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[The following is summary. Boldface, underlining, bracketed commentary, and section subdivisions are my own. Proofreading is incomplete, so please forgive my mistakes. Text is copied from online sources (see bibliography below).]
Summary of
Alexandre Dumas
Le meneur de loups
The Wolf-Leader
24
“Une chasse enragée”
“Hunting down the Were-Wolf”
Brief summary (collecting those below):
__(24.1)__ (Recall from section 23 that Thibault the sorcerer became a were-wolf and is now being hunted by the Baron of Vez. Today is the one day of the year that Thibault is vulnerable, so the hunt could kill him.) Thibault continues to try to get ahead of the hunting dogs that are on his trail. But “Unfortunately for him, just as he reached the end of the Route du Pendu, he came across another pack of twenty dogs, which Monsieur de Montbreton’s huntsman was bringing up as a relay, for the Baron had sent his neighbour news of the chase.” Vez is hellbent on catching the prey, “his eye flashing, his nostrils dilated, exciting the pack with wild shouts and furious blasts.” Thibault is equally intent: “As he retained to the full all his human consciousness, it seemed to him impossible, as he still ran on, that he should not escape in safety from this ordeal; he felt that it was not possible for him to die before he had taken vengeance for all the agony that others made him suffer, before he had known those pleasures that had been promised him, above all—for at this critical moment his thoughts kept on running on this—before he had gained Agnelette’s love. [...] So he determined to take a bold course so as to out-distance the dogs, and to get back to his lairs, where he knew his ground and hoped to evade the dogs. He therefore doubled for the second time. He first ran back to Puiseux, then skirted past Viviers, regained the forest of Compiègne, made a dash into the forest of Largue, returned and crossed the Aisne at Attichy, and finally got back to the forest of Villers-Cotterets at the low lands of Argent. He trusted in this way to baffle the strategical plans of the Lord of Vez, who had, no doubt, posted his dogs at various likely points.” Finally Thibault takes a position across a river. When the dogs come, they all fall into it and are swept away, with the hunters going in after them. __(24.2)__ Thibault now goes up the river to the village Préciamont, where Agnelette had lived, in order to be somewhere the hunters would not expect. It is now evening. Thibault notices the beauty of nature and wonders if he made the right decision in becoming a were-wolf today: “When, at last, after circling round by Manereux and Oigny, the black wolf reached the borders of the heath by the lane of Ham, the sun was already beginning to sink, and shedding a dazzling light over the flowery plain; the little white and pink flowers scented the breeze that played caressingly around them; the grasshopper was singing in its little house of moss, and the lark was soaring up towards heaven, saluting the eve with its song, as twelve hours before it had saluted the morn. The peaceful beauty of nature had a strange effect on Thibault. It seemed enigmatical to him that nature could be so smiling and beautiful, while anguish such as his was devouring his soul. He saw the flowers, and heard the insects and the birds, and he compared the quiet joy of this innocent world with the horrible pangs he was enduring, and asked himself, whether after all, notwithstanding all the new promises that had been made him by the devil’s envoy [l’envoyé du démon], he had acted any more wisely in making this second compact than he had in making the first. He began to doubt whether he might not find himself deceived in the one as he had been in the other.” He then walks the “very path that he had taken Agnelette home on the first day of their acquaintance; the day, when inspired by his good angel, he had asked her to be his wife. The thought that, thanks to this new compact [pact], he might be able to recover Agnelette’s love, revived his spirits, which had been saddened and depressed by the sight of the universal happiness around him.” He next goes into a cemetery and hides: “The wolf made for the thickest of these bramble bushes; he found a sort of ruined vault, whence he could look out without being seen, and he crept under the branches and hid himself inside.” Nearby is a freshly dug grave. A funeral procession comes to the grave. “Although there was nothing unusual in such a sight as this, seeing that he was in a cemetery, and that the newly-dug grave must have prepared him for it, Thibault, nevertheless, felt strangely moved as he looked on. Although the slightest movement might betray his presence and bring destruction upon him, he anxiously watched every detail of the ceremony.” When the pall is lifted from the body’s face, Thibault sees it is Agnelette, his love and potential salvation. “A low groan escaped from Thibault’s agonised breast, and mingled with the tears and sobs of those present. Agnelette, as she lay there so pale in death, wrapped in an ineffable calm, appeared more beautiful than when in life, beneath her wreath of forget-me-nots and daisies. As Thibault looked upon the poor dead girl, his heart seemed suddenly to melt within him. It was he, as he had truly realised, who had really killed her, and he experienced a genuine and overpowering sorrow, the more poignant since for the first time for many long months he forgot to think of himself, and thought only of the dead woman, now lost to him for ever.” Thibault is overcome when she is laid to rest: “But the grief of the man overcame this instinct of the wild beast at bay; a shudder passed through the body hidden beneath its wolf skin; tears fell from the fierce blood-red eyes, and the unhappy man cried out: ‘O God! take my life, I give it gladly, if only by my death I may give back life to her whom I have killed!’ The words were followed by such an appalling howl, that all who were in the cemetery fled, and the place was left utterly deserted. Almost at the same moment, the hounds, having recovered the scent, came leaping in over the wall, followed by the Baron, streaming with sweat as he rode his horse, which was covered with foam and blood.” The dogs go to the bramble bush where Thibault had hidden himself. Baron Vez goes to see what the dogs found. The hounds were “fighting over a fresh and bleeding wolf-skin, but the body had disappeared.” This is Thibault’s pelt, because it was entirely black except for one white hair (see section 23.1). The people believe that Thibault was saved: “as the skin had been found without the body, and, as, from the spot where it was found a peasant reported to have heard someone speak the words: ‘O God! take my life! I give it gladly, if only by my death I may give back life to her whom I have killed,’ the priest declared openly that Thibault, by reason of his sacrifice and repentance, had been saved! And what added to the consistency of belief in this tradition was, that every year on the anniversary of Agnelette’s death, up to the time when the Monasteries were all abolished at the Revolution, a monk from the Abbey of the Premonstratensians at Bourg-Fontaine, which stands half a league from Préciamont, was seen to come and pray beside her grave. __(24.3)__ This ends the story Mocquet has been telling the narrator and author, Alexandre Dumas (see section 0.9).
