"What are you saying? What are you saying? . . . Oh, no, no! . . . I entreat you! . . . Wake me, if I am asleep . . . or else let me die! . . . But I am dead, am I not? And this is the nightmare of a corpse! . . . Oh, I feel my brain going! . . . I entreat you. . . ." Sernine placed his hand gently on the young man's head and, bending over him: "Listen to me . . . listen to me carefully and understand what I say. You are alive. Your matter and your mind are as they were and live. But Gérard Baupré is dead. You understand me, do you not? That member of society who was known as Gérard Baupré has ceased to exist. You have done away with that one. To-morrow, the registrar will write in his books, opposite the name you bore, the word 'Dead,' with the date of your decease." "It's a lie!" stammered the terrified lad. "It's a lie! Considering that I, Gérard Baupré, am here!" "You are not Gérard Baupré," declared Sernine. And, pointing to the open door, "Gérard Baupré is there, in the next room. Do you wish to see him? He is hanging from the nail to which you hooked him. On the table is a letter in which you certify his death with your signature. It is all quite regular, it is all final. There is no getting away from the irrevocable, brutal fact: Gérard Baupré has ceased to exist!" The young man listened in despair. Growing calmer, now that facts were assuming a less tragic significance, he began to understand: "And then . . ." he muttered. "And then . . . let us talk." "Yes, yes . . . let us talk. . . ." "A cigarette?" asked the prince. "Will you have one? Ah, I see that you are becoming reconciled to life! So much the better: we shall understand each other; and that quickly." He lit the young man's cigarette and his own and, at once, in a few words uttered in a hard voice, explained himself: "You, the late Gérard Baupré, were weary of life, ill, penniless, hopeless. . . . Would you like to be well, rich, and powerful?" "I don't follow you." "It is quite simple. Accident has placed you on my path. You are young, good-looking, a poet; you are intelligent and--your act of despair shows it--you have a fine sense of conduct. These are qualities which are rarely found united in one person. I value them . . . and I take them for my account." "They are not for sale." "Idiot! Who talks of buying or selling? Keep your conscience. It is too precious a jewel for me to relieve you of it." "Then what do you ask of me?"