No one shall dare dispute my tigress, Cecily. Ah! she
calls! she calls!" said he, looking around, and seeming to listen. After a
moment's pause, he groped his way along the wall, saying, "No; I thought I
heard her; she is not there, but I see her, oh! always, always! Oh! there
she is! She calls me--she roars--she roars there! I come, I come."
And Jacques Ferrand dragged himself toward the middle of the chamber on his
hands and knees. Although his strength was exhausted, from time to time he
advanced by a convulsive spring: then he would pause, seeming to listen
attentively.
"Where is she? where is she? I approach, she flies. Ah! there; oh! she
awaits me; go; go, Cecily, your old tiger is yours," cried he.
And with a desperate effort he succeeded in getting on his knees. But,
suddenly, falling backward with alarm, his body crouched on his heels, his
hair standing on end, his look wild, his mouth distorted with terror, his
hands stretched out, he seemed to struggle with age against an invisible
object, and cried, in a broken voice, "What a bite--help--my arms break--I
cannot take it off--sharp teeth. No, no, oh! not the eyes--help--a black
serpent--oh! its flat head--its burning eyeballs. It looks at me--it is
the devil. Ah! he knows me--Jacques Ferrand--at the church--holy
man--always at the church-avaunt!" And the notary, raising himself a little
and sustaining himself with one hand on the floor, tried with the other to
make the sign of the cross.
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