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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/14323-0.txt b/14323-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..1901bd7 --- /dev/null +++ b/14323-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10239 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14323 *** + +LÀ-BAS + +(DOWN THERE) + +by +J.K. HUYSMANS + +Translated +by +KEENE WALLACE + + +[Transcriber's note: +Original published 1891, +English translation privately published 1928.] + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +"You believe pretty thoroughly in these things, or you wouldn't abandon +the eternal triangle and the other stock subjects of the modern +novelists to write the story of Gilles de Rais," and after a silence Des +Hermies added, "I do not object to the latrine; hospital; and workshop +vocabulary of naturalism. For one thing, the subject matter requires +some such diction. Again, Zola, in _L'Assommoir_, has shown that a +heavy-handed artist can slap words together hit-or-miss and give an +effect of tremendous power. I do not really care how the naturalists +maltreat language, but I do strenuously object to the earthiness of +their ideas. They have made our literature the incarnation of +materialism--and they glorify the democracy of art! + +"Say what you will, their theory is pitiful, and their tight little +method squeezes all the life out of them. Filth and the flesh are their +all in all. They deny wonder and reject the extra-sensual. I don't +believe they would know what you meant if you told them that artistic +curiosity begins at the very point where the senses leave off. + +"You shrug your shoulders, but tell me, how much has naturalism done to +clear up life's really troublesome mysteries? When an ulcer of the +soul--or indeed the most benign little pimple--is to be probed, +naturalism can do nothing. 'Appetite and instinct' seem to be its sole +motivation and rut and brainstorm its chronic states. The field of +naturalism is the region below the umbilicus. Oh, it's a hernia clinic +and it offers the soul a truss! + +"I tell you, Durtal, it's superficial quackery, and that isn't all. +This fetid naturalism eulogizes the atrocities of modern life and +flatters our positively American ways. It ecstasizes over brute force +and apotheosizes the cash register. With amazing humility it defers to +the nauseating taste of the mob. It repudiates style, it rejects every +ideal, every aspiration towards the supernatural and the beyond. It is +so perfectly representative of bourgeois thought that it might be sired +by Homais and dammed by Lisa, the butcher girl in _Ventre de Paris_." + +"Heavens, how you go after it!" said Durtal, somewhat piqued. He lighted +his cigarette and went on, "I am as much revolted by materialism as you +are, but that is no reason for denying the unforgettable services which +naturalism has rendered. + +"It has demolished the inhuman puppets of romanticism and rescued our +literature from the clutches of booby idealists and sex-starved old +maids. It has created visible and tangible human beings--after +Balzac--and put them in accord with their surroundings. It has carried +on the work, which romanticism began, of developing the language. Some +of the naturalists have had the veritable gift of laughter, a very few +have had the gift of tears, and, in spite of what you say, they have not +all been carried away by an obsession for baseness." + +"Yes, they have. They are in love with the age, and that shows them up +for what they are." + +"Do you mean to tell me Flaubert and the De Goncourts were in love with +the age?" + +"Of course not. But those men were artists, honest, seditious, and +aloof, and I put them in a class by themselves. I will also grant that +Zola is a master of backgrounds and masses and that his tricky handling +of people is unequalled. Then, too, thank God, he has never followed +out, in his novels, the theories enunciated in his magazine articles, +adulating the intrusion of positivism upon art. But in the works of his +best pupil, Rosny, the only talented novelist who is really imbued with +the ideas of the master, naturalism has become a sickening jargon of +chemist's slang serving to display a layman's erudition, which is about +as profound as the scientific knowledge of a shop foreman. No, there is +no getting around it. Everything this whole poverty-stricken school has +produced shows that our literature has fallen upon evil days. The +grovellers! They don't rise above the moral level of the tumblebug. Read +the latest book. What do you find? Simple anecdotes: murder, suicide, +and accident histories copied right out of the newspaper, tiresome +sketches and wormy tales, all written in a colorless style and +containing not the faintest hint of an outlook on life nor an +appreciation of human nature. When I have waded through one of these +books its insipid descriptions and interminable harangues go instantly +out of my mind, and the only impression that remains is one of surprise +that a man can write three or four hundred pages when he has absolutely +nothing to reveal to us--nothing to say!" + +"If it's all the same to you, Des Hermies, let's speak of something +else. We shall never agree on the subject of naturalism, as the very +mention of it makes you see red. What about this Mattei system of +medicine? Your globules and electric phials at least relieve a few +sufferers?" + +"Hmph. A little better than the panaceas of the Codex, though I can't +say the effects are either lasting or sure. But, it serves, like +anything else. And now I must run along. The clock is striking ten and +your concierge is coming to put out the hall light. See you again very +soon, I hope. Good night." + +When the door closed Durtal put some more coke in the grate and resumed +a comfortless train of thought aggravated by this too pertinent +discussion with his friend. For some months Durtal had been trying to +reassemble the fragments of a shattered literary theory which had once +seemed inexpugnable, and Des Hermies's opinions troubled him, in spite +of their exaggerated vehemence. + +Certainly if naturalism confined one to monotonous studies of mediocre +persons and to interminable inventories of the objects in a drawing-room +or a landscape, an honest and clear-sighted artist would soon cease to +produce, and a less conscientious workman would be under the necessity +of repeating himself over and over again to the point of nausea. +Nevertheless Durtal could see no possibilities for the novelist outside +of naturalism. Were we to go back to the pyrotechnics of romanticism, +rewrite the lanuginous works of the Cherbuliez and Feuillet tribe, or, +worse yet, imitate the lachrymose storiettes of Theuriet and George +Sand? Then what was to be done? And Durtal, with desperate +determination, set to work sorting out a tangle of confused theories and +inchoate postulations. He made no headway. He felt but could not define. +He was afraid to. Definition of his present tendencies would plump him +back into his old dilemma. + +"We must," he thought, "retain the documentary veracity, the precision +of detail, the compact and sinewy language of realism, but we must also +dig down into the soul and cease trying to explain mystery in terms of +our sick senses. If possible the novel ought to be compounded of two +elements, that of the soul and that of the body, and these ought to be +inextricably bound together as in life. Their interreactions, their +conflicts, their reconciliation, ought to furnish the dramatic interest. +In a word, we must follow the road laid out once and for all by Zola, +but at the same time we must trace a parallel route in the air by which +we may go above and beyond.... A spiritual naturalism! It must be +complete, powerful, daring in a different way from anything that is +being attempted at present. Perhaps as approaching my concept I may cite +Dostoyevsky. Yet that _exorable_ Russian is less an elevated realist +than an evangelic socialist. In France right now the purely corporal +recipe has brought upon itself such discredit that two clans have +arisen: the liberal, which prunes naturalism of all its boldness of +subject matter and diction in order to fit it for the drawing-room, and +the decadent, which gets completely off the ground and raves +incoherently in a telegraphic patois intended to represent the language +of the soul--intended rather to divert the reader's attention from the +author's utter lack of ideas. As for the right wing verists, I can only +laugh at the frantic puerilities of these would-be psychologists, who +have never explored an unknown district of the mind nor ever studied an +unhackneyed passion. They simply repeat the saccharine Feuillet and the +saline Stendhal. Their novels are dissertations in school-teacher style. +They don't seem to realize that there is more spiritual revelation in +that one reply of old Hulot, in Balzac's _Cousine Bette_, 'Can't I take +the little girl along?' than in all their doctoral theses. We must +expect of them no idealistic straining toward the infinite. For me, +then, the real psychologist of this century is not their Stendhal but +that astonishing Ernest Hello, whose unrelenting unsuccess is simply +miraculous!" + +He began to think that Des Hermies was right. In the present +disorganized state of letters there was but one tendency which seemed to +promise better things. The unsatisfied need for the supernatural was +driving people, in default of something loftier, to spiritism and the +occult. + +Now his thoughts carried him away from his dissatisfaction with +literature to the satisfaction he had found in another art, in painting. +His ideal was completely realized by the Primitives. These men, in +Italy, Germany, and especially in Flanders, had manifested the amplitude +and purity of vision which are the property of saintliness. In authentic +and patiently accurate settings they pictured beings whose postures were +caught from life itself, and the illusion was compelling and sure. From +these heads, common enough, many of them, and these physiognomies, often +ugly but powerfully evocative, emanated celestial joy or acute anguish, +spiritual calm or turmoil. The effect was of matter transformed, by +being distended or compressed, to afford an escape from the senses into +remote infinity. + +Durtal's introduction to this naturalism had come as a revelation the +year before, although he had not then been so weary as now of _fin de +siècle_ silliness. In Germany, before a Crucifixion by Matthæus +Grünewald, he had found what he was seeking. + +He shuddered in his armchair and closed his eyes as if in pain. With +extraordinary lucidity he revisualized the picture, and the cry of +admiration wrung from him when he had entered the little room of the +Cassel museum was reechoing in his mind as here, in his study, the +Christ rose before him, formidable, on a rude cross of barky wood, the +arm an untrimmed branch bending like a bow under the weight of the body. + +This branch seemed about to spring back and mercifully hurl afar from +our cruel, sinful world the suffering flesh held to earth by the +enormous spike piercing the feet. Dislocated, almost ripped out of their +sockets, the arms of the Christ seemed trammelled by the knotty cords of +the straining muscles. The laboured tendons of the armpits seemed ready +to snap. The fingers, wide apart, were contorted in an arrested gesture +in which were supplication and reproach but also benediction. The +trembling thighs were greasy with sweat. The ribs were like staves, or +like the bars of a cage, the flesh swollen, blue, mottled with +flea-bites, specked as with pin-pricks by spines broken off from the +rods of the scourging and now festering beneath the skin where they had +penetrated. + +Purulence was at hand. The fluvial wound in the side dripped thickly, +inundating the thigh with blood that was like congealing mulberry juice. +Milky pus, which yet was somewhat reddish, something like the colour of +grey Moselle, oozed from the chest and ran down over the abdomen and the +loin cloth. The knees had been forced together and the rotulæ touched, +but the lower legs were held wide apart, though the feet were placed one +on top of the other. These, beginning to putrefy, were turning green +beneath a river of blood. Spongy and blistered, they were horrible, the +flesh tumefied, swollen over the head of the spike, and the gripping +toes, with the horny blue nails, contradicted the imploring gesture of +the hands, turning that benediction into a curse; and as the hands +pointed heavenward, so the feet seemed to cling to earth, to that