about this one, I've got him.
PIERRE
You mean you've got his slippers.
MR. JACKAL
You will learn, my good friend, that when I have the shoe, I have the foot and when I have the foot, I have the rest of him. Turn to the other. Ah -- ah -- here's a third track. A very particular foot which has no resemblance to that we just examined -- a foot of a great lord or churchman.
SALVATOR
A man of the world, Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
Why do you stress a man of the world?
SALVATOR
Because in our day, churchmen don't wear spurs -- and here at the heel is the little cut made by a spur.
MR. JACKAL
You are right, on my word! Now, let's see where these footprints go and where they come from. Ah, here they go from the wall to the window and from the window to the wall. It appears the ravishers were well informed. Ah, come here, Mr. Salvator! Look!
SALVATOR
Two tracks in the ground joined by a line cutting them.
MR. JACKAL
You recognize the signs of a ladder.
SALVATOR
And the first step is pushed into the muddy ground -- caused by the humidity.
MR. JACKAL
It must be a pleasure to work with you, Mr. Salvator. No -- it's a question of figuring out how many men leaned on the ladder to cause it sink in the mud thus deeply. Is there a ladder in the house, Madame Desmarest?
MADAME DESMAREST
Ask Pierre.
SALVATOR
Mr. Pierre, do you have a ladder?
PIERRE
Ah! Good question.
MR. JACKAL
Reply to it.
PIERRE
Certainly, I have a ladder.
MR. JACKAL
And where is this ladder?
PIERRE
It's near the greenhouse.
MR. JACKAL
(pointing to a ladder leaning against Gerard's house)
You must be mistaken, my friend, wouldn't that be it, by chance?
PIERRE
Goodness -- yes! Who the devil took my ladder and put it under Mr. Gerard's window? Now do you want it? I am going to go get it.
MR. JACKAL
No. I am going there myself. That's what complicates things. Your Mr. Gerard passes for rich, doesn't he?
MADAME DESMAREST
They say he's a millionaire.
MR. JACKAL
Did my comedians kill two birds with one stone? This will have to be looked into -- but later.
(fitting the ladder to the prints)
Already we have a piece of proof. The marks and the ladder are in agreement.
SALVATOR
And what's more remarkable is that the ladder isn't of ordinary dimensions.
MR. JACKAL
Do you have a son, Pierre?
PIERRE
Yes. Who told you that?
MR. JACKAL
Between twelve and fifteen?
PIERRE
He'll be fourteen soon.
MR. JACKAL
Soon! It is indeed his son.
PIERRE
What do you mean, it's indeed his son?
MR. JACKAL
He needed help from a child to show him the way and he bought a large ladder, so the child could go up the ladder at the same time with him.
PIERRE
Well, so what? Is there anything wrong in that?
MR. JACKAL
No -- on the contrary! Come here, my friend -- how long is it since you worked in the garden?
PIERRE
Not for at least three days.
MR. JACKAL
Then for three days your ladder has been near the greenhouse.
PIERRE
It isn't near the greenhouse, as you just placed it here.
MR. JACKAL
This boy is smart! But there is one thing of which I am sure -- it's that he had no experience in kidnapping. Come up with me, my friend!
(Pierre gives a questioning look to Madame Desmarest.)
MADAME DESMAREST
Do what the gentleman tells you, Pierre.
(Pierre climbs.)
MR. JACKAL
Again.
(to Salvator)
Well?
SALVATOR
It's stuck in but not the other side.
MR. JACKAL
Go down, my friend.
PIERRE
I'm down.
MR. JACKAL
Notice how this man says few things but what he says is well said. Now, my friend, take Madame Desmarest in your arms.
PIERRE
Fie! Sir!
MR. JACKAL
Take Madame Desmarest in your arms.
MADAME DESMAREST
But what are you saying?
PIERRE
I will never dare, sir.
MADAME DESMAREST
I forbid you to, Pierre.
MR. JACKAL
(coming down the ladder)
Go where I was, my friend.
(He intends to carry off Madame Desmarest.)
MADAME DESMAREST
But, sir, but, sir, what are you doing?
MR. JACKAL
Suppose, Madame, that I am in love with you.
PIERRE
Now, there's a supposition.
MADAME DESMAREST
But sir!
MR. JACKAL
Relax, Madame, it's only as my friend, Pierre, said -- a supposition. I am carrying you off -- rather I am not -- I am going to help you to climb, Much prefer that. Fear nothing.
(they go up)
(to Salvator)
Is it pressing in on the other side?
SALVATOR
Not at all.
MR. JACKAL
(to Babolin)
Come here to make it balance.
BABOLIN
Me?
MR. JACKAL
Yes, you -- get on the second rung.
BABOLIN
There.
SALVATOR
The ladder is exactly on the same point as the other.
MR. JACKAL
Then everything is done. Let's get down.
MADAME DESMAREST
I do not understand.
MR. JACKAL
It's very simple, now. You are somewhat heavier than Rose Noel.
(to Babolin)
How much do you weigh?
BABOLIN
Sixty-five pounds. I weighed myself three days ago.
MR. JACKAL
The two men who kidnapped Rose Noel were sixty-five pounds heavier than Pierre and me.
BABOLIN
He's clever, this Mr. Jackal! He's clever.
PIERRE
Ah, I understand now. Someone kidnapped one of the pensioners.
MR. JACKAL
Madame Desmarest -- never lose this boy -- he's a treasure of penetration. Let's look around the interior of the room.
(to Madame Desmarest)
You have a double key for each room?
MADAME DESMAREST
Here's that of Rose Noel.
(Jackal opens the door. They all try to enter.)
MR. JACKAL
Softly! All depends on the first examination. Ah! Ah! Traces of footprints from the door to the bed -- and from the bed to the window. Mr. Salvator -- look with your hunter's eyes.
SALVATOR
Ah! Ah! Something new. A woman's footprint. It's outlined by the garden gravel.
MR. JACKAL
What did I always tell you, Mr. Salvator, "Cherchez la femme," this time the woman is found.
MADAME DESMAREST
What do you mean, the woman is found? You think there's a woman in this affair?
MR. JACKAL
There's a woman in every case. Rather than having a report given, I say "look for the woman." They look for the woman and when the woman is found --
MADAME DESMAREST
Well.
MR. JACKAL
-- there's no delay in finding the man. One day, a roofing man fell from a roof and broke both of his legs. They gave me a report and I said "look for the woman." That made them laugh. I questioned the injured man. The imbecile was amusing himself watching a grisette undress in her garret. He missed his step and he fell. Let's look for the woman, Mr. Salvator, let's look for the woman.
SALVATOR
This one is a coquette. She followed the garden paths so as not to dirty her slippers. Yellow gravel, without a mixture of mud.
MR. JACKAL
When you stop being an errand-boy, Mr. Salvator, come tell me. And now, Madame Desmarest that's what happened. You yourself conducted Ms. Rose Noel to her chamber.
MADAME DESMAREST
Myself, sir.
MR. JACKAL
She was very sad.
MADAME DESMAREST
How do you know that?
MR. JACKAL
It's not difficult to figure out. Her handkerchief was wet, she went to bed crying. They knocked on the door.
MADAME DESMAREST
Which one did that?
MR. JACKAL
Probably the woman. Rose Noel rose and opened the door.
MADAME DESMAREST
Without knowing who was knocking?
MR. JACKAL
Who told you she didn't know who was knocking? Behind the woman came the young man with boots and spurs. Behind the young man were the men with large shoes. She was overpowered. They put a kerchief in her mouth -- they threw her peignoir over her from the bed and wrapped her in it -- and thus, they carried her off. See, they took her by way of the window -- and the proof that she came through the window and not very willingly --?
SALVATOR
Is that she grabbed the curtain and that the curtain is torn.
MR. JACKAL
The rest goes by itself -- they went over the wall. The woman returned to the room. She closed the window, very naturally, then the door, then she went back to sleep.
SALVATOR
(grasping the hand of Mr. Jackal)
I've got it all -- let me do it. Madame Desmarest can you get us a slipper of Miss Suzanne de Valgeneuse without her knowing it?
MADAME DESMAREST
Probably. She probably put them outside her door yesterday evening so her chambermaid could clean them as usual.
SALVATOR
Then Madame Desmarest -- a slipper of Miss Suzanne's and not a word.
MR. JACKAL
You hear, Madame, not a word.
MADAME DESMAREST
I am going there myself.
(She leaves.)
SALVATOR
Mr. Pierre, if you want to go back to your room we have no further need of you. Babolin, if you want to go play with your top, you will be pleasing us.
BABOLIN
I have no top, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
Then go buy one -- here's for it.
(He give him five francs.)
BABOLIN
Oh -- a five franc note.
(Babolin leaves but Pierre stops by his door.)
PIERRE
Why should I go back to my room? I only take orders from Madame Desmarest.
SALVATOR
The woman is Miss Suzanne de Valgeneuse. The man with spurs is her brother.
MR. JACKAL
You think so?
SALVATOR
I am sure of it. She was the one who suggested the pension of Madame Desmarest for Rose Noel that day at Petrus. It was she who fought all my objections at the instigation of her brother. From that moment, the plan for the kidnapping was made. Ah, my dear cousins.
MR. JACKAL
What do you mean there?
SALVATOR
Nothing -- I say you are a great man, Mr. Jackal and that your maxim "cherchez la femme" will pass on to posterity.
