The Wandering Jew Part 187

"Why, how is the conspiracy going on, in whose honor you make me keep it up all day and all night?"

"It is working, but the time is not yet come; that is why I wish to have you always at hand, till the great day. Do you complain?"

"Hang it, no!" said Jacques. "What could I do? Burnt up with brandy as I am, if I wanted to work, I've no longer the strength to do so. I have not, like you, a head of marble, and a body of iron; but as for fuddling myself with gunpowder, instead of anything else, that'll do for me; I'm only fit for that work now--and then, it will drive away thought."

"Oh what kind?"

"You know that when I do think, I think only of one thing," said Jacques, gloomily.

"The Baccha.n.a.l queen?--still?" said Morok, in a disdainful tone.

"Still! rather: when I shall think of her no longer, I shall be dead--or stupefied. Fiend!"

"You were never better or more intelligent, you fool!" replied Morok, fastening his turban. The conversation was here interrupted. Morok's aider entered hastily.

The gigantic form of this Hercules had increased in width. He was habited like Alcides; his enormous limbs, furrowed with veins as thick as whipcord, were covered with a close-fitting flesh-colored garment, to which a pair of red drawers formed a strong contrast.

"Why do you rush in like a storm, Goliath?" said Morok.

"There's a pretty storm in the house; they are beginning to get impatient, and are calling out like madmen. But if that were all!"

"Well, what else?"

"Death will not be able to play this evening."

Morok turned quickly around. He seemed uneasy. "Why so?" he exclaimed.

"I have just seen her! she's crouching at the bottom of her cage; her ears lie so close to her head, she looks as if they had been cut off.

You know what that means."

"Is that all?" said Morok, turning to the gla.s.s to complete his head dress.

"It's quite enough; she's in one of her tearing fits. Since that night in Germany, when she ripped up that old hack of a white horse, I've not seen her look so savage! her eyes shine like burning candles."

"Then she must have her fine collar on," said Morok, quietly.

"Her fine collar?"

"Yes; her spring-collar."

"And I must be lady's-maid," said the giant. "A nice toilet to attend to!"

"Hold your tongue!"

"That's not all--" continued Goliath, hesitating.

"What more?"

"I might as well tell you at once."

"Will you speak?"

"Well! he is here."

"Who, you stupid brute?"

"The Englishman!"

Morok started; his arms fell powerless by his side. Jacques was struck with the lion-tamer's paleness and troubled countenance.

"The Englishman!--you have seen him?" cried Morok, addressing Goliath.

"You are quite sure?"

"Quite sure. I was looking through the peep-hole in the curtain; I saw him in one of the stage-boxes--he wishes to see things close; he's easy to recognize, with his pointed forehead, big nose, and goggle eyes."

Morok shuddered again; usually fierce and unmoved, he appeared to be more and more agitated, and so alarmed, that Jacques said to him: "Who is this Englishman?"

"He has followed me from Strasburg, where he fell in with me," said Morok, with visible dejection. "He travelled with his own horses, by short stages, as I did; stopping where I stopped, so as never to miss one of my exhibitions. But two days before I arrived at Paris, he left me--I thought I was rid of him," said Morok, with a sigh.

"Rid of him!--how you talk!" replied Jacques, surprised; "such a good customer, such an admirer!"

"Aye!" said Morok, becoming more and more agitated; "this wretch has wagered an enormous sum, that I will be devoured in his presence, during one of my performances: he hopes to win his wager--that is why he follows me about."

Sleepinbuff found the John Bull's idea so amusingly eccentric, that, for the first time since a very long period, he burst into a peal of hearty laughter. Morok, pale with rage, rushed towards him with so menacing an air, that Goliath was obliged to interpose.

"Come, come," said Jacques, "don't be angry; if it is serious, I will not laugh any more."

Morok was appeased, and said to Sleepinbuff in a hoa.r.s.e voice: "Do you think me a coward?"

"No, by heaven!"

"Well! And yet this Englishman, with his grotesque face, frightens me more than any tiger or my panther!"

"You say so, and I believe it," replied Jacques; "but I cannot understand why the presence of this man should alarm you."

"But consider, you dull knave!" cried Morok, "that, obliged to watch incessantly the least movement of the ferocious beast, whom I keep in subjection by my action and my looks, there is something terrible in knowing that two eyes are there--always there--fixed--waiting till the least absence of mind shall expose me to be torn in pieces by the animals."

"Now, I understand," said Jacques, shuddering in his turn. "It is terrible."

"Yes; for once there, though I may not see this cursed Englishman, I fancy I have his two round eyes, fixed and wide open, always before me.

My tiger Cain once nearly mutilated my arm, when my attention was drawn away by this Englishman, whom the devil take! Blood and thunder!" cried Morok: "this man will be fatal to me." And Morok paced the room in great agitation.

"Besides, Death lays her ears close to her skull," said Goliath, brutally. "If you persist--mind, I tell you--the Englishman will win his wager this evening."

"Go away, you brute!--don't vex my head with your confounded predictions," cried Morok: "go and prepare Death's collar."

"Well, every one to his taste; you wish the panther to taste you," said the giant, stalking heavily away, after this joke.

"But if you feel these fears," said Jacques, "why do you not say that the panther is ill?"