CATASTROPHE


"Those seem to be good horses, and we change on the way," said Planard.
"You give the men a Napoleon or two; we must do it within three hours
and a quarter. Now, come; I'll lift him upright, so as to place his feet
in their proper berth, and you must keep them together and draw the
white shirt well down over them."

In another moment I was placed, as he described, sustained in Planard's
arms, standing at the foot of the coffin, and so lowered backward,
gradually, till I lay my length in it. Then the man, whom he called
Planard, stretched my arms by my sides, and carefully arranged the
frills at my breast and the folds of the shroud, and after that, taking
his stand at the foot of the coffin made a survey which seemed to
satisfy him.

The Count, who was very methodical, took my clothes, which had just been
removed, folded them rapidly together and locked them up, as I
afterwards heard, in one of the three presses which opened by doors in
the panel.

I now understood their frightful plan. This coffin had been prepared for
me; the funeral of St. Amand was a sham to mislead inquiry; I had myself
given the order at Pere la Chaise, signed it, and paid the fees for the
interment of the fictitious Pierre de St. Amand, whose place I was to
take, to lie in his coffin with his name on the plate above my breast,
and with a ton of clay packed down upon me; to waken from this
catalepsy, after I had been for hours in the grave, there to perish by a
death the most horrible that imagination can conceive.