Fabiola : or, The church of the catacombs - Digital Repository Services

Tn a few moments his strength was exhausted, and M. Mor-
ii'il in raisin.'.; Iiiiu in Ills iiriim and n placing him in
: l> il. lie then stood beside his pillow in such a -way as to \>;
open, his checks hollow and iivid, his lips waxy pale ; liis eyes
alone still gleamed vividly, while, his fare alternately assumed
blackisii or blueish, livid or purple hues.
With folded arms, gravely and silently, M. Morren kept his
eyes fixed Badly on the dying man. He saw death rapidly approaching,
and would have wished to allay (lie poor wretch s
Bufferings, but he had not in his heart a single word o;
latiou to address to his friend. He was foreed to d> dine the
combat, and leave Death that implacable enemy, that jini-ie
of all sinners free to torture this condemned patient, this un-
fortunate victim.
tion and all his courage were beginning to fail him ; an enormous
load weighed on his chest ; he felt ho was on the point
of being suffocated, and instinctively sighed for a purer air, a
calmer nnd more invigorating atmosphere.
The freethinker's sister was sobbing loudly,
A DOUBLE 47
able to restrain him if another crisis unpenened. But, Midi ;\
precaution .sei'iued no 1
!
br.-ast. Tt was I yes,
longer u> Initiated on
his deathbed, motionless, spi-eeh'ess, and a,ni[>.4 lifeless. Only
from time to time a oomvnlsivb shuddering shook his limbs
the hist
flickering of the flame. His month was already wido
their I'
me; undi-r tin ir tVi t,
I
with her face
bent over the pillow ; she dared not fix her eyi s on the convulsed
countenance of that brother whose errors she had shared
and whose miserable and dreadful agony she now contem-
plated.
Thus the moments passed. The sick man, from time to
time, shuddered painfully; the phi/osophc, grave mid m jtion-
less, meditated in silence; the young girl wrung her hands in
mute despair; below stairs the three terrified iolidairee emptied
many a bumper to give themselves courage, but nobody
prayed in that accursed house.
And a sad and solemn silence had long reigned in that room,
when at last a half-stifled rattle was heaid in the dying man's
throat. The young girl then raised her head; but at that moment
Ernest's features had n less feverish and ferocious
expression; consciousness, no doubt, was gradually returning.
"Ernest," she murmured in his
"
ear, shall I call back the
'
priest ?
" The priest !" repeated the dying man in accents of rage and
fury, as if that word alone ha:l awakened all his hatred. "No,
no, the priest begone J Haven't I told you already he can't
help me ? that I am condemned, lost ! that there is no longer
any possible pardon !"
M. Morren, then approaching the unhappy man, strove to
calm him.
"Go away, go away; it's all over," said he, with a horrible
burst
"
of laughter. It's come at last that hour your nephew
told me of before, you remember. 'An hour will come, 'said he
tome, 'when you'll wish in vain to believe; vihen you'll implore
the assistance of a priest entreatingly, despairingly. But
who knows if God will then consent to hear you ?' Yes, yes, I
see it; that hour has come at last. Here, here" and, speaking
thus, he clasped his hand across his burning breast"!
feel a fire burning me here; it's like a foretaste of the fire of
hell that will soon ingulf me . . For I see it now. Morren,
there is a hell, and there is a God, don't you know ? . . Well,
if you don't know it, it is I who tell it to you I, the enemy of
. . There is a God
vulsively, as if to drive away some in. phantom.
"Look!" he cried; "look! here *
they are * *
!
is your nephew, Van Dai I, mid thn !>
woman ami * * I
i.
kuow
him, too. That s Via n, with in his
was I who dec. d.'d MILNO t<
the mounters, the tigers, ti'
it was i
"id feeble! ()]i! tln-y are ci
I, th'y nr
-lit !''
And In' east his arms about f-vi'i-ishly and l>r -fully,
while a convulsive gasping distended his Ihrout as if some,
heavy biiiden was crushing him down.
..at moment the door opened and the sentinels of ]:<
,i'd. Tho dying man d 'them and fixed o
i 'nice upon his perfidious friends.
:
"Woe, woe!" "
here they are, the accui
the demons of hell who are coming to carry me away."
And, as if hi; felt the hand of death upon him at that mo-
lie bo
Victor's father, too, was scnrcely conscious of what was going
on around him. At one moment he thought himseif
ment,
stretched in his turn on that bed of pain awaiting the visit of
his Sovereign Judge, struggling with death. All his resolu-
as if ho wished to escape his inevitable fate,
out of bed, dashing forward with all the frenzy of desp.dr.
But it was in vain. The poor wretch fell heavily i:pon tlio
floor. Tho fibre pcnuevr the freethinker was dead, and
'
Victor's fiitlr r lied precipitately out of that accursed hi
When he returned home that night In
scene of grief and tears. He had scarcely end i wingroom
when he uttered a piercing cry of pain and nugush. His
wife, se .ted sadly in a corner, was weeping in the arms of her
sister and her niece.
"What's the matter? What's the matter ?" cried the old
man distractedly.
Madame Morren, with a trembling hand, gave him a
bearing the stamp
of the Pontifical States. Tho uni
father had no sooner ghmced at it than he uttered a :
rending scre.im, and, prostrated with grief, fell upon the nearest
seat.
GHAPTEB XVII.
THE TWO FATHERS.
' Good day, dear Nina,"
" Good day, Carlotta. And where are you coming from now,
neighbor ?"
Thus spoke, one pleasant December morning, two of the
young girls whom we met in a previous chapter in the midst of
their pleasant chat near the Acqua Pauln.
'And what do I see?" continued Nina, without giying her
friend time to answer. "You've certainly been crying, for
your eyes are quite red."
"Alas lyes; and if you were with me, neighbor, I'm certain
you'd have wept too. I've left the Bianchi's, where I had
been to see Nunziata, who is always busy nursing that young
Zouave. Oh ! Nina, one would have th night it was no 1
a man but an angel he's so sweet and patient and calm and
and '' here she began fobbing, covering her face with her
handkerchief" my heart is still ready to break when I thiuk
of it !"
" But I really thought he was getting better since yester-
day !"
"
Alas, no ! . . I'm afraid the Lord will soon summon
him to his heavenly Paradise."
" And yet we were so hopeful a. few days ago when we went
the Christians; I, the libre penscur
and there is a hell !"
And he writhed convulsively on his bed, striving, in his
anguish, to hide under his bed-clothes his with Nunziata to pray to the Madonna di A'i7>j Agostino to
preserve his life ! How moved I Mas at the grief of that poor
brow, already inundated
with the cold sweat of death. Suddenly, as if some horrible
vision was unveiled to his sight, he shud. !
'fully,
; his eyes aifrightedly, and stretched for.h his arms con-
Nunziata when, weeping so bitterly, she began to recite the
Litany of the Blessed Virgin ! How fervently we all respond-
'
ed to her humble : prayer Grnzia, grazia, good Mary. You'll
grant us grace, JMothor of the Divide Saviour.'"
There is a pious aud touching custom at Koine among the
women of the people in the Trastevcro quarter. When one of