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Updated: June 1, 2025
Then Aubert and Gerande returned to Geneva, and during the long life which God accorded to them, they made it a duty to redeem by prayer the soul of the castaway of science. In the month of September, 185 , I arrived at Frankfort-on-the-Maine.
Gerande shuddered and started up without understanding the cause of the noise which thus disturbed her reverie. When she became a little calmer she opened the sash. The clouds had burst, and a torrent-like rain pattered on the surrounding roofs. The young girl leaned out of the window to draw to the shutter shaken by the wind, but she feared to do so.
"Dost thou hear, my Gerande? I live, I still live! Listen to my breathing, see the blood circulating in my veins! No, thou wouldst not kill thy father, and thou wilt accept this man for thy husband, so that I may become immortal, and at last attain the power of God!" At these blasphemous words old Scholastique crossed herself, and Pittonaccio laughed aloud with joy.
"O father, it will be nothing. I am cold, and I imagine that it is " "What, Gerande?" "The presence of that man, who always follows us," she replied in a low tone. Master Zacharius turned towards the little old man. "Faith, he goes well," said he, with a satisfied air, "for it is just four o'clock. Fear nothing, my child; it is not a man, it is a clock!" Gerande looked at her father in terror.
So, though Gerande and Aubert were ignorant of it, all Geneva was soon talking of their speedy union. But it happened also that, while the worthy folk were gossiping, a strange chuckle was often heard, and a voice saying, "Gerande will not wed Aubert." If the talkers turned round, they found themselves facing a little old man who was quite a stranger to them. How old was this singular being?
Gerande thought she would go mad with terror. What was her father doing? She opened the door, and it escaped from her hands, and slammed loudly with the force of the tempest. Gerande then found herself in the dark supper-room, succeeded in gaining, on tiptoe, the staircase which led to her father's shop, and pale and fainting, glided down.
He was pursuing the phantom of Pittonaccio across the rickety corridors. Scholastique, Gerande, and Aubert remained, speechless and fainting, in the large gloomy hall. The young girl had fallen upon a stone seat; the old servant knelt beside her, and prayed; Aubert remained erect, watching his betrothed.
At news of this, the customers came in a crowd, and the poor watchmaker's money fast melted away; but his honesty remained intact. Gerande warmly praised his delicacy, which was leading him straight towards ruin; and Aubert soon offered his own savings to his master. "What will become of my daughter?" said Master Zacharius, clinging now and then in the shipwreck to his paternal love.
Like the pictures of Leonardo di Vinci, he was sketched in black. Gerande had the pleasantest room in the whole house, whence, through a narrow window, she had the inspiriting view of the snowy peaks of Jura; but the bedroom and workshop of the old man were a kind of cavern close on to the water, the floor of which rested on the piles.
"If I had only a spring here," said she, putting her hand on her heart, "I would not love you as I do, father." Master Zacharius looked intently at Gerande, and did not reply. Suddenly he uttered a cry, carried his hand eagerly to his heart, and fell fainting on his old leathern chair. "Father, what is the matter?" "Help!" cried Aubert. "Scholastique!" But Scholastique did not come at once.
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