MADAME DESMAREST
(entering)
Here's one of Miss Suzanne's slippers, gentlemen.
SALVATOR
(measuring the footprint)
Sir! Well -- what do you say to that?
MR. JACKAL
I say that it is Miss Suzanne who's behind all this. Madame Desmarest, call Miss Suzanne.
MADAME DESMAREST
Wait, sir, here she is.
MR. JACKAL
Where's that?
MADAME DESMAREST
She's walking toward the garden.
MR. JACKAL
Signal her to come here.
MADAME DESMAREST
I don't know if she will come.
MR. JACKAL
And why wouldn't she come?
MADAME DESMAREST
Because Miss Suzanne is very proud.
MR. JACKAL
Call her anyway. If she doesn't come. I'll go fetch her.
MADAME DESMAREST
Miss Suzanne! Miss Suzanne!
SUZANNE
Madame does me the honor of calling me, I believe?
(Mr. Jackal is in the court; Salvator in the pavilion -- invisible to Suzanne.)
MADAME DESMAREST
Yes, my child, for here's a gentleman, who wishes to ask you some questions.
SUZANNE
Some questions from me? But I don't know the gentleman.
MADAME DESMAREST
The gentleman is the representative of the authorities.
SUZANNE
What have I do with the authorities?
MADAME DESMAREST
Calm yourself, my child; it's a question of Rose Noel.
SUZANNE
Well -- so what?
MR. JACKAL
So what? Please leave us, Madame Desmarest, and bid Mr. Pierre to go to his room.
(Pierre and Madame Desmarest both leave.)
MR. JACKAL
So what, Miss -- ? We want to have some information about your friend.
SUZANNE
What friend?
MR. JACKAL
Miss Rose Noel.
SUZANNE
I choose my friends from places other than the streets. Miss Rose Noel was perhaps my protégé but she was not my friend.
MR. JACKAL
Then I am simply going to interrogate you.
SUZANNE
Interrogate me? About what?
MR. JACKAL
On the kidnapping of Miss Rose Noel.
SUZANNE
Oh! Poor little thing -- she was kidnapped?
MR. JACKAL
You know it better than anyone, Miss, since you participated in the kidnapping.
SUZANNE
You are mad, sir.
MR. JACKAL
No, Miss -- I am --
(opens his coat and show his uniform)
SUZANNE
Why didn't you say so before? One would have answered you with the respect due to your rank.
MR. JACKAL
Let's not waste any more time, Miss. Your name and station in the world?
SUZANNE
Then this really is an interrogation?
MR. JACKAL
Yes, Miss.
SUZANNE
My name! I am Aimee Adelaide Suzanne de Valgeneuse. I am the daughter of the Marquise Rene de Valgeneuse, peer of France, niece of Louis Clement de Valgeneuse, Cardinal at the Court of Rome and sister of the Count Loredan de Valgeneuse, lieutenant in the guards. I am the heiress of a half-million pound income. There --
MR. JACKAL
(taking a step back and rebuttoning his coat)
Pardon, Miss, I was unaware.
SUZANNE
Yes, I understand, you were unaware that I am my father's daughter, my uncle's niece and my brother's sister. But now you know it -- don't forget it.
(She makes a disdainful gesture with her hand and starts to leave.)
MR. JACKAL
Pardon, Miss, one more word, I beg you. You are proud and boastful of your fortune -- but this fortune comes to you through the succession of an uncle whose will they say, disappeared. Reduced to misery by the disappearance of this will, Mr. Conrad de Valgeneuse killed himself -- but let's suppose for a moment that your cousin is not dead and the will is found. You would be ruined -- you, and your brother.
SUZANNE
Is that a threat you are making me?
MR. JACKAL
No, Miss -- it's an opinion I'm giving you.
SUZANNE
From where do you get an opinion in this?
MR. JACKAL
The opinion is not in what I've told you, but in what I still have to tell you. Listen to me then, Miss, and although I speak quietly to you -- don't lose one of my words for they are the words of a friend.
SUZANNE
(scornfully)
You, a friend?
MR. JACKAL
You shall judge -- the young girl your brother had kidnapped and who he thinks is a gypsy is not a gypsy -- she is the niece of Mr. Gerard -- and on the day her uncle dies, she will inherit five million. So your brother must not make her his mistress -- but his wife. Will you say this advice doesn't come from a friend?
SUZANNE
I don't know from whom it comes nor from what motive it is given, but as it is good. In an hour, I will leave to join my brother -- and I swear to you that Rose Noel will never be his mistress -- goodbye, sir!
(Mr. Jackal bows very low.)
MR. JACKAL
Your humble servant, Miss.
(Suzanne leaves.)
MR. JACKAL
Mr. Salvator, I believe we have nothing more of importance to do here and as I have a different reason for staying, I won't keep you.
SALVATOR
If I asked you for an explanation, Mr. Jackal, would you give me one?
MR. JACKAL
No, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
Well, I will give one myself. You're afraid of this viper, Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
I'm not afraid of anything, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
Well, Mr. Jackal, what you don't want to do, I will do myself.
MR. JACKAL
You?
SALVATOR
Me! Only one last word -- is it your conscience which forces you to abstain from acting?
MR. JACKAL
It's my duty -- goodbye, Mr. Conrad.
SALVATOR
(turning quickly)
Mr. Conrad?
MR. JACKAL
Pardon, I made a mistake -- goodbye, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
Mr. Jackal within eight hours I will have found Rose Noel and brought her back.
MR. JACKAL
If that happens try to protect her.
SALVATOR
Oh -- once in my hands, she'll never leave them. Goodbye, Mr. Jackal. I'll answer for that.
(Salvator leaves.)
MR. JACKAL
Man proposes -- God disposes. While waiting, let's see why this ladder was placed against Gerard's window -- if that brigand Gibassier wasn't in Toulon, I would swear it was he who did this.
(curtain)
Interior of Gerard's room at Vanvres. The most complete disorder -- chairs overturned -- secretary forced open -- light continuing to burn on the right table -- a bloody knife on the furniture. Jackal is outside on the ladder. Only his arm can be seen which passes through a broken pane of glass feeling for the lock -- he opens the lock and then in the window Jackal appears.
VOICE
(from outside the door)
Mr. Gerard! Mr. Gerard! Open up, Mr. Gerard -- open up.
MR. JACKAL
(at the window)
It's very imprudent for a millionaire to sleep on the first floor without grills on his windows -- true, it gives on the pension of young girls -- but the sheep attract the wolves.
(he jumps into the room)
Here's a beautiful mess! Perhaps it is an effect of art.
VOICE
Mr. Gerard -- if you don't reply I am going to get the police.
MR. JACKAL
Go without wasting a moment. That's what you ought best to do.
VOICE
(frightened, going off)
There's someone in Mr. Gerard's room. Help, police -- police!
MR. JACKAL
That's very good! One of the three men has separated himself. The one whose shoes I have in my pocket, he came with the ladder, leaned on it underneath the window, broke a pane and entered. Mr. Gerard slept or didn't sleep. The bed is made, but seems not to be in its place. Why isn't it in place? Oh -- because they moved it to force open the armoire which was behind it. Mr. Gerard heard a noise, he came in, he was overcome, since here is the desk forced open -- the drawer is empty.
(seeing a spot on the floor and putting his handkerchief over it)
That's clear. A piece of evidence. To the stationhouse.
(while rummaging he spots the knife)
What do I see shining under it? Oh -- oh -- here's something will put us on the man's track. "Lardereau to Valence." Near to the road to Toulon. Gibassier escaped from the galleys. It was his legs I saw at Brocanti's. These are his shoes in my pocket and this is his knife which I have in my hand. More evidence. To the stationhouse.
(a noise is heard)
God. They've come back.
VOICE
(outside)
In the name of the law -- open.
MR. JACKAL
Nice voice? Who is Commissioner in Vanvres? It's Henry Bertin, one of my proteges. I am charmed to see that I used my protection so well.
COMMISSIONER
In the name of the law -- open.
MR. JACKAL
What the devil has become of Mr. Gerard in all this?
(opening the door of the cabinet)
Well -- there he is -- the assassin placed him here -- he put the key in his pocket and left by the door, locked it from outside and got to the street by the window on the street floor.
(He goes to the cabinet; meanwhile the door is forced; the Commissioner rushes in the room with police; at this moment Mr. Jackal comes out of the cabinet pulling Mr. Gerard's body by the shoulder.)
COMMISSIONER
(pointing to Mr. Jackal)
Arrest this man!
MR. JACKAL
Whom do you wish to arrest?
COMMISSIONER
You, by God.
MR. JACKAL
Ah, dear Mr. Henry, I had a high opinion of you and now you destroy it yourself.
COMMISSIONER
Mr. Jackal.
ALL
Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
Let's see, help me to put this brave Mr. Gerard on his bed. I have to be at the prefects at eight o'clock and I want to know before I go if he is dead or alive. If he's not dead he's in very bad condition. Is there a doctor in the village?
COMMISSIONER
Yes, but I saw him leave this morning in his carriage.
MR. JACKAL
Then, as there is no time to lose, send for a priest.
COMMISSIONER
Today is Sunday, he is singing a mass at the chapel of Mr. Lamotte Houden. But I saw a monk on his way to Meudon, where two lovers asphyxiated themselves. I will go --
MR. JACKAL
No, not you.
GENDARME
I am going, sir.
