"A Camus - The Stranger" - читать интересную книгу автора (Camus Albert)
One thing about this phase of the trial was rather irksome. Quite often, interested as I was in what they had to say, I was tempted to put in a word, myself. But my lawyer had advised me not to. УYou wonТt do your case any good by talking,Ф he had warned me. In fact, there seemed to be a conspiracy to exclude me from the proceedings; I wasnТt to have any say and my fate was to be decided out of hand.
It was quite an effort at times for me to refrain from cutting them all short, and saying: УBut, damn it all, whoТs on trial in this court, IТd like to know? ItТs a serious matter for a man, being accused of murder. And IТve something really important to tell you.Ф
However, on second thoughts, I found I had nothing to say. In any case, I must admit that hearing oneself talked about loses its interest very soon. The ProsecutorТs speech, especially, began to bore me before he was halfway through it. The only things that really caught my attention were occasional phrases, his gestures, and some elaborate tiradesЧbut these were isolated patches.
What he was aiming at, I gathered, was to show that my crime was premeditated. I remember his saying at one moment, УI can prove this, gentlemen of the jury, to the hilt. First, you have the facts of the crime; which are as clear as daylight. And then you have what I may call the night side of this case, the dark workings of a criminal mentality.Ф
He began by summing up the facts, from my motherТs death onward. He stressed my heartlessness, my inability to state MotherТs age, my visit to the swimming pool where I met Marie, our matinee at the pictures where a Fernandel film was showing, and finally my return with Marie to my rooms. I didnТt quite follow his remarks at first, as he kept on mentioning Уthe prisonerТs mistress,Ф whereas for me she was just УMarie.Ф Then he came to the subject of Raymond. It seemed to me that his way of treating the facts showed a certain shrewdness. All he said sounded quite plausible. IТd written the letter in collusion with Raymond so as to entice his mistress to his room and subject her to ill-treatment by a man Уof more than dubious reputation.Ф Then, on the beach, IТd provoked a brawl with RaymondТs enemies, in the course of which Raymond was wounded. IТd asked him for his revolver and gone back by myself with the intention of using it. Then IТd shot the Arab. After the first shot I waited. Then, Уto be certain of making a good job of it,Ф I fired four more shots deliberately, point-blank, and in cold blood, at my victim.
УThat is my case,Ф he said. УI have described to you the series of events which led this man to kill the deceased, fully aware of what he was doing. I emphasize this point. We are not concerned with an act of homicide committed on a sudden impulse which might serve as extenuation. I ask you to note, gentlemen of the jury, that the prisoner is an educated man. You will have observed the way in which he answered my questions; he is intelligent and he knows the value of words. And I repeat that it is quite impossible to assume that, when he committed the crime, he was unaware what he was doing.Ф
I noticed that he laid stress on my Уintelligence.Ф It puzzled me rather why what would count as a good point in an ordinary person should be used against an accused man as an overwhelming proof of his guilt. While thinking this over, I missed what he said next, until I heard him exclaim indignantly: УAnd has he uttered a word of regret for his most odious crime? Not one word, gentlemen. Not once in the course of these proceedings did this man show the least contrition.Ф
Turning toward the dock, he pointed a finger at me, and went on in the same strain. I really couldnТt understand why he harped on this point so much. Of course, I had to own that he was right; I didnТt feel much regret for what IТd done. Still, to my mind he overdid it, and IТd have liked to have a chance of explaining to him, in a quite friendly, almost affectionate way, that I have never been able really to regret anything in all my life. IТve always been far too much absorbed in the present moment, or the immediate future, to think back. Of course, in the position into which I had been forced, there was no question of my speaking to anyone in that tone. I hadnТt the right to show any friendly feeling or possess good intentions. And I tried to follow what came next, as the Prosecutor was now considering what he called my Уsoul.Ф
He said heТd studied it closelyЧand had found a blank, Уliterally nothing, gentlemen of the jury.Ф Really, he said, I had no soul, there was nothing human about me, not one of those moral qualities which normal men possess had any place in my mentality. УNo doubt,Ф he added, Уwe should not reproach him with this. We cannot blame a man for lacking what it was never in his power to acquire. But in a criminal court the wholly passive ideal of tolerance must give place to a sterner, loftier ideal, that of justice. Especially when this lack of every decent instinct is such as that of the man before you, a menace to society.Ф He proceeded to discuss my conduct toward my mother, repeating what he had said in the course of the hearing. But he spoke at much greater length of my crimeЧat such length, indeed, that I lost the thread and was conscious only of the steadily increasing heat.
