University of Virginia Library

4. IV.

HE knew that he was in an insane asylum. He knew that he was mad. Sometimes, after a feverish day, he would wake during the night with weary limbs and a horrible headache, but entirely rational. Perhaps it

was the lack of impressions during the darkness and nocturnal silence; perhaps it was the too great feebleness of his brain, the absence of the restless creatures by whom he was surrounded, that occasioned such moments during which he comprehended his condition and became lucid.

But the morning would come, and from the dawn when the house was again in commotion, the strange and weird sensations crowded upon him. His diseased brain did not have the power to master them, and madness resumed its sway. His case presented a curious mixture of rational and insane ideas. He knew that he was in the midst of madmen. All the time while knowing it, he saw in each one of them a being—some one who was in hiding or who had been kidnapped, some one whom he had known formerly, whose name he had read, or heard spoken. The establishment seemed to him filled with people of all times and all countries. There were there, the living and the dead. There, were to be met with illustrious personages, celebrities, soldiers fallen in the last war, people that had been hanged and resuscitated. He believed himself in an enchanted circle, a mysterious place, that contained in itself alone the power of the entire universe; and he himself (very proud of it) imagined that he was the center of this circle.

All his companions in misfortune had combined for the accomplishment of a great work, of a thing that he considered an important and inspired undertaking—the annihilation forever of evil on the earth. He did not know in what this undertaking consisted, but he felt in himself a tremendous force to accomplish it. He could read the thoughts of others. When he looked at objects he knew their history. The great elms in the garden related to him the events of former times. He took the hospital, which, it is true, dated many years back, for a construction of Peter the Great, and he was sure the Czar had inhabited it at the time of the battle of Pultawa. He read all this on the wall, on the stucco falling in dust, on the fragments of brick, on the stones in the garden. The history of the establishment was engraven from one end to the other on these scattered objects.

He peopled the little house that served as a morgue with hundreds of dead men, dead for many years, and scrutinized the narrow skylight of the vault in a corner of the garden with unwearied attention. He saw in the vague light projected through the dust-stained windows, well-known faces of men he had seen or the pictures of whom he had contemplated.

However, fine weather with its genial warmth returned. The patients passed the whole day in the open air. The little umbrageous place that was their favorite haunt was literally covered with flowers. All that were able worked under the surveillance of a guardian. They weeded the walks from morning till evening, and carpeted them with fine sand, spaded the beds, and watered the plants, cucumbers, and melons that they had sown themselves.

One corner of the garden was all in leaf with cherry trees. Here began an avenue lined with elms. The middle forming an artificial mound, was adorned with an immense bed of beautiful flowers of brilliant and varied colors, over which towered a cluster of rare tulips, a gorgeous flower of a golden yellow color flecked with red flame.

The tulips formed the center of the garden, and many of the patients attributed to them a peculiar and mysterious significance.

The walks were lined with pretty shrubs and plants. There all the flowers that are to be found in Little Russia teemed: tall and brilliant geraniums, bright petunias with delicate petals, big tobacco plants with pale leaves, and little pink flowers, curled mint, amaranths, cresses, and poppies. Not far from the stairway three wild poppy plants of a curious species, grew. Their flowers were very small, and were distinguished by their fire-red color and extremely vivid lustre. They looked like tufts of glowing embers. These were the flowers that our patient observed from the first day of his arrival at the asylum when he looked into the garden through the glass door.

When he entered the garden for the first time, he contemplated for a long time before descending the stairs, the wild poppies with their dazzling red petals. There were only two flowers, separated by a considerable space. The place not having yet been weeded, had been invaded by a thick covering of wild grass and by a swarm of white fringed daisies.

The patients passed through the door, one

by one, near which one of the keepers stood, who handed to each of them a knit cotton cap, white and pointed at the top, with a red cross in front. The madman immediately attributed a peculiar and mystic significance to the red cross. He took it off, looked at the cross that adorned it. Then he gazed at the poppy; its flowers were of a much more vivid scarlet.

"That is what bears it," he murmured, "only for us two."

And he descended the stairs. He walked through the grounds without having been noticed by the keeper standing behind him, and stretched his hand towards the flower. Yet, he couldn't make up his mind to pluck it.

All at once he felt in his extended hand, painful, burning prickings that spread from his arms through his entire body. A magnetic fluid of unheard-of power emanated from that red flower and invaded his whole organism. He stooped lower; his fingers almost touched the flower. But it defended itself, it resisted, vomiting, as it seemed to him, blasts of fetid odor charged with poison. He turned his head aside, and made a last effort to seize it. Already he held the stem pressed between his fingers, when a heavy hand came down upon his shoulder. It was the hand of the keeper.

