Produced by David Widger and Pat Castevens
By Eugene Sue
L. The Ruins of the Abbey of St. John the Baptist
LI. The Calvary
LII. The Council
LIII. Happiness
LIV. Duty
LV. The Improvised Hospital
LVI. Hydrophobia
LVII. The Guardian Angel
LVIII. Ruin
LIX. Memories
LX. The Ordeal
LXI. Ambition
LXII. To a Socius, a Socius and a Half
LXIII. Faringhea's Affection
LXIV. An Evening at St. Colombe's
LXV. The Nuptial Bed
LXVI. A Duel to the Death
LXVII. A Message
LXVIII. The First of June
I. Four Years After
II. The Redemption
The sun is fast sinking. In the depths of an immense piny wood, in themidst of profound solitude, rise the ruins of an abbey, once sacred toSt. John the Baptist. Ivy, moss, and creeping plants, almost entirelyconceal the stones, now black with age. Some broken arches, some wallspierced with ovals, still remain standing, visible on the dark backgroundof the thick wood. Looking down upon this mass of ruins from a brokenpedestal, half-covered with ivy, a mutilated, but colossal statue ofstone still keeps its place. This statue is strange and awful. Itrepresents a headless human figure. Clad in the antique toga, it holds inits hand a dish and on that dish is a head. This head is its own. It isthe statue of St. John the Baptist and Martyr, put to death by wish ofHerodias.
The silence around is solemn. From time to time, however, is heard thedull rustling of the enormous branches of the pine-trees, shaken by thewind. Copper-colored clouds, reddened by the setting sun, pass slowlyover the forest, and are reflected in the current of a brook, which,deriving its source from a neighboring mass of rocks, flows through theruins. The water flows, the clouds pass on, the ancient trees tremble,the breeze murmurs.
Suddenly, through the shadow thrown by the overhanging wood, whichstretches far into endless depths, a human form appears. It is a woman.She advances slowly towards the ruins. She has reached them. She treadsthe once sacred ground. This woman is pale, her look sad, her long robefloats on the wind, her feet covered with dust. She walks with difficultyand pain. A block of stone is placed near the stream, almost at the footof the statue of John the Baptist. Upon this stone she sinks breathlessand exhausted, worn out with fatigue. And yet, for many days, many years,many centuries, she has walked on unwearied.
For the first time, she feels an unconquerable sense of lassitude. Forthe first time, her feet begin to fail her. For the first time, she, whotraversed, with firm and equal footsteps, the moving lava of torriddeserts, while whole caravans were buried in drifts of fiery sand—whopassed, with steady and disdainful tread, over the eternal snows ofArctic regions, over icy solitudes, in which no other human being couldlive—who had been spared by the devouring flames of conflagrations, andby the impetuous waters of torrents—she, in brief, who for centuries hadhad nothing in common with humanity—for the first time suffers mortalpain.
Her feet bleed, her limbs ache with fatigue, she is devoured by burningthirst. She feels these infirmities, yet scarcely dares to believe themreal. Her joy would b