Well, about a year last autumn, I suddenly began to suffer inexplicable spells of a strange malaise. To begin with, I was prey to a kind of nervous anxiety which kept me awake for entire nights at a stretch, a kind of hypersensitivity which made me jump at the least little sound. I began to have periods of moodiness and sudden fits of anger for no apparent reason. I consulted a doctor who prescribed cold showers and potassium bromide.

I followed his advice and took a shower morning and evening, as well as the bromide. Quite soon I did in fact manage to start sleeping again, but this time sleep turned out to be even more intolerable than the insomnia. As soon as my head hit the pillow, my eyes closed and I was out. I mean out completely. I fell into absolute nothingness, a void, a total blank. My self became completely dead until I was suddenly, horribly awoken by the most appalling sensation. An unbearable weight was lying on my chest and another mouth was sucking the life out of me through my own. I shall never forget the terrible shock of it! Just imagine a man asleep and in the process of being murdered. He wakes with the knife in his throat. He can hear his own death-rattle, feel his own blood ooze out of him. He cannot breathe. He knows he is going to die but not why – that’s exactly what it felt like!

I was losing a dangerous amount of weight all the time and suddenly realized that my coachman, a big, solid sort of fellow, was doing the same thing. I said to him in the end, “Look, Jean, there’s definitely something wrong with you. What d’you think is the matter?” “To tell you the truth, monsieur,” he said, “I think I’ve caught whatever you’ve got. My nights seem to be eating into my days.” I began to think that there was something noxious permeating the house, something poisonous, maybe, emanating from the river.

I had decided to spend two or three months away, despite the fact that the hunting season was in full swing, when something strange happened. I might easily have missed it, so trivial did it at first seem but it led to a series of such unbelievable, fantastical events that I decided after all, to stay.

One night, being thirsty, I drank half a glass of water and noticed when I did so that the carafe on my bedside table had been full up as far as its glass stopper. During the night I had one of those terrible awakenings I just mentioned. Still shaking, I lit my candle and was about to take another drink of water when I noticed to my stupefaction that the carafe was now empty. I could not believe my eyes. Either someone had come into the room or I was acting unconsciously in my sleep.