dorothy did not answer. she was still quite absorbed in the strange will of the marquis. her companions, their eyes fixed on her, seemed to be waiting for her to express an opinion; and since she remained silent, george earrington, of london, said:
"not a bad joke. what?"
she shook her head:
"is it quite certain, cousin, that it is a joke?"
"oh, mademoiselle! this resurrection ... the elixir ... the hidden diamonds!"
"i don't say that it isn't," said dorothy, smiling. "the old fellow does seem to me a trifle cracked. nevertheless the letter he has written to us is certainly authentic; at the end of two centuries we have come, as he foresaw that we should, to the rendezvous he appointed, and above all we are certainly members of the same family."
"i think that we might start embracing all over again, mademoiselle."
"i'm sure, if our ancestor permits it, i shall be charmed," said dorothy.
"but he does permit it."
"we'll go and ask him."
maître delarue protested:
"you'll go without me, mademoiselle. understand once and for all that i am not going to see whether jean-pierre-augustin de la roche, marquis de beaugreval, is still alive at the age of two hundred and sixty-two years!"
"but he isn't as old as all that, maître delarue. we need not count the two hundred years' sleep. then it's only a matter of sixty-two years; that's quite normal. his friend, monsieur de fontenelle, as the marquis predicted and thanks to an elixir of life, lived to be a hundred."
"in fact you do not believe in it, mademoiselle?"
"no. but all the same there should be something in it."
"what else can there be in it?"
"we shall know presently. but at the moment i confess to my shame that i should like before——"
she paused; and with one accord they cried:
"what?"
she laughed.
"well, the truth is i'm hungry—hungry with a two-hundred-year-old hunger—as hungry as the marquis de beaugreval must be. has any of you by any chance——"
the three young men darted away. one ran to his motor-cycle, the other two to their horses. each had a haversack full of provisions which they brought and set out on the grass at dorothy's feet. the russian kourobelef, who had only a slice of bread, dragged a large flat stone in front of her by way of table.
"this is really nice!" she said, clapping her hands. "a real family lunch! we invite you to join us, maître delarue, and you also, soldier of wrangel."
the meal, washed down by the good wine of anjou, was a merry one. they drank the health of the worthy nobleman who had had the excellent idea of bringing them together at his château; and webster made a speech in his honor.
the diamonds, the codicil, the survival of their ancestor and his resurrection had become so many trifles to which they paid no further attention. for them the adventure came to an end with the reading of the letter and the improvised meal. and even so it was amazing enough!
"and so amusing!" said dorothy, who kept laughing. "i assure you that i have never been so amused—never."
her four cousins, as she called them, hung on her lips and never took their eyes off her, amused and astonished by everything she said. at first sight they had understood her and she had understood them, without the five of them having to pass through the usual stages of becoming intimate, through which people who are thrown together for the first time generally have to pass. to them she was grace, beauty, spirit and freshness. she represented the charming country from which their ancestors had long ago departed; they found in her at once a sister of whom they were proud and a woman they burned to win.
already rivals, each of them strove to appear at his best.
errington, webster, and dario organized contests, feats of strength, exhibitions of balancing; they ran races. the only prize they asked for was that dorothy, queen of the tourney, should regard them with favor with those beautiful eyes, of which they felt the profound seduction, and which appeared to them the most beautiful eyes they had ever seen.
but the winner of the tournament was dorothy herself. directly she took part in it, all that the others could do was to sit down, look on, and wonder. a fragment of wall, of which the top had crumbled so thin that it was nearly a sharp edge, served her as a tight-rope. she climbed trees and let herself drop from branch to branch. springing upon the big horse of dario she forced him through the paces of a circus horse. then, seizing the bridle of the pony, she did a turn on the two of them, lying down, standing up, or astride.
she performed all these feats with a modest grace, full of reserve, without a trace of coquetry. the young men were no less enthusiastic than amazed. the acrobat delighted them. but the young girl inspired them with a respect from which not one of them dreamt of departing. who was she? they called her princess, laughing; but their laughter was full of deference. really they did not understand it.
it was not till three in the afternoon that they decided to carry the adventure to its end. they all started to do so in the spirit of picnickers. maître delarue, to whose head the good wine of anjou had mounted in some quantity, with his broad bow unknotted and his tall hat on the back of his head, led the way on his donkey, chanting couplets about the resurrection of marquis lazarus. dario, of genoa, imitated a mandolin accompaniment. errington and webster held over dorothy's head, to keep the sun off it, an umbrella made of ferns and wild flowers.
they went round the hillock, which was composed of the débris of the old château, behind the clock and along a beautiful avenue of trees centuries old, which ended in a circular glade in the middle of which rose a magnificent oak.
maître delarue said in the tone of a guide:
"these are the trees planted by the marquis de beaugreval's father. you will observe their vigor. venerable trees, if ever there were any! behold the oak king! whole generations have taken shelter under his boughs. hats off, gentlemen!"
then they came to the woody slopes of a small hill, on the summit of which in the middle of a circular embankment, formed by the ruins of the wall that had encircled it, rose a tower oval in shape.