A moment came when the Prosecutor paused and, after a short silence, said in a low, vibrant voice: УThis same court, gentlemen, will be called on to try tomorrow that most odious of crimes, the murder of a father by his son.Ф To his mind, such a crime was almost unimaginable. But, he ventured to hope, justice would be meted out without paltering. And yet, he made bold to say, the horror that even the crime of parricide inspired in him paled beside the loathing inspired by my callousness.
УThis man, who is morally guilty of his motherТs death, is no less unfit to have a place in the community than that other man who did to death the father that begat him. And, indeed, the one crime led on to the other; the first of these two criminals, the man in the dock, set a precedent, if I may put it so, and authorized the second crime. Yes, gentlemen, I am convincedФЧhere he raised his voice a toneЧУthat you will not find I am exaggerating the case against the prisoner when I say that he is also guilty of the murder to be tried tomorrow in this court. And I look to you for a verdict accordingly.Ф
The Prosecutor paused again, to wipe the sweat off his face. He then explained that his duty was a painful one, but he would do it without flinching. УThis man has, I repeat, no place in a community whose basic principles he flouts without compunction. Nor, heartless as he is, has he any claim to mercy. I ask you to impose the extreme penalty of the law; and I ask it without a qualm. In the course of a long career, in which it has often been my duty to ask for a capital sentence, never have I felt that painful duty weigh so little on my mind as in the present case. In demanding a verdict of murder without extenuating circumstances, I am following not only the dictates of my conscience and a sacred obligation, but also those of the natural and righteous indignation I feel at the sight of a criminal devoid of the least spark of human feeling.Ф
When the Prosecutor sat down there was a longish silence. Personally I was quite overcome by the heat and my amazement at what I had been hearing. The presiding judge gave a short cough, and asked me in a very low tone if I had anything to say. I rose, and as I felt in the mood to speak, I said the first thing that crossed my mind: that IТd had no intention of killing the Arab. The Judge replied that this statement would be taken into consideration by the court. Meanwhile he would be glad to hear, before my counsel addressed the court, what were the motives of my crime. So far, he must admit, he hadnТt fully understood the grounds of my defense.
I tried to explain that it was because of the sun, but I spoke too quickly and ran my words into each other. I was only too conscious that it sounded nonsensical, and, in fact, I heard people tittering.
My lawyer shrugged his shoulders. Then he was directed to address the court, in his turn. But all he did was to point out the lateness of the hour and to ask for an adjournment till the following afternoon. To this the judge agreed.
When I was brought back next day, the electric fans were still churning up the heavy air and the jurymen plying their gaudy little fans in a sort of steady rhythm. The speech for the defense seemed to me interminable. At one moment, however, I pricked up my ears; it was when I heard him saying: УIt is true I killed a man.Ф He went on in the same strain, saying УIФ when he referred to me. It seemed so queer that I bent toward the policeman on my right and asked him to explain. He told me to shut up; then, after a moment, whispered: УThey all do that.Ф It seemed to me that the idea behind it was still further to exclude me from the case, to put me off the map. so to speak, by substituting the lawyer for myself. Anyway, it hardly mattered; I already felt worlds away from this courtroom and its tedious Уproceedings.Ф
My lawyer, in any case, struck me as feeble to the point of being ridiculous. He hurried through his plea of provocation, and then he, too, started in about my soul. But I had an impression that he had much less talent than the Prosecutor.
УI, too,Ф he said, Уhave closely studied this manТs soul; but, unlike my learned friend for the prosecution, I have found something there. Indeed, I may say that I have read the prisonerТs mind like an open book.Ф What he had read there was that I was an excellent young fellow, a steady, conscientious worker who did his best by his employer; that I was popular with everyone and sympathetic in othersТ troubles. According to him I was a dutiful son, who had supported his mother as long as he was able. After anxious consideration I had reached the conclusion that, by entering a home, the old lady would have comforts that my means didnТt permit me to provide for her. УI am astounded, gentlemen,Ф he added, Уby the attitude taken up by my learned friend in referring to this Home. Surely if proof be needed of the excellence of such institutions, we need only remember that they are promoted and financed by a government department.Ф I noticed that he made no reference to the funeral, and this seemed to me a serious omission. But, what with his long-windedness, the endless days and hours they had been discussing my Уsoul,Ф and the rest of it, I found that my mind had gone blurred; everything was dissolving into a grayish, watery haze.
Only one incident stands out; toward the end, while my counsel rambled on, I heard the tin trumpet of an ice-cream vendor in the street, a small, shrill sound cutting across the flow of words. And then a rush of memories went through my mindЧmemories of a life which was mine no longer and had once provided me with the surest, humblest pleasures: warm smells of summer, my favorite streets, the sky at evening, MarieТs dresses and her laugh. The futility of what was happening here seemed to take me by the throat, I felt like vomiting, and I had only one idea: to get it over, to go back to my cell, and sleep ... and sleep.
