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<h2> CHAPTER XXII </h2>
<p>The following nights proved still more cruel. The murderers had wished to
pass this part of the twenty-four hours together, so as to be able to
defend themselves against the drowned man, and by a strange effect, since
they had been doing so, they shuddered the more. They were exasperated,
and their nerves so irritated, that they underwent atrocious attacks of
suffering and terror, at the exchange of a simple word or look. At the
slightest conversation between them, at the least talk, they had alone,
they began raving, and were ready to draw blood.</p>
<p>The sort of remorse Laurent experienced was purely physical. His body, his
irritated nerves and trembling frame alone were afraid of the drowned man.
His conscience was for nothing in his terror. He did not feel the least
regret at having killed Camille. When he was calm, when the spectre did
not happen to be there, he would have committed the murder over again, had
he thought his interests absolutely required it.</p>
<p>During the daytime he laughed at himself for his fright, making up his
mind to be stronger, and he harshly rebuked Therese, whom he accused of
troubling him. According to what he said, it was Therese who shuddered, it
was Therese alone who brought on the frightful scenes, at night, in the
bedroom. And, as soon as night came, as soon as he found himself shut in
with his wife, icy perspiration pearled on his skin, and his frame shook
with childish terror.</p>
<p>He thus underwent intermittent nervous attacks that returned nightly, and
threw his senses into confusion while showing him the hideous green face
of his victim. These attacks resembled the accesses of some frightful
illness, a sort of hysteria of murder. The name of illness, of nervous
affection, was really the only one to give to the terror that Laurent
experienced. His face became convulsed, his limbs rigid, his nerves could
be seen knotting beneath his skin. The body suffered horribly, while the
spirit remained absent. The wretch felt no repentance. His passion for
Therese had conveyed a frightful evil to him, and that was all.</p>
<p>Therese also found herself a prey to these heavy shocks. But, in her
terror, she showed herself a woman: she felt vague remorse, unavowed
regret. She, at times, had an inclination to cast herself on her knees and
beseech the spectre of Camille to pardon her, while swearing to appease it
by repentance. Maybe Laurent perceived these acts of cowardice on the part
of Therese, for when they were agitated by the common terror, he laid the
blame on her, and treated her with brutality.</p>
<p>On the first nights, they were unable to go to bed. They waited for
daylight, seated before the fire, or pacing to and fro as on the evening
of the wedding-day. The thought of lying down, side by side, on the bed,
caused them a sort of terrifying repugnance. By tacit consent, they
avoided kissing one another, and they did not even look at their couch,
which Therese tumbled about in the morning.</p>
<p>When overcome with fatigue, they slept for an hour or two in the
armchairs, to awaken with a start, under the influence of the sinister
denouement of some nightmare. On awakening, with limbs stiff and tired,
shivering all over with discomfort and cold, their faces marbled with
livid blotches, they contemplated one another in bewilderment astonished
to see themselves there. And they displayed strange bashfulness towards
each other, ashamed at showing their disgust and terror.</p>
<p>But they struggled against sleep as much as they could. They seated
themselves, one on each side of the chimney, and talked of a thousand
trifles, being very careful not to let the conversation drop. There was a
broad space between them in front of the fire. When they turned their
heads, they imagined that Camille had drawn a chair there, and occupied
this space, warming his feet in a lugubrious, bantering fashion. This
vision, which they had seen on the evening of the wedding-day, returned
each night.</p>
<p>And this corpse taking a mute, but jeering part, in their interviews, this
horribly disfigured body ever remaining there, overwhelmed them with
continued anxiety. Not daring to move, they half blinded themselves
staring at the scorching flames, and, when unable to resist any longer,
they cast a timid glance aside, their eyes irritated by the glowing coal,
created the vision, and conveyed to it a reddish glow.</p>
<p>Laurent, in the end, refused to remain seated any longer, without avowing
the cause of this whim to Therese. The latter understood that he must see
Camille as she saw him; and, in her turn, she declared that the heat made
her feel ill, and that she would be more comfortable a few steps away from
the chimney. Pushing back her armchair to the foot of the bed, she
remained there overcome, while her husband resumed his walk in the room.