ochre +ground, ferruginous like the purple soil of Thuringia. + +Above this eruptive cadaver, the head, tumultuous, enormous, encircled +by a disordered crown of thorns, hung down lifeless. One lacklustre eye +half opened as a shudder of terror or of sorrow traversed the expiring +figure. The face was furrowed, the brow seamed, the cheeks blanched; all +the drooping features wept, while the mouth, unnerved, its under jaw +racked by tetanic contractions, laughed atrociously. + +The torture had been terrific, and the agony had frightened the mocking +executioners into flight. + +Against a dark blue night-sky the cross seemed to bow down, almost to +touch the ground with its tip, while two figures, one on each side, kept +watch over the Christ. One was the Virgin, wearing a hood the colour of +mucous blood over a robe of wan blue. Her face was pale and swollen with +weeping, and she stood rigid, as one who buries his fingernails deep +into his palms and sobs. The other figure was that of Saint John, like a +gipsy or sunburnt Swabian peasant, very tall, his beard matted and +tangled, his robe of a scarlet stuff cut in wide strips like slabs of +bark. His mantle was a chamois yellow; the lining, caught up at the +sleeves, showed a feverish yellow as of unripe lemons. Spent with +weeping, but possessed of more endurance than Mary, who was yet erect +but broken and exhausted, he had joined his hands and in an access of +outraged loyalty had drawn himself up before the corpse, which he +contemplated with his red and smoky eyes while he choked back the cry +which threatened to rend his quivering throat. + +Ah, this coarse, tear-compelling Calvary was at the opposite pole from +those debonair Golgothas adopted by the Church ever since the +Renaissance. This lockjaw Christ was not the Christ of the rich, the +Adonis of Galilee, the exquisite dandy, the handsome youth with the +curly brown tresses, divided beard, and insipid doll-like features, whom +the faithful have adored for four centuries. This was the Christ of +Justin, Basil, Cyril, Tertullian, the Christ of the apostolic church, +the vulgar Christ, ugly with the assumption of the whole burden of our +sins and clothed, through humility, in the most abject of forms. + +It was the Christ of the poor, the Christ incarnate in the image of the +most miserable of us He came to save; the Christ of the afflicted, of +the beggar, of all those on whose indigence and helplessness the greed +of their brother battens; the human Christ, frail of flesh, abandoned by +the Father until such time as no further torture was possible; the +Christ with no recourse but His Mother, to Whom--then powerless to aid +Him--He had, like every man in torment, cried out with an infant's cry. + +In an unsparing humility, doubtless, He had willed to suffer the Passion +with all the suffering permitted to the human senses, and, obeying an +incomprehensible ordination, He, in the time of the scourging and of the +blows and of the insults spat in His face, had put off divinity, nor had +He resumed it when, after these preliminary mockeries, He entered upon +the unspeakable torment of the unceasing agony. Thus, dying like a +thief, like a dog, basely, vilely, physically, He had sunk himself to +the deepest depth of fallen humanity and had not spared Himself the last +ignominy of putrefaction. + +Never before had naturalism transfigured itself by such a conception and +execution. Never before had a painter so charnally envisaged divinity +nor so brutally dipped his brush into the wounds and running sores and +bleeding nail holes of the Saviour. Grünewald had passed all measure. He +was the most uncompromising of realists, but his morgue Redeemer, his +sewer Deity, let the observer know that realism could be truly +transcendent. A divine light played about that ulcerated head, a +superhuman expression illuminated the fermenting skin of the epileptic +features. This crucified corpse was a very God, and, without aureole, +without nimbus, with none of the stock accoutrements except the +blood-sprinkled crown of thorns, Jesus appeared in His celestial +super-essence, between the stunned, grief-torn Virgin and a Saint John +whose calcined eyes were beyond the shedding of tears. + +These faces, by nature vulgar, were resplendent, transfigured with the +expression of the sublime grief of those souls whose plaint is not +heard. Thief, pauper, and peasant had vanished and given place to +supraterrestial creatures in the presence of their God. + +Grünewald was the most uncompromising of idealists. Never had artist +known such magnificent exaltation, none had ever so resolutely bounded +from the summit of spiritual altitude to the rapt orb of heaven. He had +gone to the two extremes. From the rankest weeds of the pit he had +extracted the finest essence of charity, the mordant liquor of tears. In +this canvas was revealed the masterpiece of an art obeying the +unopposable urge to render the tangible and the invisible, to make +manifest the crying impurity of the flesh and to make sublime the +infinite distress of the soul. + +It was without its equivalent in literature. A few pages of Anne +Emmerich upon the Passion, though comparatively attenuated, approached +this ideal of supernatural realism and of veridic and exsurrected life. +Perhaps, too, certain effusions of Ruysbroeck, seeming to spurt forth in +twin jets of black and white flame, were worthy of comparison with the +divine befoulment of Grünewald. Hardly, either. Grünewald's masterpiece +remained unique. It was at the same time infinite and of earth earthy. + +"But," said Durtal to himself, rousing out of his revery, "if I am +consistent I shall have to come around to the Catholicism of the Middle +Ages, to _mystic_ naturalism. Ah, no! I will not--and yet, perhaps I +may!" + +Here he was in the old dilemma. How often before now had he halted on +the threshold of Catholicism, sounding himself thoroughly and finding +always that he had no faith. Decidedly there had been no effort on the +part of God to reclaim him, and he himself had never possessed the kind +of will that permits one to let oneself go, trustingly, without reserve, +into the sheltering shadows of immutable dogma. + +Momentarily at times when, after reading certain books, his disgust for +everyday life was accentuated, he longed for lenitive hours in a +cloister, where the monotonous chant of prayers in an incense-laden +atmosphere would bring on a somnolence, a dreamy rapture of mystical +ideas. But only a simple soul, on which life's wear and tear had left no +mark, was capable of savouring the delights of such a self-abandon, and +his own soul was battered and torn with earthly conflict. He must admit +that the momentary desire to believe, to take refuge in the timeless, +proceeded from a multitude of ignoble motives: from lassitude with the +petty and repeated annoyances of existence, quarrels with the laundress, +with the waiter, with the landlord; the sordid scramble for money; in a +word, from the general spiritual failure of a man approaching forty. He +thought of escaping into a monastery somewhat as street girls think of +going into a house where they will be free from the dangers of the +chase, from worry about food and lodging, and where they will not have +to do their own washing and ironing. + +Unmarried, without settled income, the voice of carnality now +practically stilled in him, he sometimes cursed the existence he had +shaped for himself. At times, weary of attempting to coerce words to do +his bidding, he threw down his pen and looked into the future. He could +see nothing ahead of him but bitterness and cause for alarm, and, +seeking consolation, he was forced to admit that only religion could +heal, but religion demanded in return so arrant a desertion of common +sense, so pusillanimous a willingness to be astonished at nothing, that +he threw up his hands and begged off. + +Yet he was always playing with the thought, indeed he could not escape +it. For though religion was without foundation it was also without limit +and promised a complete escape from earth into dizzy, unexplored +altitudes. Then, too, Durtal was attracted to the Church by its intimate +and ecstatic art, the splendour of its legends, and the radiant naïveté +of the histories of its saints. + +He did not believe, and yet he admitted the supernatural. Right here on +earth how could any of us deny that we are hemmed in by mystery, in our +homes, in the street,--everywhere when we came to think of it? It was +really the part of shallowness to ignore those extrahuman relations and +account for the unforeseen by attributing to fate the more than +inexplicable. Did not a chance encounter often decide the entire life of +a man? What was love, what the other incomprehensible shaping +influences? And, knottiest enigma of all, what was money? + +There one found oneself confronted by primordial organic law, atrocious +edicts promulgated at the very beginning of the world and applied ever +since. + +The rules were precise and invariable. Money attracted money, +accumulating always in the same places, going by preference to the +scoundrelly and the mediocre. When, by an inscrutable exception, it +heaped up in the coffers of a rich man who was not a miser nor a +murderer, it stood idle, incapable of resolving itself into a force for +good, however charitable the hands which fain would administer it. One +would say it was angry at having got into the wrong box and avenged +itself by going into voluntary paralysis when possessed by one who was +neither a sharper nor an ass. + +It acted still more strangely when by some extraordinary chance it +strayed into the home of a poor man. Immediately it defiled the clean, +debauched the chaste, and, acting simultaneously on the body and the +soul, it insinuated into its possessor a base selfishness, an ignoble +pride; it suggested that he spend for himself alone; it made the humble +man a boor, the generous man a skinflint. In one second it changed every +habit, revolutionized every idea, metamorphosed the most deeply rooted +passions. + +It was the instigator and vigilant accomplice of all the important sins. +If it permitted one of its detainers to forget himself and bestow a boon +it awakened hatred in the recipient, it replaced avarice with +ingratitude and re-established equilibrium so that the account might +balance and not one sin of commission be wanting. + +But it reached its real height of monstrosity when, concealing its +identity under an assumed name, it entitled itself capital. Then its +action was not limited to individual incitation to theft and murder but +extended to the entire human race. With one word capital decided +monopolies, erected banks, cornered necessities, and, if it wished, +caused thousands of human beings to starve to death. + +And it grew and begot itself while slumbering in a safe, and the Two +Worlds adored it on bended knee, dying of desire before it as before a +God. + +Well! money was the devil, otherwise its mastery of souls was +inexplicable. And how many other mysteries, equally unintelligible, how +many other phenomena were there to make a reflective man shudder! + +"But," thought Durtal, "seeing that there are so many more things +betwixt heaven and earth than are dreamed of in anybody's philosophy, +why not believe in the Trinity? Why reject the divinity of Christ? It is +no strain on one to admit the _Credo quia absurdum_ of Saint Augustine +and Tertullian and say that if the supernatural were comprehensible it +would not be supernatural, and that precisely because it passes the +faculties of man it is divine. + +"And--oh, to hell with it! What's it all about, anyway?" + +And again, as so often when he had found himself before this +unbridgeable gulf between reason and belief, he recoiled from the leap. + +Well, his thoughts had strayed far from the subject of that naturalism +so reviled by Des Hermies. He returned to Grünewald and said to himself +that the great Crucifixion was the masterpiece of an art driven out of +bounds. One need not go far in search of the extra-terrestrial as to +fall into perfervid Catholicism. Perhaps spiritualism would give one all +one required to formulate a supernaturalistic method. + +He rose and went into his tiny workroom. His pile of manuscript notes +about the Marshal de Rais, surnamed Bluebeard, looked at him derisively +from the table where they were piled. + +"All the same," he said, "it's good to be here, in out of the world and +above the limits of time. To live in another age, never read a +newspaper, not even know that the theatres exist--ah, what a dream! To +dwell with Bluebeard and forget the grocer on the corner and all the +other petty little criminals of an age perfectly typified by the café +waiter who ravishes the boss's daughter--the goose who lays the golden +egg, as he calls her--so that she will have to marry him!" + +Bed was a good place, he added, smiling, for he saw his cat, a creature +with a perfect time sense, regarding him uneasily as if to remind him of +their common convenience and to reproach him for not having prepared the +couch. Durtal arranged the pillows and pulled back the coverlet, and the +cat jumped to the foot of the bed but remained humped up, tail coiled +beneath him, waiting till his master was stretched out at length before +burrowing a little hollow to curl up in. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +Nearly two years ago Durtal had ceased to associate with men of letters. +They were represented in books and in the book-chat columns of magazines +as forming an aristocracy which had a monopoly on intelligence. Their +conversation, if one believed what one read, sparkled with effervescent +and stimulating wit. Durtal had difficulty accounting to himself for the +persistence of this illusion. His sad experience led him to believe that +every literary man belonged to one of two classes, the thoroughly +commercial or the utterly impossible. + +The first consisted of writers spoiled by the public, and drained dry in +consequence, but "successful." Ravenous for notice they aped the ways of +the world of big business, delighted in gala dinners, gave formal +evening parties, spoke of copyrights, sales, and long run plays, and +made great display of wealth. + +The second consisted of café loafers, "bohemians." Rolling on the +benches, gorged with beer they feigned an exaggerated modesty and at the +same time cried their wares, aired their genius, and abused their +betters. + +There was now no place where one could meet a few artists and privately, +intimately, discuss ideas at ease. One was at the mercy of the café +crowd or the drawing-room company. One's interlocutor was listening +avidly to steal one's ideas, and behind one's back one was being +vituperated. And the women were always intruding. + +In this indiscriminate world there was no illuminating criticism, +nothing but small talk, elegant or inelegant. + +Then Durtal learned, also by experience, that one cannot associate with +thieves without becoming either a thief or a dupe, and finally he broke +off relations with his confrères. + +He not only had no sympathy but no common topic of conversation with +them. Formerly when he accepted naturalism--airtight and unsatisfactory +as it was--he had been able to argue esthetics with them, but now! + +"The point is," Des Hermies was always telling him, "that there is a +basic difference between you and the other realists, and no patched-up +alliance could possibly be of long duration. You execrate the age and +they worship it. There is the whole matter. You were fated some day to +get away from this Americanized art and attempt to create something less +vulgar, less miserably commonplace, and infuse a little spirituality +into it. + +"In all your books you have fallen on our _fin de siècle_--our _queue du +siècle_--tooth and nail. But, Lord! a man soon gets tired of whacking +something that doesn't fight back but merely goes its own way repeating +its offences. You needed to escape into another epoch and get your +bearings while waiting for a congenial subject to present itself. That +explains your spiritual disarray of the last few months and your +immediate recovery as soon as you stumbled onto Giles de Rais." + +Des Hermies had diagnosed him accurately. The day on which Durtal had +plunged into the frightful and delightful latter mediæval age had been +the dawn of a new existence. The flouting of his actual surroundings +brought peace to Durtal's soul, and he had completely reorganized his +life, mentally cloistering himself, far from the furore of contemporary +letters, in the château de Tiffauges with the monster Bluebeard, with +whom he lived in perfect accord, even in mischievous amity. + +Thus history had for Durtal supplanted the novel, whose forced banality, +conventionality, and tidy structure of plot simply griped him. Yet +history, too, was only a peg for a man of talent to hang style and +ideas on, for events could not fail to be coloured by the temperament +and distorted by the bias of the historian. + +As for the documents and sources! Well attested as they might be, they +were all subject to revision, even to contradiction by others exhumed +later which were no less authentic than the first and which also but +waited their turn to be refuted by newer discoveries. + +In the present rage for grubbing around in dusty archives writing of +history served as an outlet for the pedantry of the moles who reworked +their mouldy findings and were duly rewarded by the Institute with +medals and diplomas. + +For Durtal history was, then, the most pretentious as it was the most +infantile of deceptions. Old Clio ought to be represented with a +sphinx's head, mutton-chop whiskers, and one of those padded bonnets +which babies wore to keep them from bashing their little brains out when +they took a tumble. + +Of course exactitude was impossible. Why should he dream of getting at +the whole truth about the Middle Ages when nobody had been able to give +a full account of the Revolution, of the Commune for that matter? The +best he could do was to imagine himself in the midst of creatures of +that other epoch, wearing their antique garb, thinking their thoughts, +and then, having saturated himself with their spirit, to convey his +illusion by means of adroitly selected details. + +That is practically what Michelet did, and though the garrulous old +gossip drivelled endlessly about matters of supreme unimportance and +ecstasized in his mild way over trivial anecdotes which he expanded +beyond all proportion, and though his sentimentality and chauvinism +sometimes discredited his quite plausible conjectures, he was +nevertheless the only French historian who had overcome the limitation +of time and made another age live anew before our eyes. + +Hysterical, garrulous, manneristic as he was, there was yet a truly epic +sweep in certain passages of his History of France. The personages were +raised from the oblivion into which the dry-as-dust professors had sunk +them, and became live human beings. What matter, then, if Michelet was +the least trustworthy of historians since he was the most personal and +the most evocative? + +As for the others, they simply ferreted around among the old state +papers, clipped them, and, following M. Taine's example, arranged, +ticketed, and mounted their sensational gleanings in logical sequence, +rejecting, of course, everything that did not advance the case they were +trying to make. They denied themselves imagination and enthusiasm and +claimed that they did not invent. True enough, but they did none the +less distort history by the selection they employed. And how simply and +summarily they disposed of things! It was discovered that such and such +an event occurred in France in several communities, and straightway it +was decided that the whole country lived, acted, and thought in a +certain manner at a certain hour, on a certain day, in a certain year. + +No less than Michelet they were doughty falsifiers, but they lacked his +vision. They dealt in knickknacks, and their trivialities were as far +from creating a unified impression as were the pointillistic puzzles of +modern painters and the word hashes cooked up by the decadent poets. + +And worst of all, thought Durtal, the biographers. The depilators! +taking all the hair off a real man's chest. They wrote ponderous tomes +to prove that Jan Steen was a teetotaler. Somebody had deloused Villon +and shown that the Grosse Margot of the ballade was not a woman but an +inn sign. Pretty soon they would be representing the poet as a +priggishly honest and judicious man. One would say that in writing their +monographs these historians feared to dishonour themselves by treating +of artists who had tasted somewhat fully and passionately of life. Hence +the expurgation of masterpieces that an artist might appear as +commonplace a bourgeois as his commentator. + +This rehabilitation school, today all-powerful, exasperated Durtal. In +writing his study of Gilles de Rais he was not going to fall into the +error of these bigoted sustainers of middle-class morality. With his +ideas of history he could not claim to give an exact likeness of +Bluebeard, but he was not going to concede to the public taste for +mediocrity in well- and evil-doing by whitewashing the man. + +Durtal's material for this study consisted of: a copy of the memorial +addressed by the heirs of Gilles de Rais to the king, notes taken from +the several true copies at Paris of the proceedings in the criminal +trial at Nantes, extracts from Vallet de Viriville's history of Charles +VII, finally the _Notice_ by Armand Guéraut and the biography of the +abbé Bossard. These sufficed to bring before Durtal's eyes the +formidable figure of that Satanic fifteenth century character who was +the most artistically, exquisitely cruel, and the most scoundrelly of +men. + +No one knew of the projected study but Des Hermies, whom Durtal saw +nearly every day. + +They had met in the strangest of homes, that of Chantelouve, the +Catholic historian, who boasted of receiving all classes of people. And +every week in the social season that drawing-room in the rue de Bagneux +was the scene of a heterogeneous gathering of under sacristans, café +poets, journalists, actresses, partisans of the cause of Naundorff,[1] +and dabblers in equivocal sciences. + +[Footnote 1: A watchmaker who at the time of the July monarchy attempted +to pass himself off for Louis XVII.] + +This salon was on the edge of the clerical world, and many religious +came here at the risk of their reputations. The dinners were +discriminately, if unconventionally, ordered. Chantelouve, rotund, +jovial, bade everyone make himself at home. Now and then through his +smoked spectacles there stole an ambiguous look which might have given +an analyst pause, but the man's bonhomie, quite ecclesiastical, was +instantly disarming. Madame was no beauty, but possessed a certain +bizarre charm and was always surrounded. She, however, remained silent +and did nothing to encourage her voluble admirers. As void of prudery as +her husband, she listened impassively, absently, with her thoughts +evidently afar, to the boldest of conversational imprudences. + +At one of these evening parties, while La Rousseil, recently converted, +howled a hymn, Durtal, sitting in a corner having a quiet smoke, had +been struck by the physiognomy and bearing of Des Hermies, who stood out +sharply from the motley throng of defrocked priests and grubby poets +packed into Chantelouve's library and drawing-room. + +Among these smirking and carefully composed faces, Des Hermies, +evidently a man of forceful individuality, seemed, and probably felt, +singularly out of place. He was tall, slender, somewhat pale. His eyes, +narrowed in a frown, had the cold blue gleam of sapphires. The nose was +short and sharp, the cheeks smooth shaven. With his flaxen hair and +Vandyke he might have been a Norwegian or an Englishman in not very good +health. His garments were of London make, and the long, tight, +wasp-waisted coat, buttoned clear up to the neck, seemed to enclose him +like a box. Very careful of his person, he had a manner all his own of +drawing off his gloves, rolling them up with an almost inaudible +crackling, then seating himself, crossing his long, thin legs, and +leaning over to the right, reaching into the patch pocket on his left +side and bringing forth the embossed Japanese pouch which contained his +tobacco and cigarette papers. + +He was methodic, guarded, and very cold in the presence of strangers. +His superior and somewhat bored attitude, not exactly relieved by his +curt, dry laugh, awakened, at a first meeting, a serious antipathy which +he sometimes justified by venomous words, by meaningless silences, by +unspoken innuendoes. He was respected and feared at Chantelouve's, but +when one came to know him one found, beneath his defensive shell, great +warmth of heart and a capacity for true friendship of the kind that is +not expansive but is capable of sacrifice and can always be relied upon. + +How did he live? Was he rich or just comfortable? No one knew, and he, +tight lipped, never spoke of his affairs. He was doctor of the Faculty +of Paris--Durtal had chanced to see his diploma--but he spoke of +medicine with great disdain. He said