Something
exceedingly vital to himself, to his soul, hung in the balance.
And, always when he returned to the inn about the hour
of sunset, he saw the figures of the townsfolk stealing through the
dusk from their shop doors, moving sentry-wise to and fro at the
corners of the streets, yet always vanishing silently like shadows at
his near approach. And as the inn invariably closed its doors at ten
o’clock he had never yet found the opportunity he rather half-heartedly
sought to see for himself what account the town could give of itself at
night.
“—a cause du sommeil et a cause des chats”—the
words now rang in his ears more and more often, though still as yet
without any definite meaning.
Moreover, something made him sleep like the dead.
It was, I think, on the fifth day—though in this
detail his story sometimes varied—that he made a definite discovery
which increased his alarm and brought him up to a rather sharp climax.
Before that he had already noticed that a change was going forward and
certain subtle transformations being brought about in his character
which modified several of his minor habits. And he had affected to
ignore them. Here, however, was something he could no longer ignore;
and it startled him.
At the best of times he was never very positive,
always negative rather, compliant and acquiescent; yet, when necessity
arose he was capable of reasonably vigorous action and could take a
strongish decision. The discovery he now made that brought him up with
such a sharp turn was that this power had positively dwindled to
nothing. He found it impossible to make up his mind. For, on this fifth
day, he realised that he had stayed long enough in the town and that
for reasons he could only vaguely define to himself it was wiser and
safer that he should leave.
And he found that he could not leave!
This is difficult to describe in words, and it was more by gesture
and the expression of his face that he conveyed to Dr. Silence the
state of impotence he had reached. All this spying and watching, he
said, had as it were spun a net about his feet so that he was trapped
and powerless to escape; he felt like a fly that had blundered into the
intricacies of a great web; he was caught, imprisoned, and could not
get away. It was a distressing sensation. A numbness had crept over his
will till it had become almost incapable of decision. The mere thought
of vigorous action—action towards escape—began to terrify him. All
the currents of his life had turned inwards upon himself, striving to
bring to the surface something that lay buried almost beyond reach,
determined to force his recognition of something he had long
forgotten—forgotten years upon years, centuries almost ago. It seemed
as though a window deep within his being would presently open and
reveal an entirely new world, yet somehow a world that was not
unfamiliar. Beyond that, again, he fancied a great Curtain hung; and
when that too rolled up he would see still farther into this region and
at last understand something of the secret life of these extraordinary
people.
“Is this why they wait and watch?” he asked himself
with rather a shaking heart, “for the time when I shall join them—or
refuse to join them? Does the decision rest with me after all, and not
with them?”
And it was at this point that the sinister character
of the adventure first really declared itself, and he became genuinely
alarmed. The stability of his rather fluid little personality was at
stake, he felt, and something in his heart turned coward:
Why otherwise should he have suddenly taken to
walking stealthily, silently, making as little sound as possible, for
ever looking behind him? Why else should he have moved almost on tiptoe
about the passages of the practically deserted inn, and when he was
abroad have found himself deliberately taking advantage of what cover
presented itself? And why, if he was not afraid, should the wisdom of
staying indoors after sundown have suddenly occurred to him as
eminently desirable? Why, indeed?
And, when John Silence gently pressed him for an
explanation of these things, he admitted apologetically that he had
none to give.
“It was simply that I feared something might happen
to me unless I kept a sharp look-out. I felt afraid. It was
instinctive,” was all he could say. “I got the impression that the
whole town was after me—wanted me for something; and that if it got me
I should lose myself, or at least the Self I knew, in some unfamiliar
state of consciousness. But I am not a psychologist, you know,” he
added meekly, “and I cannot define it better than that.”
It was while lounging in the courtyard half an hour
before the evening meal that Vezin made this discovery, and he at once
went upstairs to his quiet room at the end of the winding passage to
think it over alone. In the yard it was empty enough, true, but there
was always the possibility that the big woman whom he dreaded would
come out of some door, with her pretence of knitting, to sit and watch
him. This had happened several times, and he could not endure the sight
of her. He still remembered his original fancy, bizarre though it was,
that she would spring upon him the moment his back was turned and land
with one single crushing leap upon his neck. Of course it was nonsense,
but then it haunted him, and once an idea begins to do that it ceases
to be nonsense. It has clothed itself in reality.
He went upstairs ‘accordingly. It was dusk, and the
oil lamps had not yet been lit in the passages. He stumbled over the
uneven surface of the ancient flooring, passing the dim outlines of
doors along the corridor— doors that he had never once seen
opened—rooms that seemed never occupied. He moved, as his habit now
was, stealthily and on tiptoe.
Halfway down the last passage to his own chamber
there was a sharp turn, and it was just here, while groping round the
walls with outstretched hands, that his fingers touched something that
was not wall— something that moved. It was soft and warm in texture,
indescribably fragrant, and about the height of his shoulder; and he
immediately thought of a furry, sweet-smelling kitten.
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