It
was a small room, whitewashed; a south window stood open on a vast
depth of air and a spacious and distant prospect; and from deep
below, in the Grassmarket the voices of hawkers came up clear and
far away. Hard by, on a little bed, lay Goguelat. The sunburn had
not yet faded from his face, and the stamp of death was already
there. There was something wild and unmannish in his smile, that
took me by the throat; only death and love know or have ever seen
it. And when he spoke, it seemed to shame his coarse talk.
He held out his arms as if to embrace me. I drew near with
incredible shrinkings, and surrendered myself to his arms with
overwhelming disgust. But he only drew my ear down to his lips.
'Trust me,' he whispered. 'Je suis bon bougre, moi. I'll take it
to hell with me, and tell the devil.'
Why should I go on to reproduce his grossness and trivialities?
All that he thought, at that hour, was even noble, though he could
not clothe it otherwise than in the language of a brutal farce.
Presently he bade me call the doctor; and when that officer had
come in, raised a little up in his bed, pointed first to himself
and then to me, who stood weeping by his side, and several times
repeated the expression, 'Frinds--frinds--dam frinds.'
To my great surprise, the doctor appeared very much affected.
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