[Thibault’s Chase and Temporary Escape]
[Thibault’s Disappearance and Possible Salvation]
[The End of Mocquet’s Story]
Summary
[Thibault’s Chase and Temporary Escape]
[(Recall from section 23 that Thibault the sorcerer became a were-wolf and is now being hunted by the Baron of Vez. Today is the one day of the year that Thibault is vulnerable, so the hunt could kill him.) Thibault continues to try to get ahead of the hunting dogs that are on his trail. But “Unfortunately for him, just as he reached the end of the Route du Pendu, he came across another pack of twenty dogs, which Monsieur de Montbreton’s huntsman was bringing up as a relay, for the Baron had sent his neighbour news of the chase.” Vez is hellbent on catching the prey, “his eye flashing, his nostrils dilated, exciting the pack with wild shouts and furious blasts.” Thibault is equally intent: “As he retained to the full all his human consciousness, it seemed to him impossible, as he still ran on, that he should not escape in safety from this ordeal; he felt that it was not possible for him to die before he had taken vengeance for all the agony that others made him suffer, before he had known those pleasures that had been promised him, above all—for at this critical moment his thoughts kept on running on this—before he had gained Agnelette’s love. [...] So he determined to take a bold course so as to out-distance the dogs, and to get back to his lairs, where he knew his ground and hoped to evade the dogs. He therefore doubled for the second time. He first ran back to Puiseux, then skirted past Viviers, regained the forest of Compiègne, made a dash into the forest of Largue, returned and crossed the Aisne at Attichy, and finally got back to the forest of Villers-Cotterets at the low lands of Argent. He trusted in this way to baffle the strategical plans of the Lord of Vez, who had, no doubt, posted his dogs at various likely points.” Finally Thibault takes a position across a river. When the dogs come, they all fall into it and are swept away, with the hunters going in after them.]
[ditto]
Thibault avait une grande avance sur les chiens, grâce à la précaution qu’il avait prise de détaler aux premiers abois du limier.
Il fut assez longtemps sans entendre la meute.
Cependant, tout à coup, ses hurlements, comme un roulement de tonnerre, lui arrivèrent de l’horizon, et commencèrent à lui causer quelque inquiétude.
Il quitta le trot, redoubla de vitesse et ne s’arrêta que quand il eut mis quelques lieues de plus entre ses ennemis et lui.
Alors, il regarda autour de lui et s’orienta : il était sur les hauteurs de Montaigu.
Il prêta l’oreille.
Les chiens lui semblèrent avoir conservé leur distance : ils étaient aux environs du buisson du Tillet.
Il fallait l’oreille d’un loup pour les entendre à cette distance.
Thibault redescendit comme s’il allait au-devant d’eux, laissa Erneville à sa gauche, sauta dans le petit cours d’eau qui y prend sa source, le descendit jusqu’à Grimaucourt, se lança dans les bois de Lessart-l’Abbesse et gagna la forêt de Compiègne.
Sentant alors que, malgré les trois heures de course rapide qu’il venait de faire, les muscles d’acier de ses jambes de loup ne semblaient point fatigués le moins du monde, il se rassura un peu.
Il hésitait cependant à se hasarder dans une forêt qui lui était moins familière que celle de Villers-Cotterêts.
Aussi, après une pointe d’une ou deux lieues, se décida-t-il à faire un hourvari en conservant les grandes refuites qui lui semblaient les plus propres à se débarrasser des chiens.
Il traversa d’un trait toute la plaine qui s’étend de Pierrefonds à Mont-Gobert, entra dans la forêt au champ Meutard, en sortit à Vauvaudrand, reprit le cours d’eau du flottage de Sancères, et rentra dans la forêt par le bois de Longpont.
Malheureusement, au haut de la route du Pendu, il donna dans une nouvelle meute de vingt chiens, que le piqueur de M. de Montbreton, prévenu par le seigneur de Vez, amenait à son aide comme relais volant.
La meute fut découplée à l’instant même et à vue par le piqueur, qui, s’étant aperçu que le loup conservait ses distances, craignait, s’il attendait l’équipage pour lancer ces chiens, que l’animal ne se forlongeât.
Alors commença vraiment la lutte entre le loup-garou et les chiens.
C’était une course folle que les chevaux, quelles que fussent l’habileté et l’adresse de leurs cavaliers, avaient grand-peine à suivre.
La chasse traversait les plaines, les bois, les bruyères avec la rapidité de la pensée.
Elle paraissait et disparaissait comme l’éclair dans la nue, en laissant derrière elle une trombe de poussière et un bruit de cors et de cris que l’écho avait à peine le temps de répéter.