MR. JACKAL
If you find a doctor in Meudon, bring him along.
(The gendarme leaves.)
MR. JACKAL
There, now that you have seen all there is to see, my good friends, let's have some air. If Mr. Gerard is dead he doesn't need you here, if he's alive it's our business not yours.
ASSISTANTS
(slowly as they leave)
Oh! Try to preserve him for us, Mr. Jackal, you don't know the good he has done in the country -- he is the father of the poor. We are going to pray to God for him.
MR. JACKAL
You will do well! Go, my friends, go. Watch the door and don't let anyone enter except the monk and the doctor --
(the gendarmes leave -- to Commissioner)
As for you -- take notes for your report.
COMMISSIONER
Do you want to dictate it to me?
MR. JACKAL
I don't have the time. I should already be on my way to Paris.
(The Commissioner sets to work at a table.)
COMMISSIONER
Sunday, etc., etc.
MR. JACKAL
(about to leave)
Hush! It seems to me that I heard a sigh. Come help me, Mr. Henry.
(they listen to Gerard)
Ah -- ah -- it appears he's calling us.
GERARD
Ah!
MR. JACKAL
Bravo! 7:10. I will spur the horse.
(he takes a silver spoon from the glass on the desk)
It appears the desk was well furnished; although made of silver, the little spoon was scorned.
(He puts some drops of red liquor contained in a flask which he has about him, and helps Gerard to drink.)
GERARD
(returning to himself)
Thanks, Mr. Thief, thanks.
MR. JACKAL
Honest, Mr. Gerard, it's not a case of a thief here but justice watching over you.
GERARD
(returning to himself)
J--J--Justice?
MR. JACKAL
See how Justice reassures him! Relax, dear Mr. Gerard; we are old acquaintances, what the devil. I took your deposition after the murder at Viry sur Orge, which resulted in the indictment against Mr. Sarranti and caused him to be condemned to death as a thief and assassin.
GERARD
I have nothing to say except to a confessor.
MR. JACKAL
You are going to be served as you wish. I have sent for a priest and a doctor.
GERARD
Oh, the priest first, the priest first.
(He falls back on his bed.)
MR. JACKAL
The devil! And I have to leave him. My dear Mr. Henry, I doubt that Mr. Gerard will revive, but if he does, do me the favor of watching him and informing me of his gestures and actions.
COMMISSIONER
Of the acts and gestures of the honest Mr. Gerard?
MR. JACKAL
Yes, of the good Mr. Gerard.
COMMISSIONER
You have some intentions with regard to him then?
MR. JACKAL
Hush! I'm preparing a surprise for him. Don't breathe a word of it to him. Only if he is ill, make him drink a cup of this liquor; it will sustain him for a while; 7:15, luckily what I am bringing will excuse my delay. Goodbye.
Mr. Henry! Goodbye.
(An agent comes in.)
AGENT
From the prefect.
MR. JACKAL
From the prefect?
AGENT
Yes -- it seems it's about a grave concern, for he ordered me not to return without you.
MR. JACKAL
My, my, my -- here's something else! Mr. Sarranti has returned to France. I thought to arrest him the other day at Bordiers -- and he is coming to surrender himself. Does this imbecile of an honest man, who was all right in India, who could easily have stayed there, imagine he can return and purge his guilt? Poor devil -- I feel sorry for him!
(to Agent)
Come! Come! And you, dear Mr. Henry -- don't forget my instructions.
(looking at Gerard)
Decidedly, I wouldn't give them for nothing.
(Jackal leaves with the agent.)
GERARD
(reopening his eyes)
He is gone? This man frightens me! What is this letter he has received? I heard him pronounce the name of Sarranti. Oh -- how weak I am! Help! I am dying.
COMMISSIONER
What's wrong, dear Mr. Gerard?
GERARD
Mr. Henry Bertin. Do you think they can find a priest, sir?
A POLICEMAN
(entering)
Pardon, excuse me, Mr. Commissioner -- it's the monk -- my partner and I met him on the way from Meudon and he sent us ahead, waiting for the doctor.
GERARD
(rising up)
The monk! What monk?
COMMISSIONER
The Curé of Vanvres is away -- and since I knew that a monk was at Meudon, I sent for him. It seems they met him on the way.
GERARD
Then -- then this monk is a stranger to the country?
(Enter Dominique.)
DOMINIQUE
(replying to Gerard's question)
I've come from Rome where I have been received into orders by the hands of His Holiness himself.
GERARD
That's good. Coming from Rome perhaps you have great power. Closer, come closer, Father.
DOMINIQUE
Here I am.
GERARD
It seems to me you are very young.
DOMINIQUE
I am not offering myself, sir, I have been requested.
GERARD
I only mean that at your age, one has not perhaps meditated enough on the somber side of life to reply to the questions that I am going to put to you.
DOMINIQUE
All that I can reply to you, sir, is that if you question my faith, I will reply in faith, and if you question my spirit, well, I will reply spiritually.
GERARD
That's fine, Father. Gentlemen -- leave us.
(Everyone leaves.)
GERARD
Sit down, Father, and come as close to me as possible. I am so weak that I can hardly speak.
(Dominique sits.)
GERARD
Now, in the name of heaven -- don't be scandalized by what I tell you and especially promise me not to abandon me before I have told you all that I have to tell you.
DOMINIQUE
Speak with confidence, sir, I am listening.
GERARD
You know better than I, the dogmas of religion to which you are born -- tell me -- is there a case where the words of a dying man can be revealed by the confessor who has received them?
DOMINIQUE
I know of none, sir.
GERARD
So once you have received my confession, none could force you to make it public?
DOMINIQUE
Not by anyone in the world.
GERARD
Not even by a court, not even by a minister, not even by a King?
DOMINIQUE
Not even by the Vicar of God who sits at Rome.
GERARD
And what ought a priest to do who was placed between death and revealing a secret so confided to him?
DOMINIQUE
He must die.
GERARD
Then listen to me, Father, hear me.
DOMINIQUE
I am waiting.
GERARD
And I, I hesitate. It seems to me that I still have strength and that I can wait. Couldn't you return this evening -- or tomorrow?
DOMINIQUE
Impossible! For it is likely I will not only quit Paris, but France, perhaps tomorrow, perhaps tonight even. Never to return.
GERARD
(aside)
He's leaving -- better him than someone else -- ah! Ah!
DOMINIQUE
What's wrong?
GERARD
Father, Father, I think I am going to die. Help me -- there on the table a flask. Be kind enough -- a sip of liquor which is in the flask.
DOMINIQUE
I understand.
(he makes Gerard take a sip of the liquor)
It's strange. It seems to me I know this man.
GERARD
Listen to me now. I am going to tell you everything succinctly as possible. I'm afraid I won't be able to finish.
DOMINIQUE
(sitting)
Speak, I am listening.
GERARD
I was living in the country a few leagues from Paris. I lived with a woman thirty years of age -- beautiful -- too beautiful for my good. She was born in the mountains of the Pyrenees. She had a bitter and obstinate will, and she had brought me her under her will! My brother, who had left for India, left me with his two children, a boy and a girl -- had recommended one of his friends as their tutor -- a Corsican.
(Dominique passes successively from curiosity to interest and from interest to terror)
My brother died.
DOMINIQUE
The place you lived -- was it called Viry sur Orge?
GERARD
Yes.
DOMINIQUE
Weren't the children called Victor and Leonie?
GERARD
Those were their names.
DOMINIQUE
Oh! I recognize you, now, although I only saw you once before while I was suffering severe pain. You are Mr. Gerard.
GERARD
Yes but you -- who are you?
DOMINIQUE
Don't you recognize me?
GERARD
No!
DOMINIQUE
Have a good look!
GERARD
Who are you, in the name of heaven?
DOMINIQUE
I am Dominique Sarranti!
GERARD
Oh!
DOMINIQUE
I am the son of Phillippe Sarranti, who you accused of murder and theft and who was, by your action, condemned to death, while I was finishing my novitiate.
GERARD
My God! My God!
DOMINIQUE
You see well how you would betray yourself if I listen any longer to your confession; because instead of listening with the charity of a priest and the pardon of a Christian, I would listen with the hate of a son whose father you have dishonored and consequently with a curse in his heart.
(He goes quickly to the door.)
GERARD
No, no, no! Stay -- to the contrary, stay -- it is Providence which has sent you. Stay! It is God who will permit me before dying to repair the harm I have done.
DOMINIQUE
You want that? Take care! I ask nothing better than to stay -- it took a superhuman effort on my part to tell you who I was and not to abuse the luck that brought me near you.
GERARD
No, not luck, but Providence, my brother, Providence. Oh, far from fleeing you, far from fearing you, I had been, before dying, I would have been on top of the world if I'd known how to find you. You here -- listen to me, but no, I feel, I won't have the strength to tell you the horrible deed.
DOMINIQUE
But my father? My father?
GERARD
Well, one of the children was killed by me, the other --
DOMINIQUE
My father, I tell you?
GERARD
But don't you see I am dying?
DOMINIQUE
Oh -- don't die, wretch -- I need the innocence of my father.
GERARD
Yes, your father is innocent.
DOMINIQUE
I knew it -- and yet, I might see him die on the scaffold without the power to save him, for despite the admission you have made to me, sir, as the admission is in confession, I cannot reveal it, and the accusation continues to weigh eternally on the head of my father -- oh, sir, you are indeed infamous!