Dimly I heard my counsel making his last appeal.
УGentlemen of the jury, surely you will not send to his death a decent, hard-working young man, because for one tragic moment he lost his self-control? Is he not sufficiently punished by the lifelong remorse that is to be his lot? I confidently await your verdict, the only verdict possibleЧthat of homicide with extenuating circumstances.Ф
The court rose, and the lawyer sat down, looking thoroughly exhausted. Some of his colleagues came to him and shook his hand. УYou put up a magnificent show, old man,Ф I heard one of them say. Another lawyer even called me to witness: УFine, wasnТt it?Ф I agreed, but insincerely; I was far too tired to judge if it had been УfineФ or otherwise.
Meanwhile the day was ending and the heat becoming less intense. By some vague sounds that reached me from the street I knew that the cool of the evening had set in. We all sat on, waiting. And what we all were waiting for really concerned nobody but me. I looked round the courtroom. It was exactly as it had been on the first day. I met the eyes of the journalist in gray and the robot woman. This reminded me that not once during the whole hearing had I tried to catch MarieТs eye. It wasnТt that IТd forgotten her; only I was too preoccupied. I saw her now, seated between Cщleste and Raymond. She gave me a little wave of her hand, as if to say, УAt last!Ф She was smiling, but I could tell that she was rather anxious. But my heart seemed turned to stone, and I couldnТt even return her smile.
The judges came back to their seats. Someone read out to the jury, very rapidly, a string of questions. I caught a word here and there. УMurder of malice aforethought ... Provocation ... Extenuating circumstances.Ф The jury went out, and I was taken to the little room where I had already waited. My lawyer came to see me; he was very talkative and showed more cordiality and confidence than ever before. He assured me that all would go well and IТd get off with a few yearsТ imprisonment or transportation. I asked him what were the chances of getting the sentence quashed. He said there was no chance of that. He had not raised any point of law, as this was apt to prejudice the jury. And it was difficult to get a judgment quashed except on technical grounds. I saw his point, and agreed. Looking at the matter dispassionately, I shared his view. Otherwise there would be no end to litigation. УIn any case,Ф the lawyer said, Уyou can appeal in the ordinary way. But IТm convinced the verdict will be favorable.Ф
УThe foreman of the jury will read out the answers. You will be called on after that to hear the judgment.Ф
Some doors banged. I heard people hurrying down flights of steps, but couldnТt tell whether they were near by or distant. Then I heard a voice droning away in the courtroom.
When the bell rang again and I stepped back into the dock, the silence of the courtroom closed in round me, and with the silence came a queer sensation when I noticed that, for the. first time, the young journalist kept his eyes averted. I didnТt look in MarieТs direction. In fact, I had no time to look, as the presiding judge had already started pronouncing a rigmarole to the effect that Уin the name of the French peopleФ I was to be decapitated in some public place.
It seemed to me then that I could interpret the look on the faces of those present; it was one of almost respectful sympathy. The policemen, too, handled me very gently. The lawyer placed his hand on my wrist. I had stopped thinking altogether. I heard the JudgeТs voice asking if I had anything more to say. After thinking for a moment, I answered, УNo.Ф Then the policemen led me out.
V
I HAVE just refused, for the third time, to see the prison chaplain. I have nothing to say to him, donТt feel like talkingЧand shall be seeing him quite soon enough, anyway. The only thing that interests me now is the problem of circumventing the machine, learning if the inevitable admits a loophole.
They have moved me to another cell. In this one, lying on my back, I can see the sky, and there is nothing else to see. All my time is spent in watching the slowly changing colors of the sky, as day moves on to night. I put my hands behind my head, gaze up, and wait.
This problem of a loophole obsesses me; I am always wondering if there have been cases of condemned prisonersТ escaping from the implacable machinery of justice at the last moment, breaking through the police cordon, vanishing in the nick of time before the guillotine falls. Often and often I blame myself for not having given more attention to accounts of public executions. One should always take an interest in such matters. ThereТs never any knowing what one may come to. Like everyone else IТd read descriptions of executions in the papers. But technical books dealing with this subject must certainly exist; only IТd never felt sufficiently interested to look them up. And in these books I might have found escape stories. Surely theyТd have told me that in one case, anyhow, the wheels had stopped; that once, if only once, in that inexorable march of events, chance or luck had played a happy part. Just once! In a way I think that single instance would have satisfied me. My emotion would have done the rest. The papers often talk of Уa debt owed to societyФЧa debt which, according to them, must be paid by the offender. But talk of that sort doesnТt touch the imagination. No, the one thing that counted for me was the possibility of making a dash for it and defeating their bloodthirsty rite; of a mad stampede to freedom that would anyhow give me a momentТs hope, the gamblerТs last throw. Naturally, all that УhopeФ could come to was to be knocked down at the corner of a street or picked off by a bullet in my back. But, all things considered, even this luxury was forbidden me; I was caught in the rattrap irrevocably.
