watched thee from the top of my tower. Each evening I returned more charmed, more despairing, more bewitched, more lost than before.
“I had learned who thou wast— a gipsy— a Bohemian— a gitana— a zingara. How could I doubt of the witchcraft? Listen. I hoped that a prosecution would rid me of the spell. A sorceress had bewitched Bruno of Ast; he had her burned, and was cured. I knew this. I would try this remedy. First, I had thee forbidden the Parvis of Notre-Dame, hoping to forget thee if thou camest no more. Thou didst not heed it. Thou camest again. Then I had the idea of carrying thee off. One night I attempted it. We were two of us. Already we had thee fast, when that miserable officer came upon the scene. He delivered thee, and so began thy misfortunes— and mine— and his own as well. At length, not knowing what to do or what was to become of me, I denounced thee to the Holy Office.
“I thought that I should thus be cured like Bruno of Ast. I thought too, confusedly, that a prosecution would deliver thee into my hands, that once in prison I should hold thee, that thou couldst not then escape me— that thou hadst possessed me long enough for me to possess thee in my turn. When one sets out upon an evil path, one should go the whole way— ’tis madness to stop midway in the monstrous! The extremity of crime has its delirium of joy. A priest and a witch may taste of all delights in one another’s arms on the straw pallet of a dungeon.
“So I denounced thee. ’Twas then I began to terrify thee whenever I met thee. The plot which I was weaving against thee, the storm which I was brewing over thy head, burst from me in muttered threats and lightning glances. And yet I hesitated. My project had appalling aspects from which I shrank.
“It may be that I would have renounced it— that my hideous thought would have withered in my brain without bearing fruit. I thought it would always depend on myself either to follow up or set aside this prosecution. But every evil thought is inexorable and will become an act; and there, where I thought myself all-powerful, Fate was more powerful than I. Alas! alas! ’tis Fate has laid hold on thee and cast thee in among the dread wheels of the machinery I had constructed in secret! Listen. I have almost done.
“One day— it was again a day of sunshine— a man passes me who speaks thy name and laughs with the gleam of lust in his eyes. Damnation! I followed him. Thou knowest the rest—”
He ceased.
The girl could find but one word— “Oh, my Phœbus!”
“Not that name!” exclaimed the priest, grasping her arm with violence. “Utter not that name! Oh, wretched that we are, ’tis that name has undone us! Nay, rather we have all undone one another through the inexplicable play of Fate! Thou art suffering, art thou not? Thou art cold; the darkness blinds thee, the dungeon wraps thee round; but mayhap thou hast still more light shining within thee— were it only thy childish love for the fatuous being who was trifling with thy heart! while I— I bear the dungeon within me; within, my heart is winter, ice, despair— black night reigns in my soul! Knowest thou all that I have suffered? I was present at the trial. I was seated among the members of the Office. Yes, one of those priestly cowls hid the contortions of the damned. When they led thee in, I was there; while they questioned thee, I was there. Oh, den of wolves! It was my own crime— my own gibbet that I saw slowly rising above thy head. At each deposition, each proof, each pleading, I was present— I could count thy every step along that dolorous path. I was there, too, when that wild beast— oh, I had not foreseen the torture! Listen. I followed thee into the chamber of anguish; I saw thee disrobed and half-naked under the vile hands of the torturer; saw thy foot— that foot I would have given an empire to press one kiss upon and die; that foot which I would have rejoiced to feel crushing my head— that foot I saw put into the horrible boot that turns the limbs of a human being into a gory pulp. Oh, miserable that I am! While I looked on at this, I had a poniard under my gown with which I lacerated my breast. At thy cry I plunged it into my flesh— a second cry from thee and it should have pierced my heart. Look— I believe it still bleeds.”