ck to the head of the drowned
man. He might indeed assert his will, and avoid the lines he knew so
well. In spite of himself, he drew those lines, he obeyed his muscles
and his rebellious nerves. He had first of all proceeded rapidly with
his sketches; he now took pains to pass the stick of charcoal slowly
over the canvas. The result was the same: Camille, grimacing and in
pain, appeared ceaselessly.

The artist sketched the most different heads successively: the heads of
angels, of virgins with aureoles, of Roman warriors with their helmets,
of fair, rosy children, of old bandits seamed with scars; and the
drowned man always, always reappeared; he became, in turn, angel,
virgin, warrior, child and bandit.

Then, Laurent plunged into caricature: he exaggerated the features,
he produced monstrous profiles, he invented grotesque heads, but
only succeeded in rendering the striking portrait of his victim more
horrible. He finished by drawing animals, dogs and cats; but even the
dogs and cats vaguely resembled Camille.

Laurent then became seized with sullen rage. He smashed the canvas with
his fist, thinking in despair of his great picture. Now, he must put
that idea aside; he was convinced that, in future, he would draw nothing
but the head of Camille, and as his friend had told him, faces all alike
would cause hilarity. He pictured to himself what his work would have
been, and perceived upon the shoulders of his personages, men and women,
the livid and terrified face of the drowned man. The strange picture he
thus conjured up, appeared to him atrociously ridiculous and exasperated
him.

He no longer dared to paint, always dreading that he would resuscitate
his victim at the least stroke of his brush. If he desired to live
peacefully in his studio he must never paint there. This thought that
his fingers possessed the fatal and unconscious faculty of reproducing
without end the portrait of Camille, made him observe his hand in
terror. It seemed to him that his hand no longer belonged to him.

CHAPTER XXVI

The crisis threatening Madame Raquin took place. The paralysis, which
for several months had been creeping along her limbs, always ready to
strangle her, at last took her by the throat and linked her body. One
evening, while conversing peacefully with Therese and Laurent, she
remained in the middle of a sentence with her mouth wide open: she felt
as if she was being throttled. When she wanted to cry out and cal