he had become convinced of the +futility of all he had been taught, and had thrown it over for +homeopathy, which in turn he had thrown over for a Bolognese system, and +this last he was now excoriating. + +There were times when Durtal could not doubt that his friend was an +author, for Des Hermies spoke understandingly of tricks of the trade +which one learns only after long experience, and his literary judgment +was not that of a layman. When, one day, Durtal reproached him for +concealing his productions, he replied with a certain melancholy, "No, I +caught myself in time to choke down a base instinct, the desire of +resaying what has been said. I could have plagiarized Flaubert as well +as, if not better than, the poll parrots who are doing it, but I decided +not to. I would rather phrase abstruse medicaments of rare application; +perhaps it is not very necessary, but at least it isn't cheap." + +What surprised Durtal was his friend's prodigious erudition. Des Hermies +had the run of the most out-of-the-way book shops, he was an authority +on antique customs and, at the same time, on the latest scientific +discoveries. He hobnobbed with all the freaks in Paris, and from them he +became deeply learned in the most diverse and hostile sciences. He, so +cold and correct, was almost never to be found save in the company of +astrologers, cabbalists, demonologists, alchemists, theologians, or +inventors. + +Weary of the advances and the facile intimacies of artists, Durtal had +been attracted by this man's fastidious reserve. It was perfectly +natural that Durtal, surfeited with skin-deep friendships, should feel +drawn to Des Hermies, but it was difficult to imagine why Des Hermies, +with his taste for strange associations, should take a liking to +Durtal, who was the soberest, steadiest, most normal of men. Perhaps Des +Hermies felt the need of talking with a sane human being now and then as +a relief. And, too, the literary discussions which he loved were out of +the question with these addlepates who monologued indefatigably on the +subject of their monomania and their ego. + +At odds, like Durtal, with his confrères, Des Hermies could expect +nothing from the physicians, whom he avoided, nor from the specialists +with whom he consorted. + +As a matter of fact there had been a juncture of two beings whose +situation was almost identical. At first restrained and on the +defensive, they had come finally to _tu-toi_ each other and establish a +relation which had been a great advantage to Durtal. His family were +dead, the friends of his youth married and scattered, and since his +withdrawal from the world of letters he had been reduced to complete +solitude. Des Hermies kept him from going stale and then, finding that +Durtal had not lost all interest in mankind, promised to introduce him +to a really lovable old character. Of this man Des Hermies spoke much, +and one day he said, "You really ought to know him. He likes the books +of yours which I have lent him, and he wants to meet you. You think I am +interested only in obscure and twisted natures. Well, you will find +Carhaix really unique. He is the one Catholic with intelligence and +without sanctimoniousness; the one poor man with envy and hatred for +none." + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +Durtal was in a situation familiar to all bachelors who have the +concierge do their cleaning. Only these know how a tiny lamp can fairly +drink up oil, and how the contents of a bottle of cognac can become +paler and weaker without ever diminishing. They know, too, how a once +comfortable bed can become forbidding, and how scrupulously a concierge +can respect its least fold or crease. They learn to be resigned and to +wash out a glass when they are thirsty and make their own fire when they +are cold. + +Durtal's concierge was an old man with drooping moustache and a powerful +breath of "three-six." Indolent and placid, he opposed an unbudgeable +inertia to Durtal's frantic and profanely expressed demand that the +sweeping be done at the same hour every morning. + +Threats, prayers, insults, the withholding of gratuities, were without +effect. Père Rateau took off his cap, scratched his head, promised, in +the tone of a man much moved, to mend his ways, and next day came later +than ever. + +"What a nuisance!" thought Durtal today, as he heard a key turning in +the lock, then he looked at his watch and observed that once again the +concierge was arriving after three o'clock in the afternoon. + +There was nothing for it but to submit with a sigh to the ensuing +hullabaloo. Rateau, somnolent and pacific in his lodge, became a demon +when he got a broom in his hand. In this sedentary being, who could +drowse all morning in the stale basement atmosphere heavy with the +cumulative aroma of many meat-stews, a martial ardour, a warlike +ferocity, then asserted themselves, and like a red revolutionary he +assaulted the bed, charged the chairs, manhandled the picture frames, +knocked the tables over, rattled the water pitcher, and whirled Durtal's +brogues about by the laces as when a pillaging conqueror hauls a +ravished victim along by the hair. So he stormed the apartment like a +barricade and triumphantly brandished his battle standard, the dust rag, +over the reeking carnage of the furniture. + +Durtal at such times sought refuge in the room which was not being +attacked. Today Rateau launched his offensive against the workroom, so +Durtal fled to the bedroom. From there, through the half open door, he +could see the enemy, with a feather duster like a Mohican war bonnet +over his head, doing a scalp dance around a table. + +"If I only knew at what time that pest would break in on me so I could +always arrange to be out!" groaned Durtal. Now he ground his teeth, as +Rateau, with a yell, grabbed up the mop and, skating around on one leg, +belaboured the floor lustily. + +The perspiring conqueror then appeared in the doorway and advanced to +reduce the chamber where Durtal was. The latter had to return to the +subjugated workroom, and the cat, shocked by the racket, arched its back +and, rubbing against its master's legs, followed him to a place of +safety. + +In the thick of the conflict Des Hermies rang the door bell. + +"I'll put on my shoes," cried Durtal, "and we'll get out of this. +Look--" he passed his hand over the table and brought back a coat of +grime that made him appear to be wearing a grey glove--"look. That brute +turns the house upside down and knocks everything to pieces, and here's +the result. He leaves more dust when he goes than he found when he came +in!" + +"Bah," said Des Hermies, "dust isn't a bad thing. Besides having the +taste of ancient biscuit and the smell of an old book, it is the +floating velvet which softens hard surfaces, the fine dry wash which +takes the garishness out of crude colour schemes. It is the caparison of +abandon, the veil of oblivion. Who, then, can despise it--aside from +certain persons whose lamentable lot must often have wrung a tear from +you? + +"Imagine living in one of these Paris _passages_. Think of a consumptive +spitting blood and suffocating in a room one flight up, behind the +'ass-back' gables of, say the passage des Panoramas, for instance. When +the window is open the dust comes in impregnated with snuff and +saturated with clammy exudations. The invalid, choking, begs for air, +and in order that he may breathe the window is _closed_. + +"Well, the dust that you complain of is rather milder than that. Anyway +I don't hear you coughing.... But if you're ready we'll be on our way." + +"Where shall we go?" asked Durtal. + +Des Hermies did not answer. They left the rue du Regard, in which Durtal +lived, and went down the rue du Cherche-Midi as far as the Croix-Rouge. + +"Let's go on to the place Saint-Sulpice," said Des Hermies, and after a +silence he continued, "Speaking of dust, 'out of which we came and to +which we shall return,' do you know that after we are dead our corpses +are devoured by different kinds of worms according as we are fat or +thin? In fat corpses one species of maggot is found, the rhizophagus, +while thin corpses are patronized only by the phora. The latter is +evidently the aristocrat, the fastidious gourmet which turns up its nose +at a heavy meal of copious breasts and juicy fat bellies. Just think, +there is no perfect equality, even in the manner in which we feed the +worms. + +"But this is where we stop." + +They had come to where the rue Férou opens into the place Saint-Sulpice. +Durtal looked up and on an unenclosed porch in the flank of the church +of Saint-Sulpice he read the placard, "Tower open to visitors." + +"Let's go up," said Des Hermies. + +"What for! In this weather?" and Durtal pointed at the yellow sky over +which black clouds, like factory smoke, were racing, so low that the tin +chimneys seemed to penetrate them and crenelate them with little spots +of clarity. "I am not enthusiastic about trying to climb a flight of +broken, irregular stairs. And anyway, what do you think you can see up +there? It's misty and getting dark. No, have a heart." + +"What difference is it to you where you take your airing? Come on. I +assure you you will see something unusual." + +"Oh! you brought me here on purpose?" + +"Yes." + +"Why didn't you say so?" + +He followed Des Hermies into the darkness under the porch. At the back +of the cellarway a little essence lamp, hanging from a nail, lighted a +door, the tower entrance. + +For a long time, in utter darkness, they climbed a winding stair. Durtal +was wondering where the keeper had gone, when, turning a corner, he saw +a shaft of light, then he stumbled against the rickety supports of a +"double-current" lamp in front of a door. Des Hermies pulled a bell cord +and the door swung back. + +Above them on a landing they could see feet, whether of a man or of a +woman they could not tell. + +"Ah! it's you, M. des Hermies," and a woman bent over, describing an +arc, so that her head was in a stream of light. "Louis will be very glad +to see you." + +"Is he in?" asked Des Hermies, reaching up and shaking hands with the +woman. + +"He is in the tower. Won't you stop and rest a minute?" + +"Why, when we come down, if you don't mind." + +"Then go up until you see a grated door--but what an old fool I am! You +know the way as well as I do." + +"To be sure, to be sure.... But, in passing, permit me to introduce my +friend Durtal." + +Durtal, somewhat flustered, made a bow in the darkness. + +"Ah, monsieur, how fortunate. Louis is so anxious to meet you." + +"Where is he taking me?" Durtal wondered as again he groped along behind +his friend, now and then, just as he felt completely lost, coming to the +narrow strip of light admitted by a barbican, and again proceeding in +inky darkness. The climb seemed endless. Finally they came to the barred +door, opened it, and found themselves on a frame balcony with the abyss +above and below. Des Hermies, who seemed perfectly at home, pointed +downward, then upward. They were halfway up a tower the face of which +was overlaid with enormous criss-crossing joists and beams riveted +together with bolt heads as big as a man's fist. Durtal could see no +one. He turned and, clinging to the hand rail, groped along the wall +toward the daylight which stole down between the inclined leaves of the +sounding-shutters. + +Leaning out over the precipice, he discerned beneath him a formidable +array of bells hanging from oak supports lined with iron. The sombre +bell metal was slick as if oiled and absorbed light without refracting +it. Bending backward, he looked into the upper abyss and perceived new +batteries of bells overhead. These bore the raised effigy of a bishop, +and a place in each, worn by the striking of the clapper, shone golden. + +All were in quiescence, but the wind rattled against the +sounding-shutters, stormed through the cage of timbers, howled along the +spiral stair, and was caught and held whining in the bell vases. +Suddenly a light breeze, like the stirring of confined air, fanned his +cheek. He looked up. The current had been set in motion by the swaying +of a great bell beginning to get under way. There was a crash of sound, +the bell gathered momentum, and now the clapper, like a gigantic pestle, +was grinding the great bronze mortar with a deafening clamour. The tower +trembled, the balcony on which Durtal was standing trepidated like the +floor of a railway coach, there was the continuous rolling of a mighty +reverberation, interrupted regularly by the jar of metal upon metal. + +In vain Durtal scanned the upper abyss. Finally he managed to catch +sight of a leg, swinging out into space