Chapter II: Prologue: In Tsen-Tac's Opium Den

This is the door, here, in front of me! A heavy door of teak, black and shiny. However, with my hand on the iron latch, I hesitate, fighting the subtle uneasiness and irritation which I feel rising in me. At the back of my mind a question forms: why do I come here, to the bottom of this hidden alley at night, I, who seldom or never touch the opium pipe? Hardly at all: perhaps five or six pipes now and again on Sundays at the hour of siesta! Six little pipes, that's nothing! Any regular opium-smoker will tell you so. Then, why have I come here tonight? Why? As a matter of fact I feel that my presence here, behind this back-shop in the heart of the Chinese town of Cho-lon is silly and without excuse.... So silly and aimless that already I have withdrawn my hand, with my mind made up to retrace my steps along the sombre corridor and back through the sumptuous mart of the worthy Tsen-Tac, who sells to knowing connoisseurs precious silks and out-of-the-way curiosities brought by the big-bellied junks from China ... and who in addition dispenses, with discretion, to a few genuine and carefully chosen smokers, the priceless calm of opium.

Yes, I shall not stay.... It will be better. The darkling spirit of the Drug shall not glide through my blood tonight. I am off.... But fate at this very moment decides otherwise. At my back, in the thick shadows a raucous voice cries:

"In the name of Confucius, get on there!"

And instinctively, pushing the swing-door, I enter. A puff of acrid odor, the smell of the wonderful perfume of Shandoo, at once rough and voluptuous, assails my senses and makes my heart leap!

Behind me the closed door swings open roughly, and the man who addressed me stumbles into the room. Pushing by me, he advances to the "boy" who has run up to meet him. For a second I follow him with my eyes. His form is broken and bent, very tall, and so thin that it accentuates the fullness of the white linen clothes which flap about his limbs and at moments soften the jagged outline of his bones. A curious figure, like that of an old man, skeletonized and moribund; and the more surprising, in that certain signs reveal the strange contrast of an undeniable youthfulness in him. Sure signs: his step, rapid and full of strength; his movements, quick and jerky, peculiar to those who are under the domination of the Drug, when the brown hour of the smoke has arrived. But what do I care about this unknown man? He hurries on toward the bottom of the room and disappears. Without knowing why, I sigh with relief, and in my turn step forward. The "boy," as I come, smiles, showing his black enamelled teeth, and points out to me the bed which lies along the wall, the great plank platform on which the smokers lie and dream their strange dreams, while about them watches and drifts the spirit of the opium.

With a nod, I assent and give my order.

"Bamboo: small pipe."

And, heavily, my body weary, I fling myself down on the bare wood polished with use, the coolness of which, through the cloth of my coat, penetrates deliciously to my flesh....

* * * * *

The time drifts away.... How many hours? I do not know, I do not care to know. Stretched out on my side, with my eyes fixed on the little crystal lamp topped with its conical globe in which the flame, like a living tongue, points upward, steady and reddish, I watch the movements of the "boy" plunging the steel needle into the sticky Shandoo, turning it over the lamp and rolling it on the brown bowl of the pipe.

With my lips glued to the bamboo tube, blackened by opium and soaked with its deadly taste, I breathe in slowly, taking the long inhalations of the practiced smoker. Then, with my head thrown back on the pillow of smooth hollowed-out wood, I fix my eyes on the acrid smoke which trickles from my expanded nostrils, and of which the clouds, circling in spirals, rise slowly to the beams of the ceiling. All is silence. The only sound besides the bubbling of the cooked pills of opium is the scratching of the needles on the pipe bowls. Across the room a divine happiness floats, filling with dreams the warm dusk which the light of the great silken Chinese lanterns does not disturb,--just as it should be!

Indescribable smell of opium smoke! I no longer think of anything else! It is the whole universe for me now; and my whole life flows in the great sweetness which drifts through my veins, lulling my senses and making the very marrow of my bones and the fibres of my muscles weak with pleasure!...

Eighth or tenth pipe? What does it matter! The curtains are drawn, the air is still and pleasant, the light is faint, as it ought to be, too faint for any eyes but those of the smokers. Here and there along the platform the little lamps burn, like will-o-the-wisps dancing on the dark and sleeping surface of the wood, and the stretched-out bodies lie along the wall, the bamboo tubes in their mouths, while the "boy" bends over and puts fresh opium in the empty pipes.