"cocquesin tower," said maître delarue, more and more cheerful. "venerable ruins, if ever there were any! remnants of the feudal keep! that's where the sleeping marquis of the enchanted wood is waiting for us, whom we're going to resuscitate with a thimbleful of foaming elixir."
the blue sky appeared through the empty windows. whole masses of wall had fallen down. however, the whole of the right side seemed to be intact; and if there really was a staircase and some kind of habitation, as the marquis had stated, it could only be in that part of the tower.
and now the arch, against which the draw-bridge had formerly been raised opened before them. the approach to it was so blocked by interlaced briars and bushes, that it took them a long time to reach the vault in which were the stones indicated by the marquis de beaugreval.
then, another barrier of fallen stones, and another effort to clear a double path to the two walls.
"here we are," said dorothy at last. she had directed their labors. "and we can be quite sure that no one has been before us."
before beginning the operation which had been enjoined on them they went to the end of the vault. it opened on to the immense nave formed by the interior of the keep, its stories fallen away, its only roof the sky. they saw, one above the other, the embrasures of four fireplaces, under chimney-pieces of sculptured stone, full now of wild plants.
one might have described it as the oval of a roman amphitheater, with a series of small vaulted chambers above, of which one perceived the gaping openings, separated by passages into distinct groups.
"the visitors who risk coming to roche-périac can enter from this side," said dorothy. "wedding parties from the neighborhood must come here now and then. look: there are greasy pieces of paper and sardine-tins scattered about on the ground."
"it's odd that the draw-bridge vault hasn't been cleared out," said webster.
"by whom? do you think that picnickers are going to waste their time doing what we have done, when on the opposite side there are easy entrances?"
they did not seem in any hurry to get to work to verify the statements of the marquis; and it was rather to have their consciences clear and to be able to say to themselves without any equivocation, "the adventure is finished," that they attacked the walls of the vault.
dorothy, sceptical as the others, again carelessly took command, and said: "come on, cousins. you didn't come from america and russia to stand still with folded arms. we owe our ancestor this proof of our good will before we have the right to throw our medals into drawers. dario, of genoa—errington, be so good as to push, each on the side you are, the third stone at the top. yes: those two, since this is the groove in which the old portcullis worked."
the stones were a good height above the ground, so that the englishman and the italian had to raise their arms to reach them. following dorothy's advice, they climbed on to the shoulders of webster and kourobelef.
"are you ready?"
"we're ready," replied errington and dario.
"then push gently with a continuous pressure. and above all have faith! maître delarue has no faith. so i am not asking him to do anything."
the two young men set their hands against the two stones and pushed hard.
"come: a little vigor!" said dorothy in a tone of jest. "the statements of the marquis are gospel truth. he has written that the stone on the right will slip back. let the stone on the right slip back."
"mine is moving," said the englishman, on the left.
"so is mine," said the italian, on the right.
"it isn't possible!" cried dorothy incredulously.
"but it is! but it is!" declared the englishman. "and the stone above it, too. they are slipping back from the top."
the words were hardly out of his mouth, when the two stones, forming one piece, slipped back into the interior of the wall and revealed in the semi-darkness the foot of a staircase and some steps.
the englishman uttered a cry of triumph:
"the worthy gentleman did not lie! there's the staircase!"
for a moment they remained speechless. not that there was anything extraordinary in the affair so far; but it was a confirmation of the first part of the marquis de beaugreval's statement; and they asked themselves if the rest of his predictions would not be fulfilled with the same exactness.
"if it turns out that there are a hundred and thirty-two steps, i shall declare myself convinced," said errington.
"what?" said maître delarue, who also appeared deeply impressed. "do you mean to assert that the marquis——"
"that the marquis is awaiting us like a man who is expecting our visit."