GERARD
But am I not dying? Do you think that if I didn't feel the mortal wound the horrible secret would ever leave my mouth?
DOMINIQUE
But, you dead, will I be permitted to reveal it?
GERARD
All, father, all -- didn't I thank Heaven for bringing you to my bed?
DOMINIQUE
But who will believe the declaration of a son in favor of his father?
GERARD
Wait -- there -- there in -- the thickness of the wall a secret armoire. Follow the molding of the door. There -- you are there. Push! Do you see a manuscript found in three seals?
DOMINIQUE
A manuscript. Here it is! Here it is!
(reading)
Here is my confession before god and man -- not to be made public before my death -- signed, Gerard.
GERARD
That paper contains word-for-word the story of my weakness; for now it is forbidden to you to reveal it in all its details, but after my death, I relieve you of the secret of the confessional.
DOMINIQUE
It will be according to your wish -- I swear it before God!
GERARD
You see, I succumb to emotion; won't you console me with some words of hope?
DOMINIQUE
Sir, perhaps, you need a more powerful intercession before the Lord than mine. But as for me, I pardon you. Now God willingly ratifies the pardon, that as a priest I beg him to cause to descend on your head.
GERARD
(in a voice almost unintelligible)
And now, what does there remain for me to do?
DOMINIQUE
Pray.
(He goes out.)
GERARD
(alone)
Lord! Lord! Have pity on me! Lord! Lord! Receive me in your mercy!
A SERVANT
(introducing Ludovic)
Now, sir, you can enter, the priest is gone.
LUDOVIC
It's against custom -- after the doctor, the priest -- while today, after the priest, the doctor. Let's hope all this portends well for you, Mr. Gerard.
GERARD
(in a weak voice)
Who's calling me.
LUDOVIC
Eh! The voice is not wheezing. Are you spitting blood?
(Gerard makes a negative sign)
LUDOVIC
Nothing in the lungs consequently. Lividity -- from the enormous quantity of blood lost. Let's see the eye. Look at me! A little distraction caused by terror! The wounds now.
GERARD
Great God -- if I am not going to die!
LUDOVIC
Eh! Eh! I've seen far worse!
GERARD
Oh! The monk! The monk! Run after the monk! Bring him back! No --
(weakening)
If --
(fainting)
This time I am dying.
LUDOVIC
Well -- this is a singular illness. You might say he was terrified of being cured!
(curtain)
The Park at Viry seen at night. To the left the chateau cut away. The lake is seen shining brightly through the trees.
(Salvator and others come from the wall at right.)
SALVATOR
Come on, let's go Roland!
(Roland jumps over the wall, after Roland, Salvator appears at the top of the wall)
Very good, Roland.
JEAN TAUREAU
(from the other side of the wall)
Well? What do you see, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
A great park and at the back a sort of chateau.
JEAN TAUREAU
(showing his head)
And no one?
SALVATOR
No one.
JEAN TAUREAU
You are sure?
SALVATOR
Roland is barking.
JEAN TAUREAU
It's very true -- only watch out for a trap.
SALVATOR
Come down, and tell Sac a Platre to come down in his turn.
JEAN TAUREAU
Well -- he isn't up here yet. Come on -- slow poke.
(he takes Sac a Platre by the collar and passes him over the wall)
There. That does it. My turn.
(He jumps.)
SALVATOR
Come here, Roland.
(The dog and the three men group around a tree.)
SAC A PLATRE
(in a half voice)
But, say Mr. Salvator, I recognize this place.
SALVATOR
You!
JEAN TAUREAU
There's nothing surprising in that, he's from the country.
SAC A PLATRE
Not at all. I am from Savigny -- but that means nothing.
SALVATOR
Well, where are we?
SAC A PLATRE
We are in the Park of the Chateau Viry. I was there several times for Mr. Gerard -- I worked for him -- poor dear man.
SALVATOR
For Mr. Gerard, you said?
SAC A PLATRE
Yes.
SALVATOR
And near Mr. Gerard, did you know a woman named Orsola?
SAC A PLATRE
I should say so! She was his mistress. He was going to marry her when the famous catastrophe took place.
SALVATOR
What catastrophe?
SAC A PLATRE
That of the children killed -- hold, the poor children, I can still see them playing on the lawn. The little boy was called Victor and the little girl, Leonie.
SALVATOR
They are the two children Mr. Sarranti was accused of having killed. Mr. Sarranti was condemned to death in absentia, returned to France and yesterday, unable to endure the infamous accusation which weighed on him, surrendered himself to the authorities. Now, listen here, you who are honest men, instead of submitting him to a jury which would have acquitted him he was deferred here to a military court; in twenty-four hours he will be sentenced; in forty-eight hours executed unless we find proof of his innocence. This proof at all hazards, I've come to look for here. I am going to tell you briefly what hope leads me here. You both know Rose Noel, don't you?
JEAN TAUREAU
The little gypsy.
SAC A PLATRE
I should say we know here.
SALVATOR
Well, Roland and she know each other, too, and my conviction is that Roland played his role in the terrible drama in the month of May 1820, and that Rose Noel is one of the two children Mr. Sarranti is accused of having killed.
JEAN TAUREAU
That would be a providence.
SALVATOR
Through misfortune, Rose Noel whom I wish to question, was kidnapped on the day after we put her in pension at Vanvres, and by another misfortune I was not able to follow her ravisher. Well, this morning, I said to myself, "Let's use Roland's intelligence and the courage of my good friends of Jean Taureau and Sac a Platre." I brought you to the place where I had found Roland and said to him, "Find!" and he led us to the foot of this wall, which he tried to scale. Here we are on the other side of the wall. Sac a Platre recognizes the garden of this chateau. It was the chateau inhabited by Orsola and Mr. Gerard, meaning the two persons whose names made Rose Noel faint. Roland recognized it, too, since he absolutely wants me to leave to let him search. Now what are we going to see? What are we going to find? There's something profoundly funereal in the aspect of all we see. I would be very surprised if some horrible crime wasn't committed here, in fact, the shadow is darker here than elsewhere. The light is weaker than elsewhere -- never mind! Let's continue to seek the cause of all this.
JEAN TAUREAU
Silence -- it seems to me I heard the step of a horse.
SAC A PLATRE
He's passing by the foot of this wall which leads to the side of the chateau.
SALVATOR
Don't budge, Roland!
(approaching the wall)
Come here, Jean Taureau.
(Jean Taureau leans on the wall and holds the short ladder for Salvator, who goes up with his hands -- and looks over the wall.)
Loredan de Valgeneuse! The ravisher of Rose Noel -- what the devil is my dear cousin doing here?
(he comes back down pensively)
Where is Sac a Platre?
JEAN TAUREAU
I saw him glide down that alley. He wanted to hear or see something.
SALVATOR
Nothing upsetting in any case, since Roland didn't budge.
JEAN TAUREAU
Wait.
(he goes down the alley and makes a sign to Salvator not to budge)
Here's someone coming.
SAC A PLATRE
I heard the noise of a carriage.
SALVATOR
Well?
SAC A PLATRE
It stopped at the gate. The gate opened. Two women got out and went into the chateau.
SALVATOR
The windows are lighting up.
JEAN TAUREAU
The devil! This may hinder our investigation.
SALVATOR
It isn't like at this time of night they will go for a walk in the garden. Never mind. Where is your carriage?
SAC A PLATRE
A hundred feet from here -- under the Godeau bridge, guarded by Toussaint.
SALVATOR
You have some ropes?
SAC A PLATRE and JEAN TAUREAU
Yes.
SALVATOR
Your masks?
SAC A PLATRE and JEAN TAUREAU
Yes.
SALVATOR
You are convinced what we are doing is right?
SAC A PLATRE and JEAN TAUREAU
Yes.
SALVATOR
And whatever I order you to do, you are disposed to obey me?
SAC A PLATRE and JEAN TAUREAU
Blindly!
SALVATOR
Then in God's care! -- let's get Pirolet -- wait, what's Roland doing?
JEAN TAUREAU
He's scratching the earth, there, behind this bush at the foot of the tree.
SAC A PLATRE
He's whining.
SALVATOR
What's wrong my good Roland?
(Roland scratches harder)
Hunt, my dog, hunt!
(calling)
Sac a Platre.
(Sac a Platre approaches.)
SALVATOR
The other child was a little boy, right?
SAC A PLATRE
Yes -- his name was Victor.
SALVATOR
You've never mentioned that they found his body.
SAC A PLATRE
No, Mr. Salvator, the authorities have not yet found his body.
SALVATOR
Well -- we are luckier. The cadaver is there. Come Roland! Roland come.
JEAN TAUREAU
Mr. Salvator -- I am a man who never fears anybody. Well, word of Jean Taureau, I am trembling like a child.
SALVATOR
Why not? I am trembling, too.
(noise of a scream)
What is this again?
JEAN TAUREAU
Some one screamed.
SAC A PLATRE
A woman!
ROSE NOEL
(in the distance)
Help -- help -- help!
SALVATOR
It's Rose Noel's voice!
ROSE NOEL
Help -- come to me! I am dying!
SALVATOR
Rose, come to me! This way. Hold Roland, you two --
(the two men restrain Roland by his collar)
This way, Rose, it's me, Salvator!
ROSE NOEL
(entering, pale, out of breath)
Salvator, my friend! Help me, protect me! Save me!