From time to time, he opened the window, allowing the icy air of the cold
January night to fill the apartment, and this calmed his fever.</p>
<p>For a week, the newly-married couple passed the nights in this fashion,
dozing and getting a little rest in the daytime, Therese behind the
counter in the shop, Laurent in his office. At night they belonged to pain
and fear. And the strangest part of the whole business was the attitude
they maintained towards each other. They did not utter one word of love,
but feigned to have forgotten the past; and seemed to accept, to tolerate
one another like sick people, feeling secret pity for their mutual
sufferings.</p>
<p>Both hoped to conceal their disgust and fear, and neither seemed to think
of the peculiar nights they passed, which should have enlightened them as
to the real state of their beings. When they sat up until morning, barely
exchanging a word, turning pale at the least sound, they looked as if they
thought all newly-married folk conducted themselves in the same way,
during the first days of their marriage. This was the clumsy hypocrisy of
two fools.</p>
<p>They were soon so overcome by weariness that they one night decided to lie
on the bed. They did not undress, but threw themselves, as they were, on
the quilt, fearing lest their bare skins should touch, for they fancied
they would receive a painful shock at the least contact. Then, when they
had slept thus, in an anxious sleep, for two nights, they risked removing
their clothes, and slipping between the sheets. But they remained apart,
and took all sorts of precautions so as not to come together.</p>
<p>Therese got into bed first, and lay down close to the wall. Laurent waited
until she had made herself quite comfortable, and then ventured to stretch
himself out at the opposite edge of the mattress, so that there was a
broad space between them. It was there that the corpse of Camille lay.</p>
<p>When the two murderers were extended under the same sheet, and had closed
their eyes, they fancied they felt the damp corpse of their victim, lying
in the middle of the bed, and turning their flesh icy cold. It was like a
vile obstacle separating them. They were seized with fever and delirium,
and this obstacle, in their minds, became material. They touched the
corpse, they saw it spread out, like a greenish and dissolved shred of
something, and they inhaled the infectious odour of this lump of human
putrefaction. All their senses were in a state of hallucination, conveying
intolerable acuteness to their sensations.</p>
<p>The presence of this filthy bedfellow kept them motionless, silent,
abstracted with anguish. Laurent, at times, thought of taking Therese
violently in his arms; but he dared not move. He said to himself that he
could not extend his hand, without getting it full of the soft flesh of
Camille. Next he fancied that the drowned man came to sleep between them
so as to prevent them clasping one another, and he ended by understanding
that Camille was jealous.</p>
<p>Nevertheless, ever and anon, they sought to exchange a timid kiss, to see
what would happen. The young man jeered at his wife, and ordered her to
embrace him. But their lips were so cold that it seemed as if the dead man
had got between their mouths. Both felt disgusted. Therese shuddered with
horror, and Laurent who heard her teeth chattering, railed at her:</p>
<p>"Why are you trembling?" he exclaimed. "Are you afraid of Camille? Ah! the
poor man is as dead as a doornail at this moment."</p>
<p>Both avoided saying what made them shudder. When an hallucination brought
the countenance of the drowned man before Therese, she closed her eyes,
keeping her terror to herself, not daring to speak to her husband of her
vision, lest she should bring on a still more terrible crisis. And it was
just the same with Laurent. When driven to extremities, he, in a fit of
despair, accused Therese of being afraid of Camille. The name, uttered
aloud, occasioned additional anguish. The murderer raved.</p>
<p>"Yes, yes," he stammered, addressing the young woman, "you are afraid of
Camille. I can see that plain enough! You are a silly thing, you have no
pluck at all. Look here! just go to sleep quietly. Do you think your
husband will come and pull you out of bed by the heels, because I happen
to be sleeping with you?"</p>
<p>This idea that the drowned man might come and pull them out of bed by the
heels, made the hair of Laurent stand on end, and he continued with
greater violence, while still in the utmost terror himself.</p>
<p>"I shall have to take you some night to the cemetery. We will open the
coffin Camille is in, and you will see what he looks like! Then you will
perhaps cease being afraid. Go on, he doesn't know we threw him in the
water."</p>
<p>Therese with her head under the bedclothes, was uttering smothered groans.</p>
<p>"We threw him into the water, because he was in our way," resumed her
husband. "And we'll throw him in again, will we not? Don't act like a
child. Show a little strength. It's silly to trouble our happiness. You
see, my dear, when we are dead and underground, we shall be neither less
nor more happy, because we cast an idiot in the Seine, and we shall have
freely enjoyed our love which will have been an advantage. Come, give me a
kiss."</p>
<p>The young woman kissed him, but she was icy cold, and half crazy, while he
shuddered as much as she did.</p>
<p>For a fortnight Laurent was asking himself how he could kill Camille
again. He had flung him in the water; and yet he was not dead enough,
because he came every night to sleep in the bed of Therese. While the
murderers thought that having committed the crime, they could love one
another in peace, their resuscitated victim arrived to make their touch
like ice. Therese was not a widow. Laurent found that he was mated to a
woman who already had a drowned man for husband.</p>
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