Original Short Stories — Volume 04Maupassant, Guy de
General
Original Short Stories — Volume 04
Maupassant, Guy de
Short stories, French -- Translations into English
And Ulrich felt that it was there, quite close to him, behind the wall,
behind the door which he had just fastened. It was wandering about, like
a night bird which lightly touches a lighted window with his wings, and
the terrified young man was ready to scream with horror. He wanted to
run away, but did not dare to go out; he did not dare, and he should
never dare to do it in the future, for that phantom would remain there
day and night, round the inn, as long as the old man's body was not
recovered and had not been deposited in the consecrated earth of a
churchyard.
When it was daylight Kunsi recovered some of his courage at the return
of the bright sun. He prepared his meal, gave his dog some food and then
remained motionless on a chair, tortured at heart as he thought of the
old man lying on the snow, and then, as soon as night once more covered
the mountains, new terrors assailed him. He now walked up and down the
dark kitchen, which was scarcely lighted by the flame of one candle, and
he walked from one end of it to the other with great strides, listening,
listening whether the terrible cry of the other night would again break
the dreary silence outside. He felt himself alone, unhappy man, as no
man had ever been alone before! He was alone in this immense desert of
Snow, alone five thousand feet above the inhabited earth, above human
habitation, above that stirring, noisy, palpitating life, alone under an
icy sky! A mad longing impelled him to run away, no matter where, to get
down to Loeche by flinging himself over the precipice; but he did not
even dare to open the door, as he felt sure that the other, the dead
man, would bar his road, so that he might not be obliged to remain up
there alone:
Toward midnight, tired with walking, worn out by grief and fear, he at
last fell into a doze in his chair, for he was afraid of his bed as one
is of a haunted spot. But suddenly the strident cry of the other evening
pierced his ears, and it was so shrill that Ulrich stretched out his
arms to repulse the ghost, and he fell backward with his chair.
Sam, who was awakened by the noise, began to howl as frightened dogs
do howl, and he walked all about the house trying to find out where
the danger came from. When he got to the door, he sniffed beneath it,
smelling vigorously, with his coat bristling and his tail stiff, while
he growled angrily. Kunsi, who was terrified, jumped up, and, holding
his chair by one leg, he cried: “Don't come in, don't come in, or I
shall kill you.” And the dog, excited by this threat, barked angrily at
that invisible enemy who defied his master's voice. By degrees, however,
he quieted down and came back and stretched himself in front of the
fire, but he was uneasy and kept his head up and growled between his
teeth.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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