Slowly, very slowly,--for what is the good of hurrying--are not dreams everlasting?--I raise my hand. My lips, stiff, clumsy, manage to form the single word:

"Tea."

Silently the Annamese goes off, and I smile with satisfaction that he has been able to understand me without having made me go through the effort of explaining myself. Decidedly Tsen-Tac is a worthy proprietor, whose servants have been trained by practiced opium-smokers. I let my eyes close. Under my neck I feel the wood of the pillow like a cool and comforting hand, and in my brain, which has become clear and subtle, all sorts of strange things appear and move about,--apparitions which may be souvenirs of another life or visions of another world,--things reserved for the initiates of opium,--at any rate things which are strangely alive in the recesses of my brain and which one day without doubt will come into my human thoughts ... unless, when the effects of the opium have passed away I forget them--which is quite possible. For everything is possible! Everything! Except the one thing: that anyone should touch or interfere with a smoker who is dreaming over his pipe.

I lift my lids and turn my head slightly towards the hand which has just dropped on my shoulder and committed this most inexcusable offence. My glance steals upwards, full of disgust, along the wrist and the arm, up to the face of the man who does not even know that one must pay absolute respect to the intoxication of the opium-smoker. At first with disgust, then in astonishment. It seems to me, indeed, that I know the face bent towards me. Where have I seen that expression before ... and when? It was a long time ago, certainly, a very long time. The eyes are deep and black and despairing, eyes which one does not quickly forget.

Now the man speaks in a hoarse, muffled voice. Calling me by my name, he says:

"Good evening, Jacques. I see that you are always sensible, as usual. You have had only ten pipes and here you are waiting for the green tea of Yun-nan which the boy is making for you. Only ten pipes, and already you are disgusted at me!"

He has sat himself down in the attitude of one of those Lao-ese idols, with his legs crossed, his hands flat on his thighs, and he smiles upon me with a faint baffling smile.

"Yes, I see this surprises you. But I understood your look at once when you raised your head towards me. Yes, I saw your scorn at the bottom of your eyes; exactly as I recognized you at once, when you came to stretch yourself out beside me, without noticing, and I said to myself: Here is he with whom I spent my childhood, and who does not know me,--_because I have aged so much_,--I have aged too soon, much too soon for other men to know me, even when they have been my childhood friends."

He bends over me and looks at me strangely. He has something ironical and yet almost tender in his expression that I observe with curiosity. Then he lifts his head and speaks out loud the very thought which has just crossed my mind.

"No. I am neither drunk nor mad! Scarcely twenty-five pipes. At this moment I have had my exact dose. Just enough to make me extraordinarily subtle and clairvoyant; and it is because of that I am speaking to you. I admit I hesitated a long time ... or a short one, I do not know which. What do you think of it? Is it worth the trouble?

"Who am I? Bah!... I already told you: your best friend, he with whom you lived for years side by side, who shared your games, your pleasures and your sorrows of childhood. Don't you remember? Well, I am not surprised. I always thought that you had a mediocre brain. Unlucky that the Drug itself has not succeeded in improving it."

He interrupts himself for a second to shrug his shoulders with a yawn of pity. His silence seems to expect an answer, yet nothing in me protests against the impertinence, at once brutal and kindly, of this unknown. The opium has permeated my soul with wisdom, kindliness and peace. Indifferent to his questions, I let my eyes wander over the panels inlaid with mother-of-pearl; the red hangings, embroidered with yellow characters, which cover the walls of the smoke-room; the faint white-clad forms, which move fitfully from time to time on the long vista of the platform, sighing heavily. But already the harsh voice of the stranger is beginning again:

"Really, don't you remember Dinard? The beach at Port Blanc, blazing in the sunshine; the green water of the little bay in which we bathed every day in July? Don't you remember the house where we spent our vacations, covered all over with wild vine, its two little doorways of green wood, the spindle trees in line along the railings, and the clumps of hydrangeas on which the sun, striking through the trees, flung splashes of gold in which the blackbirds used to come and scold?...

"And then later, don't you remember our school, the dear old Colonial School of the Avenue d'Observation, and the Luxembourg,--the old Luco where we used to leave our 'box' on autumn evenings and go to gaze at the falling dusk and the first yellow leaves which the breeze drove fluttering down from the trees and rolled gaily round the white statues on their gray pedestals?...

