A Happy Death
Albert Camus
Contents:
1 Part One Natural Death
2
55 Part Two
Conscious Death
153 Afterword
169 Notes and Variants
Part One
Natural Death
1
It was ten in the morning, and Patrice Mersault was walking steadily toward Zagreus’ villa. By now the
housekeeper had left for the market, and the villa was deserted. It was a beautiful April morning, chilly
and bright; the sky was radiant, but there was no warmth in the glistening sunshine. The empty road
sloped up toward the villa, and a pure light streamed between the pines covering the hillside. Patrice
Mersault was carrying a suitcase, and as he walked on through that primal morning, the only sounds he
heard were the click of his own footsteps on the cold road and the regular creak of the suitcase handle.
Not far from the villa, the road crossed a little square decorated with flowerbeds and benches. The effect
of the early red geraniums among gray aloes, the blue sky, and the whitewashed walls was so fresh, so
childlike that Mersault stopped a moment before walking on through the square. Then the road sloped
down again toward Zagreus’ villa. On the doorstep he paused and put on his gloves. He opened the door
which the cripple never locked and carefully closed it behind him. He walked down the hall to the third
door on the left, knocked and went in. Zagreus was there, of course, a blanket over the stumps of his legs,
sitting in an armchair by the fire exactly where Mersault had sat two days ago. He
was reading, and his book lay open on the blanket; there was no surprise in his round eyes as he stared up
at Mersault, who was standing in front of the closed door. The curtains were drawn back, and patches of
sunshine lay on the floor, the furniture, making objects glitter in the room. Beyond the window, the
morning rejoiced over the cold, golden earth. A great icy joy, the birds’ shrill, tentative outcry, the flood of pitiless light gave the day an aspect of innocence and truth. Mersault stood motionless, the room’s
stifling heat filling his throat, his ears. Despite the change in the weather, there was a blazing fire in the grate. And Mersault felt his blood rising to his temples, pounding at the tips of his ears. Zagreus’ eyes
followed his movements, though he did not say a word. Patrice walked toward the chest on the other side
of the fireplace and put his suitcase down on a table without looking at the cripple. He felt a faint tremor
in his ankles now. He took out a cigarette and lit it—clumsily, for he was wearing gloves. A faint noise
behind him made him turn around, the cigarette between his lips. Cagreus was still staring at him, but had
just closed the book. Mersault—the fire was painfully hot against his knees now—could read the title
upside down: The Courtier by Baltasar Gracian. Then he bent over the chest and opened it. The revolver was still there, its lustrous black, almost feline curves on the white letter. Mersault picked up the envelope with his left hand and the revolver with his right. After an instant’s hesitation, he thrust the gun under his left arm and opened the envelope. It contained one large
sheet of paper, with only a few lines of Za-greus’ tall, angular handwriting across the top:
“I am doing away with only half a man. It need cause no problem—there is more than enough here to pay
off those who have taken care of me till now. Please use what is left over to improve conditions of the
men in death row. But I know it’s asking a lot.”
Expressionless, Mersault folded the sheet and put it back in the envelope. As he did so the smoke from
his cigarette stung his eyes, and a tiny chunk of ash fell on the envelope. He shook it off, set the envelope 3
on the table where it was sure to be noticed, and turned toward Zagreus, who was staring at the envelope now, his stubby powerful fingers still holding the book. Mersault bent down, turned the key of the little
strongbox inside the chest, and took out the packets of bills, only their ends visible in the newspaper
wrappings. Holding the gun under one arm, with the other hand he methodically filled up the suitcase.
There were fewer than twenty packets of hundreds, and Mersault realized he had brought too large a
suitcase. He left one packet in the safe. Then he closed the suitcase, flicked the half-smoked cigarette into the fire and, taking the revolver in his right hand, walked toward the cripple.
Zagreus was staring at the window now. A car drove slowly past, making a faint chewing sound.
Motionless, Zagreus seemed to be contemplating all
the inhuman beauty of this April morning. When he felt the barrel against his right temple, he did not turn
away. But Patrice, watching him, saw his eyes fill with tears. It was Patrice who closed his eyes, He
stepped back and fired. Leaning against the wall for a moment, his eyes still closed, he felt his blood
throbbing in his ears. Then he opened his eyes. The head had fallen over onto the left shoulder, the body
only slightly tilted. But it was no longer Zagreus he saw now, only a huge, bulging wound of brain, blood,
and bone. Mersault began to tremble. He walked around to the other side of the armchair, groped for
Zagreus’ right hand, thrust the revolver into it, raised it to the temple, and let it fall back. The revolver dropped onto the arm of the chair and then into Zagreus’ lap. Now Mersault noticed the cripple’s mouth
and chin—he had the same serious and sad expression as when he was staring at the window. Just then a
shrill horn sounded in front of the door. A second time. Mersault, still leaning over the armchair, did not
move. The sound of tires meant that the butcher had driven away. Mersault picked up his suitcase, turned
the doorknob gleaming suddenly in a sunbeam, and left the room, his head throbbing, his mouth parched.
He opened the outer door and walked away quickly. There was no one in sight except a group of children
at one end of the little square. He walked on. Past the square, he was suddenly aware of the cold, and
shivered under his light jacket. He sneezed twice, and the valley
filled with shrill mocking echoes that the crystal sky carried higher and higher. Staggering slightly, he
stopped and took a deep breath. Millions of tiny white smiles thronged down from the blue sky. They
played over the leaves still cupping the rain, over the damp earth of the paths, soared to the blood-red tile roofs, then back into the lakes of air and light from which they had just overflowed. A tiny plane hummed
its way across the sky. In this flowering of air, this fertility of the heavens, it seemed as if a man’s one
duty was to live and be happy. Everything in Mersault fell silent. He sneezed a third time, and shivered
feverishly. Then he hurried away without glancing around him, the suitcase creaking, his footsteps loud
on the road. Once he was back in his room, and had put the suitcase in a corner, he lay down on his bed
and slept until the middle of the afternoon.
2
Summer crammed the habor with noise and sunlight. It was eleven thirty. The day split open down the
middle, crushing the docks under the burden of its heat. Moored at the sheds of the Algiers Municipal
Depot, black-hulled, red-chimneyed freighters were loading sacks of wheat. Their dusty fragrance
mingled with the powerful smell of tar melting under a hot sun. Men were drinking at a little stall that
reeked of creosote and anisette, while some Arab acrobats in red shirts somersaulted on the scorching
flagstones in front of the sea in the leaping light. Without so much as a glance at them, the stevedores
carrying the sacks walked up the two sagging planks that slanted from the dock to the freighter decks.
When they reached the top, their silhouettes were suddenly divided between the sea and the sky among
the winches and masts. They stopped for an instant, dazzled by the light, eyes gleaming in the whitish
crust of dust and sweat that covered their faces, before they plunged blindly into the hold stinking of hot
blood. In the fiery air, a siren blew without stopping.
Suddenly the men on the plank stopped in confusion. One of them had fallen, and was caught between the
planks, his arm pinned under his body, crushed under the tremendous weight of the sack, and he screamed
with pain. Just at this moment, Pa-
4
trice Mersault emerged from his office, and on the doorstep, the summer heat took his breath away. He opened his mouth, inhaled the tar vapors, which stung his throat, and then he went over to the stevedores.