The Red Inn | Page 7

the floor."
So saying, he went and shut the window, making all the noise that
prudent operation demanded.

"I accept," said the merchant; "in fact I will admit," he added, lowering
his voice and looking at the two Frenchmen, "that I desired it. My
boatmen seem to me suspicious. I am not sorry to spend the night with
two brave young men, two French soldiers, for, between ourselves, I
have a hundred thousand francs in gold and diamonds in my valise."
The friendly caution with which this imprudent confidence was
received by the two young men, seemed to reassure the German. The
landlord assisted in taking off one of the mattresses, and when all was
arranged for the best he bade them good-night and went off to bed.
The merchant and the surgeons laughed over the nature of their pillows.
Prosper put his case of surgical instruments and that of Wilhelm under
the end of his mattress to raise it and supply the place of a bolster,
which was lacking. Wahlenfer, as a measure of precaution, put his
valise under his pillow.
"We shall both sleep on our fortune," said Prosper, "you, on your gold;
I, on my instruments. It remains to be seen whether my instruments will
ever bring me the gold you have now acquired."
"You may hope so," said the merchant. "Work and honesty can do
everything; have patience, however."
Wahlenfer and Wilhelm were soon asleep. Whether it was that his bed
on the floor was hard, or that his great fatigue was a cause of
sleeplessness, or that some fatal influence affected his soul, it is certain
that Prosper Magnan continued awake. His thoughts unconsciously
took an evil turn. His mind dwelt exclusively on the hundred thousand
francs which lay beneath the merchant's pillow. To Prosper Magnan
one hundred thousand francs was a vast and ready-made fortune. He
began to employ it in a hundred different ways; he made castles in the
air, such as we all make with eager delight during the moments
preceding sleep, an hour when images rise in our minds confusedly,
and often, in the silence of the night, thought acquires some magical
power. He gratified his mother's wishes; he bought the thirty acres of
meadow land; he married a young lady of Beauvais to whom his
present want of fortune forbade him to aspire. With a hundred thousand

francs he planned a lifetime of happiness; he saw himself prosperous,
the father of a family, rich, respected in his province, and, possibly,
mayor of Beauvais. His brain heated; he searched for means to turn his
fictions to realities. He began with extraordinary ardor to plan a crime
theoretically. While fancying the death of the merchant he saw
distinctly the gold and the diamonds. His eyes were dazzled by them.
His heart throbbed. Deliberation was, undoubtedly, already crime.
Fascinated by that mass of gold he intoxicated himself morally by
murderous arguments. He asked himself if that poor German had any
need to live; he supposed the case of his never having existed. In short,
he planned the crime in a manner to secure himself impunity. The other
bank of the river was occupied by the Austrian army; below the
windows lay a boat and boatman; he would cut the throat of that man,
throw the body into the Rhine, and escape with the valise; gold would
buy the boatman and he could reach the Austrians. He went so far as to
calculate the professional ability he had reached in the use of
instruments, so as to cut through his victim's throat without leaving him
the chance for a single cry.
[Here Monsieur Taillefer wiped his forehead and drank a little water.]
Prosper rose slowly, making no noise. Certain of having waked no one,
he dressed himself and went into the public room. There, with that fatal
intelligence a man suddenly finds on some occasions within him, with
that power of tact and will which is never lacking to prisoners or to
criminals in whatever they undertake, he unscrewed the iron bars,
slipped them from their places without the slightest noise, placed them
against the wall, and opened the shutters, leaning heavily upon their
hinges to keep them from creaking. The moon was shedding its pale
pure light upon the scene, and he was thus enabled to faintly see into
the room where Wilhelm and Wahlenfer were sleeping. There, he told
me, he stood still for a moment. The throbbing of his heart was so
strong, so deep, so sonorous, that he was terrified; he feared he could
not act with coolness; his hands trembled; the soles of his feet seem
planted on red-hot coal; but the execution of his plan was accompanied
by such apparent good luck that he fancied he saw a species of