"Mustn't pluck it!" said the old Sokal, "and you mustn't walk in the flower beds. For if there were many of you madmen who had that fancy, it wouldn't be long before every flower in the garden would be gone."

He added the last sentence in a persuasive voice, without taking his hand from the patient's shoulder.

The sick man looked in his face, freed himself from his hold without a word, and began to walk up and down the garden in great agitation.

"O you unfortunates!" he thought. "You see nothing. You are so blind that you defend it. But, at all costs, I shall reach it! If it is not to-day, it will be to-morrow. We shall measure our strength with one another. And even if I must die for it—well! what matter?"

He walked in the garden until evening, making many acquaintances and pronouncing strange discourses, which were taken by those with whom he spoke as answers to their own lucubrations—these lucubrations in turn being considered by our madman as mysterious revelations of the highest importance. The sick man walked now with one, now with another of his companions in misfortune, and when evening came he had reached the perfect conviction that "all was ready," as he repeated to himself in a low voice. Soon, yes, soon the iron bars would fall in fragments, the prisoners would quit the place to spread themselves over all the countries of the world. The earth would tremble, would be despoiled of her ancient garment to be re-clothed resplendently in new and youthful beauty.

He had hardly thought any more of the flower; but when he was preparing to mount the stairs, he perceived on the sward, heavy with large pearls of dew, two burning embers of a vivid red. Then he remained in the rear, letting all the other patients pass before him, hiding behind the keeper and watching a favorite opportunity. No one saw him cross the flower bed, pluck the flower, and hide it in his bosom under his shirt. When its moist and cool petals touched his skin a mortal pallor covered his face and he opened his eyes, all big with horror, while an icy perspiration pearled his forehead.

They were lighting the lamps in the asylum. The patients for the most part, stretched themselves on their beds waiting for supper, while a few uneasy madmen walked feverishly through the corridors and halls. Our patient with his flower was among the last. He crossed his two hands convulsively on his breast. He seemed to wish to smother that flower and to crush it. When he met one of his comrades he sprang from him with a bound, fearing to touch him with his garments.

"Don't come near me! Don't come near me!" he cried.

But it was in an insane asylum where words like these are considered of no importance. He walked more and more rapidly with automatic steps. He walked one hour, two hours, lost in a somber fury.

"I shall destroy you! I shall smother you!" said he in a hoarse voice and with mad gesticulations.

From time to time he ground his teeth terribly.

Supper had been served in the dining hall. On the great bare tables were arranged big bowls of yellow wood with red figures traced

on them, filled with thin vegetable soup. The patients took their places on the benches and received each a round loaf of coarse bread. About eight ate from the same bowl, from which they helped themselves with wooden spoons. Those for whom more nourishing food had been ordered, ate apart. Our madman, who had swallowed quickly the portion brought to him in his cell by the keeper, had descended, still ravenous, into the common hall. He tramped about, here and there, apparently much discontented.

"Will you permit me to take a seat here?" he asked the inspector.

"Haven't you had your supper yet?" this official asked, busily engaged filling fresh bowls with lentils.

"The fact is, I am literally dying of hunger. I need a great deal of nourishment. That is the only thing that sustains me. You know I cannot sleep, even for a minute."

"Eat, my friend, and much good may it do you. Taras, bring him a bowl and some bread."

He seated himself near one of the dishes and swallowed a great quantity of soup.

"Enough, now, enough," said the inspector at last, when all the patients had quitted the table, and our madman remained alone, still helping himself eagerly out of the bowl, holding the spoon with one hand and the other pressed convulsively against his breast. "You are going to make yourself sick."

"Ah, if you knew how much strength I need, and what strength? Good-bye, Nicolas Nicolaïewitch," said the unfortunate, rising from his seat and pressing the hand of the inspector. "Good-bye!"

"Where are you going, pray?" asked the inspector, smiling.

"I? Nowhere. I shall stay here. It is possible, however, that we may not see each other to-morrow. I thank you for the great kindness you have shown me."

He pressed the hand of the inspector a second time forcibly. His voice trembled and big tears stood in his eyes.

"Calm yourself, my dear friend. Do not disquiet yourself," replied the inspector. "What good do all these sad repinings do? Go to bed and have a good sleep. You ought to sleep more. If you sleep you will soon be cured."

The poor wretch began to sob. The inspector turned round and ordered the table to be cleared. A half hour later all were asleep in the house except one, who lay stretched on his bed with his clothes on. He trembled as though in the grip of a fierce fever, with his hand pressed strongly to his breast, where he seemed to feel the embrace of poisoned flames running in fiery undulations.