The Lock and Key Library: the Most Interesting Stories of All Nations: French Novels
General
The Lock and Key Library: the Most Interesting Stories of All Nations: French Novels
Detective and mystery stories, French; French fiction -- Translations into English
Eastern Church, heard you ever such language before?
Then he sprang on a chair, tore the two pictures from the wall,
threw them to the ground, and seizing his riding whip, switched
them furiously. In this affair, St. George lost half of his head
and one of his legs, and St. Sergius was disfigured for the rest of
his days. When he had satisfied his fury, Stephane hung them up
again on their nails, turning their faces to the wall, and blew out
the lamp; then he rolled upon the floor, twisting his arms and
tearing his hair--but suddenly sitting up, he drew from his bosom a
small, heart-shaped medallion which he gazed on fixedly, and as he
looked the tears began to roll down his cheeks, and in the midst of
his sobs, he cried out:
"Oh, my mother! I desire nothing from you! you could do nothing for
me; but why did I have time to know you? To remember! to remember--
what torment! Yes, I can see you now-- Every morning you gave me
a kiss, high on my forehead at the roots of my hair. The mark is
there yet--sometimes it burns me. I have often looked in the glass
to see if I had not a scar there-- Oh, my mother! come and heal my
wound by renewing it! To be kissed by one's mother, Great God!
what happiness! Oh! for a kiss, for a single kiss from you, I
would brave a thousand dangers, I would give my blood, my life, my
soul. Ah! how sad you look! there are tears in your eyes. You
recognize me, do you not? I am much changed, much changed; but I
have always your look, your forehead, your mouth, your hair."
Then starting up suddenly, Stephane walked around the room with an
unsteady step. He held the medallion closely grasped in his right
hand and kept his eyes upon it. Again he held it out at arm's
length and looked at it steadily with half-closed eyes, or drawing
it nearer to him, he said to it sweet and tender things, pressing
it to his lips, kissing it a thousand times and passing it over his
hair and his cheeks wet with tears; it seemed as though he were
trying to make some particle of this sacred image penetrate his
life and being. At last, placing it on the bed, he knelt before
it, and burying his face in his hands, cried out sobbing, "Mother,
mother, it is long since your daughter died. When will you call
your son to you?"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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