"Monster," cried I, "we arrest you for the crime of mayhem."
"Perhaps, gentlemen," said the photographer, "you will be kind enough to exhibit your warrant." As he said this, he drew from his pocket with his right hand, the writ of arrest which had been intrusted to Cloudsdale, and deliberately lighting it in the candle, burned it to ashes before we could arrest his movement. Lucile had fallen upon a ready prepared bed, in a fit of pain, and fainting. The Doctor took his place at her side, his own eyes streaming with tears, and his very soul heaving with agitation.
As for me, my heart was beating as audibly as a drum. With one hand I grappled the collar of Pollexfen, and with the other held a cocked pistol at his head.
He stood as motionless as a statue. Not a nerve trembled nor a tone faltered, as he spoke these words: "I am most happy to see you, gentlemen; especially the Doctor, for he can relieve me of the duties of surgeon. You, sir, can assist him as nurse." And shaking off my hold as though it had been a child's, he sprang into the laboratory adjoining, and locked the door as quick as thought.
The insensibility of Lucile did not last long. Consciousness returned gradually, and with it pain of the most intense description. Still she maintained a rigidness of feature, and an intrepidity of soul that excited both sorrow and admiration. "Poor child! poor child!" was all we could utter, and even that spoken in whispers. Suddenly a noise in the laboratory attracted attention. Rising I went close to the door.
"Two to one in measure; eight to one in weight; water, only water," soliloquized the photographer. Then silence, "Phosphorus; yellow in color; burns in oxygen." Silence again.
"Good God!" cried I, "Doctor, he is analyzing her eye! The fiend is actually performing his incantations!"
A moment elapsed. A sudden, sharp explosion; then a fall, as if a chair had been upset, and——
"Carbon in combustion! Carbon in combustion!" in a wild, excited tone, broke from the lips of Pollexfen, and the instant afterwards he stood at the bedside of his pupil. "Lucile! Lucile! the secret is ours; ours only!"
At the sound of his voice the girl lifted herself from her pillow, whilst he proceeded: "Carbon in combustion; I saw it ere the light died from the eyeball."
A smile lighted the pale face of the girl as she faintly responded, "Regulus gave both eyes for his country; I have given but one for my art."
Pressing both hands to my throbbing brow, I asked myself, "Can this be real? Do I dream? If real, why do I not assassinate the fiend? Doctor," said I, "we must move Lucile. I will seek assistance."
"Not so," responded Pollexfen; the excitement of motion might bring on erysipelas, or still worse, tetanus.
A motion from Lucile brought me to her bedside. Taking from beneath her pillow a bank deposit-book, and placing it in my hands, she requested me to hand it to Courtland the moment of his arrival, which she declared would be the 20th, and desire him to read the billet attached to the banker's note of the deposit. "Tell him," she whispered, "not to love me less in my mutilation;" and again she relapsed into unconsciousness.
The photographer now bent over the senseless form of his victim, and muttering, "Yes, carbon in combustion," added, in a softened tone, "Poor girl!" As he lifted his face, I detected a solitary tear course down his impressive features. "The first I have shed," said he, sternly, "since my daughter's death."
Saying nothing, I could only think—"And this wretch once had a child!"
The long night through we stood around her bed. With the dawn, Martha, the housekeeper, returned, and we then learned, for the first time, with what consummate skill Pollexfen had laid all his plans. For even the housekeeper had been sent out of the way, and on a fictitious pretense that she was needed at the bedside of a friend, whose illness was feigned for the occasion. Nor was the day over before we learned with certainty, but no longer with surprise, that Cloudsdale was on his way to Panama, with a bribe in his pocket.
As soon as it was safe to remove Lucile, she was borne on a litter to the hospital of Dr. Peter Smith, where she received every attention that her friends could bestow.
Knowing full well, from what Lucile had told me, that Courtland would be down in the Sacramento boat, I awaited his arrival with the greatest impatience. I could only surmise what would be his course. But judging from my own feelings, I could not doubt that it would be both desperate and decisive.
Finally, the steamer rounded to, and the next moment the pale, emaciated form of the youth sank, sobbing, into my arms. Other tears mingled with his own.
The story was soon told. Eagerly, most eagerly, Courtland read the little note accompanying the bankbook. It was very simple, and ran thus:
My own life's Life: Forgive the first, and only act, that you will ever disapprove of in the conduct of your mutilated but loving Lucile. Ah! can I still hope for your love, in the future, as in the past? Give me but that assurance, and death itself would be welcome.