Try as I might, I couldnТt stomach this brutal certitude. For really, when one came to think of it, there was a disproportion between the judgment on which it was based and the unalterable sequence of events starting from the moment when that judgment was delivered. The fact that the verdict was read out at eight P.M. rather than at five, the fact that it might have been quite different, that it was given by men who change their underclothes, and was credited to so vague an entity as the УFrench peopleФЧfor that matter, why not to the Chinese or the German people?Чall these facts seemed to deprive the courtТs decision of much of its gravity. Yet I could but recognize that, from the moment the verdict was given, its effects became as cogent, as tangible, as, for example, this wall against which I was lying, pressing my back to it.
When such thoughts crossed my mind, I remembered a story Mother used to tell me about my father. I never set eyes on him. Perhaps the only things I really knew about him were what Mother had told me. One of these was that heТd gone to see a murderer executed. The mere thought of it turned his stomach. But heТd seen it through and, on coming home, was violently sick. At the time, I found my fatherТs conduct rather disgusting. But now I understood; it was so natural. How had I failed to recognize that nothing was more important than an execution; that, viewed from one angle, itТs the only thing that can genuinely interest a man? And I decided that, if ever I got out of jail, IТd attend every execution that took place. I was unwise, no doubt, even to consider this possibility. For, the moment IТd pictured myself in freedom, standing behind a double rank of policemenЧon the right side of the line, so to speakЧthe mere thought of being an onlooker who comes to see the show, and can go home and vomit afterward, flooded my mind with a wild, absurd exultation. It was a stupid thing to let my imagination run away with me like that; a moment later I had a shivering fit and had to wrap myself closely in my blanket. But my teeth went on chattering; nothing would stop them.
Still, obviously, one canТt be sensible all the time. Another equally ridiculous fancy of mine was to frame new laws, altering the penalties. What was wanted, to my mind, was to give the criminal a chance, if only a dogТs chance; say, one chance in a thousand. There might be some drug, or combination of drugs, which would kill the patient (I thought of him as Уthe patientФ) nine hundred and ninety times in a thousand. That he should know this was, of course, essential. For after taking much thought, calmly, I came to the conclusion that what was wrong about the guillotine was that the condemned man had no chance at all, absolutely none. In fact, the patientТs death had been ordained irrevocably. It was a foregone conclusion. If by some fluke the knife didnТt do its job, they started again. So it came to this, thatЧagainst the grain, no doubtЧthe condemned man had to hope the apparatus was in good working order! This, I thought, was a flaw in the system; and, on the face of it, my view was sound enough. On the other hand, I had to admit it proved the efficiency of the system. It came to this; the man under sentence was obliged to collaborate mentally, it was in his interest that all should go off without a hitch.
Another thing I had to recognize was that, until now, IТd had wrong ideas on the subject. For some reason IТd always supposed that one had to go up steps and climb on to a scaffold, to be guillotined. Probably that was because of the 1789 Revolution; I mean, what IТd learned about it at school, and the pictures I had seen. Then one morning I remembered a photograph the newspapers had featured on the occasion of the execution of a famous criminal. Actually the apparatus stood on the ground; there was nothing very impressing about it, and it was much narrower than IТd imagined. It struck me as rather odd that picture had escaped my memory until now. What had struck me at the time was the neat appearance of the guillotine; its shining surfaces and finish reminded me of some laboratory instrument. One always has exaggerated ideas about what one doesnТt know. Now I had to admit it seemed a very simple process, getting guillotined; the machine is on the same level as the man, and he walks toward it as he steps forward to meet somebody he knows. In a sense, that, too, was disappointing. The business of climbing a scaffold, leaving the world below, so to speak, gave something for a manТs imagination to get hold of. But, as it was, the machine dominated everything; they killed you discreetly, with a hint of shame and much efficiency.