SALVATOR
From whom? From what? I will defend you against whoever you wish.
ROSE NOEL
Mr. Gerard! My father! Orsola! They brought me to this cursed house. Save me! Save me!
VOICE OF LOREDAN
Rose! Dear Rose! What's wrong with you? Don't you know that I love you and that I respect you?
ROSE NOEL
He's coming! He's coming! Where can I hide?
SALVATOR
It's him, it's Loredan! Fear nothing!
(to Sac a Platre and Jean Taureau)
Hold Roland! Put on your masks. Get the rope ready. And obey me as you promised to do.
SAC A PLATRE and JEAN TAUREAU
We are ready.
SALVATOR
Have no fear, Rose.
ROSE NOEL
Oh! Near you, I fear nothing.
LOREDAN
(hunting for Rose)
Rose Noel! My dear Rose! Where are you?
SALVATOR
Over here, sir!
LOREDAN
Salvator! What have you come here for?
SALVATOR
You see, sir, I am come to look for Rose Noel who you carried off.
LOREDAN
I find you here in a garden, which is my property, you have climbed the walls like a bandit. I will treat you like a bandit.
(He draws a pistol from his pocket and intends to fire on Salvator. Rose Noel covers him with her body.)
SALVATOR
And I, I treat you as a madman. Take this man.
(Jean Taureau and Sac a Platre hurl themselves on him.)
SALVATOR
Gag him!
SALVATOR
Tie him! Is it done?
SAC A PLATRE and JEAN TAUREAU
Yes.
LOREDAN
Oh! You wretch!
SALVATOR
In the house you know, near the Cour de France, you will hide the gentlemen from sight for forty-eight hours and not let him leave. There are provisions there for three days. Go!
JEAN TAUREAU
(putting Loredan on his shoulder)
Come, my dear, sir.
(Sac a Platre and Jean Taureau go over the wall carrying Loredan.)
ROSE NOEL
Salvator!
SALVATOR
Dear child!
ROSE NOEL
Oh, my God, how did you get here? Who brought you here?
SALVATOR
Providence! A miracle! God who doesn't want the innocent to be punished instead of the guilty. But let's not waste time. It's my job to ask the questions and yours to reply.
ROSE NOEL
Ask -- I will tell you everything, everything.
SALVATOR
Hear, in my breast, in my arms, you have no fear, right?
ROSE NOEL
No, and I am very happy!
SALVATOR
It was here in this house you were brought up, right?
ROSE NOEL
Yes, with my poor brother.
SALVATOR
You are the niece of Mr. Gerard?
ROSE NOEL
(trembling)
Yes.
SALVATOR
Don't be afraid! Don't tremble! You have nothing to fear now. He had a housekeeper named Orsola? I told you not to be afraid.
ROSE NOEL
Yes.
SALVATOR
Well, now, on May 20th, 1820, what happened?
ROSE NOEL
Hold me to you, Salvator!
SALVATOR
Speak, child. On each of your trembling words hangs the life of a man. You remember everything, right?
ROSE NOEL
Oh, I do indeed. I don't think what happened in the afternoon would have happened but for a letter brought earlier.
SALVATOR
It announced the death of your father.
ROSE NOEL
Towards four o'clock in the afternoon, Mr. Sarranti returned, very pale, very agitated. He spoke for a short while with Mr. Gerard, then got on his horse with Jean, and both of them left at a gallop.
SALVATOR
Because he stole a hundred thousand shillings and murdered your brother?
ROSE NOEL
Not for that! Others did it.
SALVATOR
Gerard and Orsola?
ROSE NOEL
Yes.
SALVATOR
(turning his eyes to heaven)
I knew it! Continue.
ROSE NOEL
We had dinner, Victor and me on the terrace, then they sent the gardener to Morsang! After dinner, Mr. Gerard took his rifle and led my brother to hunt.
SALVATOR
Continue --
ROSE NOEL
I really wanted to go with him. I was afraid to stay alone with Orsola, for I had seen her place a knife on the table.
SALVATOR
I am listening.
ROSE NOEL
She led me off by force. I was afraid; I cried. And then passing in front of a window that gave on the lake.
SALVATOR
Courage. Go on!
ROSE NOEL
Oh it was so terrible I can see it.
SALVATOR
You see Mr. Gerard, who was drowning your brother, right?
ROSE NOEL
(eyes fixed as if she were seeing it again)
Yes! Yes! There! I called for help and at the same time, I felt a wound in my throat, I was blinded by my blood. I called Bresil. Bresil by good luck broke his chain and ran, he got in, I don't know how -- coming through the door, he leapt for Orsola's throat, who in her turn uttered a scream. I felt her hands release me. I escaped. The park's gate was closed. I got through a hole.
SALVATOR
The same without doubt which Roland passed through?
ROSE NOEL
I ran, I ran, I was mad with terror. I must have run two or three leagues. Then I stopped at a great highway where a carriage had stopped. It was that of Brocanti. She saw me, covered with blood -- nearly fainting, dying, I cried to her "Hide me -- hide me." She hid me in her carriage. You know the rest, right?
SALVATOR
Right up to the day you were kidnapped by Mr. de Valgeneuse. Now, I understand your joy and astonishment, in meeting Roland or rather Bresil, your emotion at the name of the Mr. Sarranti, your fright at those of Mr. Gerard and Orsola. Only, you have to tell me how you got here.
ROSE NOEL
I myself hardly know. The night I was kidnapped I came down with a fever and was delirious. Mr. Loredan was obliged to stop in a town, I don't know where -- when I came to myself, it was his sister who was near my bed.
SALVATOR
Suzanne?
ROSE NOEL
Yes -- she told me I had nothing to fear from her brother, that I had to pardon the violence of the passion which I had inspired in him. That he didn't want to make me his mistress but his wife. I replied to her that wife or mistress, I would never belong to him. Mr. de Valgeneuse had never come back to see me -- only each day his sister received a letter which she read to me, which was full of his passion for me. Succumbing to fatigue believing they had taken me far from Paris, I was sleeping when the carriage stopped at the door of the chateau. I got up, hardly awake, and they left me in a room. At first I did not recognize this room, the furnishings were different. I found myself in the midst of an elegance which was unfamiliar to me. But little by little, my memories returned and with them, an unspeakable terror. I was in a house of murder! After seven years, chance fatally brought me back to the same place I had left. I opened the door and I recognized the room where Orsola tried to murder me and was herself killed. I opened the window and I recognized the lake where my poor brother perished. It was in this moving moment that another door opened and Mr. de Valgeneuse appeared. Then it was more than fear, terror, fright -- it was madness. I rose to the heights, screaming "Help, help!" You heard me. Your voice guided me -- I came to you -- I hurled myself in your arms -- ! Now, you are here, I don't fear anyone. What is there to say -- ? What is to be done? Where must one go? My dear savior, I will listen to you and obey you.
SALVATOR
Oh -- my beloved child -- an atheist who heard your story would be forced to fall to his knees and say "My God! I believe you." But you said, I think that Miss Suzanne de Valgeneuse accompanied you?
ROSE NOEL
Yes.
SALVATOR
Where is she?
ROSE NOEL
(pointing to the chateau)
She is there.
SALVATOR
That's good. I have a score to settle with her. I am going there.
ROSE NOEL
And me?
SALVATOR
You are going to stay here.
ROSE NOEL
I would never dare.
SALVATOR
And if I give you a guardian as sure as myself?
ROSE NOEL
Who?
SALVATOR
Bresil.
ROSE NOEL
Where is he?
SALVATOR
There.
ROSE NOEL
Bresil?
SALVATOR
(excitedly)
Don't go. Sit there at the foot of this tree -- Bresil!
ROSE NOEL
Bresil!
(Bresil comes slowly.)
SALVATOR
Bresil. Protect Leonie, and think that you will answer to me for her.
(The dog lies at her feet head on her knees.)
SALVATOR
Wait for me -- both of you -- innocence and fidelity, under the protection of the Lord.
ROSE NOEL
(arms toward him)
Salvator!
SALVATOR
I will return or I will call you.
ROSE NOEL
And we will wait.
(Salvator goes. Rose Noel leans her head on the dog.)
(curtain)
Same as in Prologue only the furnishings and tapestries are new.
SUZANNE
(on the balcony, alone)
I see nothing. I hear nothing. Decidedly nothing will tame this little savage! But I hope Loredan won't fail. It's well worth the trouble. A fortune of four or five millions! For certain, this little girl is in love with someone. Who could she love? An individual of her class -- some gypsy. Ah, I hear some steps. Is it you, my brother?
SALVATOR
(enters)
No, it's me, cousin.
SUZANNE
Mr. Salvator!
SALVATOR
Say Conrad! Didn't we recognize each other at Petrus' studio at first glance?
SUZANNE
I thought you were dead, sir!
SALVATOR
In effect, I am.
SUZANNE
Then I'm having business with a ghost.
SALVATOR
Or something like.
SUZANNE
How I detest enigmas and love plain talk. Who are you? What do you want?
SALVATOR
I am a man who has believed for a long time that you had a heart, Suzanne, and who believing this, loved you madly.
SUZANNE
And did you rise from the grave to tell me that?
SALVATOR
No, I tell you this in passing -- something that is in the past.
SUZANNE
Then, you no longer love me?
SALVATOR
I have that happiness. You ask me who I am and what I want. I came here precisely to tell you that.
