"Nothing, I say. The whole scaffolding of my plans rests on you, but you do not count. You have no active part to play. You are, for the moment, but a silent actor, or not even that, but just a pawn which I move along the board." "What shall I do?" "Nothing. Write poetry. You shall live as you please. You shall have money. You shall enjoy life. I will not even bother my head about you. I repeat, you play no part in my venture." "And who shall I be?" Sernine stretched out his arm and pointed to the next room: "You shall take that man's place. _You are that man!_" Gérard shuddered with revolt and disgust: "Oh, no, he is dead! . . . And then . . . it is a crime! . . . No, I want a new life, made for me, thought out for me . . . an unknown name. . . ." "That man, I tell you!" cried Sernine, irresistible in his energy and authority. "You shall be that man and none other! That man, because his destiny is magnificent, because his name is illustrious, and because he hands down to you a thrice-venerable heritage of ancestral dignity and pride." "It is a crime!" moaned Baupré, faltering. "You shall be that man!" spoke Sernine, with unparalleled vehemence. "You shall be that man! If not, you become Baupré again; and over Baupré I own rights of life and death. Choose." He drew his revolver, cocked it and took aim at the young man: "Choose," he repeated. The expression of his face was implacable. Gérard was frightened and sank down on his bed sobbing: "I wish to live!" "You wish it firmly, irrevocably?" "Yes, a thousand times yes! After the terrible thing which I attempted, death appals me. . . . Anything . . . anything rather than death! . . . Anything! . . . Pain . . . hunger . . . illness . . . every torture, every shame . . . crime itself, if need be . . . but not death!" He shivered with fever and agony, as though the great enemy were still prowling round him and as though he felt himself powerless to escape from its clutches. The prince redoubled his efforts and, in a fervent voice, holding him under him like a prey: "I will ask nothing impossible of you, nothing wrong. . . . If there is anything, I am responsible. . . . No, no crime . . . a little pain at most. . . . A little of your blood must flow. But what is that, compared with the dread of dying?" "Pain is indifferent to me." "Then here and now!" shouted Sernine. "Here and now! Ten seconds of pain and that is all. . . . Ten seconds and the other's life is yours. . . ." He had seized him round the body and forced him down on a chair; and he now held the young man's left hand flat on the table, with his five fingers spread out. He swiftly took a knife from his pocket, pressed the blade against the little finger, between the first and second joints, and commanded: "Strike! Strike your own blow. One blow of the fist and that is all!" He had taken Gérard's right hand and was trying to bring it down upon the other like a hammer.