"you're raving," growled the notary. "isn't he, mademoiselle?"
the young men hauled themselves on to the landing formed by the stones which had slipped back. dorothy joined them. two electric pocket-lamps took the place of the torch suggested by the marquis de beaugreval, and they set about mounting the high steps which wound upwards in a very narrow space.
"fifteen—sixteen—seventeen," dario counted.
to hearten himself, maître delarue sang the couplets of "da tour, prende garde." but at the thirtieth step he began to save his breath.
"it's a steep climb, isn't it?" said dorothy.
"yes it is. but it's chiefly the idea of paying a visit to a dead man. it makes my legs a bit shaky."
at the fiftieth step a hole in the wall let in some light. dorothy looked out and saw the woods of la roche-périac; but a cornice, jutting out, prevented her from seeing the ground at the foot of the keep.
they continued the ascent. maître delarue kept singing in a more and more shaky voice, and towards the end it was rather a groaning than a singing.
"a hundred ... a hundred and ten ... a hundred and twenty."
at a hundred and thirty-two he made the announcement:
"it is indeed the last. a wall blocks the staircase. about this also our ancestor was telling the truth."
"and are there three bricks let into the step?"
"there are."
"and a pick-ax?"
"it's here."
"come: on getting to the top of the staircase and examining what we find there, every detail agrees with the will, so that we have only to carry out the good man's final instructions." she said: "break down the wall, webster. it's only a plaster partition."
at the first blow in fact the wall crumbled away, disclosing a small, low door.
"goodness!" muttered the lawyer, who was no longer trying to dissemble his uneasiness. "the program is indeed being carried out item by item."
"ah, you're becoming a trifle less sceptical, maître delarue. you'll be declaring next that the door will open."
"i do declare it. this old lunatic was a clever mechanician and a scenical producer of the first order."
"you speak of him as if he were dead," observed dorothy.
the notary seized her arm.
"of course i do! i'm quite willing to admit that he's behind this door. but alive? no, no! certainly not!"
she put her foot on one of the bricks. errington and dario pressed the two others. the door jerked violently, quivered, and turned on its hinges.
"holy virgin!" murmured dario. "we're confronted by a genuine miracle. are we going to see satan?"
by the light of their lamps they perceived a fair-sized room with an arched ceiling. no ornament relieved the bareness of the stone walls. there was nothing in the way of furniture in it. but one judged that there was a small, low room, which formed an alcove, from the piece of tapestry, roughly nailed to a beam, which ran along the left side of it.
the five men and dorothy did not stir, silent, motionless. maître delarue, extremely pale, seemed very ill at ease indeed.
was it the fumes of wine, or the distress inspired by mystery?
no one was smiling any longer. dorothy could not withdraw her eyes from the piece of tapestry. so the adventure did not come to an end with the astonishing meeting of the marquis' heirs, nor with the reading of his fantastic will. it went as far as the hollow stairway in the old tower, to which no one had ever penetrated, to the very threshold of the inviolable retreat in which the marquis had drunk the draft which brings sleep.... or which kills. what was there behind the tapestry? a bed, of course ... some garments which kept perhaps the shape of the body they had covered ... and besides, a handful of ashes.
she turned her head to her companions as if to say to them:
"shall i go first?"
they stood motionless—undecided, ill at ease.
then she took a step forward—then two. the tapestry was within reach. with a hesitating hand she took hold of the edge of it, while the young men drew nearer.
they turned the light of their lamps into the alcove.
at the back of it was a bed. on that bed lay a man.
this vision was, in spite of everything, so unexpected, that for a few seconds dorothy's legs almost failed her, and she let the tapestry fall. it was archibald webster who, deeply perturbed, raised it quickly, and walked briskly to this sleeping man, as if he were about to shake him and awake him forthwith. the others tumbled into the alcove after him. archibald stopped short at the bed, with his arm raised, and dared not make another movement.
one might have judged the man on the bed to be sixty years old.
but in the strange paleness of that wholly colorless skin, beneath which flowed no single drop of blood, there was something that was of no age. a face absolutely hairless. not an eyelash, no eyebrows. the nose, cartilage and all, transparent like the noses of some consumptives. no flesh. a jaw, bones, cheek-bones, large sunken eyelids. that was the face between two sticking-out ears; and above it was an enormous forehead running up into an entirely bald skull.
