The Wolf-Leader. Dumas Alexandre
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Hippolyte, a sort of black merry-andrew, whom my father, I believe, only kept that he might be well primed with anecdotes wherewith to gain the advantage in his encounters with Brunel1 and beat his wonderful stories; fourthly: of a keeper named Mocquet, for whom I had a great admiration, seeing that he had magnificent stories to tell of ghosts and were-wolves, to which I listened every evening, and which were abruptly broken off the instant the General – as my father was usually called – appeared on the scene; fifthly: of a cook, who answered to the name of Marie, but this figure I can no longer recall, it is lost to me in the misty twilight of life; I remember only the name, as given to someone of whom but a shadowy outline remains in my memory, and about whom, as far as I recollect, there was nothing of a very poetic character.
Mocquet, however, is the only person that need occupy our attention for the present. Let me try to make him known to you, both as regards his personal appearance and his character.
III
MOCQUET was a man of about forty years of age, short, thick-set, broad of shoulder, and sturdy of leg. His skin was burnt brown by the sun, his eyes were small and piercing, his hair grizzled, and his black whiskers met under his chin in a half circle.
As I look back, his figure rises before me, wearing a three-cornered hat, and clad in a green waistcoat with silver buttons, velveteen cord breeches, and high leathern gaiters, with a game-bag over his shoulder, his gun in his hand, and a cutty-pipe in his mouth.
Let us pause for a moment to consider this pipe, for this pipe grew to be, not merely an accessory, but an integral part of Mocquet. Nobody could remember ever having seen Mocquet without it. If by any chance Mocquet did not happen to have it in his mouth, he had it in his hand.
This pipe, having to accompany Mocquet into the heart of the thickest coverts, it was necessary that it should be of such a kind as to offer the least possible opportunity to any other solid body of bringing about its destruction; for the destruction of his old, well-coloured cutty would have been to Mocquet a loss that years alone could have repaired. Therefore the stem of Mocquet’s pipe was not more than half-an-inch long; moreover you might always wager that half that half inch at least was supplied by the quill of a feather.
This habit of never being without his pipe, which, by causing the almost entire disappearance of both canines, had hollowed out a sort of vice for itself on the left side of his mouth, between the fourth incisor and the first molar, had given rise to another of Mocquet’s habits; this was to speak with his teeth clenched, whereby a certain impression of obstinacy was conveyed by all he said. – This became even more marked if Mocquet chanced at any moment to take his pipe out of his mouth, for there was nothing then to prevent the jaws closing and the teeth coming together in a way which prevented the words passing through them at all except in a sort of whistle, which was hardly intelligible.
Such was Mocquet with respect to outward appearance. In the following pages I will endeavour to give some idea of his intellectual capacity and moral qualities.
IV
EARLY one morning, before my father had risen, Mocquet walked into his room, and planted himself at the foot of the bed, stiff and upright as a sign-post.
“Well, Mocquet,” said my father, “what’s the matter now? what gives me the pleasure of seeing you here at this early hour?”
“The matter is, General,” replied Mocquet with the utmost gravity, “the matter is that I am nightmared.”
Mocquet had, quite unawares to himself, enriched the language with a double verb, both active and passive.
“You are nightmared?” responded my father, raising himself on his elbow. “Dear, dear, that’s a serious matter, my poor Mocquet.”
“You are right there, General.”
And Mocquet took his pipe out of his mouth, a thing he did rarely, and only on the most important occasions.
“And how long have you been nightmared?” continued my father compassionately.
“For a whole week, General.”
“And who by, Mocquet?”
“Ah! I know very well who by,” answered Mocquet, through his teeth, which were so much the more tightly closed that his pipe was in his hand, and his hand behind his back.
“And may I also know by whom?”
“By Mother Durand, of Haramont, who, as you will have heard, is an old witch.”
“No, indeed, I assure you I had no idea of such a thing.”
“Ah! but I know it well enough; I’ve seen her riding past on her broomstick to her Witches’ Sabbath.”
“You have seen her go by on her broomstick?”
“As plainly as I see you, General; and more than that, she has an old black billy-goat at home that she worships.”
“And why should she come and nightmare you?”
“To revenge herself on me, because I came upon her once at midnight on the heath of Gondreville, when she was dancing round and round in her devil’s circle.”
“This is a most serious accusation which you bring against her, my friend; and before repeating to anyone what you have been telling me in private, I think it would be as well if you tried to collect some more proofs.”
“Proofs! What more proofs do I want! Does not every soul in the village know that in her youth she was the Mistress of Thibault, the wolf-leader?”
“Indeed! I must look carefully into this matter, Mocquet.”
“I am looking very carefully into it myself, and she shall pay for it, the old mole!”
Old mole was an expression that Mocquet had borrowed from his friend Pierre, the gardener, who, as he had no worse enemies to deal with than moles, gave the name of mole to everything and everybody that he particularly detested.
V
“I must look carefully into this matter” – these words were not said by my father by reason of any belief he had in the truth of Mocquet’s tale about his nightmare; and even the fact of the nightmare being admitted by him, he gave no credence to the idea that it was Mother Durand who had nightmared the keeper. Far from it; but my father was not ignorant of the superstitions of the people, and he knew that belief in spells was still wide-spread among the peasantry in the country districts. He had heard of terrible acts of revenge carried out by the victims on some man or woman who they thought had bewitched them, in the belief that the charm would thus be broken; and Mocquet, while he stood denouncing Mother Durand to my father, had had such an accent of menace in his voice, and had given such a grip to his gun, that my father thought it wise to appear to agree with everything he said, in order to gain his confidence and so prevent him doing anything without first consulting him.
So, thinking that he had so far gained an influence over Mocquet, my father ventured to say:
“But before you make her pay for it, my good Mocquet, you ought to be quite sure that no one can cure you of your nightmare.”
“No one can cure me, General,” replied Mocquet in a tone of conviction.
“How! No one able to cure you?”
“No one; I have tried the impossible.”
“And how did you try?”
“First of all, I drank a large bowl of hot wine before going to bed.”
“And who recommended that remedy? was it Monsieur Lécosse?” Monsieur Lécosse was the doctor in repute at Villers-Cotterets.
“Monsieur Lécosse?” exclaimed Mocquet. “No, indeed! What should he know about spells! By my faith, no! it was not Monsieur Lécosse.”
“Who was it, then?”
“It was the shepherd of Longpré.”
“But a bowl of wine, you dunderhead! Why,
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