a heartrending possibility that existed not for Dea, who was blind; he

could compare himself with other men. Now, in a situation such as that

of Gwynplaine, admitting that he should seek to examine it, to compare

himself with others was to understand himself no more. To have, like

Dea, empty sight from which the world is absent, is a supreme distress,

yet less than to be an enigma to oneself; to feel that something is

wanting here as well, and that something, oneself; to see the universe

and not to see oneself. Dea had a veil over her, the night; Gwynplaine a

mask, his face. Inexpressible fact, it was by his own flesh that

Gwynplaine was masked! What his visage had been, he knew not. His face

had vanished. They had affixed to him a false self. He had for a face, a

disappearance. His head lived, his face was dead. He never remembered to

have seen it. Mankind was for Gwynplaine, as for Dea, an exterior fact.

It was far-off. She was alone, he was alone. The isolation of Dea was

funereal, she saw nothing; that of Gwynplaine sinister, he saw all

things. For Dea creation never passed the bounds of touch and hearing;

reality was bounded, limited, short, immediately lost. Nothing was

infinite to her but darkness. For Gwynplaine to live was to have the

crowd for ever before him and outside him. Dea was the proscribed from

light, Gwynplaine the banned of life. They were beyond the pale of hope,

and had reached the depth of possible calamity; they had sunk into it,

both of them. An observer who had watched them would have felt his

reverie melt into immeasurable pity. What must they not have suffered!

The decree of misfortune weighed visibly on these human creatures, and

never had fate encompassed two beings who had done nothing to deserve

it, and more clearly turned destiny into torture, and life into hell.

409

The Man Who Laughs