The Beast Within - Emile Zola [39]
‘Love, listen to me ...’
But he didn’t hear her. He kept pacing the room, like a wisp of straw blown about in a gale.
‘What am I to do? What am I to do?’
Eventually she managed to seize his wrist and made him stand still for a moment.
‘Listen to me, love,’ she pleaded. ‘I was the one who didn’t want to go to Doinville. I would never have gone there again. Never! You’re the one I love.’
She spoke softly, trying to calm his temper, drawing him towards her and raising her lips so that he might kiss her. He had fallen on to the bed beside her but he suddenly pushed her away, horrified.
‘So now you want to make love, you bitch! A moment ago you didn’t fancy it; you didn’t want me. And now you do, just so you can say you’ve got me back again! You think I can’t resist it, don’t you! Just because I’m a man! I’d sooner burn in hell! I’d sooner burn in hell, I tell you, than make love to the likes of you!’
He shuddered. The thought of possessing her, the thought of their two bodies falling together on to the bed seared into his brain. From somewhere in the troubled darkness of his flesh, from deep down amidst the stirrings of his wounded desire, there came the sudden, irresistible urge to kill.
‘I must kill him,’ he said. ‘I can’t sleep with you again, until I’ve killed him, do you hear. I must kill him! Kill him! Kill him!’
His voice became louder and louder. He stood up, saying it again and again. He felt himself grown in stature; it was as if, by simply repeating the words to himself, he had regained his composure and strengthened his resolve. Without a word he walked slowly over to the table and looked down at the knife, its blade open, shining. He picked it up mechanically, closed it and put it into his pocket. He stood there, his hands hanging loosely at his sides, a faraway look in his eyes, lost in thought. It would not be easy. Two deep lines furrowed his brow as he pondered the difficulties that lay ahead. To help himself think more clearly, he walked over to the window, opened it and stood with his face to the cool evening air. His wife had got up from the bed and had come to stand behind him. A new fear had taken hold of her. She did not dare speak to him and she waited, looking out at the broad sweep of sky and trying to guess what desperate schemes were taking shape inside his head.
As night began to fall, the distant houses stood out as dark silhouettes; a purplish mist settled over the huge expanse of the railway station below them. The deep cutting that led out towards Batignolles lay sunk beneath swirling clouds of ash which drifted up between the girders of the Pont de l’Europe. From the sky above Paris a last pale glimmer of daylight fell on to the glass roofs of the great train sheds. Inside the station all was shrouded in dark. Along the platforms, little points of light pierced the gloom as the gas lamps were lit. A beam of light shone from the headlamp of the train for Dieppe, crammed with passengers, all its doors closed, waiting for the traffic manager to give the right-away. There was a problem in getting the train off on time; the starting signal still showed red. The train had to be held in the station while a small locomotive came to clear some carriages that had accidentally come adrift in a shunting operation. In the gathering darkness, an endless stream of trains picked its way through the intricate network of lines between rows of carriages that stood waiting in the sidings. A train left for Argenteuil, followed by another for Saint-Germain. A train arrived from Cherbourg — a very long train. Signals were continually changing, engines blew their whistles, shunters sounded their horns; everywhere you looked there were lights — red lights, green lights, amber lights, white lights — a scene of utter confusion in the lurid glow of the departing day. It seemed that the trains were all going to collide with each other, but they found their way through, sometimes running close together side by side and then going their separate ways, all with the same smooth, snake-like movement, before