Elle franchissait les montagnes, les vallées, les torrents, les fondrières, les précipices, comme si chiens et chevaux eussent eu les ailes, ceux-ci de la chimère, ceux-là de l’hippogriffe.
Le seigneur Jean avait rejoint.
Il courait en tête de ses piqueurs, marchant sur la queue des chiens, l’œil ardent, la narine dilatée, actionnant la meute par des cris et des bien-aller formidables, et fouillant de l’éperon avec rage le ventre de son cheval lorsque la rencontre d’un obstacle faisait hésiter celui-ci.
De son côté, le loup noir maintenait ses grandes allures.
Quoique, en entendant, au moment du retour, les aboiements féroces de la nouvelle meute retentir à cent pas derrière lui, son émotion fût devenue profonde, il ne perdait point pour cela un pouce de terrain.
Tout en courant, comme il conservait dans toute sa plénitude la pensée humaine, il lui semblait impossible qu’il succombât dans cette épreuve ; il lui semblait ne pouvoir mourir sans avoir tiré vengeance de toutes ces angoisses qu’on lui faisait souffrir, avant d’avoir connu les jouissances qui lui étaient promises, avant surtout, – car, dans ce moment critique, sa pensée y revenait sans cesse, – avant d’avoir conquis l’amour d’Agnelette.
Parfois la terreur le dominait, mais parfois aussi c’était la colère.
Il pensait à se retourner, à faire face à cette troupe hurlante, et, oubliant sa nouvelle forme, à la dissiper à coups de pierres et de bâton.
Puis, un instant après, à moitié fou de rage, étourdi du glas de mort que la meute aboyait à ses oreilles, il fuyait, il bondissait, il volait avec les jambes du cerf, avec les ailes de l’aigle.
Mais ses efforts étaient impuissants. Il avait beau fuir, bondir, voler presque, le bruit funèbre était attaché à lui, et ne s’éloignait un instant, ou plutôt n’était un instant distancé que pour se rapprocher plus menaçant et plus formidable.
Cependant le soin de sa conservation ne l’abandonnait pas ; ses forces n’étaient point diminuées.
Mais, il sentait que s’il fallait que, par mauvaise chance, il rencontrât de nouveaux relais, ses forces pourraient bien s’épuiser.
Il se décida donc à prendre un grand parti pour essayer de distancer les chiens, puis de rentrer dans ses demeures, où, grâce à la connaissance qu’il avait de la forêt, il pouvait espérer de dépasser les chiens.
En conséquence, il fit un second hourvari.
Il remonta vers Puiseux, longea les bordures de Viviers, rentra dans la forêt de Compiègne, fit une pointe dans la forêt de Largue, revint traverser l’Aisne à Attichy, et rentra dans la forêt de Villers-Cotterêts par le fond d’Argent.
Il espérait ainsi déjouer la stratégie avec laquelle le seigneur Jean avait sans doute échelonné sa meute.
Une fois de retour dans ses repaires habituels, Thibault respira plus à l’aise.
Il se retrouvait sur les bords de l’Ourcq, entre Norroy et Trouennes, à l’endroit où la rivière roule profondément encaissée entre une double rangée de rochers ; il s’élança sur une roche aiguë qui surplombait le torrent, du haut de cet escarpement se jeta résolument dans les flots, gagna à la nage une anfractuosité située au soubassement du roc, d’où il venait de se laisser tomber, et, caché un peu au-dessous du niveau ordinaire de l’eau, au fond de cette caverne, il attendit.
Il avait gagné près d’une lieue sur la meute.
Cependant, il était là depuis dix minutes à peine, lorsque la tempête de chiens arriva sur la crête du rocher.
Ceux qui menaient la tête, ivres d’ardeur, ne virent point le gouffre, ou, comme celui qu’ils poursuivaient, crurent pouvoir le franchir, et Thibault fut, jusqu’au fond de sa retraite, éclaboussé par l’eau qui jaillissait de tous côtés à la chute de leurs corps.
Mais, moins heureux et moins vigoureux que lui, ils ne purent dompter la violence du courant. Après d’impuissants efforts, ils disparurent emportés par lui, sans avoir éventé la retraite du loup-garou.
Celui-ci entendait au-dessus de sa tête le trépignement des chevaux, les abois de ce qui restait de la meute, les cris des hommes, et, par-dessus tous ces cris, les imprécations du seigneur Jean, dont la voix dominait toutes les autres voix.
Ensuite, et lorsque le dernier chien tombé dans le torrent eut, comme le reste de la meute, été emporté par le courant, il vit, grâce à un coude, les chasseurs se diriger en aval de la rivière.
Convaincu que le seigneur Jean, qu’il reconnaissait à la tête de ses piqueurs, n’agissait ainsi que pour la remonter ensuite, il ne voulut pas l’attendre.
Il quitta sa retraite.
(301-305)
THIBAULT had got well ahead of the dogs, thanks to the precaution he had taken of making good his escape at the first note of the bloodhound. For some time he heard no further sound of pursuit; but, all at once, like distant thunder, the baying of the hounds reached his ears, and he began to feel some anxiety. He had been trotting, but he now went on at greater speed, and did not pause till he had put a few more leagues between himself and his enemies. Then he stood still and took his bearings; he found himself on the heights at Montaigu. He bent his head and listened—the dogs still seemed a long way off, somewhere near the Tillet coppice.
