The Inn Page #3

"The Inn" is a short story by Guy de Maupassant that explores themes of human nature, desire, and the complexities of relationships in a rustic setting. The narrative unfolds at a remote inn, where a chance encounter between the protagonist and a local innkeeper leads to a poignant examination of love, longing, and societal expectations. Through Maupassant's evocative prose and keen insights into character psychology, the story captures the intricacies of emotion and the impact of fleeting moments in life.

								

the direction of the Wildstrubel. For five hours he mounted, scaling the
rocks by means of his climbing irons, cutting into the ice, advancing
continually, and occasionally hauling up the dog, who remained below at
the foot of some slope that was too steep for him, by means of the rope.
It was about six o'clock when he reached one of the summits to which
old Gaspard often came after chamois, and he waited till it should be
daylight.

The sky was growing pale overhead, and a strange light, springing
nobody could tell whence, suddenly illuminated the immense ocean of pale
mountain summits, which extended for a hundred leagues around him. One
might have said that this vague brightness arose from the snow itself
and spread abroad in space. By degrees the highest distant summits
assumed a delicate, pink flesh color, and the red sun appeared behind
the ponderous giants of the Bernese Alps.

Ulrich Kunsi set off again, walking like a hunter, bent over, looking
for tracks, and saying to his dog: “Seek, old fellow, seek!”

He was descending the mountain now, scanning the depths closely, and
from time to time shouting, uttering aloud, prolonged cry, which soon
died away in that silent vastness. Then he put his ear to the ground to
listen. He thought he could distinguish a voice, and he began to run and
shouted again, but he heard nothing more and sat down, exhausted and in
despair. Toward midday he breakfasted and gave Sam, who was as tired as
himself, something to eat also, and then he recommenced his search.

When evening came he was still walking, and he had walked more than
thirty miles over the mountains. As he was too far away to return home
and too tired to drag himself along any further, he dug a hole in
the snow and crouched in it with his dog under a blanket which he had
brought with him. And the man and the dog lay side by side, trying to
keep warm, but frozen to the marrow nevertheless. Ulrich scarcely slept,
his mind haunted by visions and his limbs shaking with cold.

Day was breaking when he got up. His legs were as stiff as iron bars
and his spirits so low that he was ready to cry with anguish, while his
heart was beating so that he almost fell over with agitation, when he
thought he heard a noise.

Suddenly he imagined that he also was going to die of cold in the
midst of this vast solitude, and the terror of such a death roused his
energies and gave him renewed vigor. He was descending toward the inn,
falling down and getting up again, and followed at a distance by Sam,
who was limping on three legs, and they did not reach Schwarenbach until
four o'clock in the afternoon. The house was empty and the young man
made a fire, had something to eat and went to sleep, so worn out that he
did not think of anything more.

He slept for a long time, for a very long time, an irresistible sleep.
But suddenly a voice, a cry, a name, “Ulrich!” aroused him from his
profound torpor and made him sit up in bed. Had he been dreaming? Was it
one of those strange appeals which cross the dreams of disquieted minds?
No, he heard it still, that reverberating cry-which had entered his ears
and remained in his flesh-to the tips of his sinewy fingers. Certainly
somebody had cried out and called “Ulrich!” There was somebody there
near the house, there could be no doubt of that, and he opened the door
and shouted, “Is it you, Gaspard?” with all the strength of his lungs.
But there was no reply, no murmur, no groan, nothing. It was quite dark
and the snow looked wan.

The wind had risen, that icy wind that cracks the rocks and leaves
nothing alive on those deserted heights, and it came in sudden gusts,
which were more parching and more deadly than the burning wind of the
desert, and again Ulrich shouted: “Gaspard! Gaspard! Gaspard.” And then
he waited again. Everything was silent on the mountain.

Then he shook with terror and with a bound he was inside the inn, when
he shut and bolted the door, and then he fell into a chair trembling all
over, for he felt certain that his comrade had called him at the moment
he was expiring.

He was sure of that, as sure as one is of being alive or of eating a
piece of bread. Old Gaspard Hari had been dying for two days and three
nights somewhere, in some hole, in one of those deep, untrodden ravines
whose whiteness is more sinister than subterranean darkness. He had been
dying for two days and three nights and he had just then died, thinking
of his comrade. His soul, almost before it was released, had taken its
flight to the inn where Ulrich was sleeping, and it had called him by
that terrible and mysterious power which the spirits of the dead have to
haunt the living. That voiceless soul had cried to the worn-out soul of
the sleeper; it had uttered its last farewell, or its reproach, or its
curse on the man who had not searched carefully enough.

And Ulrich felt that it was there, quite close to him, behind the wall,
behind the door which he had just fastened. It was wandering about, like
a night bird which lightly touches a lighted window with his wings, and
the terrified young man was ready to scream with horror. He wanted to
run away, but did not dare to go out; he did not dare, and he should
never dare to do it in the future, for that phantom would remain there
day and night, round the inn, as long as the old man's body was not
recovered and had not been deposited in the consecrated earth of a
churchyard.

When it was daylight Kunsi recovered some of his courage at the return
of the bright sun. He prepared his meal, gave his dog some food and then
remained motionless on a chair, tortured at heart as he thought of the
old man lying on the snow, and then, as soon as night once more covered
the mountains, new terrors assailed him. He now walked up and down the
dark kitchen, which was scarcely lighted by the flame of one candle, and
he walked from one end of it to the other with great strides, listening,
listening whether the terrible cry of the other night would again break
the dreary silence outside. He felt himself alone, unhappy man, as no
man had ever been alone before! He was alone in this immense desert of
Snow, alone five thousand feet above the inhabited earth, above human
habitation, above that stirring, noisy, palpitating life, alone under an
icy sky! A mad longing impelled him to run away, no matter where, to get
down to Loeche by flinging himself over the precipice; but he did not
even dare to open the door, as he felt sure that the other, the dead
man, would bar his road, so that he might not be obliged to remain up
there alone:

Toward midnight, tired with walking, worn out by grief and fear, he at
last fell into a doze in his chair, for he was afraid of his bed as one
is of a haunted spot. But suddenly the strident cry of the other evening
pierced his ears, and it was so shrill that Ulrich stretched out his
arms to repulse the ghost, and he fell backward with his chair.

Sam, who was awakened by the noise, began to howl as frightened dogs
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