SUZANNE
Will it be that long?
SALVATOR
Long enough for you to take a seat if you are afraid of tiring yourself.
SUZANNE
And you?
SALVATOR
I'll stand up, if you like.
SUZANNE
This story ought to be curious.
SALVATOR
And full of interest, I swear to you.
SUZANNE
For me?
SALVATOR
Especially for you.
SUZANNE
Even if, following the example you have given me, I no longer love you?
SALVATOR
You will always love your fortune and your position, two things which only I can take from you.
SUZANNE
You can take away my fortune and my position? Ridiculous!
SALVATOR
You will permit me to prove it to you?
SUZANNE
By all means!
SALVATOR
I am the natural son of the Marquis de Valgeneuse.
SUZANNE
The biological son -- but not recognized.
SALVATOR
Unfortunately for you.
SUZANNE
Why's that?
SALVATOR
As a natural son, he could not leave me, if I was recognized, more than a fifth of his fortune. As nonrecognized, he could leave me everything.
SUZANNE
By will.
SALVATOR
You understand.
SUZANNE
With much more facility, but he left no will.
SALVATOR
He left no will?
SUZANNE
No.
SALVATOR
The rumor is he had two. One which he dictated to his notary, Mr. Barrateau, and one which was shut in his desk.
SUZANNE
As I recall, neither one was found.
SALVATOR
In this manner, my father dying intestate, his fortune went to your father and consequently to you.
SUZANNE
At which time, my father offered you an income of six thousand francs.
SALVATOR
Which I refused.
SUZANNE
With a dignity that everyone admired.
SALVATOR
Yes, but what I supported with less dignity than the loss of my fortune was the loss of your love. Without you, who for more than two years I regarded as my life's companion, life appeared to me impossible. I decided to kill myself.
SUZANNE
I am pleased to see you gave up that resolution.
SALVATOR
Not completely, since, not being killed, I am no less dead because of it.
SUZANNE
Now that you will have to explain to me.
SALVATOR
I am going to do it briefly. I went to buy the ammunition necessary to blow my brains out. Good fortune caused me to pass before St. Roch, and the idea came to me to address one last prayer to God. A monk was preaching against suicide. In the midst of a number of listeners, an errand-boy listened to the monk. At this monk's words, I felt remorse born in my heart, and ready to die, I resolved to live in another form. I was without any resources. I knew no job nor trade -- I must live by my own strength. I questioned the errand-boy and what he told me of his job pleased me. Only, so that I could break with my old friends, all the world must believe me dead. I had often studied anatomy at the Hotel Dieu, I said I wanted to study a body at home -- I got a medic that I knew to let me have a subject -- I hid it in my bed -- I wrote a letter in which I declared I had decided to kill myself -- and I asked those who found my body not to accuse anyone of my death and I discharged my pistol in the face of the one I wanted buried in my place. All happened as I planned; a doctor attested to my suicide, and seated on my errand-boy's cushions I watched my own funeral.
SUZANNE
And I had the naivety to cry for you with hot tears.
SALVATOR
You are very kind.
SUZANNE
But all that tells me nothing to the point, dear cousin; how you can dispossess me of my fortune and my position?
SALVATOR
Do you believe in Providence, my beautiful cousin?
SUZANNE
I have my days.
SALVATOR
Well, I am going to tell you a little anecdote which will make you understand why I believe it.
SUZANNE
Speak! You have no idea the interest with which I am listening to you.
SALVATOR
Well, listen to what I am going to tell you then, and don't let a word escape you. One day when I was practicing my business as errand-boy, I took a letter to a merchant of bric-a-brac in the Rue de la Paix, and while waiting for a response to my letter, I looked over his old boxes and saw an old desk of rosewood which struck me as familiar and I recognized a little desk which once belonged to my father.
SUZANNE
You mean to say to the Marquis de Valgeneuse.
SALVATOR
Excuse me, I always make that mistake -- it's only habit. A sort of filial piety caused me to purchase this furniture and it cost me twice what it is worth, but as I had had a good day's work, I bought it and brought it home where I amused myself by looking it over very carefully. I recalled then that there was a double bottomed drawer, but this secret was very well hidden, something I learned from my father, excuse me, the Marquis. Well, I found the opening and the drawer opened -- can you imagine what I found?
SUZANNE
How do you expect me to imagine that?
SALVATOR
You're right -- well I found the copy of the will made by Mr. Barrateau which had been lost and vainly searched for -- and whose loss was the cause of my ruin and your fortune.
SUZANNE
(stupefied)
You found it again?
SALVATOR
Oh! My God, yes, that will.
SUZANNE
How long ago was it?
SALVATOR
A year -- a little more.
SUZANNE
This is impossible.
SALVATOR
And why?
SUZANNE
In a year, you'd have had your rights evaluated.
SALVATOR
To what good?
SUZANNE
Well, if only, not to stay an errand-boy all your life.
SALVATOR
I love my job.
SUZANNE
What! You prefer to carry letters for ten sous and packages for twenty, than to have a two hundred thousand francs income?
SALVATOR
I don't just carry letter and packages.
SUZANNE
What do you do then?
SALVATOR
A host of other things which amuse me. As for example at this moment.
SUZANNE
Well?
SALVATOR
I am recovering a young woman that your brother carried off.
SUZANNE
Ah!
SALVATOR
And whom I have taken back from him.
SUZANNE
From my brother?
SALVATOR
From your brother.
SUZANNE
From Loredan?
SALVATOR
From Loredan.
SUZANNE
And he let you do it so easily?
SALVATOR
No, oh, he drew a gun on me.
SUZANNE
And --
SALVATOR
And he lost.
SUZANNE
Come on!
SALVATOR
You always disbelieve what I tell you.
SUZANNE
Certainly, I doubt it.
SALVATOR
(opening the window)
Well -- look -- there -- down there at the foot of the tree. In the ray of moonlight. Do you see Rose Noel with Bresil who is guarding her?
SUZANNE
Where is my brother?
SALVATOR
He is --
(laughing)
He is where I put those I don't want to disturb me.
SUZANNE
And you are not afraid to attack us this way?
SALVATOR
Since I found the will, I've become very audacious!
SUZANNE
(after a moment of silent rage)
I would really like to see this will!
SALVATOR
Could it really be true you have this desire?
SUZANNE
Very seriously.
SALVATOR
Oh dear cousin, it will never be said that on the day I had the good fortune to find you again, you had a desire which I could fulfill and did not.
SUZANNE
You have this will on you?
SALVATOR
A will worth four million is worth keeping about -- especially when it has been lost for nearly two years.
(he pulls a portfolio from his pocket)
You know the Marquis' handwriting, right, dear cousin?
SUZANNE
Without doubt, I know it.
SALVATOR
(putting the paper before her eyes)
Well look: "This is my Last Will and Testament written in my own handwriting, a copy of which is in the possession of Mr. Barrateau, notary, Rue de Bac No. 31 -- signed by Marquis de Valgeneuse."
SUZANNE
And you've shown this paper to Loredan?
SALVATOR
Oh! No! I reserved it first for you. I don't know if this attention will please your brother, dear cousin, but I can give you my word of honor that you are the first person who has seen it -- after me.
SUZANNE
And to what end do you show it to me?
SALVATOR
Only to make you understand that you have all sorts of reasons to be nice to me. That is, of course, dear cousin, to be set down to revenge.
SUZANNE
And your desire to be nice to me goes to the point of--
SALVATOR
Goes to assure that something is happening -- if you do me the services I have come to ask you -- goes to assure you of a million under this will.
SUZANNE
And, if not?
SALVATOR
And if not, I will take the value of the will in its entirety, and keep the four million for myself. But, believe it, from a friend, accept the million and do me the service.
SUZANNE
What is my guaranty?
SALVATOR
My word of honor.
SUZANNE
What are you doing?
SALVATOR
I see that you accept.
SUZANNE
And then?
SALVATOR
(ringing)
And now, I am ringing.
SUZANNE
Why?
SALVATOR
To put the horses to the carriage.
A SERVANT
(entering)
Madame rang?
SUZANNE
Yes. Harness up!
(Servant leaves)
Where am I going?
SALVATOR
To Paris.
SUZANNE
And at Paris, what will I do?
SALVATOR
You will go to the prefect of police and request a promotion for Mr. Jackal.
SUZANNE
Why the promotion of Mr. Jackal? I thought he was your enemy?
SALVATOR
That's exactly the way I deal with my enemies. To one I give a million, to the other advancement. Only, this promotion must be given to Mr. Jackal by noon tomorrow and he must leave Paris by two o'clock. Have you something against Mr. Jackal, my beautiful cousin?
SUZANNE
On the contrary, he rendered my brother and myself a service at Madame Desmarest's, which I must reward, in supposing his intention be taken for fact, but it astonishes me you pay a million for a service I would have done for nothing.
SALVATOR
It was the only way I had of offering it to you.
SERVANT
(returning)
Madame's carriage is ready.
(Suzanne takes a step to the door but returns, looking fixedly at Salvator.)
SUZANNE
So, you no longer love me, Conrad?
SALVATOR
(laughing)
Oh, dear cousin, how can you ask such a question of a man who blew out his brains for you?
SUZANNE
Decidedly, I was stupid, Mr. Jackal will have his promotion before noon tomorrow.
SALVATOR
And you, dear cousin, you will have your million on the day you marry.
SUZANNE
Goodbye, cousin.