It required a wolf’s ear to distinguish them so far off. Thibault went down the hill again, as if to meet the dogs; then, leaving Erneville to the left, he leaped into the little stream which rises there, waded down its course as far as Grimancourt, dashed into the woods of Lessart-l’Abbesse, and finally gained the forest of Compiègne. He was somewhat reassured to find that, in spite of his three hours’ hard running, the steel-like muscles of his wolf legs were not in the least fatigued. He hesitated, however, to trust himself in a forest which was not so familiar to him as that of Villers-Cotterets.
After another dash of a mile or so, he decided that by doubling boldly he would be most likely to put the dogs off the scent. He crossed at a gallop all the stretch of plain between Pierrefond and Mont-Gobert, took to the woods at the Champ Meutard, came out again at Vauvaudrand, regained the stream by the Sancères timber floatage, and once more found himself in the forest near Long-Pont. Unfortunately for him, just as he reached the end of the Route du Pendu, he came across another pack of twenty dogs, which Monsieur de Montbreton’s huntsman was bringing up as a relay, for the Baron had sent his neighbour news of the chase. Instantly the hounds were uncoupled by the huntsman as he caught sight of the wolf, for seeing that the latter kept its distance, he feared it would get too far ahead if he waited for the others to come up before loosing his dogs. And now began the struggle between the were-wolf and the dogs in very earnest. It was a wild chase, which the horses, in spite of their skilled riders, had great difficulty in following, a chase over plains, through woods, across heaths, pursued at a headlong pace. As the hunt flew by, it appeared and disappeared like a flash of lightning across a cloud, leaving behind a whirlwind of dust, and a sound of horns and cries which echo had hardly time to repeat. It rushed over hill and dale, through torrents and bogs, and over precipices, as if horses and dogs had been winged like Hippogriffs and Chimeras. The Baron had come up with his huntsmen, riding at their head, and almost riding on the tails of his dogs, his eye flashing, his nostrils dilated, exciting the pack with wild shouts and furious blasts, digging his spurs into his horse’s sides whenever an obstacle of any kind caused it to hesitate for a single instant. The black wolf, on his side, still held on at the same rapid pace; although sorely shaken at hearing the fresh pack in full pursuit only a short way behind him, just as he had got back to the forest, he had not lost an inch of ground. As he retained to the full all his human consciousness, it seemed to him impossible, as he still ran on, that he should not escape in safety from this ordeal; he felt that it was not possible for him to die before he had taken vengeance for all the agony that others made him suffer, before he had known those pleasures that had been promised him, above all—for at this critical moment his thoughts kept on running on this—before he had gained Agnelette’s love. At moments he was possessed by terror, at others by anger. He thought at times that he would turn and face this yelling pack of dogs, and, forgetting his present form, scatter them with stones and blows. Then, an instant after, feeling mad with rage, deafened by the death-knell the hounds were ringing in his ears, he fled, he leaped, he flew with the legs of a deer, with the wings of an eagle. But his efforts were in vain; he might run, leap, almost fly, the sounds of death still clung to him, and if for a moment they became more distant, it was only to hear them a moment after nearer and more threatening still. But still the instinct of self-preservation did not fail him; and still his strength was undiminished; only, if by ill luck, he were to come across other relays, he felt that it might give way. So he determined to take a bold course so as to out-distance the dogs, and to get back to his lairs, where he knew his ground and hoped to evade the dogs. He therefore doubled for the second time. He first ran back to Puiseux, then skirted past Viviers, regained the forest of Compiègne, made a dash into the forest of Largue, returned and crossed the Aisne at Attichy, and finally got back to the forest of Villers-Cotterets at the low lands of Argent. He trusted in this way to baffle the strategical plans of the Lord of Vez, who had, no doubt, posted his dogs at various likely points.
Once back in his old quarters Thibault breathed more freely. He was now on the banks of the Ourcq between Norroy and Trouennes, where the river runs at the foot of deep rocks on either side; he leaped up on to a sharp-pointed crag overhanging the water, and from this high vantage ground he sprang into the waves below, then swam to a crevice at the base of the rock from which he had leapt, which was situated rather below the ordinary level of the water, and here, at the back of this cave, he waited. He had gained at least three miles upon the dogs; and yet, scarcely another ten minutes had elapsed, when the whole pack arrived and stormed the crest of the rock. Those who were leading, mad with excitement, did not see the gulf in front of them, or else, like their quarry they thought they would leap safely into it, for they plunged, and Thibault was splashed, far back as he was hidden, by the water that was scattered in every direction as they fell into it one by one. Less fortunate, however, and less vigorous than he was, they were unable to fight against the current, and after vainly battling with it, they were borne along out of sight before they had even got scent of the were-wolf’s retreat. Overhead he could hear the tramping of the horses’ feet, the baying of the dogs that were still left, the cries of men, and above all these sounds, dominating the other voices, that of the Baron as he cursed and swore. When the last dog had fallen into the water, and been carried away like the others, he saw, thanks to a bend in the river, that the huntsmen were going down it, and persuaded that the Baron, whom he recognised at the head of his hunting-train, would only do this with the intention of coming up it again, he determined not to wait for this, and left his hiding-place.