and back again, in one of those +wooden stirrups, two of which, he had noticed, were fastened to the +bottom of every bell. Leaning out so that he was almost prone on one of +the timbers, he finally perceived the ringer, clinging with his hands to +two iron handles and balancing over the gulf with his eyes turned +heavenward. + +Durtal was shocked by the face. Never had he seen such disconcerting +pallor. It was not the waxen hue of the convalescent, not the lifeless +grey of the perfume- or snuff-maker, it was a prison pallor of a +bloodless lividness unknown today, the ghastly complexion of a wretch of +the Middle Ages shut up till death in a damp, airless, pitch-dark +_in-pace_. + +The eyes were blue, prominent, even bulging, and had the mystic's +readiness to tears, but their expression was singularly contradicted by +the truculent Kaiser Wilhelm moustache. The man seemed at once a dreamer +and a fighter, and it would have been difficult to tell which character +predominated. + +He gave the bell stirrup a last yank with his foot and with a heave of +his loins regained his equilibrium. He mopped his brow and smiled down +at Des Hermies. + +"Well! well!" he said, "you here." + +He descended, and when he learned Durtal's name his face brightened and +the two shook hands cordially. + +"We have been expecting you a long time, monsieur. Our friend here +speaks of you at great length, and we have been asking him why he didn't +bring you around to see us. But come," he said eagerly, "I must conduct +you on a tour of inspection about my little domain. I have read your +books and I know a man like you can't help falling in love with my +bells. But we must go higher if we are really to see them." + +And he bounded up a staircase, while Des Hermies pushed Durtal along in +front of him in a way that made retreat impossible. + +As he was once more groping along the winding stairs, Durtal asked, "Why +didn't you tell me your friend Carhaix--for of course that's who he +is--was a bell-ringer?" + +Des Hermies did not have time to answer, for at that moment, having +reached the door of the room beneath the tower roof, Carhaix was +standing aside to let them pass. They were in a rotunda pierced in the +centre by a great circular hole which had around it a corroded iron +balustrade orange with rust. By standing close to the railing, which was +like the well curb of the Pit, one could see down, down, to the +foundation. The "well" seemed to be undergoing repairs, and from the top +to the bottom of the tube the beams supporting the bells were +crisscrossed with timbers bracing the walls. + +"Don't be afraid to lean over," said Carhaix. "Now tell me, monsieur, +how do you like my foster children?" + +But Durtal was hardly heeding. He felt uneasy, here in space, and as if +drawn toward the gaping chasm, whence ascended, from time to time, the +desultory clanging of the bell, which was still swaying and would be +some time in returning to immobility. + +He recoiled. + +"Wouldn't you like to pay a visit to the top of the tower?" asked +Carhaix, pointing to an iron stair sealed into the wall. + +"No, another day." + +They descended and Carhaix, in silence, opened a door. They advanced +into an immense storeroom, containing colossal broken statues of saints, +scaly and dilapidated apostles, Saint Matthew legless and armless, Saint +Luke escorted by a fragmentary ox, Saint Mark lacking a shoulder and +part of his beard, Saint Peter holding up an arm from which the hand +holding the keys was broken off. + +"There used to be a swing in here," said Carhaix, "for the little girls +of the neighbourhood. But the privilege was abused, as privileges always +are. In the dusk all kinds of things were done for a few sous. The +curate finally had the swing taken down and the room closed up." + +"And what is that over there?" inquired Durtal, perceiving, in a +corner, an enormous fragment of rounded metal, like half a gigantic +skull-cap. On it the dust lay thick, and in the hollow the meshes on +meshes of fine silken web, dotted with the black bodies of lurking +spiders, were like a fisherman's hand net weighted with little slugs of +lead. + +"That? Ah, monsieur!" and there was fire in Carhaix's mild eyes, "that +is the skull of an old, old bell whose like is not cast these days. The +ring of that bell, monsieur, was like a voice from heaven." And suddenly +he exploded, "Bells have had their day!--As I suppose Des Hermies has +told you.--Bell ringing is a lost art. And why wouldn't it be? Look at +the men who are doing it nowadays. Charcoal burners, roofers, masons out +of a job, discharged firemen, ready to try their hand at anything for a +franc. There are curates who think nothing of saying, 'Need a man? Go +out in the street and pick up a soldier for ten sous. He'll do.' That's +why you read about accidents like the one that happened lately at Notre +Dame, I think. The fellow didn't withdraw in time and the bell came down +like the blade of a guillotine and whacked his leg right off. + +"People will spend thirty thousand francs on an altar baldachin, and +ruin themselves for music, and they have to have gas in their churches, +and Lord knows what all besides, but when you mention bells they shrug +their shoulders. Do you know, M. Durtal, there are only two men in Paris +who can ring chords? Myself and Père Michel, and he is not married and +his morals are so bad that he can't be regularly attached to a church. +He can ring music the like of which you never heard, but he, too, is +losing interest. He drinks, and, drunk or sober, goes to work, then he +bowls up again and goes to sleep. + +"Yes, the bell has had its day. Why, this very morning, Monsignor made +his pastoral visit to this church. At eight o'clock we sounded his +arrival. The six bells you see down here boomed out melodiously. But +there were sixteen up above, and it was a shame. Those extras jangled +away haphazard. It was a riot of discord." + +Carhaix ruminated in silence as they descended. Then, "Ah, monsieur," he +said, his watery eyes fairly bubbling, "the ring of bells, there's your +real sacred music." + +They were now above the main door of the building and they came out into +the great covered gallery on which the towers rest. Carhaix smiled and +pointed out a complete peal of miniature bells, installed between two +pillars on a plank. He pulled the cords, and, in ecstasies, his eyes +protruding, his moustache bristling, he listened to the frail tinkling +of his toy. + +And suddenly he relinquished the cords. + +"I once had a crazy idea," he said, "of forming a class here and +teaching all the intricacies of the craft, but no one cared to learn a +trade which was steadily going out of existence. Why, you know we don't +even sound for weddings any more, and nobody comes to look at the tower. + +"But I really can't complain. I hate the streets. When I try to cross +one I lose my head. So I stay in the tower all day, except once in the +early morning when I go to the other side of the square for a bucket of +water. Now my wife doesn't like it up here. You see, the snow does come +in through all the loopholes and it heaps up, and sometimes we are +snowbound with the wind blowing a gale." + +They had come to Carhaix's lodge. His wife was waiting for them on the +threshold. + +"Come in, gentlemen," she said. "You have certainly earned some +refreshment," and she pointed to four glasses which she had set out on +the table. + +The bell-ringer lighted a little briar pipe, while Des Hermies and +Durtal each rolled a cigarette. + +"Pretty comfortable place," remarked Durtal, just to be saying +something. It was a vast room, vaulted, with walls of rough stone, and +lighted by a semi-circular window just under the ceiling. The tiled +floor was badly covered by an infamous carpet, and the furniture, very +simple, consisted of a round dining-room table, some old _bergère_ +armchairs covered with slate-blue Utrecht velours, a little stained +walnut sideboard on which were several plates and pitchers of Breton +faience, and opposite the sideboard a little black bookcase, which might +contain fifty books. + +"Of course a literary man would be interested in the books," said +Carhaix, who had been watching Durtal. "You mustn't be too critical, +monsieur. I have only the tools of my trade." + +Durtal went over and took a look. The collection consisted largely of +works on bells. He read some of the titles: + +On the cover of a slim parchment volume he deciphered the faded legend, +hand-written, in rust-coloured ink, "_De tintinnabulis_ by Jerome +Magius, 1664"; then, pell-mell, there were: _A curious and edifying +miscellany concerning church bells_ by Dom Rémi Carré; another _Edifying +miscellany_, anonymous; a _Treatise of bells_ by Jean-Baptiste Thiers, +curate of Champrond and Vibraye; a ponderous tome by an architect named +Blavignac; a smaller work entitled _Essay on the symbolism of bells_ by +a parish priest of Poitiers; a _Notice_ by the abbé Baraud; then a whole +series of brochures, with covers of grey paper, bearing no titles. + +"It's no collection at all," said Carhaix with a sigh. "The best ones +are wanting, the _De campanis commentarius_ of Angelo Rocca and the _De +tintinnabulo_ of Percichellius, but they are so hard to find, and so +expensive when you do find them." + +A glance sufficed for the rest of the books, most of them being pious +works, Latin and French Bibles, an _Imitation of Christ_, Görres' +_Mystik_ in five volumes, the abbé Aubert's _History and theory of +religious symbolism_, Pluquet's _Dictionary of heresies_, and several +lives of saints. + +"Ah, monsieur, my own books are not much account, but Des Hermies lends +me what he knows will interest me." + +"Don't talk so much!" said his wife. "Give monsieur a chance to sit +down," and she handed Durtal a brimming glass aromatic with the +acidulous perfume of genuine cider. + +In response to his compliments she told him that the cider came from +Brittany and was made by relatives of hers at Landévennec, her and +Carhaix's native village. + +She was delighted when Durtal affirmed that long ago he had spent a day +in Landévennec. + +"Why, then we know each other already!" she said, shaking hands with him +again. + +The room was heated to suffocation by a stove whose pipe zigzagged over +to the window and out through a sheet-iron square nailed to the sash in +place of one of the panes. Carhaix and his good wife, with her honest, +weak face and frank, kind eyes, were the most restful of people. Durtal, +made drowsy by the warmth and the quiet domesticity, let his thoughts +wander. He said to himself, "If I had a place like this, above the roofs +of Paris, I would fix it up and make of it a real haven of refuge. Here, +in the clouds, alone and aloof, I would work away on my book and take my +time about it, years perhaps. What inconceivable happiness it would be +to escape from the age, and, while the waves of human folly were +breaking against the foot of the tower, to sit up here, out of it all, +and pore over antique tomes by the shaded light of the lamp." + +He smiled at the naïveté of his daydream. + +"I certainly do like your place," he said aloud, as if to sum up his +reflections. + +"Oh, you wouldn't if you had to live here," said the good wife. "We have +plenty of room, too much room, because there are a couple of bedchambers +as big as this, besides plenty of closet space, but it's so +inconvenient--and so cold! And no kitchen--" and she pointed to a +landing where, blocking the stairway, the cook stove had had to be +installed. "And there are so many, many steps to go up when you come +back from market. I am getting old, and I have a twinge of the +rheumatics whenever I think about making the climb." + +"You can't even drive a nail into this rock wall and have a peg to hang +things on," said Carhaix. "But I like this place. I was made for it. Now +my wife dreams constantly of spending her last days in Landévennec." + +Des Hermies rose. All shook hands, and monsieur and madame made Durtal +swear that he would come again. + +"What refreshing people!" exclaimed Durtal as he and Des Hermies crossed +the square. + +"And Carhaix is a mine of information." + +"But tell me, what the devil is an educated man, of no ordinary +intelligence, doing, working as a--as a day labourer?" + +"If Carhaix could hear you! But, my friend, in the Middle Ages +bell-ringers were high officials. True, the craft has declined +considerably in modern times. I couldn't tell you myself how Carhaix +became hipped on the subject of bells. All I know is that he studied at +a seminary in Brittany, that he had scruples of conscience and +considered himself unworthy