Page:Marquis de Sade - Adelaide of Brunswick.djvu/120

 people when they are occupied with their thoughts, did not notice where he was walking until he found himself in an uneven section of ground and he noticed that there were tombstones. His walk had taken him to the cemetery.

"Alas," he said to himself, "this is the place where I must stay. Chance has brought me here and does it not seem like an order? After all what do I have left in the world after having lost the heart and the person of the one I adore? Why should I leave this place in order to expose myself to new misfortunes? Adelaide, I must die here since I shall never see you again, and since if I did find you, I could only think of your infidelities. Ah, my suspicions did not deceive me when they fell on Kaunitz; but why should I have had assassinated the one she preferred? The blood of this young man is still on my conscience. I see his shadow still following me through this sinister habitation of the dead."

Suddenly a flash of lightning brightened the heavens and thunder grumbled on the tips of the mountains and more flashes lighted up the valleys. The clouds piled up in heavy masses and made the black obscurity even more frightful. The violent crashes of the lightning became more frequent and the streaks of fire crossed the heavens in all directions. At this moment the earth shook and the graves opened up. One might have said that they were like mouths cursing the sky for the death which it was sending down to the earth.

"Crush me," yelled Frederick to the lightning, "hasten to have me join the unfortunate ones who are resting here. Let my criminal remains be purified, if it is possible, but being close to the innocent bodies of those who have been buried here. If Heaven is just, in compensation for the troubles I have had, may it deign to pardon those I have caused."

Frederick, haggard, kept on with this soliloquy. He was the image of the sinner who was unable to stop the fury of God who shows his anger and his power at times to us mortals.

Suddenly, he stopped because he thought he saw a shadow in one of the graves which had been opened up by the earthquake. He tried to penetrate the darkness with his eyes, but was unable.

"Don't you know me?" asked a deep voice. "Have you