"What! You don't? You remember nothing?... Doesn't that recall anything to you? Poor brute!..."

Again he has bent over me, and he smiles with his face close to mine. But in vain I seek in my past and dig among the recollections of dead days in the corners of my memory. I cannot manage to recognize this man who pretends to have been the play-fellow of my youth. However, Yes!... I feel that everything that he has just reminded me of is right, and that these scenes that he has revived were formerly the background of my life! But what about him? I fling down my eyes with weariness and even with irritation.

Nevertheless, his voice goes on, sadder and more confidential than ever.

"No! I won't insist on it, but nevertheless open your eyes and look. Yes, that's right. Look at me long and carefully. Well? Is my poor face ugly enough, with its white hair, its wan gray skin withered by fever, washed by the rain, torn by the thorns? Is it terrible enough, with its bones that stick out all over it, with all these wrinkles which make it look like an old tragic mask from some Chinese theatre?

"Disgusting face, isn't it? Well! I have just come out of hospital after four months in bed--four months in bed--and before that, four months more of suffering, weariness, and ghastly terror, of daily fear and deadly companionship! That changes a man, I tell you; and I forgive you for not knowing me, since even I myself at times have recoiled with fright before the unknown image that the looking-glass shows me!"

He lifts his head. A twitch, a sort of intermittent cramp of his lip drags his mouth to one side violently, changing and deforming the face, which becomes livid, while in his staring eyes a sudden terrible light shines for an instant and passes away. He lifts his arms in a gesture of despair and weariness; then in a low voice, as if it were to himself, with a little dry laugh which comes and goes in jerks:

"Just a rag! This is what one year in this country has made of me. Yes, this healthy and vigorous body and this willing brain which I brought here a few months ago are nothing now but rags and tatters, used up and withered, in which my soul and youth, though still alive, flutter and are slowly dying. And soon I shall be nothing but a vague memory which will gradually fade out day by day in the hearts of those who love me. Then soon,--so quickly--yes, so quickly--I shall have gone altogether. Then, who in this vile life will think of Pierre de Lursac?"

"--_Pierre!_"

I must have spoken too loud. Upon the sleeping-platform two or three smokers, like white spectres, begin to move and grumble at the intruder who is disturbing the serenity of the place.... What does that matter to me! With my arms stretched out, I repeat, my voice trembling:--

"--_Pierre! Pierre!_"

He bends towards me and with his two hands gripping my shoulders he holds me down.

"Quiet ... yes ... it is I.... But quiet. I am satisfied.... Don't move. There is nothing important enough to allow of your disturbing your opium trance, and nothing is worse than getting excited when you have just finished smoking your dose.... Don't trouble to talk."

He falls silent, his expression grave and thoughtful. On my part, while anxiously watching him, I dream of my childhood days and my youth. _Lursac!_... Is it really he whom I have before me? Once more I see him in my mind coming ashore at Saigon some few months after his graduation from college, scarcely a year ago.... I recall his enthusiasm, his ardor, his thirst for adventure, and the air of strength and manliness, of youth and good looks, which glowed in him. And now I look at him feverishly again. He is right ... a rag ... a miserable rag....

"But why? Why?... What can have happened?"

With a sombre eye he stares at me in silence. Slowly he changes his attitude of a Buddhist statue and stretches himself on his side, his hollowed face turned towards my lamp. Without words and without a wasted movement, he takes up the pipe that I have laid down. His long hands, fleshless and transparent, busy themselves in the prescribed motions, always the same. With eyes closed he smokes.

Pipe follows pipe. A great silence weighs upon the human beings who stagnate in this hall filled with the oppressive perfume of the Drug. A silence only broken now and again for a moment by the distant striking of a gong, which marks the swallowing up of one hour after another in eternity ... and, from time to time, unreal and without echo in this house of nothingness, a woman's nervous laugh sends a spasm of discomfort through the calm.

Then, in my turn I take up the pipe again....

* * * * *

Then, suddenly, Lursac is talking. I watch him with vague curiosity. He is stretched out on his back. The pupils of his wide-open eyes, dilated and black, stare out, immobile and sightless, like two dead beasts. He speaks. My brain, soaked in the bitter smoke, picks its way among the aimless swarming of thoughts which rise up, melt away, and vanish without leaving any trace....