(111-113)
[Thibault’s Disappearance and Possible Salvation]
[Thibault now goes up the river to the village Préciamont, where Agnelette had lived, in order to be somewhere the hunters would not expect. It is now evening. Thibault notices the beauty of nature and wonders if he made the right decision in becoming a were-wolf today: “When, at last, after circling round by Manereux and Oigny, the black wolf reached the borders of the heath by the lane of Ham, the sun was already beginning to sink, and shedding a dazzling light over the flowery plain; the little white and pink flowers scented the breeze that played caressingly around them; the grasshopper was singing in its little house of moss, and the lark was soaring up towards heaven, saluting the eve with its song, as twelve hours before it had saluted the morn. The peaceful beauty of nature had a strange effect on Thibault. It seemed enigmatical to him that nature could be so smiling and beautiful, while anguish such as his was devouring his soul. He saw the flowers, and heard the insects and the birds, and he compared the quiet joy of this innocent world with the horrible pangs he was enduring, and asked himself, whether after all, notwithstanding all the new promises that had been made him by the devil’s envoy [l’envoyé du démon], he had acted any more wisely in making this second compact than he had in making the first. He began to doubt whether he might not find himself deceived in the one as he had been in the other.” He then walks the “very path that he had taken Agnelette home on the first day of their acquaintance; the day, when inspired by his good angel, he had asked her to be his wife. The thought that, thanks to this new compact [pact], he might be able to recover Agnelette’s love, revived his spirits, which had been saddened and depressed by the sight of the universal happiness around him.” He next goes into a cemetery and hides: “The wolf made for the thickest of these bramble bushes; he found a sort of ruined vault, whence he could look out without being seen, and he crept under the branches and hid himself inside.” Nearby is a freshly dug grave. A funeral procession comes to the grave. “Although there was nothing unusual in such a sight as this, seeing that he was in a cemetery, and that the newly-dug grave must have prepared him for it, Thibault, nevertheless, felt strangely moved as he looked on. Although the slightest movement might betray his presence and bring destruction upon him, he anxiously watched every detail of the ceremony.” When the pall is lifted from the body’s face, Thibault sees it is Agnelette, his love and potential salvation. “A low groan escaped from Thibault’s agonised breast, and mingled with the tears and sobs of those present. Agnelette, as she lay there so pale in death, wrapped in an ineffable calm, appeared more beautiful than when in life, beneath her wreath of forget-me-nots and daisies. As Thibault looked upon the poor dead girl, his heart seemed suddenly to melt within him. It was he, as he had truly realised, who had really killed her, and he experienced a genuine and overpowering sorrow, the more poignant since for the first time for many long months he forgot to think of himself, and thought only of the dead woman, now lost to him for ever.” Thibault is overcome when she is laid to rest: “But the grief of the man overcame this instinct of the wild beast at bay; a shudder passed through the body hidden beneath its wolf skin; tears fell from the fierce blood-red eyes, and the unhappy man cried out: ‘O God! take my life, I give it gladly, if only by my death I may give back life to her whom I have killed!’ The words were followed by such an appalling howl, that all who were in the cemetery fled, and the place was left utterly deserted. Almost at the same moment, the hounds, having recovered the scent, came leaping in over the wall, followed by the Baron, streaming with sweat as he rode his horse, which was covered with foam and blood.” The dogs go to the bramble bush where Thibault had hidden himself. Baron Vez goes to see what the dogs found. The hounds were “fighting over a fresh and bleeding wolf-skin, but the body had disappeared.” This is Thibault’s pelt, because it was entirely black except for one white hair (see section 23.1). The people believe that Thibault was saved: “as the skin had been found without the body, and, as, from the spot where it was found a peasant reported to have heard someone speak the words: ‘O God! take my life! I give it gladly, if only by my death I may give back life to her whom I have killed,’ the priest declared openly that Thibault, by reason of his sacrifice and repentance, had been saved! And what added to the consistency of belief in this tradition was, that every year on the anniversary of Agnelette’s death, up to the time when the Monasteries were all abolished at the Revolution, a monk from the Abbey of the Premonstratensians at Bourg-Fontaine, which stands half a league from Préciamont, was seen to come and pray beside her grave.]
[ditto]
Tantôt nageant, tantôt sautant avec adresse d’une roche à l’autre, tantôt marchant dans l’eau, il remonta l’Ourcq jusqu’à l’extrémité du buisson de Crêne.
Arrivé là, et certain d’avoir sur ses ennemis une avance considérable, il résolut de gagner un village et de ruser autour des maisons, pensant bien que ce n’était point là qu’on viendrait le chercher.
Il pensa à Préciamont.
Si un village lui était connu, c’était celui-là.
Puis, à Préciamont, il serait près d’Agnelette.
Il lui semblait que ce voisinage lui donnerait de la force et lui porterait bonheur, et que la douce image de la chaste enfant pourrait avoir quelque influence sur sa bonne ou sa mauvaise fortune.
Thibault se dirigea donc de ce côté.
Il était six heures du soir.
Il y avait près de quinze heures que la chasse durait.
Loup, chiens et chasseurs avaient bien fait cinquante lieues.
Lorsque, après avoir fait un détour par Manereux et Oigny, le loup noir apparut à la lisière de la queue de Ham, le soleil commençait de descendre à l’horizon, et répandait sur la bruyère une teinte éblouissante de pourpre ; les petites fleurs blanches et roses parfumaient la brise qui les caressait ; le grillon chantait dans son palais de mousse, et, montant perpendiculairement dans le ciel, l’alouette saluait la nuit, comme, douze heures auparavant, elle avait salué le jour.
Le calme de la nature fit un singulier effet sur Thibault.
Il lui semblait étrange qu’elle pût être si belle et si souriante, alors qu’une pareille angoisse déchirait son âme.
En voyant ces fleurs, en entendant ces insectes et ces oiseaux, il comparait la douce quiétude de tout ce monde innocent avec les horribles soucis qu’il éprouvait, et se demandait, malgré les nouvelles promesses à lui faites par l’envoyé du démon, s’il avait plus sagement agi en faisant le second pacte qu’en faisant le premier.
