The day was so hot that the letters of the inscription seemed to
quiver in the dull light of summer. In the distance, on the road,
there were clouds of dust, as in Blue Beard when Sister Anne is asked:
"Sister Anne, Sister Anne, do you see anything coming?" This pale
dryness, how magnificent it was, and how filled it was with the bitter
fragrance of mint.

And Rabbit saw a horse and a covered cart approaching.

It was a sorry nag and dragged a two-wheeled cart and was unable to
move except in a jerky sort of gallop. Every leap made its disjointed
skeleton quiver and jolted its harness and made its earth-colored
mane fly in the air, shiny and greenish, like the beard of an ancient
mariner. Wearily as though they were paving-stones the animal lifted
its hoofs which were swollen like tumors....

Then a doubt, stronger than all the doubts which hitherto had assailed
the soul of Rabbit, pierced him.

* * * * *

This doubt was a leaden grain of shot which had just passed through
the nape of his neck behind his long ears into his brain. A veil of
blood more beautiful than the glowing autumn floated before his eyes
in which the shadows of eternity rose. He cried out. The fingers of
a huntsman pinioned his throat, strangled him, suffocated him. His
heart-beat grew weaker and weaker; this heart which used to flutter
like the pale wild rose in the wind dissolving at the morning hour
when the hedge softly caresses the lambs. An instant he remained
motionless, hollow-flanked and drawn-out like Death itself in the