(Suzanne leaves.)
SALVATOR
(alone)
She's a very intelligent woman, my cousin de Valgeneuse, but I doubt she will ever make her husband happy. She's gone. Bon Voyage! Now let's call Rose Noel.
(opens window)
Rose! Rose! Come my child.
ROSE NOEL
(outside)
Here we are! Come, Bresil! Come!
SALVATOR
Poor child. I understand what fear she must have had. For her, this house is full of ghosts.
(pointing to the room in which Orsola had been killed)
Here, Orsola's --
(pointing to the lake)
There that of her brother. If she had known down there that she was sitting ten paces from the ditch where little Victor was -- here she is.
ROSE NOEL
Bresil -- come, Bresil -- don't leave me.
SALVATOR
Rest easy, my child. Neither Bresil nor I will ever leave you again.
ROSE NOEL
Oh -- then I will be very happy.
SALVATOR
But you must be brave. You mustn't let these terrors prevent the truth from leaving your mouth. What you told me -- that Mr. Gerard was guilty and Mr. Sarranti innocent. It must be said again, publicly to the whole world. What you told me of the murder your brother by his uncle and of your murder by Orsola -- it must be repeated to the justices. The justices, you see, are delegates of the Lord on earth and you cannot lie to God's judges.
ROSE NOEL
Oh, I will never lie, I will be courageous, I will tell everything, I will tell all. Besides, I know that you are there to help me, to encourage me, to protect me. With you, near to you, and even far from you, now that I have found you, I fear nothing.
SALVATOR
Come, I have a sure place to hide you.
(Mr. Jackal appears.)
MR. JACKAL
Why hide the young lady -- doesn't she have a natural protector in Mr. Gerard, her uncle?
SALVATOR
Mr. Jackal.
ROSE NOEL
What is this man talking about, my good friend?
MR. JACKAL
I am saying, Miss, that you owe thanks to Mr. Salvator for the trouble he has taken to get you from your ravisher, Mr. Loredan de Valgeneuse, but you see, he got here a few minutes ahead of me. Would you please follow me?
ROSE NOEL
But I don't wish to leave Mr. Salvator. I don't want to! I don't want to!
(She hugs Salvator.)
MR. JACKAL
Mr. Salvator, be good enough to make this child understand, since she appears to me to have the greatest confidence in you, that as neither her husband nor her brother, nor her relative, you can not claim the right to protect her. That right belongs to her nearest relative after her father, that right belongs to her uncle, Mr. Gerard. Come Miss!
ROSE NOEL
Never! Never! Help me, Salvator, help me!
MR. JACKAL
The law does not discuss, Miss, it demands, and you have in Mr. Salvator a very wise advisor who will tell you to obey it without delay or rebellion.
SALVATOR
(to Jackal)
Mr. Jackal, are you the bearer of a decree which orders the young lady to be returned to the hands of her uncle?
MR. JACKAL
Here it is, Mr. Salvator.
SALVATOR
(after having glanced at the paper)
Obey, my child! But fear nothing, I watch over you and were you in the claws of Satan, by the living God, I will tear you from them.
(curtain)
Gerard's room -- same decorations as Scene vi.
(At the rise, Gerard is occupied arranging sacks of gold in a suitcase. Someone knocks at the door. He shuts the suitcase and the door of the hiding place.)
GERARD
Who is it?
LUDOVIC
(outside)
Me, the doctor.
GERARD
Come in, dear Mr. Ludovic.
LUDOVIC
On your feet! And opening the door by yourself. Do you know you are sound without looking so? Without doubt, as I told you the first day I saw you, when you were apparently in so much pain. It wasn't a serious wound, but you had lost a devilish lot of blood. It's true that with good bouillon and roast beef, the blood would come back rapidly. How many days since your accident took place?
GERARD
Nine days today.
LUDOVIC
Well, at the end of nine days, it's fine! Continue and if you wish to follow my advice in two or three weeks, you will take a little trip which will put you completely right.
GERARD
I was just about to leave, my dear, sir, when this horrible misfortune happened to me -- and I have my passport ready to travel.
LUDOVIC
Go to Italy, then Mr. Gerard, go to Italy. Is there nothing to keep you in Paris?
GERARD
Nothing.
LUDOVIC
No children?
GERARD
No children.
LUDOVIC
No nieces? No nephews?
GERARD
No.
LUDOVIC
Millionaire?
GERARD
People say so, but --
LUDOVIC
You, you needn't hide anything from me, it is not my fees that will ruin you. One hundred sous per visit, it's a nice price and still if you find it too expensive, I won't come back. At present, you are cured, my dear sir. Only, don't forget you won't always have such luck.
GERARD
On the contrary, come back, come back, as much as you like. No, your visits not only cure me, they make me feel good.
LUDOVIC
The Devil! Don't go around saying that; you will do me harm. A feel-good doctor cannot be a serious physician. And now, by my word, I am going to leave you in good company. Here's Mr. Jackal, who is probably coming to tell you he has caught your assailant. It's all the same, but it must pain you when you read, as was said in the papers, that you were dead. Mr. Jackal, you know that I am one of your admirers.
MR. JACKAL
I return the compliment, sir, for you have accomplished a magnificent cure you know.
LUDOVIC
(joking)
Have you found the woman?
MR. JACKAL
If she has not been found, she will be.
LUDOVIC
Let's hope so!
(He leaves singing.)
MR. JACKAL
You have a charming doctor there, Mr. Gerard.
GERARD
Yes, and I told him just now I am always happier after he leaves me.
MR. JACKAL
Well, I bring you news which will make you happier still.
GERARD
Really?
MR. JACKAL
But take the trouble to have a seat, you are still weak.
(Gerard sits)
Since I've known you, dear Mr. Gerard, I have noticed in you a bit of sadness, melancholy and taciturnity.
GERARD
The fact is I'm not gay.
MR. JACKAL
I said to myself, "There's no sadness without some reason."
(Gerard sighs)
Well, what makes this brave Mr. Gerard sad is the death of his nephew, Victor, and the disappearance of his niece, Leonie. His nephew one cannot bring back to him, but his niece can be found again.
GERARD
(shaking his head)
I have done all I could to achieve this result and I have not succeeded.
MR. JACKAL
Because you do not have at your disposition the means that I have. Also, I've been luckier than you.
GERARD
(frightened)
Luckier than me! What have you done then?
MR. JACKAL
I've done some research.
GERARD
(paling)
You?
MR. JACKAL
Yes, and --
GERARD
(with a voice out of breath)
And?
MR. JACKAL
And I have found her.
GERARD
Who?
MR. JACKAL
Leonie, your niece!
GERARD
My God!
MR. JACKAL
Come on, good! You're going to be sick with joy now -- Ah, dear Mr. Gerard, you have a very tender heart.
GERARD
And where is she?
MR. JACKAL
Below in the carriage. She's only waiting for your permission to throw herself in your arms.
GERARD
Oh!
MR. JACKAL
(to the wings)
Mr. Gerard says he cannot resist his impatience -- have Miss Leonie come up.
(Gerard gets up and goes trembling to the room at the rear)
Where are you going?
GERARD
I don't know.
MR. JACKAL
My dear Mr. Gerard, you don't seem to be completely right in your head and therefore you won't object that an officer of the government takes some precautions. A single moment of madness can sometimes cause irreparable damage. I bring you back your neice, Leonie. She's a beautiful girl of sixteen, so beset by misfortune that from the moment I received the order placing her back in your hands, she inspired in me the liveliest interest and I tell you, my dear Mr. Gerard, it's in your care that this charming girl is placed. Well, take care nothing bad happens to her, watch that a single hair doesn't fall from her head, for wherever you may be, even in a foreign country, even in America, even in China, I will reach out my arm and bring you to me -- and then, you know the old adage -- tooth for tooth, eye for eye -- head for head -- ! But what's wrong with you? You are not listening to me. What I am now saying has its importance.
GERARD
(eye fixed on the door)
Mr. Jackal! Mr. Jackal! Do you see -- !
MR. JACKAL
Certainly, I see! I see your niece entering and I am withdrawing to leave you all the pleasure of seeing her again. Goodbye, Mr. Gerard! Goodbye Miss.
(to gendarmes)
Gentlemen, you have nothing to do here.
(Stops at the most distant part of the room. Gerard looks at her with a profound terror. Moment of silence.)
GERARD
(in a voice he tries to render caressing)
Leonie, my dear Leonie, is it really you?
LEONIE
Myself! And if you doubt it, look, uncle.
(she opens her collar)
There's the scar from Orsola's knife!
GERARD
Yes, she was an evil creature, and who, to me also, did evil! But God has punished her.
LEONIE
If it was God who punished her, why since she was the least guilty of the two, was she punished the most severely?
GERARD
Leonie! Leonie! Remember how much I loved you.
LEONIE
I remember that the one you loved the best was my brother Victor. Your preferences are terrible, uncle. They kill. Don't love me too much.
GERARD
You are right, Leonie, accuse me, overwhelm me, condemn me. Never, no never, can you say more than my conscience has said. Look at me! It's seven years since that wretched crime was committed; I have aged twenty years in seven years. It's really a terrible thing, isn't it? That you find yourself face-to-face with me in the sunlight. That to see you enter, pale and threatening in this room, and when I doubt it's you, to see you trace the scar from Orsola's knife, telling me "look." Well, less terrible I tell you, than to see in my dreams the hair running in the water of the lake and the pressed face, the ghostly sight of your poor brother crying to me, "Uncle, Uncle, good Uncle, do not kill me." But let's let the poor child sleep in his tomb. He rests there more peacefully than I do in my bed, I am sure of it -- and let's concern ourselves with you, my dear Leonie -- of your future, of your happiness. You are young, you are pretty, you can be happy. I don't speak of riches.