Il en vint à redouter de ne trouver que déception dans l’un comme dans l’autre.
En traversant un sentier à moitié perdu sous les genêts dorés, il reconnut ce sentier pour celui par lequel il avait reconduit Agnelette le premier jour où il l’avait vue ; le jour où, inspiré par son bon génie, il lui avait offert de devenir son époux.
L’idée que, grâce au nouveau pacte passé, il pourrait reconquérir l’amour d’Agnelette, releva un peu le courage de Thibault, qui s’était abattu au spectacle de cette joie universelle.
La cloche de Préciamont tintait dans la vallée.
Ses sons tristement monotones rappelèrent au loup noir et les hommes et ce qu’il avait à craindre d’eux.
Il avança donc hardiment, à travers champs, vers le village, où il espérait trouver un asile dans quelque masure abandonnée.
Comme il longeait le petit mur de pierres sèches qui entoure le cimetière de Préciamont, il entendit un bruit de voix dans le chemin creux qu’il suivait.
En continuant son chemin, il ne pouvait manquer de rencontrer ceux qui venaient à lui ; en revenant sur ses pas, il avait à franchir une arête, où il pouvait être vu ; il jugea donc prudent de franchir le petit mur du cimetière.
D’un bond, il fut de l’autre côté.
Le cimetière, comme presque tous les cimetières de village, attenait à l’église.
Il était inculte, couvert de grandes herbes partout, de ronces et d’épines en certains endroits.
Le loup s’avança vers le plus épais de ces ronces ; il découvrit une espèce de caveau ruiné, d’où il pouvait voir sans être vu.
Il se glissa sous ces ronces et se cacha dans le caveau.
À dix pas de Thibault était une fosse fraîchement creusée qui attendait son hôte.
On entendait dans l’église le chant des prêtres.
Ce chant était d’autant plus distinct que le caveau qui servait de retraite au fugitif avait dû autrefois avoir une communication avec l’église souterraine.
Au bout de quelques minutes, les chants cessèrent.
Le loup noir, qui se sentait instinctivement mal à l’aise dans le voisinage d’une église, pensa que les gens du chemin creux étaient passés, et qu’il était temps pour lui de reprendre sa course et de chercher une retraite plus sûre que celle qu’il avait momentanément adoptée.
Mais, au moment où il mettait le nez hors de son roncier, la porte du cimetière s’ouvrit.
Il reprit donc son premier poste, tout en s’inquiétant de qui venait.
Et d’abord il vit un enfant vêtu d’une aube blanche et tenant à la main un bénitier.
Puis la croix d’argent, portée par un homme qui avait également un surplis par-dessus ses vêtements.
Après eux, le prêtre, psalmodiant les prières des morts.
Après le prêtre, un brancard porté par quatre paysans et recouvert d’un drap blanc semé de branches vertes et de couronnes de fleurs.
Sous le drap se dessinait la forme d’une bière.
Quelques habitants de Préciamont marchaient derrière le brancard.
Quoique cette rencontre fût toute naturelle dans un cimetière et que Thibault eût dû y être préparé par la vue de la fosse ouverte, elle fit sur le fugitif une profonde impression ; et, bien que le moindre mouvement pût trahir sa présence, et, par conséquent, amener sa perte, il suivit avec une curiosité inquiète tous les détails de la cérémonie.
Lorsque le prêtre eut béni la fosse qui avait tout d’abord frappé les yeux de Thibault, les porteurs déposèrent leur fardeau sur une tombe voisine.
La coutume, chez nous, est, lorsqu’on enterre une jeune fille morte dans son éclat, une jeune femme trépassée dans sa beauté, de la conduire au cimetière couchée dans sa bière, mais couverte d’un drap seulement.
Là, les amis peuvent dire un dernier adieu à la morte, les parents lui donner un dernier baiser.
Puis on cloue le couvercle, et tout est dit.
Une vieille femme, guidée par une main charitable, car elle paraissait aveugle, s’approcha pour donner un dernier baiser à la morte. Les porteurs relevèrent le drap qui couvrait son visage.
Thibault reconnut Agnelette.
Un gémissement sourd s’échappa de sa poitrine brisée, et se confondit avec les pleurs et les sanglots des assistants.
Le visage d’Agnelette, tout pâle qu’il était, paraissait, dans le calme ineffable de la mort, plus beau qu’il n’avait jamais été de son vivant sous son diadème de myosotis et de pâquerettes.
À la vue de la pauvre trépassée, Thibault avait senti tout à coup se fondre la glace de son cœur. Il songeait qu’en réalité c’était lui qui avait tué cette enfant, et il éprouvait une douleur immense, parce qu’elle était vraie ; poignante, parce que, pour la première fois depuis longtemps, il ne songeait pas à lui, mais à celle qui était morte.
Lorsqu’il entendit les coups de marteau qui clouaient le couvercle de la bière, lorsqu’il entendit les pierres et la terre, poussées par la bêche du fossoyeur, rouler avec un bruit sourd sur le corps de la seule femme qu’il eût jamais aimée, le vertige s’empara de lui ; il lui sembla que les durs cailloux meurtrissaient la chair d’Agnelette, cette chair il y a peu de jours si fraîche, si belle, et encore hier si palpitante, et il fit un mouvement pour se précipiter sur les assistants et leur arracher ce corps qui lui semblait, mort, devoir être à lui, puisque, vivant, il avait été à un autre.