to enter the priesthood, that he came to +Paris and apprenticed himself to a very intellectual master bell-ringer, +Père Gilbert, who had in his cell at Notre Dame some ancient and of +course unique plans of Paris that would make your mouth water. Gilbert +wasn't a 'labourer,' either. He was an enthusiastic collector of +documents relating to old Paris. From Notre Dame Carhaix came to Saint +Sulpice, fifteen years ago, and has been there ever since." + +"How did you happen to make his acquaintance?" + +"First he was my patient, then my friend. I've known him ten years." + +"Funny. He doesn't look like a seminary product. Most of them have the +shuffling gait and sheepish air of an old gardener." + +"Carhaix will be all right for a few more years," said Des Hermies, as +if to himself, "and then let us mercifully wish him a speedy death. The +Church, which has begun by sanctioning the introduction of gas into the +chapels, will end by installing mechanical chimes instead of bells. That +will be charming. The machinery will be run by electricity and we shall +have real up-to-date, timbreless, Protestant peals." + +"Then Carhaix's wife will have a chance to go back to Finistère." + +"No, they are too poor, and then too Carhaix would be broken-hearted if +he lost his bells. Curious, a man's affection for the object that he +manipulates. The mechanic's love for his machine. The thing that one +tends, and that obeys one, becomes personalized, and one ends by falling +in love with it. And the bell is an instrument in a class of its own. It +is baptized like a Christian, anointed with sacramental oil, and +according to the pontifical rubric it is also to be sanctified, in the +interior of its chalice, by a bishop, in seven cruciform unctions with +the oil of the infirm that it may send to the dying the message which +shall sustain them in their last agonies. + +"It is the herald of the Church, the voice from without as the priest is +the voice from within. So you see it isn't a mere piece of bronze, a +reversed mortar to be swung at a rope's end. Add that bells, like fine +wines, ripen with age, that their tone becomes more ample and mellow, +that they lose their sharp bouquet, their raw flavour. That will +explain--imperfectly--how one can become attached to them." + +"Why, you seem to be an enthusiast yourself." + +"Oh, I don't know anything about it. I am simply repeating what I have +heard Carhaix say. If the subject interests you, he will be only too +glad to teach you the symbolism of bells. He is inexhaustible. The man +is a monomaniac." + +"I can understand," said Durtal dreamily. "I live in a quarter where +there are a good many convents and at dawn the air is a-tingle with the +vibrance of the chimes. When I was ill I used to lie awake at night +awaiting the sound of the matin bells and welcoming them as a +deliverance. In the grey light I felt that I was being cuddled by a +distant and secret caress, that a lullaby was crooned over me, and a +cool hand applied to my burning forehead. I had the assurance that the +folk who were awake were praying for the others, and consequently for +me. I felt less lonely. I really believe the bells are sounded for the +special benefit of the sick who cannot sleep." + +"The bells ring for others, notably for the trouble-makers. The rather +common inscription for the side of a bell, '_Paco cruentos_,' 'I pacify +the bloody-minded,' is singularly apt, when you think it over." + +This conversation was still haunting Durtal when he went to bed. +Carhaix's phrase, "The ring of the bells is the real sacred music," took +hold of him like an obsession. And drifting back through the centuries +he saw in dream the slow processional of monks and the kneeling +congregations responding to the call of the angelus and drinking in the +balm of holy sound as if it were consecrated wine. + +All the details he had ever known of the liturgies of ages came crowding +into his mind. He could hear the sounding of matin invitatories; chimes +telling a rosary of harmony over tortuous labyrinths of narrow streets, +over cornet towers, over pepper-box pignons, over dentelated walls; the +chimes chanting the canonical hours, prime and tierce, sexte and none, +vespers and compline; celebrating the joy of a city with the tinkling +laughter of the little bells, tolling its sorrow with the ponderous +lamentation of the great ones. And there were master ringers in those +times, makers of chords, who could send into the air the expression of +the whole soul of a community. And the bells which they served as +submissive sons and faithful deacons were as humble and as truly of the +people as was the Church itself. As the priest at certain times put off +his chasuble, so the bell at times had put off its sacred character and +spoken to the baptized on fair day and market day, inviting them, in the +event of rain, to settle their affairs inside the nave of the church +and, that the sanctity of the place might not be violated by the +conflicts arising from sharp bargaining, imposing upon them a probity +unknown before or since. + +Today bells spoke an obsolete language, incomprehensible to man. Carhaix +was under no misapprehension. Living in an aërial tomb outside the human +scramble, he was faithful to his art, and in consequence no longer had +any reason for existing. He vegetated, superfluous and demoded, in a +society which insisted that for its amusement the holy place be turned +into a concert hall. He was like a creature reverted, a relic of a +bygone age, and he was supremely contemptuous of the miserable _fin de +siècle_ church showmen who to draw fashionable audiences did not fear to +offer the attraction of cavatinas and waltzes rendered on the cathedral +organ by manufacturers of profane music, by ballet mongers and comic +opera-wrights. + +"Poor Carhaix!" said Durtal, as he blew out the candle. "Another who +loves this epoch about as well as Des Hermies and I do. But he has the +tutelage of his bells, and certainly among his wards he has his +favourite. He is not to be pitied. He has his hobby, which renders life +possible for him, as hobbies do." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +"How is Gilles de Rais progressing?" + +"I have finished the first part of his life, making just the briefest +possible mention of his virtues and achievements." + +"Which are of no interest," remarked Des Hermies. + +"Evidently, since the name of Gilles de Rais would have perished four +centuries ago but for the enormities of vice which it symbolizes. I am +coming to the crimes now. The great difficulty, you see, is to explain +how this man, who was a brave captain and a good Christian, all of a +sudden became a sacrilegious sadist and a coward." + +"Metamorphosed over night, as it were." + +"Worse. As if at a touch of a fairy's wand or of a playwright's pen. +That is what mystifies his biographers. Of course untraceable influences +must have been at work a long time, and there must have been occasional +outcropping not mentioned in the chronicles. Here is a recapitulation of +our material. + +"Gilles de Rais was born about 1404 on the boundary between Brittany and +Anjou, in the château de Mâchecoul. We know nothing of his childhood. +His father died about the end of October, 1415, and his mother almost +immediately married a Sieur d'Estouville, abandoning her two sons, +Gilles and René. They became the wards of their grandfather, Jean de +Craon, 'a man old and ancient and of exceeding great age,' as the texts +say. He seems to have allowed his two charges to run wild, and then to +have got rid of Gilles by marrying him to Catherine de Thouars, November +30, 1420. + +"Gilles is known to have been at the court of the Dauphin five years +later. His contemporaries represent him as a robust, active man, of +striking beauty and rare elegance. We have no explicit statement as to +the rôle he played in this court, but one can easily imagine what sort +of treatment the richest baron in France received at the hands of an +impoverished king. + +"For at that moment Charles VII was in extremities. He was without +money, prestige, or real authority. Even the cities along the Loire +scarcely obeyed him. France, decimated a few years before, by the +plague, and further depopulated by massacres, was in a deplorable +situation. + +"England, rising from the sea like the fabled polyp the Kraken, had cast +her tentacles over Brittany, Normandy, l'Ile de France, part of Picardy, +the entire North, the Interior as far as Orléans, and crawling forward +left in her wake towns squeezed dry and country exhausted. + +"In vain Charles clamoured for subsidies, invented excuses for +exactions, and pressed the imposts. The paralyzed cities and fields +abandoned to the wolves could afford no succour. Remember his very claim +to the throne was disputed. He became like a blind man going the rounds +with a tin cup begging sous. His court at Chinon was a snarl of intrigue +complicated by an occasional murder. Weary of being hunted, more or less +out of harm's way behind the Loire, Charles and his partisans finally +consoled themselves by flaunting in the face of inevitable disaster the +devil-may-care debaucheries of the condemned making the most of the few +moments left them. Forays and loans furnished them with opulent cheer +and permitted them to carouse on a grand scale. The eternal _qui-vive_ +and the misfortunes of war were forgotten in the arms of courtesans. + +"What more could have been expected of a used-up sleepy-headed king, the +issue of an infamous mother and a mad father?" + +"Oh, whatever you say about Charles VII pales beside the testimony of +the portrait of him in the Louvre painted by Foucquet. That bestial +face, with the eyes of a small-town ursurer and the sly psalm-singing +mouth that butter wouldn't melt in, has often arrested me. Foucquet +depicts a debauched priest who has a bad cold and has been drinking sour +wine. Yet you can see that this monarch is of the very same type as the +more refined, less salacious, more prudently cruel, more obstinate and +cunning Louis XI, his son and successor. Well, Charles VII was the man +who had Jean Sans Peur assassinated, and who abandoned Jeanne d'Arc. +What more need be said?" + +"What indeed? Well, Gilles de Rais, who had raised an army at his own +expense, was certainly welcomed by this court with open arms. There is +no doubt that he footed the bills for tournaments and banquets, that he +was vigilantly 'tapped' by the courtiers, and that he lent the king +staggering sums. But in spite of his popularity he never seems to have +evaded responsibility and wallowed in debauchery, like the king. We find +Gilles shortly afterward defending Anjou and Maine against the English. +The chronicles say that he was 'a good and hardy captain,' but his +'goodness' and 'hardiness' did not prevent him from being borne back by +force of numbers. The English armies, uniting, inundated the country, +and, pushing on unchecked, invaded the interior. The king was ready to +flee to the Mediterranean provinces and let France go, when Jeanne d'Arc +appeared. + +"Gilles returned to court and was entrusted by Charles with the 'guard +and defence' of the Maid of Orleans. He followed her everywhere, fought +at her side, even under the walls of Paris, and was with her at Rheims +the day of the coronation, at which time, says Monstrelet, the king +rewarded his valour by naming him Marshal of France, at the age of +twenty-five." + +"Lord!" Des Hermies interrupted, "promotion came rapidly in those times. +But I suppose warriors then weren't the bemedalled, time-serving +incompetents they are now." + +"Oh, don't be misled. The title of Marshal of France didn't mean so +much in Gilles's time as it did afterward in the reign of Francis I, and +nothing like what it has come to mean since Napoleon. + +"What was the conduct of Gilles de Rais toward Jeanne d'Arc? We have no +certain knowledge. M. Vallet de Viriville, without proof, accuses him of +treachery. M. l'abbé Bossard, on the contrary, claims--and alleges +plausible reasons for entertaining the opinion--that he was loyal to her +and watched over her devotedly. + +"What is certain is that Gilles's soul became saturated with mystical +ideas. His whole history proves it. + +"He was constantly in association with this extraordinary maid whose +adventures seemed to attest the possibility of divine intervention in +earthly affairs. He witnessed the miracle of a peasant girl dominating a +court of ruffians and bandits and arousing a cowardly king who was on +the point of flight. He witnessed the incredible episode of a virgin +bringing back to the fold such black rams as La