One after the other, the smokers get up and go. They have the staggering and hesitating gait of drunkards. Their linen clothes make patches of ghostly white against the red hangings of the hall.... The dull slam of the door signals the departure of each in turn....

Lursac is still talking....

Each one of his words falls into my brain and is engraved there so indelibly that I am sure that the next time I smoke opium and become entranced as I am now, I shall be able to reproduce them all, from the first to the last, without omitting a single one.... Yes.... I am absolutely certain of that.

However, tonight I do not feel able to distinguish whether all this is not a silly dream--the recollection of some life I have lived before in some other world....

Yes, I'm drunk with opium, drunk ... drunk ... drunk, to such a point that I am unable to recognize this long pale thing,--this hand that he is playing with and caressing ... this thing which looks like a hand ... a woman's.... Idiot! What is it?... Pshaw!... Let's go to sleep....

* * * * *

Time flows on.... Seconds and minutes, parted one by one from the present, plunge themselves inevitably into the shadowy ocean of the always growing past.... On the walls the red hangings begin to get paler. They become pink, then mauve, under the gentle fingers of the dawn which steals bluely through the window panes and between the shutters into the smoke-clouded opium hall. The last words of Lursac penetrate to my ears in a vague murmur.

"There you are, I'm finished.... Now, you know ... and nobody but you will know.... Nobody!... But I am glad to have told all this to you whom chance has placed at the last mile-stone of my journey. It would have worried me that you might have thought me mad, judging me by the gossip of some commonplace incident, or have supposed me crazed by the Drug and fever; as there will be those who will not fail to cry it aloud in their miserable papers!!! One lunatic the less! ... a quick and easy epitaph, but one which fits me well...."

There is a long untroubled silence. Then a violent explosion seems to tear my brain apart. What is the fool playing at--?... Warm, heavy drops are falling on my hand ... and as I half open my eyes I spring up, staring and haggard. Pierre is lying beside me ... bent double, like a useless, broken toy. From his face, disfigured by a gaping hole, blood rolls, covering my cheek, my forehead, my clothes. And I sit there stupefied, without understanding. Only after the first minutes of disturbance and agitation, and while they are carrying away his great bony body, do I see at the end of the arm, hanging down and swaying as the carriers stagger along with their terrible burden, the shining steel of a revolver, round which his fingers are still clenched.

* * * * *

Eight days ... that was eight days ago!...

And every evening since--because my nerves were torn to pieces and because the Shandoo, as I had foreseen, allowed all the details of my friend's story to rise from the bottom of my memory,--every evening since then, I have written, bit by bit, faithfully, the strange story that he told me before killing himself. I have not written it for myself, _who know_, but for others--for the people here, for the people in France; in a word, for all those unbelievers who in the darkness of their blindness think they know everything, although they are beset with ignorance, and believe that they have dislodged the Unknown from the last shadowy haunt in which it is hiding. Although they have no suspicion, even, of the mystery which is here, there, everywhere, close to them, and which I am the only one to hold under my hands.... The only one!...

* * * * *

... There, I have finished.... I have left out nothing:--not a single particular, not a word. Everything has been reproduced exactly. In any case I could not forget anything, because of this woman's hand,--this long pale hand so perfectly embalmed that one would swear it was alive and ready to move any minute. There it is: the signet on its ring-finger bears the following charge: _Dexter, argent, a lion sable--Sinister, azure, a chevron or_ ... and now, out through the window, open to the sweet and placid night of Annam, I am going to fling it, so that I may be no longer haunted by it, may no longer have to see it there....

There it goes, _splash_!

It must have fallen in the canal. And there the black mud will soon cover it for ever....

... And I shall never smoke opium again, never!... But that has nothing to do with this....

And here is the story that he told me[1]....

[Footnote 1: Captain Jacques Bressond fell on the French front, July 28, 1917, in the attack on the Chemin des Dames. At the bottom of his dispatch case among the personal souvenirs which he had asked me to send to his family if he was killed, there lay a large yellow, commercial-looking envelope with the inscription "For Jean." In the envelope there were the pages that follow, accompanied by a roll of parchment covered with unknown characters, probably in the Banhar language. My sole care has been to see to the publication of Bressond's text with a mixed feeling of respect and tenderness for his heroic death and friendship for the man himself. Although the names given by Bressond are real ones I have not changed a single word of his story, for the correctness of which I take full responsibility.

J. D'E.]