La douleur de l’homme dompta ce dernier mouvement de la bête féroce aux abois ; sous cette peau de loup, un frisson courut ; de ces yeux sanglants des larmes jaillirent, et le malheureux s’écria :
– Mon Dieu ! prenez ma vie, je vous la donne de grand cœur, si ma vie peut rendre l’existence à celle que j’ai tuée !
Ces paroles furent suivies d’un hurlement si épouvantable, que tous ceux qui étaient là s’enfuirent avec effroi.
Le cimetière resta désert.
Presque au même instant, la meute, qui avait retrouvé la piste du loup noir, l’envahit, franchissant le mur où Thibault l’avait franchi.
Derrière elle parut le seigneur Jean, ruisselant de sueur sur son cheval, couvert d’écume et de sang. Les chiens allèrent droit au buisson et pillèrent.
– Hallali ! hallali ! cria le seigneur Jean d’une voix de tonnerre, et sautant à bas de son cheval, sans s’inquiéter s’il y avait quelqu’un pour le garder, il tira son couteau de chasse, et, s’élançant vers le caveau, se fit jour au milieu des chiens.
Les chiens se disputaient une peau de loup toute fraîche et toute saignante, mais le corps avait disparu.
C’était bien certainement la peau du loup-garou qu’on chassait, puisque, à l’exception d’un seul poil blanc, elle était complètement noire.
Qu’était devenu le corps ?
Nul ne le sut jamais.
Seulement, comme, à partir de ce moment, l’on ne revit plus Thibault dans le pays, l’avis général fut que c’était l’ancien sabotier qui était le loup-garou.
Et puis, comme on n’avait retrouvé que la peau et point le corps, et comme, de l’endroit où cette peau avait été retrouvée, quelqu’un dit avoir entendu sortir ces paroles : « Mon Dieu ! prenez ma vie ! Je vous la donne de grand cœur, si ma vie peut rendre l’existence à celle que j’ai tuée ! » le prêtre déclara qu’en considération de son dévouement et de son repentir, Thibault avait été sauvé !
Et ce qui donna surtout de la consistance à cette tradition, c’est que, jusqu’au moment où les couvents furent abolis par la Révolution, on vit tous les ans un moine prémontré sortir du couvent de Bourg-Fontaine, situé à une demi-lieue de Préciamont, et venir prier sur la tombe d’Agnelette au jour anniversaire de sa mort.
(305-311)
Now swimming, now leaping with agility from one rock to the other, at times wading through the water, he went up the river to the end of the Crêne coppice. Certain that he had now made a considerable advance on his enemies, he resolved to get to one of the villages near and run in and out among the houses, feeling sure that they would not think of coming after him there. He thought of Préciamont; if any village was well known to him, it was that; and then, at Préciamont, he would be near Agnelette. He felt that this neighbourhood would put fresh vigour into him, and would bring him good fortune, and that the gentle image of the innocent girl would have some influence on his fate. So he started off in that direction. It was now six o’clock in the evening; the hunt had lasted nearly fifteen hours, and wolf, dogs and huntsmen had covered fifty leagues at least. When, at last, after circling round by Manereux and Oigny, the black wolf reached the borders of the heath by the lane of Ham, the sun was already beginning to sink, and shedding a dazzling light over the flowery plain; the little white and pink flowers scented the breeze that played caressingly around them; the grasshopper was singing in its little house of moss, and the lark was soaring up towards heaven, saluting the eve with its song, as twelve hours before it had saluted the morn. The peaceful beauty of nature had a strange effect on Thibault. It seemed enigmatical to him that nature could be so smiling and beautiful, while anguish such as his was devouring his soul. He saw the flowers, and heard the insects and the birds, and he compared the quiet joy of this innocent world with the horrible pangs he was enduring, and asked himself, whether after all, notwithstanding all the new promises that had been made him by the devil’s envoy [l’envoyé du démon], he had acted any more wisely in making this second compact [pact] than he had in making the first. He began to doubt whether he might not find himself deceived in the one as he had been in the other.
As he went along a little footpath nearly hidden under the golden broom, he suddenly remembered that it was by this very path that he had taken Agnelette home on the first day of their acquaintance; the day, when inspired by his good angel, he had asked her to be his wife. The thought that, thanks to this new compact [pact], he might be able to recover Agnelette’s love, revived his spirits, which had been saddened and depressed by the sight of the universal happiness around him. He heard the church bells at Préciamont ringing in the valley below; its solemn, monotonous tones recalled the thought of his fellow men to the black wolf, and of all he had to fear from them. So he ran boldly on, across the fields, to the village, where he hoped to find a refuge in some empty building. As he was skirting the little stone wall of the village cemetery, he heard a sound of voices, approaching along the road he was in. He could not fail to meet whoever they might be who were coming towards him, if he himself went on; it was not safe to turn back, as he would have to cross some rising ground whence he might easily be seen; so there was nothing left for it but to jump over the wall of the cemetery, and with a bound he was on the other side. This graveyard as usual adjoined the church; it was uncared for, and overgrown with tall grass, while brambles and thorns grew rankly in places. The wolf made for the thickest of these bramble bushes; he found a sort of ruined vault, whence he could look out without being seen, and he crept under the branches and hid himself inside. A few yards away from him was a newly-dug grave; within the church could be heard the chanting of the priests, the more distinctly that the vault must at one time have communicated by a passage with the crypt. Presently the chanting ceased, and the black wolf, who did not feel quite at ease in the neighbourhood of a church, and thought that the road must now be clear, decided that it was time to start off again and to find a safer retreat than the one he had fled to in his haste.