Hire, Xaintrailles, +Beaumanoir, Chabannes, Dunois, and Gaucourt, and washing their old +fleeces whiter than snow. Undoubtedly Gilles also, under her +shepherding, docilely cropped the white grass of the gospel, took +communion the morning of a battle, and revered Jeanne as a saint. + +"He saw the Maid fulfil all her promises. She raised the siege of +Orléans, had the king consecrated at Rheims, and then declared that her +mission was accomplished and asked as a boon that she be permitted to +return home. + +"Now I should say that as a result of such an association Gilles's +mysticism began to soar. Henceforth we have to deal with a man who is +half-freebooter, half-monk. Moreover--" + +"Pardon the interruption, but I am not so sure that Jeanne d'Arc's +intervention was a good thing for France." + +"Why not?" + +"I will explain. You know that the defenders of Charles were for the +most part Mediterranean cut-throats, ferocious pillagers, execrated by +the very people they came to protect. The Hundred Years' War, in effect, +was a war of the South against the North. England at that epoch had not +got over the Conquest and was Norman in blood, language, and tradition. +Suppose Jeanne d'Arc had stayed with her mother and stuck to her +knitting. Charles VII would have been dispossessed and the war would +have come to an end. The Plantagenets would have reigned over England +and France, which, in primeval times before the Channel existed, formed +one territory occupied by one race, as you know. Thus there would have +been a single united and powerful kingdom of the North, reaching as far +as the province of Languedoc and embracing peoples whose tastes, +instincts, and customs were alike. On the other hand, the coronation of +a Valois at Rheims created a heterogeneous and preposterous France, +separating homogeneous elements, uniting the most incompatible +nationalities, races the most hostile to each other, and identifying +us--inseparably, alas!--with those stained-skinned, varnished-eyed +munchers of chocolate and raveners of garlic, who are not Frenchmen at +all, but Spaniards and Italians. In a word, if it hadn't been for Jeanne +d'Arc, France would not now belong to that line of histrionic, forensic, +perfidious chatterboxes, the precious Latin race--Devil take it!" + +Durtal raised his eyebrows. + +"My, my," he said, laughing. "Your remarks prove to me that you are +interested in 'our own, our native land.' I should never have suspected +it of you." + +"Of course you wouldn't," said Des Hermies, relighting his cigarette. +"As has so often been said, 'My own, my native land is wherever I happen +to feel at home.' Now I don't feel at home except with the people of the +North. But I interrupted you. Let's get back to the subject. What were +you saying?" + +"I forget. Oh, yes. I was saying that the Maid had completed her task. +Now we are confronted by a question to which there is seemingly no +answer. What did Gilles do when she was captured, how did he feel about +her death? We cannot tell. We know that he was lurking in the vicinity +of Rouen at the time of the trial, but it is too much to conclude from +that, like certain of his biographies, that he was plotting her rescue. + +"At any rate, after losing track of him completely, we find that he has +shut himself in at his castle of Tiffauges. + +"He is no longer the rough soldier, the uncouth fighting-man. At the +time when the misdeeds are about to begin, the artist and man of letters +develop in Gilles and, taking complete possession of him, incite him, +under the impulsion of a perverted mysticism, to the most sophisticated +of cruelties, the most delicate of crimes. + +"For he was almost alone in his time, this baron de Rais. In an age when +his peers were simple brutes, he sought the delicate delirium of art, +dreamed of a literature soul-searching and profound; he even composed a +treatise on the art of evoking demons; he gloried in the music of the +Church, and would have nothing about his that was not rare and difficult +to obtain. + +"He was an erudite Latinist, a brilliant conversationalist, a sure and +generous friend. He possessed a library extraordinary for an epoch when +nothing was read but theology and lives of saints. We have the +description of several of his manuscripts; Suetonius, Valerius Maximus, +and an Ovid on parchment bound in red leather, with vermeil clasp and +key. + +"These books were his passion. He carried them with him when he +travelled. He had attached to his household a painter named Thomas who +illuminated them with ornate letters and miniatures, and Gilles himself +painted the enamels which a specialist--discovered after an assiduous +search--set in the gold-inwrought bindings. Gilles's taste in +furnishings was elevated and bizarre. He revelled in abbatial stuffs, +voluptuous silks, in the sombre gilding of old brocade. He liked +knowingly spiced foods, ardent wines heavy with aromatics; he dreamed of +unknown gems, weird stones, uncanny metals. He was the Des Esseintes of +the fifteenth century! + +"All this was very expensive, less so, perhaps, than the luxurious court +which made Tiffauges a place like none other. + +"He had a guard of two hundred men, knights, captains, squires, pages, +and all these people had personal attendants who were magnificently +equipped at Gilles's expense. The luxury of his chapel and collegium was +madly extravagant. There was in residence at Tiffauges a complete +metropolitan clergy, deans, vicars, treasurers, canons, clerks, deacons, +scholasters, and choir boys. There is an inventory extant of the +surplices, stoles, and amices, and the fur choir hats with crowns of +squirrel and linings of vair. There are countless sacerdotal ornaments. +We find vermilion altar cloths, curtains of emerald silk, a cope of +velvet, crimson and violet with orpheys of cloth of gold, another of +rose damask, satin dalmatics for the deacons, baldachins figured with +hawks and falcons of Cyprus gold. We find plate, hammered chalices and +ciboria crusted with uncut jewels. There are reliquaries, among them a +silver head of Saint Honoré. A mass of sparkling jewelleries which an +artist, installed in the château, cuts to order. + +"And anyone who came along was welcome. From all corners of France +caravans journeyed toward this château where the artist, the poet, the +scholar, found princely hospitality, cordial goodfellowship, gifts of +welcome and largesse at departure. + +"Already undermined by the demands which the war had made on it, his +fortune was giving way beneath these expenditures. Now he began to walk +the terrible ways of usury. He borrowed of the most unscrupulous +bourgeois, hypothecated his châteaux, alienated his lands. At times he +was reduced to asking advances on his religious ornaments, on his +jewels, on his books." + +"I am glad to see that the method of ruining oneself in the Middle Ages +did not differ sensibly from that of our days," said Des Hermies. +"However, our ancestors did not have Monte Carlo, the notaries, and the +Bourse." + +"And _did_ have sorcery and alchemy. A memorial addressed to the king by +the heirs of Gilles de Rais informs us that this immense fortune was +squandered in less than eight years. + +"Now it's the signories of Confolens, Chabanes, Châteaumorant, Lombert, +ceded to a captain for a ridiculous price; now it's the fief of Fontaine +Milon, of Angers, the fortress of Saint Etienne de Mer Morte acquired by +Guillaume Le Ferron for a song; again it's the châteaux of Blaison and +of Chemille forfeited to Guillaume de la Jumelière who never has to pay +a sou. But look, there's a long list of castellanies and forests, salt +mines and farm lands," said Durtal, spreading out a great sheet of paper +on which he had copied the account of the purchases and sales. + +"Frightened by his mad course, the family of the Marshal supplicated the +king to intervene, and Charles VII, 'sure,' as he said, 'of the +malgovernance of the Sire de Rais,' forbade him, in grand council, by +letters dated 'Amboise, 1436,' to sell or make over any fortress, any +château, any land. + +"This order simply hastened the ruin of the interdicted. The grand +skinflint, the master usurer of the time, Jean V, duke of Brittany, +refused to publish the edict in his states, but, underhandedly, notified +all those of his subjects who dealt with Gilles. No one now dared to buy +the Marshal's domains for fear of incurring the wrath of the king, so +Jean V remained the sole purchaser and fixed the prices. You may judge +how liberal his prices were. + +"That explains Gilles's hatred of his family who had solicited these +letters patent of the king, and why, as long as he lived, he had nothing +to do with his wife, nor with his daughter whom he consigned to a +dungeon at Pouzauges. + +"Now to return to the question which I put a while ago, how and with +what motives Gilles quitted the court. I think the facts which I have +outlined will partially explain. + +"It is evident that for quite a while, long before the Marshal retired +to his estates, Charles had been assailed by the complaints of Gilles's +wife and other relatives. Moreover, the courtiers must have execrated +the young man on account of his riches and luxuries; and the king, the +same king who abandoned Jeanne d'Arc when he considered that she could +no longer be useful to him, found an occasion to avenge himself on +Gilles for the favours Gilles had done him. When the king needed money +to finance his debaucheries or to raise troops he had not considered the +Marshal lavish. Now that the Marshal was ruined the king censured him +for his prodigality, held him at arm's length, and spared him no +reproach and no menace. + +"We may be sure Gilles had no reason to regret leaving this court, and +another thing is to be taken into consideration. He was doubtless sick +and tired of the nomadic existence of a soldier. He was doubtless +impatient to get back to a pacific atmosphere among books. Moreover, he +seems to have been completely dominated by the passion for alchemy, for +which he was ready to abandon all else. For it is worth noting that this +science, which threw him into demonomania when he hoped to stave off +inevitable ruin with it, he had loved for its own sake when he was rich. +It was in fact toward the year 1426, when his coffers bulged with gold, +that he attempted the 'great work' for the first time. + +"We shall find him, then, bent over his retorts in the château de +Tiffauges. That is the point to which I have brought my history, and now +I am about to begin on the series of crimes of magic and sadism." + +"But all this," said Des Hermies, "does not explain how, from a man of +piety, he was suddenly changed into a Satanist, from a placid scholar +into a violator of little children, a 'ripper' of boys and girls." + +"I have already told you that there are no documents to bind together +the two parts of this life so strangely divided, but in what I have been +narrating you can pick out some of the threads of the duality. To be +precise, this man, as I have just had you observe, was a true mystic. He +witnessed the most extraordinary events which history has ever shown. +Association with Jeanne d'Arc certainly stimulated his desires for the +divine. Now from lofty Mysticism to base Satanism there is but one step. +In the Beyond all things touch. He carried his zeal for prayer into the +territory of blasphemy. He was guided and controlled by that troop of +sacrilegious priests, transmuters of metals, and evokers of demons, by +whom he was surrounded at Tiffauges." + +"You think, then, that the Maid of Orleans was really responsible for +his career of evil?" + +"To a certain point. Consider. She roused an impetuous soul, ready for +anything, as well for orgies of saintliness as for ecstasies of crime. + +"There was no transition between the two phases of his being. The moment +Jeanne was dead he fell into the hands of sorcerers who were the most +learned of scoundrels and the most unscrupulous of scholars. These men +who frequented the château de Tiffauges were fervent Latinists, +marvellous conversationalists, possessors of forgotten arcana, guardians +of world-old secrets. Gilles was evidently more fitted to live with them +than with men like Dunois and La Hire. These magicians, whom all the +biographers agree to represent--wrongly, I think--as vulgar parasites +and base knaves, were, as I view them, the patricians of intellect of +the fifteenth century. Not having found places in the Church, where they +would certainly have accepted no position beneath that of cardinal or +pope, they could, in those troubled times of ignorance, but take refuge +in the patronage of