What I had seen left no room for doubt, I was stunned as though by a blow
from a club. The only thing I remember doing as I sat there, was looking
mechanically up at the sky, and, seeing a star spin across the heavens, I
saluted that fugitive gleam in which poets see a blasted world and
gravely took off my hat to it.
I returned to my home very quietly, experiencing nothing, as though
deprived of sensation and reflection. I undressed and retired; hardly had
my head touched the pillow when the spirit of vengeance seized me with
such force that I suddenly sat bolt upright against the wall as though
all my muscles were made of wood. I jumped from my bed with a cry of
pain; I could walk only on my heels, the nerves in my toes were so
irritated. I passed an hour in this way, completely foolish and stiff as
a skeleton. It was the first burst of passion I had ever experienced.
The man I had surprised with my mistress was one of my most intimate
friends. I went to his house the next day in company with a young lawyer
named Desgenais; we took pistols, another witness, and repaired to the
woods of Vincennes. On the way I avoided speaking to my adversary or even
approaching him; thus I resisted the temptation to insult or strike him,
a useless form of violence at a time when the law recognized the code.
But I could not remove my eyes from him. He was the companion of my
childhood and we had lived in the closest intimacy for many years.
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