But he had scarcely got his nose outside the bramble bush when the gate of the cemetery opened, and he quickly retreated again to his hole, in great trepidation as to who might now be approaching. The first person he saw was a child dressed in a white alb and carrying a vessel of holy water; he was followed by a man in a surplice, bearing a silver cross, and after the latter came a priest, chanting the psalms for the dead.
Behind these were four peasants carrying a bier covered with a white pall over which were scattered green branches and flowers, and beneath the sheet could be seen the outline of a coffin; a few villagers from Préciamont wound up this little procession. Although there was nothing unusual in such a sight as this, seeing that he was in a cemetery, and that the newly-dug grave must have prepared him for it, Thibault, nevertheless, felt strangely moved as he looked on. Although the slightest movement might betray his presence and bring destruction upon him, he anxiously watched every detail of the ceremony.
The priest having blessed the newly-made grave, the peasants laid down their burden on an adjoining hillock. It is the custom in our country when a young girl, or young married woman, dies in the fullness of her youth and beauty, to carry her to the grave-yard in an open coffin, with only a pall over her, so that her friends may bid her a last farewell, her relations give her a last kiss. Then the coffin is nailed down, and all is over. An old woman, led by some kind hand, for she was apparently blind, went up to the coffin to give the dead one a last kiss; the peasants lifted the pall from the still face, and there lay Agnelette. A low groan escaped from Thibault’s agonised breast, and mingled with the tears and sobs of those present. Agnelette, as she lay there so pale in death, wrapped in an ineffable calm, appeared more beautiful than when in life, beneath her wreath of forget-me-nots and daisies. As Thibault looked upon the poor dead girl, his heart seemed suddenly to melt within him. It was he, as he had truly realised, who had really killed her, and he experienced a genuine and overpowering sorrow, the more poignant since for the first time for many long months he forgot to think of himself, and thought only of the dead woman, now lost to him for ever.
As he heard the blows of the hammer knocking the nails into the coffin, as he heard the earth and stones being shovelled into the grave and falling with a dull thud on to the body of the only woman he had ever loved, a feeling of giddiness came over him. The hard stones he thought must be bruising Agnelette’s tender flesh, so fresh and sweet but a few days ago, and only yesterday still throbbing with life, and he made a movement as if to rush out on the assailants and snatch away the body, which dead, must surely belong to him, since, living, it had belonged to another.
But the grief of the man overcame this instinct of the wild beast at bay; a shudder passed through the body hidden beneath its wolf skin; tears fell from the fierce blood-red eyes, and the unhappy man cried out: “O God! take my life, I give it gladly, if only by my death I may give back life to her whom I have killed!”
The words were followed by such an appalling howl, that all who were in the cemetery fled, and the place was left utterly deserted. Almost at the same moment, the hounds, having recovered the scent, came leaping in over the wall, followed by the Baron, streaming with sweat as he rode his horse, which was covered with foam and blood.
The dogs made straight for the bramble bush, and began worrying something hidden there.
“Halloo! halloo!! halloo!!!” cried the Lord of Vez, in a voice of thunder, as he leapt from his horse, not caring if there was anyone or not to look after it, and drawing out his hunting-knife, he dashed towards the vault, forcing his way through the hounds. He found them fighting over a fresh and bleeding wolf-skin, but the body had disappeared.
There was no mistake as to its being the skin of the were-wolf that they had been hunting, for with the exception of one white hair, it was entirely black.
What had become of the body? No one ever knew. Only as from this time forth Thibault was never seen again, it was generally believed that the former sabot-maker and no other was the were-wolf.
Furthermore, as the skin had been found without the body, and, as, from the spot where it was found a peasant reported to have heard someone speak the words: “O God! take my life! I give it gladly, if only by my death I may give back life to her whom I have killed,” the priest declared openly that Thibault, by reason of his sacrifice and repentance, had been saved!
And what added to the consistency of belief in this tradition was, that every year on the anniversary of Agnelette’s death, up to the time when the Monasteries were all abolished at the Revolution, a monk from the Abbey of the Premonstratensians at Bourg-Fontaine, which stands half a league from Préciamont, was seen to come and pray beside her grave.
(113-115)
[The End of Mocquet’s Story]
[This ends the story Mocquet has been telling the narrator and author, Alexandre Dumas (see section 0.9).]
[ditto]
⁂
Et voilà l’histoire du loup noir, telle que me l’a racontée Mocquet, le garde de mon père.
FIN
. . . . . .
Such is the history of the black wolf, as it was told me by old Mocquet, my father’s keeper.
THE END.
Dumas, Alexandre. 1868. Le meneur de loups. (Nouvelle édition). Paris: Lévy.
PDF at:
https://archive.org/det ails/bub_gb_BhlMAAAAMAAJ/page/n5
and:
https://beq.ebooksgratuits.com/vents/Dumas-meneur.pdf
Online text at:
https://fr.wikisource.org/wik i/Le_Meneur_de_loups
and
https://fr.wikisource.org/wiki/Livre:Dumas_- _Le_Meneur_de_loups_(1868).djvu
Dumas, Alexandre. 1921. The Wolf-Leader. Translated by Alfred Allinson. London: Methuen.
PDF at:
https://archive.org/details/wolfle ader00duma
or:
https://archive.org/details/wo lfleader00dumauoft
Online text at:
.
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