The Man Who Laughs, Book XII [pp. 386-391]

386 APPLETONS' JO (IRNAL OF POPULAR [JUNE 26,
THE MAN WHO LAUGHS;*
OR,
BY THE KING'S COMMAND.
BY VICTOR H-UGO.
II.
FROM GAY TO GRAVE.
How simple is a miracle! It was breakfast-time in the
Green-Box, and Dea came, quite naturally, to know why Gwynplaine had not appeared at their little morning table.
- You! exclaimed Gwynplaine, and that was all. There
was for him no longer any horizon or any vision, save the
heaven in which was Dea.
He, who has not observed the immediate smile of the sea,
after the hurricane, cannot comprehend these lulls. Nothing
becomes calm more quickly than whirlpools. This comes from
their tendency to absorb. Thus is it with the human heart.
Not always, however.
Dea had but to show herself, and all the light that was in
Gwynplaine passed from him to her. There remained behind
the dazzled Gwynplaine only a flight of phantoms. What a
pacifier is adoration!
Some moments afterward, the pair were seated one before
the other, Ursus between them, Homo at their feet. The teaurn, under which a small lamp was burning, was on the table.
Fibi and Vinos were outside, and attended to serving.
Their breakfast, like the supper, was taken in the central
compartment. From the manner in which the extremely narrow table was placed, Dea turned her back to the opening in
the partition, that corresponded with the entrance-door of the
Green-Box.
Their knees were touching. Gwynplaine poured out Dea's
tea.
Dea blew gracefully into her cup. All at once she sneezed.
There was at that moment, above the flame of the lamp, a
smoke that was dispersing, and something like paper that was
falling into ashes. It was the smoke that had made Dea
sneeze.
- What is that? asked she.
- Nothing, answered Gwynplaine.
And he smiled.
He had just burned the duchess's letter.
The conscience of the man, who loves her, is the loved
woman's guardian angel.
To have the letter no longer upon him comforted him
strangely; and Gwynplaine felt his rectitude as the eagle feels
his wings.
It seemed to him that the temptation took its departure with
the smoke, and that, at the same time with the paper, the
duchess crumbled into ashes.
As they mingled their cups, drinking one after the other in
the same, they talked. Lovers' prattle, twittering of sparrows.
Puerilities worthy of Mother Goose, and of Homer. Go not
beyond two loving hearts, in search of poetry; in search of
music, go not beyond two kisses that discourse.
-Do you know one thing?
- No.
— Gwynplaine, I dreamed that we were beasts, and that we
had wings.
— Wings; that means birds, murmured Gwynplaine.
— Beasts; that means angels, grumbled Ursus.
The talk went on:
- If you did not exist, Gwynplaine.
— Well?
* ENTERED, according to Act of Congress, in the year 1869, by D. APPLETON & CO., in the Clerk's
Office of the District Court of the United States for the Southern District of Nelw York.
-There would be no good God.
- The tea is too hot. You will burn yourself, Dea.
-Blow into my cup.
-How lovely you are this morning!
-Imagine; there are all sorts of things that I want to tell
you.
Say on.
I love you.
-I adore you.
And Ursus made this remark, aside:
-By heaven! these are good people.
For lovers, how exquisite are intervals of silence! Little
heaps of love are piled up; and anon they break out softly.
There was a pause, after which Dea exclaimed:
-If you only knew. In the evening, when we are playing
the piece, at the moment when my hand touches your forehead..... Oh! you haye a noble head, Gwynplaine..... At
the instant when I feel your hair between my fingers, I tremble,
I have within me a heavenly joy; I say to myself: In all this
world of blackness that shuts me in, in this universe of solitude,
in the immense and obscure desolation where I exist, in this
fearful tremor of myself and of every thing, I have one support
to lean upon. It is he-that is yourself!
-Oh! you love me, said Gwynplaine. I, too, have but
you upon earth. You are every thing for me. Dea, what
would you have me do? Do you want any thing? What is
needful for you?
Dea answered:
-I do not know. I am happy.
- Oh! replied Gwynplaine, we are happy!
Ursus lifted up his voice severely.
-A Ah! you are happy! That's a contravention. I have
warned you of it already. Ah! you are happy! Manage,
then, so that no one may see you. Occupy the least possible
space. Happiness ought to thrust itself into holes. Make
yourselves still smaller than you are, if you are able. God
measures the greatness of happiness by the littleness of the
happy. Contented folks ought to hide themselves like malefactors. Ah! you sparkle, paltry glowworms that you are;
zounds! they will tread upon you, and they will do well. What
are they, all these "my loveys!" I am no duenna, I, whose
business it is to watch lovers billing and cooing. In short, you
weary -me. To the devil with you!
And conscious that his harsh accent was softening into tenderness, he drowned this emotion in a deep grunt.
-Father, said Dea, how loud you are talking!
-It is because I don't like to have people too happy, replied Ursus.
Here Homo gave forth an echo to Ursus. A growl was
heard under the lovers' feet.
Ursus leaned over and put his hand upon Homo's skull.
— There it is! You, too, you are in a bad humor. You
growl. You bristle up your lock of hair on your wolf's pate.
You don't like little love-affairs. That's because you are steady.
It's all the same; hush! You have spoken; you have given
your opinion; very well; now silence!
The wolf growled afresh.
Ursus looked under the table.
— Quiet, then, Homo! Come, come, don't insist upon it,
philosopher!
But the wolf sat up, and showed his teeth toward the side
where the door was.
-What's the matter with you, then? said Ursus.
And he clutched Homo by the skin of his neck.
Dea —inattentive to the wolf's gnashings of his teeth, given
up to her own thoughts, and still dwelling within herself upon
the sound of Gwynplaine's voice-remained silent, in the sort
of ecstasy common with the blind, which seems sometimes to
supply them internally with a song to listen to, and to replace
by certain strange ideal music the light that they lack. Blind
386
APPLETONS' JO U'RNAL OF POPULAR
[JUNE 26,