“The bodies of these men disappear, but they themselves remain; and in the night which follows the cessation of their heart’s pulsation I assure you, monsieur, they are terrifying.

“And in hushed tones we talked about him, recalling to mind certain sayings, certain formulas of his, those startling maxims which are like jets of flame flung, in a few words, into the darkness of the Unknown Life.

“‘It seems to me that he is going to speak,’ said my comrade.  And we stared with uneasiness bordering on fear at the motionless face, with its eternal laugh.  Gradually, we began to feel ill at ease, oppressed, on the point of fainting.  I faltered: 

“’I don’t know what is the matter with me, but, I assure you I am not well.’

“And at that moment we noticed that there was an unpleasant odor from the corpse.

“Then, my comrade suggested that we should go into the adjoining room, and leave the door open; and I assented to his proposal.

“I took one of the wax candles which burned on the stand, and I left the second behind.  Then we went and sat down at the other end of the adjoining apartment, in such a position that we could see the bed and the corpse, clearly revealed by the light.

“But he still held possession of us.  One would have said that his immaterial essence, liberated, free, all-powerful and dominating, was flitting around us.  And sometimes, too, the dreadful odor of the decomposed body came toward us and penetrated us, sickening and indefinable.

“Suddenly a shiver passed through our bones:  a sound, a slight sound, came from the death-chamber.  Immediately we fixed our glances on him, and we saw, yes, monsieur, we saw distinctly, both of us, something white pass across the bed, fall on the carpet, and vanish under an armchair.

“We were on our feet before we had time to think of anything, distracted by stupefying terror, ready to run away.  Then we stared at each other.  We were horribly pale.  Our hearts throbbed fiercely enough to have raised the clothing on our chests.  I was the first to speak: 

“‘Did you see?’

“‘Yes, I saw.’

“‘Can it be that he is not dead?’

“‘Why, when the body is putrefying?’

“‘What are we to do?’

“My companion said in a hesitating tone: 

“‘We must go and look.’

“I took our wax candle and entered first, glancing into all the dark corners in the large apartment.  Nothing was moving now, and I approached the bed.  But I stood transfixed with stupor and fright: 

“Schopenhauer was no longer laughing!  He was grinning in a horrible fashion, with his lips pressed together and deep hollows in his cheeks.  I stammered out: 

“‘He is not dead!’

“But the terrible odor ascended to my nose and stifled me.  And I no longer moved, but kept staring fixedly at him, terrified as if in the presence of an apparition.