Page:Hoffmann's Strange Stories - Hoffman - 1855.djvu/348

 requires no explanation. The fruit at which you have aimed may be tempting indeed; but it hangs too high for your reach: therefore pack up and begone!'

"I was about to speak, but without a moment's warning, as if struck with a sudden madness, he seized me by the collar and forced me out of doors with such violence, that I fell down stairs, and was severely hurt in the head and right arm. I left his home with my heart almost bursting with grief and rage, and betook myself to the farthest end of the Faubourg de St. Martin, where I had an acquaintance who received me into the ground-floor of his humble dwelling.—Here my agitations continued, and I could never rest by night nor day. In the night, indeed, I used to wander about Cardillac's house, hoping that Madelon perhaps might hear my complaints, which at intervals I could not repress;—and if she could only succeed in speaking to me from a window, I would have tried to persuade her into adopting some one of many desperate plans which I had been revolving to effect her escape.

"Now, my lady, you will please to observe, that adjoining Cardillac's house in the Rue de la Nicaise, is a high court wall, ornamented with niches, in some of which there are yet old mouldering statues cut in freestone. It happened once that I was hiding myself near one of the statues, and gazing up to the windows of the house, that looked into the square court, of which this high wall is the boundary. Suddenly, while I was then on the watch, I perceived light in the work-room of Cardillac. It was now midnight, at which hour my master never used to be awake; for, as the clock struck nine, he punctually went to rest. My heart beat violently, for I thought it possible that some accident might have occurred, in consequence of which I might once more obtain entrance into the house; but the light soon after vanished. Determining to watch as long as possible, in order to escape all risk of observation, I forced myself into the niche behind the statue; but scarcely had I taken my place when I was obliged to recoil