第481章

SUICIDE.

Cephyse and her sister continued with calmness the preparations for their death.

Alas! how many poor young girls, like these sisters, have been, and still will be, fatally driven to seek in suicide a refuge from despair, from infamy, or from a too miserable existence! And upon society will rest the terrible responsibility of these sad deaths, so long as thousands of human creatures, unable to live upon the mockery of wages granted to their labor, have to choose between these three gulfs of shame and woe; a life of enervating toil and mortal privations, causes of premature death;

prostitution, which kills also, but slowly--by contempt, brutality, and uncleanness; suicide--which kills at once.

In a few minutes, the two sisters had constructed, with the straw of their couch, the calkings necessary to intercept the air, and to render suffocation more expeditious and certain.

The hunchback said to her sister, "You are the taller, Cephyse, and must look to the ceiling; I will take care of the window and door."

"Be satisfied, sister; I shall have finished before you," answered Cephyse.

And the two began carefully to stop up every crevice through which a current of air could penetrate into the ruined garret.Thanks to her tall stature, Cephyse was able to reach the holes in the roof, and to close them up entirely.When they had finished this sad work, the sisters again approached, and looked at each other in silence.

The fatal moment drew near; their faces, though still calm, seemed slightly agitated by that strange excitement which always accompanies a double suicide.

"Now," said Mother Bunch, "now for the fire!"

She knelt down before the little chafing-dish, filled with charcoal.But Cephyse took hold of her under the arm, and obliged her to rise again, saying to her, "Let me light the fire--that is my business."

"But, Cephyse--"

"You know, poor sister, that the smell of charcoal gives you the headache!"

At the simplicity of this speech, for the Bacchanal Queen had spoken seriously, the sisters could not forbear smiling sadly.

"Never mind," resumed Cephyse; "why suffer more and sooner than is necessary?"

Then, pointing to the mattress, which still contained a little straw, Cephyse added, "Lie down there, good little sister; when our fire is alight, I will come and sit down by you."

"Do not be long, Cephyse."

"In five minutes it will be done."

The tall building, which faced the street, was separated by a narrow court from that which contained the retreat of the two sisters, and was so much higher, that when the sun had once disappeared behind its lofty roof, the garret soon became dark.The light, passing through the dirty panes of the small window, fell faintly on the blue and white patchwork of the old mattress, on which Mother Bunch was now stretched, covered with rags.Leaning on her left arm, with her chin resting in the palm of her hand, she looked after her sister with an expression of heart-rending grief.Cephyse, kneeling over the chafing-dish, with her face close to the black charcoal, above which already played a little bluish flame, exerted herself to blow the newly-kindled fire, which was reflected on the pale countenance of the unhappy girl.

The silence was deep.No sound was heard but the panting breath of Cephyse, and, at intervals, the slight crackling of the charcoal, which began to burn, and already sent forth a faint sickening vapor.Cephyse, seeing the fire completely lighted, and feeling already a little dizzy, rose from the ground, and said to her sister, as she approached her, "It is done!"

"Sister," answered Mother Bunch, kneeling on the mattress, whilst Cephyse remained standing, "how shall we place ourselves? I should like to be near you to the last."

Stop!" said Cephyse, half executing the measures of which she spoke, "I will sit on the mattress with my back against the wall.Now, little sister, you lie there.Lean your head upon my knees, and give me your hand.Are you comfortable so?"

"Yes--but I cannot see you."

"That is better.It seems there is a moment--very short, it is true--in which one suffers a good deal.And," added Cephyse, in a voice of emotion, "it will be as well not to see each other suffer."

"You are right, Cephyse."

"Let me kiss that beautiful hair for the last time," said Cephyse, as she pressed her lips to the silky locks which crowned the hunchback's pale and melancholy countenance, "and then--we will remain very quiet."

"Sister, your hand," said the sewing-girl; "for the last time, your hand --and then, as you say, we will move no more.We shall not have to wait long, I think, for I begin to feel dizzy.And you, sister?"

"Not yet," replied Cephyse; "I only perceive the smell of the charcoal."

"Do you know where they will bury us?" said Mother Bunch, after a moment's silence.

"No.Why do you ask?"

"Because I should like it to be in Pere-la-Chaise.I went there once with Agricola and his mother.What a fine view there is!--and then the trees, the flowers, the marble--do you know the dead are better lodged--

than the living--and--"

What is the matter, sister?" said Cephyse to her companion, who had stopped short, after speaking in a slow voice.

"I am giddy--my temples throb," was the answer."How do you feel?"

"I only begin to be a little faint; it is strange--the effect is slower with me than you."

"Oh! you see," said Mother Bunch, trying to smile, "I was always so forward.At school, do you remember, they said I was before the others.

And, now it happens again."

"I hope soon to overtake you this time," said Cephyse.

What astonished the sisters was quite natural.Though weakened by sorrow and misery, the Bacchanal Queen, with a constitution as robust as the other was frail and delicate, was necessarily longer than her sister in feeling the effects of the deleterious vapor.After a moment's silence, Cephyse resumed, as she laid her hand on the head she still held upon her knees, "You say nothing, sister! You suffer, is it not so?"