“I know… I know…”
Then, forgetting his own poverty in the face of this greater affliction, he asked:
“Were you born blind?”
“No… it came as I grew old… At the hospital they told me that it was caused by age… cataract, they called it, I think… But I know better… I know that it wasn’t only age that brought it… I have had too many misfortunes… I have shed too many tears…”
“You have had a great deal of trouble?”
“Oh, Monsieur!… In one year I lost my wife, my daughter, my two sons… all that I loved… all I had to love me. I almost died myself, but gradually I began to get better… But I wasn’t able to work any more… Then it was poverty… destitution… Some days I don’t have anything to eat at all. I’ve had nothing since yesterday but a crust of bread, and I gave half to my dog… With the money you gave me, I shall get some more for tonight and tomorrow.”
As he listened the beggar turned over the coppers in his pocket. He was trying to count them, distinguishing by touch the difference between the pence and halfpence. He had elevenpence-halfpenny. He said:
“Come with me. It’s too cold here. I will see that you have something to eat.”
The blind man reddened with pleasure, stammering:
“Oh, Monsieur… you are too kind…”
“Come…”
Careful that the other should not feel how wet his own clothes were, how thin, he took him by the arm, and they set off. The dog, its head up, its ears cocked, led the way through the people, pulling sharply at its chain when they crossed a road where there was traffic. They walked on like this for a long time, finally stopping before a little restaurant in a back street.
The beggar opened the door and said to the blind man:
“Come in…”
Choosing a table near the stove, he made him sit down and took a chair near him.
Some workmen, all of them silent, were hungrily emptying the small thick plates before them. The blind man took the lead off his dog and held his hands out to the fire, sighing:
“It’s very comfortable here…”
The beggar called the girl who was waiting and ordered some soup and boiled beef. She asked:
“And what will you have?”
“Nothing.”
When the soup, which smelled very appetizing, and the meat were before him, the blind man began to eat slowly and in silence. The beggar watched him, cutting little bits of bread that he held under the table to the dog. The soup and meat finished, he said:
“Have something to drink. It will put some strength into your legs.”
Later, he called the servant:
“How much?”
“Tenpence-halfpenny.”
He paid, leaving the remaining penny for the girl, and helped his companion to rise. When they were back in the street, he asked:
“Do you live far from here?”
“Where are we?”
“Near St. Lazare station.”
“Far enough. I sleep in a shed on the other side of the river.”
“I’ll go part of the way with you.”
The blind man kept on thanking him. He replied:
“No… no… it’s not worth mentioning…”
Without knowing why, he felt happy, supremely happy, happier than he ever remembered feeling. As he walked along, lost in dreamy thoughts, he forgot that he himself had been without food since yesterday, that he had no place to sleep in that night; he forgot his miseries, his rags, that he was a beggar.
From time to time he said gently to the blind man:
“Am I going too quickly? Are you very tired?”
The blind man, humble and grateful, answered:
“No… oh, no, Monsieur…”
He smiled, happy to hear himself addressed in that way, soothed alike by the illusion he was giving the other and his own odd sensation of being a rich, charitable person…
On the quay, feeling the dampness of the air from the river, the blind man said:
“Now I can find my way alone. I have my dog.”
“Yes, I will say goodbye,” replied the beggar in a solemn voice.
For a strange thought had taken possession of him: the illusion that he had so often and so ardently desired, had it not become a reality? Had he not at last enjoyed the sensation of perfect happiness? Had not this last hour given him more joy than any of his wildest dreams of wealth and rich food and love? This blind man had no suspicion that he had been leaning on the arm of a beggar as poor as himself… had he not been able to believe himself rich, and could he hope ever again to feel the deep, unmixed joy of tonight?
But the elation did not last long. Suddenly realities came back. He said a second time:
“Yes… I will leave you now.”
They had reached the middle of the bridge. He stopped, felt once more in his pockets to see if by any chance a halfpenny remained there. Not one…
He grasped the blind man’s hand, pressed it warmly, while the other said:
“Thank you once again, Monsieur. Will you tell me your name so that I can pray for you?”
“It’s not worthwhile. Hurry out of the cold. It is I who am very happy. Goodbye…”
He went a little way back, stopped, looked fixedly at the dark expanse of water below him, and once again in a louder voice said:
“Goodbye…”
Then suddenly he leaped up on the parapet…
There was a great splash… then cries of “Help!”… “Run to the bank of the river!”
Pushed roughly about by the people who rushed up, the blind man cried:
“What is it? What has happened?”
A street urchin who had almost knocked him over shouted without stopping:
“A beggar has made a hole in the water.”
With a weary gesture he shrugged his shoulders, murmuring:
“He at least had the courage, he had!…”
Then, touching his dog with the toe of his boot, he drudged on, tapping the ground with his stick, his face turned up to the sky, his back bent… without knowing…
In the Light of the Red Lamp
SEATED IN a large armchair near the fire, his elbows on his knees, his hands held out to the warmth, he was talking slowly, interrupting himself abruptly now and again with a murmured: “Yes… yes…” as if he were trying to gather up, to make sure of his memories: then he would continue his sentence.
The table beside him was littered with papers, books, odds and ends of various kinds. The lamp was turned low: I could see nothing of him except his pallid face and his hands, long and thin in the firelight.
The purring of a cat that lay on the hearth-rug and the crackling of the logs that sent up strangely shaped flames were the only sounds that broke the silence. He was speaking in a faraway voice as a man might in his dream.
“Yes… yes… It was the great, the greatest misfortune of my life. I could have borne the loss of every penny I possess, of my health… anything… everything… but not that! To have lived for ten years with the woman you adore, and then to watch her die and be left to face life alone… quite alone… it was almost more than I could bear!… It is six months since I lost her… How long ago it seems! And how short the days used to be… If only she had been ill for some time, if only there had been some warning… It seems a horrible thing to say, but when you know beforehand the mind gets prepared, doesn’t it?… Little by little the heart readjusts its outlook… you grow used to the idea… but as it was…”
“But I thought she had been ill for some time?” I said.
He shook his head. “Not at all, not at all… It was quite sudden… The doctors were never even able to find out what was the matter with her… It all happened and was over in two days. Since then I don’t know how or why I have gone on living. All day long I wander round the house looking for some reminder of her that I never find, imagining that she will appear to me from behind the hangings, that a breath of her scent will come to me in the empty rooms…”