"the finger—the finger!" murmured dorothy.
the fourth finger of the left hand was missing, cut exactly level with the palm as the will had stated.
the man was dressed in a coat of chestnut-colored cloth, a black silk waistcoat, embroidered in green, and breeches. his stockings were of fine wool. he wore no shoes.
"he must be dead," said one of the young men in a low voice.
to make sure, it would have been necessary to bend down and apply one's ear to the breast above the heart. but they had an odd feeling that, at the slightest touch, this shape of a man would crumble to dust and so vanish like a phantom.
besides, to make such an experiment, would it not be to commit sacrilege? to suspect death and question a corpse: none of them dared.
dorothy shivered, her womanly nerves strained to excess. maître delarue besought her:
"let's get away.... it's got nothing to do with us.... it's a devilish business."
but george errington had an idea. he took a small mirror from his pocket and held it close to the man's lips. after the lapse of some seconds there was a film on it.
"oh! i b-b-believe he's alive!" he stammered.
"he's alive! he's alive!" muttered the young people, keeping with difficulty their excitement within bounds.
maître delarue's legs were so shaky that he had to sit down on the foot of the bed. he murmured again and again:
"a devilish business! we've no right——"
they kept looking at one another with troubled faces. the idea that this dead man was alive—for he was dead, undeniably dead—the idea that this dead man was alive shocked them as something monstrous.
and yet was not the evidence that he was alive quite as strong as the evidence that he was dead? they believed in his death because it was impossible that he should be alive. but could they deny the evidence of their own eyes because that evidence was against all reason?
dorothy said:
"look: his chest rises and falls—you can see it—ever so slowly and ever so little. but it does. then he is not dead."
they protested.
"no.... it's out of the question. such a phenomenon would be inexplicable."
"i'm not so sure ... i'm not so sure. it might be a kind of lethargy ... a kind of hypnotic trance," she murmured.
"a trance which lasted two hundred years?"
"i don't know.... i don't understand it."
"well?"
"well, we must act."
"but how?"
"as the will tells us to act. the instructions are quite definite. our duty is to execute them blindly and without question."
"how?"
"we must try to awaken him with the elixir of which the will speaks."
"here it is," said marco dario, picking up from the stool a small object wrapped in linen. he unfolded the wrapping and displayed a phial, of antique shape, heavy, of crystal, with a round bottom and long neck which terminated in a large wax cork.
he handed it to dorothy, who broke off the top of the neck with a sharp tap against the edge of the stool.
"has any of you a knife?" she asked. "thank you, archibald. open the blade and introduce the point between the teeth as the will directs."
they acted as might a doctor confronted by a patient whom he does not know exactly how to handle, but whom he nevertheless treats, without the slightest hesitation, according to the formal prescription in use in similar cases. they would see what happened. the essential thing was to carry out the instructions.
archibald webster did not find it easy to perform his task. the lips were tightly closed, the upper teeth, for the most part black and decayed, were so firmly wedged against the lower that the knife-point could not force its way between them. he had to introduce it sideways, and then raise the handle to force the jaws apart.
"don't move," said dorothy.
she bent down. her right hand, holding the phial, tilted it gently. a few drops of a liquid of the color and odor of green chartreuse fell between the lips; then an even trickle flowed from the phial, which was soon empty.
"that's done," she said, straightening herself.
looking at her companions, she tried to smile. all of them were staring at the dead man.
she murmured: "we've got to wait. it doesn't work straightaway."
and as she uttered the words she thought:
"and then what? i am ready to admit that it will have an effect and that this man will awake from sleep! or rather from death.... for such a sleep is nothing but death. no: really we are the victims of a collective hallucination.... no: there was no film on the mirror. no: the chest does not rise and fall. no—a thousand times no! one does not come to life again!"
"three minutes gone," said marco dario.
and watch in hand, he counted, minute by minute, five more minutes—then five more.
the waiting of these six persons would have been incomprehensible, had its explanation not been found in the fact that all the events foretold by the marquis de beaugreval had followed one another with mathematical precision. there had been a series of facts which was very like a series of miracles, which compelled the witnesses of those facts to be patient—at least till the moment fixed for the supreme miracle.
"fifteen minutes," said the italian.
a few more seconds passed. of a sudden they quivered. a hushed exclamation burst from the lips of each. the man's eyelids had moved.
in a moment the phenomenon was repeated, and so clearly and distinctly that further doubt was impossible. it was the twitching of two eyes that tried to open. at the same time the arms stirred. the hands quivered.
"oh!" stuttered the distracted notary. "he's alive! he's alive!"