L. M.
We parted very late; he going to a hotel, I to the bedside of the wounded girl. Our destinies would have been reversed, but the surgeon's order was imperative, that she should see no one whose presence might conduce still further to bring on inflammation of the brain.
The next day, Courtland was confined to his bed until late in the afternoon, when he dressed, and left the hotel. I saw him no more until the subsequent day. Why, it now becomes important to relate.
About eight o'clock in the evening of the 21st, the day after his arrival, Courtland staggered into the gallery, or rather the den of John Pollexfen. He had no other arms than a short double-edged dagger, and this he concealed in his sleeve.
They had met before; as he sometimes went there, anterior to the death of M. Marmont, to obtain the photographs upon which Lucile was experimenting, previous to her engagement by the artist.
Pollexfen manifested no surprise at his visit; indeed, his manner indicated that it had been anticipated.
"You have come into my house, young man," slowly enunciated the photographer, "to take my life."
"I do not deny it," replied Courtland.
As he said this, he took a step forward. Pollexfen threw open his vest, raised himself to his loftiest height, and solemnly said: "Fire! or strike! as the case may be; I shall offer no resistance. I only beg of you, as a gentleman, to hear me through before you play the part of assassin."
Their eyes met. The struck lamb gazing at the eagle! Vengeance encountering Faith! The pause was but momentary. "I will hear you," said Courtland, sinking into a chair, already exhausted by his passion.
Pollexfen did not move. Confronting the lover, he told his story truthfully to the end. He plead for his life; for he felt the proud consciousness of having performed an act of duty that bordered upon the heroic.
Still, there was no relenting in the eye of Courtland. It had that expression in it that betokens blood. Csar saw it as Brutus lifted his dagger. Henry of Navarre recognized it as the blade of Ravillac sank into his heart. Joaquin beheld it gleaming in the vengeful orbs of Harry Love! Pollexfen, too, understood the language that it spoke.
Dropping his hands, and taking one stride toward the young man, he sorrowfully said: "I have but one word more to utter. Your affianced bride has joyfully sacrificed one of her lustrous eyes to science. In doing so, she expressed but one regret, that you, whom she loved better than vision, or even life, might, as the years roll away, forget to love her in her mutilation as you did in her beauty. Perfect yourself, she feared mating with imperfection might possibly estrange your heart. Your superiority in personal appearance might constantly disturb the perfect equilibrium of love."
He ceased. The covert meaning was seized with lightning rapidity by Courtland. Springing to his feet, he exclaimed joyfully: "The sacrifice must be mutual. God never created a soul that could outdo Charles Courtland's in generosity."
Flinging his useless dagger upon the floor, he threw himself into the already extended arms of the photographer, and begged him "to be quick with the operation." The artist required no second invitation, and ere the last words died upon his lips, the sightless ball of his left eye swung from its socket.
There was no cry of pain; no distortion of the young man's features with agony; no moan, or sob, or sigh. As he closed firmly his right eye, and compressed his pallid lips, a joyous smile lit up his whole countenance that told the spectator how superior even human love is to the body's anguish; how willingly the severest sacrifice falls at the beck of honor!
I shall attempt no description of the manner in which I received the astounding news from the lips of the imperturbable Pollexfen; nor prolong this narrative by detailing the meeting of the lovers, their gradual recovery, their marriage, and their departure for the vales of Dauphiny. It is but just to add, however, that Pollexfen added two thousand five hundred dollars to the bank account of Mademoiselle Marmont, on the day of her nuptials, as a bridal present, given, no doubt, partially as a compensation to the heroic husband for his voluntary mutilation.
Long months elapsed after the departure of Lucile and her lover before the world heard anything more of the photographer.
One day, however, in the early spring of the next season, it was observed that Pollexfen had opened a new and most magnificent gallery upon Montgomery Street, and had painted prominently upon his sign, these words:
John Pollexfen, Photographer.
Discoverer of the Carbon Process,
By which Colored Pictures are Painted by the Sun.
The news of this invention spread, in a short time, over the whole civilized world; and the Emperor Napoleon the Third, with the liberality characteristic of great princes, on hearing from the lips of Lucile a full account of this wonderful discovery, revived, in favor of John Pollexfen, the pension which had been bestowed upon Niépce, and which had lapsed by his death, in 1839; and with a magnanimity that would have rendered still more illustrious his celebrated uncle, revoked the decree of forfeiture against the estates of M. Marmont, and bestowed them, with a corresponding title of nobility, upon Lucile and her issue.
This ends my story. I trust the patient reader will excuse its length, for it was all necessary, in order to explain how John Pollexfen made his fortune.
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