(going to the door which he opens)
Hold on, this armoire contains millions -- for fear of having them stolen, I created this hiding place. No one knows of it. No one can find it when it is closed; it only opens to the a touch known only to me. Some thieves came, they threatened me with death if I wouldn't tell them where my money was -- I told them nothing. It was for you, Leonie, that I protected all this. For me, I have no need of it, what would I do with it? Come on, it's ready, let's leave. You see my portfolio, there is my passport. There it is. The carriage is below -- at our disposal -- nothing keeps us here -- come Leonie, let us go.
LEONIE
I am not leaving.
GERARD
What do you mean, not leaving?
LEONIE
No, my testimony is necessary, I am staying.
GERARD
Your testimony is necessary for what?
LEONIE
So the innocent will not be condemned in place of the guilty.
GERARD
(almost threatening)
Oh, you wish to stay to denounce me -- to have me condemned -- to see me on the scaffold?
LEONIE
No, but to see that Mr. Sarranti does not mount in your place.
GERARD
Sarranti, Sarranti. What does that man matter to you? Fate pursues him, abandon him to his fate.
LEONIE
Meaning you want me to kill him when with a word, I can save him? You want my nights to be haunted by a specter, only your ghost is merely that of a drowned child who cries, "Good uncle, don't kill me!" My ghost would be an innocent who from the height of the scaffold cried to me "Wretch, you let me die!" I don't leave.
GERARD
Oh -- willingly or by force, it's necessary for you to leave.
LEONIE
Willingly, I have told you, I won't leave. By force, how will you do it? Will you drag me down the stairs? In the stairs, I will scream! You will shut me in a carriage. In the carriage I will scream! You'll keep me in this room. In this room there is a window and from the window, I will scream. You will take me to a desert -- in the desert I will scream! And take care! In place of judges to hear me in this desert, there will be God! The man who brought me, here told you that he gave you your crime to conceal. He lied, it was your punishment.
GERARD
(head in his hand)
Frightful logic of murder! Here I am forced, because I committed one murder. Either to submit to punishment or commit a second -- Leonie!
LEONIE
(running to the window and opening it)
Don't come near me or I will scream!
GERARD
Leonie, I am not threatening you, I am begging you.
LEONIE
Begging or threatening, sir, little matter! You are a man and you are armed. I am a child without defense, but I am much stronger, I am more invulnerable than you, because I am the truth, because I am justice, because I am the law!
GERARD
What is there for me to do then?
LEONIE
To open the door for me and to tell me "Go freely where your duty tells you to go" or rather --
GERARD
Or rather?
LEONIE
Or rather kill me, as you killed my brother.
GERARD
She too!
(looks around him, sees the door of the hiding place open and appears struck by an idea to himself)
Well, I will not kill you. I will leave you to die.
(threatening)
Leonie!
LEONIE
(opening the window)
Help!
(Gerard leaps on her and throws his cloak over her)
GERARD
Ah, you scream!
LEONIE
(in a weakening voice)
Help! Help! Murder!
GERARD
(drags her to the hiding place and locks her in)
Scream now! We will see if, when I am gone, when all the doors are shut, we will see if someone will hear you and come open for you.
(he takes the suitcase full of gold and goes to the door, then recoils)
The monk! What do you want with me?
DOMINIQUE
I am going to tell you.
GERARD
Not at this time, not at this moment. This evening, tomorrow, the day after.
DOMINIQUE
No, immediately.
GERARD
I cannot.
(Gerard goes to the door, Dominique bars his way.)
DOMINIQUE
You shall not pass.
GERARD
Too late! Five minutes too late!
DOMINIQUE
It is God who measures time. Will you listen to me?
GERARD
Speak then.
DOMINIQUE
I come to ask you the right to reveal your confession.
GERARD
Meaning you come to ask my death, meaning you come to lead me by the hand to the scaffold?
DOMINIQUE
No, sir, for this permission granted to no longer oppose your departure.
GERARD
My departure -- and after that, you denounce me, the telegraph follows me, and ten leagues, twenty leagues, thirty leagues from here, they arrest me.
DOMINIQUE
I give you my word, sir, and you know I am a slave to my word, that tomorrow at noon -- meaning when you are in Belgium, I will exercise your permission.
GERARD
And when I am in Belgium, as there is a murder, you will obtain my extradition.
DOMINIQUE
I will not solicit it, sir. I am a man of peace. I ask only that the sinner repent and not that he be punished. I wish not that you die, but that my father not die.
GERARD
Impossible! You ask an impossible thing of me.
DOMINIQUE
What you are doing is terrible! At this moment, the court is deliberating the fate of my father, perhaps at this instant, they are pronouncing his sentence and the court's orders are executed in forty-eight hours.
GERARD
The agreement you had with me is exact, after my death, yes, but so long as I live, no, no, a thousand times no. Let me pass then. You can do nothing against me.
DOMINIQUE
(in complete despair)
Sir, you know that to persuade you I have employed all means, all words, all prayers, all supplications, which can raise an echo in the heart of a man? Do you think if there was a possibility of saving my father outside of this; I would propose it to you; if there is a way, say it, I ask nothing better to use it, even if it will kill my worldly body and lose my soul in the next. Wait, I put myself at your knees to beg you to save my father. A way -- indicate a way.
GERARD
I don't know of any! Let me pass!
DOMINIQUE
And if I kill you?
(Salvator rushes in and restrains Dominique)
SALVATOR
Stop -- such a rogue doesn't deserve to die by the and of an honest man! Help, Roland!
(Roland rushes into the room and jumps at the throat of Gerard who rolls with him behind the bed.)
GERARD
Protect me from the dog -- and let me leave -- and I will sign whatever you wish.
(Salvator pulls the dog from Gerard.)
SALVATOR
Good work, Roland!
DOMINIQUE
(taking a pen and presenting it with a manuscript to Gerard)
Write! Tuesday -- 11 a.m. I authorize the son of Mr. Sarranti to reveal my confession, Wednesday at noon. Sign!
(Gerard signs.)
SALVATOR
And now go hang where it pleases God and human justice to adorn a gibbet! Go -- go away -- wretch!
DOMINIQUE
(hugging Salvator)
Oh, my savior! Embrace me!
SALVATOR
Now -- where is Rose Noel?
DOMINIQUE
Rose Noel? I haven't seen her.
SALVATOR
She ought to be here now. Mr. Jackal brought her here this morning. Ah -- in the other room without doubt.
(he goes in)
Rose Noel.
DOMINIQUE
(calling)
Leonie! Leonie!
SALVATOR
(pale, frightened, reappears at the door)
Rose Noel! Rose Noel! Where are you.
DOMINIQUE
My God! What are you afraid of?
SALVATOR
Everything! This man is capable of everything!
DOMINIQUE
He must have killed her to flee, just as he killed her brother.
SALVATOR
My God!
DOMINIQUE
Listen! No -- I thought I heard a groan.
SALVATOR
Ah, that's her. It cannot be her last cry. Where is she, my God? Where is she?
(to Roland, who scratches the wall)
What are you doing, Roland? What's wrong with him? Look, my dog -- look --
(after a pause)
Dead or alive, Rose Noel is there.
DOMINIQUE
Wait.
SALVATOR
Not the door! The wall. Oh -- if necessary I will tear the house down to find her body. Rose Noel! Rose Noel!
DOMINIQUE
I remember a nook hollowed in the wall is where he'd hid his gold -- it's where he hid a manuscript -- a spring, a secret. God permitted that he showed it to me.
(He presses the spring, the hiding place opens -- one sees Rose Noel on her knees, suffocating, almost asphyxiated. She has, with her teeth and her hands torn the cloak apart, through which her head and one of her arms have broken through in the struggle.)
SALVATOR
(taking her in his arms)
Oh! Rose Noel! Living. Thanks to God!
LEONIE
Oh, Salvator, I knew it was you who saved me.
MR. JACKAL
(entering)
Gentlemen! Gentlemen!
DOMINIQUE and SALVATOR
Mr. Jackal.
MR. JACKAL
Yes, Mr. Jackal in person who comes to tell you that thanks to the influence of a powerful and unknown person he has been named central Commissioner at Toulon.
(to Gerard, who enters)
If you ever pass by there, Mr. Gerard, I will put myself at your disposal.
SALVATOR
But how does he know that Mr. Gerard --
MR. JACKAL
It's quite simple. Before leaving for my new destination, I came to pay a visit to Mr. Henry, my protege. All of a sudden, I saw pass in a post chaise, Mr. Gerard, who, instead of parting with his niece as I expressly recommended, was leaving alone. I was afraid some misfortune had happened to Rose Noel, who I love very much and I brought Mr. Gerard back here to demand a little explanation.
SALVATOR
I am going to give it to you. Mr. Gerard, in leaving had thrown his niece living into this sepulchre where she would be dead at this time had we not got her out thanks to Bresil.
MR. JACKAL
Well -- as I've always said, Mr. Salvator, cherchez la femme!
(curtain)