There were two other things about which I was always thinking: the dawn and my appeal. However, I did my best to keep my mind off these thoughts. I lay down, looked up at the sky, and forced myself to study it. When the light began to turn green I knew that night was coming. Another thing I did to deflect the course of my thoughts was to listen to my heart. I couldnТt imagine that this faint throbbing which had been with me for so long would ever cease. Imagination has never been one of my strong points. Still, I tried to picture a moment when the beating of my heart no longer echoed in my head. But, in vain. The dawn and my appeal were still there. And I ended by believing it was a silly thing to try to force oneТs thoughts out of their natural groove.
They always came for one at dawn; that much I knew. So, really, all my nights were spent in waiting for that dawn. I have never liked being taken by surprise. When something happens to me I want to be ready for it. ThatТs why I got into the habit of sleeping off and on in the daytime and watching through the night for the first hint of daybreak in the dark dome above. The worst period of the night was that vague hour when, I knew, they usually come; once it was after midnight I waited, listening intently. Never before had my ears perceived so many noises, such tiny sounds. Still, I must say I was lucky in one respect; never during any of those periods did I hear footsteps. Mother used to say that however miserable one is, thereТs always something to be thankful for. And each morning, when the sky brightened and light began to flood my cell, I agreed with her. Because I might just as well have heard footsteps, and felt my heart shattered into bits. Even though the faintest rustle sent me hurrying to the door and, pressing an ear to the rough, cold wood, I listened so intently that I could hear my breathing, quick and hoarse like a dogТs pantingЧeven so there was an end; my heart hadnТt split, and I knew I had another twenty-four hoursТ respite.
Then all day there was my appeal to think about. I made the most of this idea, studying my effects so as to squeeze out the maximum of consolation. Thus, I always began by assuming the worst; my appeal was dismissed. That meant, of course, I was to die. Sooner than others, obviously. УBut,Ф I reminded myself, УitТs common knowledge that life isnТt worth living, anyhow.Ф And, on a wide view, I could see that it makes little difference whether one dies at the age of thirty or threescore and tenЧsince, in either case, other men and women will continue living, the world will go on as before. Also, whether I died now or forty years hence, this business of dying had to be got through, inevitably. Still, somehow this line of thought wasnТt as consoling as it should have been; the idea of all those years of life in hand was a galling reminder! However, I could argue myself out of it, by picturing what would have been my feelings when my term was up, and death had cornered me. Once youТre up against it, the precise manner of your death has obviously small importance. ThereforeЧbut it was hard not to lose the thread of the argument leading up to that УthereforeФЧI should be prepared to face the dismissal of my appeal.
At this stage, but only at this stage, I had, so to speak, the right, and accordingly I gave myself leave, to consider the other alternative; that my appeal was successful. And then the trouble was to calm down that sudden rush of joy racing through my body and even bringing tears to my eyes. But it was up to me to bring my nerves to heel and steady my mind; for, even in considering this possibility, I had to keep some order in my thoughts, so as to make my consolations, as regards the first alternative, more plausible. When IТd succeeded, I had earned a good hourТs peace of mind; and that, anyhow, was something.
It was at one of these moments that I refused once again to see the chaplain. I was lying down and could mark the summer evening coming on by a soft golden glow spreading across the sky. I had just turned down my appeal, and felt my blood circulating with slow, steady throbs. No, I didnТt want to see the chaplain. ... Then I did something I hadnТt done for quite a while; I fell to thinking about Marie. She hadnТt written for ages; probably, I surmised, she had grown tired of being the mistress of a man sentenced to death. Or she might be ill, or dead. After all, such things happen. How could I have known about it, since, apart from our two bodies, separated now, there was no link between us, nothing to remind us of each other? Supposing she were dead, her memory would mean nothing; I couldnТt feel an interest in a dead girl. This seemed to me quite normal; just as I realized people would soon forget me once I was dead. I couldnТt even say that this was hard to stomach; really, thereТs no idea to which one doesnТt get acclimatized in time.
My thoughts had reached this point when the chaplain walked in, unannounced. I couldnТt help giving a start on seeing him. He noticed this evidently, as he promptly told me not to be alarmed. I reminded him that usually his visits were at another hour, and for a pretty grim occasion. This, he replied, was just a friendly visit; it had no concern with my appeal, about which he knew nothing. Then he sat down on my bed, asking me to sit beside him. I refusedЧnot because I had anything against him; he seemed a mild, amiable man.
He remained quite still at first, his arms resting on his knees, his eyes fixed on his hands. They were slender but sinewy hands, which made me think of two nimble little animals. Then he gently rubbed them together. He stayed so long in the same position that for a while I almost forgot he was there.
All of a sudden he jerked his head up and looked me in the eyes.
УWhy,Ф he asked, УdonТt you let me come to see you?Ф
I explained that I didnТt believe in God.
УAre you really so sure of that?Ф
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