Light

Light

The Project Gutenberg EBook of Light, by Henri Barbusse This
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Title: Light
Author: Henri Barbusse
Release Date: July 14, 2004 [EBook #12904]
Language: English
Character set encoding: UTF-8
*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LIGHT ***

Produced by David S. Miller

LIGHT
BY
HENRI BARBUSSE AUTHOR OF "UNDER FIRE" "WE OTHERS,"
ETC.
TRANSLATED BY FITZWATER WRAY 1919

CONTENTS

I. MYSELF II. OURSELVES III. EVENING AND DAWN IV.
MARIE V. DAY BY DAY VI. A VOICE IN THE EVENING VII. A
SUMMARY VIII. THE BRAWLER IX. THE STORM X. THE
WALLS XI. AT THE WORLD'S END XII. THE SHADOWS XIII.

WHITHER GOEST THOU? XIV. THE RUINS XV. AN
APPARITION XVI. DE PROFUNDIS CLAMAVI XVII. MORNING
XVIII. EYES THAT SEE XIX. GHOSTS XX. THE CULT XXI. NO!
XXII. LIGHT XXIII. FACE TO FACE

LIGHT

CHAPTER I
MYSELF
All the days of the week are alike, from their beginning to their end.
At seven in the evening one hears the clock strike gently, and then the
instant tumult of the bell. I close the desk, wipe my pen, and put it
down. I take my hat and muffler, after a glance at the mirror--a glance
which shows me the regular oval of my face, my glossy hair and fine
mustache. (It is obvious that I am rather more than a workman.) I put
out the light and descend from my little glass-partitioned office. I cross
the boiler-house, myself in the grip of the thronging, echoing peal
which has set it free. From among the dark and hurrying crowd, which
increases in the corridors and rolls down the stairways like a cloud,
some passing voices cry to me, "Good-night, Monsieur Simon," or,
with less familiarity, "Good-night, Monsieur Paulin." I answer here and
there, and allow myself to be borne away by everybody else.
Outside, on the threshold of the porch which opens on the naked plain
and its pallid horizons, one sees the squares and triangles of the factory,
like a huge black background of the stage, and the tall extinguished
chimney, whose only crown now is the cloud of falling night.
Confusedly, the dark flood carries me away. Along the wall which
faces the porch, women are waiting, like a curtain of shadow, which
yields glimpses of their pale and expressionless faces. With nod or
word we recognize each other from the mass. Couples are formed by
the quick hooking of arms. All along the ghostly avenue one's eyes
follow the toilers' scrambling flight.

The avenue is a wan track cut across the open fields. Its course is
marked afar by lines of puny trees, sooty as snuffed candles; by
telegraph posts and their long spider-webs; by bushes or by fences,
which are like the skeletons of bushes. There are a few houses. Up
yonder a strip of sky still shows palely yellow above the meager suburb
where creeps the muddy crowd detached from the factory. The west
wind sets quivering their overalls, blue or black or khaki, excites the
woolly tails that flutter from muffled necks, scatters some evil odors,
attacks the sightless faces so deep-drowned beneath the sky.
There are taverns anon which catch the eye. Their doors are closed, but
their windows and fanlights shine like gold. Between the taverns rise
the fronts of some old houses, tenantless and hollow; others, in ruins,
cut into this gloomy valley of the homes of men with notches of sky.
The iron-shod feet all around me on the hard road sound like the heavy
rolling of drums, and then on the paved footpath like dragged chains. It
is in vain that I walk with head bent--my own footsteps are lost in the
rest, and I cannot hear them.
We hurry, as we do every evening. At that spot in the inky landscape
where a tall and twisted tree seems to writhe as if it had a soul, we
begin suddenly to descend, our feet plunging forward. Down below we
see the lights of Viviers sparkle. These men, whose day is worn out,
stride towards those earthly stars. One hope is like another in the
evening, as one weariness is like another; we are all alike. I, also. I go
towards my light, like all the others, as on every evening.
* * * * * *
When we have descended for a long time the gradient ends, the avenue
flattens out like a river, and widens as it pierces the town. Through the
latticed boughs of the old plane trees--still naked on this