a great lord like Gilles. And Gilles was, indeed, +the only one at that epoch who was intelligent enough and educated +enough to understand them. + +"To sum up: natural mysticism on one hand, and, on the other, daily +association with savants obsessed by Satanism. The sword of Damocles +hanging over his head, to be conjured away by the will of the Devil, +perhaps. An ardent, a mad curiosity concerning the forbidden sciences. +All this explains why, little by little, as the bonds uniting him to the +world of alchemists and sorcerers grow stronger, he throws himself into +the occult and is swept on by it into the most unthinkable crimes. + +"Then as to being a 'ripper' of children--and he didn't immediately +become one, no, Gilles did not violate and trucidate little boys until +after he became convinced of the vanity of alchemy--why, he does not +differ greatly from the other barons of his times. + +"He exceeds them in the magnitude of his debauches, in opulence of +murders, and that's all. It's a fact. Read Michelet. You will see that +the princes of this epoch were redoubtable butchers. There was a sire de +Giac who poisoned his wife, put her astride of his horse and rode at +breakneck speed for five leagues, until she died. There was another, +whose name I have forgotten, who collared his father, dragged him +barefoot through the snow, and calmly thrust him into a subterranean +prison and left him there until he died. And how many others! I have +tried, without success, to find whether in battles and forays the +Marshal committed any serious misdeeds. I have discovered nothing, +except that he had a pronounced taste for the gibbet; for he liked to +string up all the renegade French whom he surprised in the ranks of the +English or in the cities which were not very much devoted to the king. + +"We shall find his taste for this kind of torture manifesting itself +later on in the château de Tiffauges. + +"Now, in conclusion, add to all these factors a formidable pride, a +pride which incites him to say, during his trial, 'So potent was the +star under which I was born that I have done what no one in the world +has done nor ever can do.' + +"And assuredly, the Marquis de Sade is only a timid bourgeois, a +mediocre fantasist, beside him!" + +"Since it is difficult to be a saint," said Des Hermies, "there is +nothing for it but to be a Satanist. One of the two extremes. +'Execration of impotence, hatred of the mediocre,' that, perhaps, is one +of the more indulgent definitions of Diabolism." + +"Perhaps. One can take pride in going as far in crime as a saint in +virtue. And that expresses Gilles de Rais exactly." + +"All the same, it's a mean subject to handle." + +"It certainly is, but happily the documents are abundant. Satan was +terrible to the Middle Ages--" + +"And to the modern." + +"What do you mean?" + +"That Satanism has come down in a straight, unbroken line from that age +to this." + +"Oh, no; you don't believe that at this very hour the devil is being +evoked and the black mass celebrated?" + +"Yes." + +"You are sure?" + +"Perfectly." + +"You amaze me. But, man! do you know that to witness such things would +aid me signally in my work? No joking, you believe in a contemporary +Satanistic manifestation? You have proofs?" + +"Yes, and of them we shall speak later, for today I am very busy. +Tomorrow evening, when we dine with Carhaix. Don't forget. I'll come by +for you. Meanwhile think over the phrase which you applied a moment ago +to the magicians: 'If they had entered the Church they would not have +consented to be anything but cardinals and popes,' and then just think +what kind of a clergy we have nowadays. The explanation of Satanism is +there, in great part, anyway, for without sacrilegious priests there is +no mature Satanism." + +"But what do these priests want?" + +"Everything!" exclaimed Des Hermies. + +"Hmmm. Like Gilles de Rais, who asked the demon for 'knowledge, power, +riches,' all that humanity covets, to be deeded to him by a title signed +with his own blood." + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +"Come right in and get warm. Ah, messieurs, you must not do that any +more," said Mme. Carhaix, seeing Durtal draw from his pocket some +bottles wrapped in paper, while Des Hermies placed on the table some +little packages tied with twine. "You mustn't spend your money on us." + +"Oh, but you see we enjoy doing it, Mme. Carhaix. And your husband?" + +"He is in the tower. Since morning he has been going from one tantrum +into another." + +"My, the cold is terrible today," said Durtal, "and I should think it +would be no fun up there." + +"Oh, he isn't grumbling for himself but for his bells. Take off your +things." + +They took off their overcoats and came up close to the stove. + +"It isn't what you would call hot in here," said Mme. Carhaix, "but to +thaw this place you would have to keep a fire going night and day." + +"Why don't you get a portable stove?" + +"Oh, heavens! that would asphyxiate us." + +"It wouldn't be very comfortable at any rate," said Des Hermies, "for +there is no chimney. You might get some joints of pipe and run them out +of the window, the way you have fixed this tubing. But, speaking of that +kind of apparatus, Durtal, doesn't it seem to you that those hideous +galvanized iron contraptions perfectly typify our utilitarian epoch? + +"Just think, the engineer, offended by any object that hasn't a +sinister or ignoble form, reveals himself entire in this invention. He +tells us, 'You want heat. You shall have heat--and nothing else.' +Anything agreeable to the eye is out of the question. No more snapping, +crackling wood fire, no more gentle, pervasive warmth. The useful +without the fantastic. Ah, the beautiful jets of flame darting out from +a red cave of coals and spurting up over a roaring log." + +"But there are lots of stoves where you can see the fire," objected +madame. + +"Yes, and then it's worse yet. Fire behind a grated window of mica. +Flame in prison. Depressing! Ah, those fine fires of faggots and dry +vine stocks out in the country. They smell good and they cast a golden +glow over everything. Modern life has set that in order. The luxury of +the poorest of peasants is impossible in Paris except for people who +have copious incomes." + +The bell-ringer entered. Every hair of his bristling moustache was +beaded with a globule of snow. With his knitted bonnet, his sheepskin +coat, his fur mittens and goloshes, he resembled a Samoyed, fresh from +the pole. + +"I won't shake hands," he said, "for I am covered with grease and oil. +What weather! Just think, I've been scouring the bells ever since early +this morning. I'm worried about them." + +"Why?" + +"Why! You know very well that frost contracts the metal and sometimes +cracks or breaks it. Some of these bitterly cold winters we have lost a +good many, because bells suffer worse than we do in bad weather.--Wife, +is there any hot water in the other room, so I can wash up?" + +"Can't we help you set the table?" Des Hermies proposed. + +But the good woman refused. "No, no, sit down. Dinner is ready." + +"Mighty appetizing," said Durtal, inhaling the odour of a peppery +_pot-au-feu_, perfumed with a symphony of vegetables, of which the +keynote was celery. + +"Everybody sit down," said Carhaix, reappearing with a clean blouse on, +his face shining of soap and water. + +They sat down. The glowing stove purred. Durtal felt the sudden +relaxation of a chilly soul dipped into a warm bath: at Carhaix's one +was so far from Paris, so remote from the epoch.... + +The lodge was poor, but cosy, comfortable, cordial. The very table, set +country style, the polished glasses, the covered dish of sweet butter, +the cider pitcher, the somewhat battered lamp casting reflections of +tarnished silver on the great cloth, contributed to the atmosphere of +home. + +"Next time I come I must stop at the English store and buy a jar of that +reliable orange marmalade," said Durtal to himself, for by common +consent with Des Hermies he never dined with the bell-ringer without +furnishing a share of the provisions. Carhaix set out a _pot-au-feu_ and +a simple salad and poured his cider. Not to be an expense to him, Des +Hermies and Durtal brought wine, coffee, liquor, desserts, and managed +so that their contributions would pay for the soup and the beef which +would have lasted for several days if the Carhaixes had eaten alone. + +"This time I did it!" said Mme. Carhaix triumphantly, serving to each in +turn a mahogany-colour bouillon whose iridescent surface was looped with +rings of topaz. + +It was succulent and unctuous, robust and yet delicate, flavoured as it +was with the broth of a whole flock of boiled chickens. The diners were +silent now, their noses in their plates, their faces brightened by steam +from the savoury soup, two selected dishes, a salad, and a dessert. + +"Now is the time to repeat the chestnut dear to Flaubert, 'You can't +dine like this in a restaurant,'" said Durtal. + +"Let's not malign the restaurants," said Des Hermies. "They afford a +very special delight to the person who has the instinct of the +inspector. I had an opportunity to gratify this instinct just the other +night. I was returning from a call on a patient, and I dropped into one +of these establishments where for the sum of three francs you are +entitled to soup, two selected dishes, a salad, and a dessert. + +"The restaurant, where I go as often as once a month, has an unvarying +clientele, hostile highbrows, officers in mufti, members of Parliament, +bureaucrats. + +"While laboriously gnawing my way through a redoubtable sole with sauce +au gratin, I examined the habitués seated all around me and I found them +singularly altered since my last visit. They had become bony or bloated; +their eyes were either hollow, with violet rings around them, or puffy, +with crimson pouches beneath; the fat people had become yellow and the +thin ones were turning green. + +"More deadly than the forgotten venefices of the days of the Avignon +papacy, the terrible preparations served in this place were slowly +poisoning its customers. + +"It was interested, as you may believe. I made myself the subject of a +course of toxicological research, and, studying my food as it went down, +I identified the frightful ingredients masking the mixtures of tannin +and powdered carbon with which the fish was embalmed; and I penetrated +the disguise of the marinated meats, painted with sauces the colour of +sewage; and I diagnosed the wine as being coloured with fuscin, perfumed +with furfurol, and enforced with molasses and plaster. + +"I have promised myself to return every month to register the slow but +sure progress of these people toward the tomb." + +"Oh!" cried Mme. Carhaix. + +"And you will claim," said Durtal, "that you aren't Satanic?" + +"See, Carhaix, he's at it already. He won't even give us time to get our +breath, but must be dogging us about Satanism. It's true I promised him +I'd try and get you to tell us something about it tonight. Yes," +continued Des Hermies, in response to Carhaix's look of astonishment, +"yesterday, Durtal, who is engaged, as you know, in writing a history of +Gilles de Rais, declared that he possessed all the information there was +about Diabolism in the Middle Ages. I asked him if he had any material +on the Satanism of the present day. He asked me what I was talking +about, and wouldn't believe that these practices are being carried on +right now." + +"But they are," replied Carhaix, becoming grave. "It is only too true." + +"Before we go any further, there is one question I'd like to put to Des +Hermies," said Durtal. "Can you, honestly, without joking, without +letting that saturnine smile play around the corner of your mouth, tell +me, in perfectly good faith, whether you do or do not believe in +Catholicism?" + +"He!" exclaimed the bell-ringer. "Why, he's worse than an unbeliever, +he's a heresiarch." + +"The fast is, if I were certain of anything, I would be inclined toward +Manicheism," said Des Hermies. "It's one of the oldest and it is _the_ +simplest of religions, and it best explains the abominable mess +everything is in at the present time. + +"The Principle of Good and the Principle of Evil, the God of Light and +the God of Darkness, two rivals, are fighting for our souls. That's at +least clear. Right now it is evident that the Evil God has the upper +hand and is reigning over the world as master. Now--and on this point, +Carhaix, who is distressed by these theories, can't reprehend me--I am +for the under dog. That's a generous and perfectly proper idea." + +"But Manicheism is impossible!" cried the bell-ringer. "Two infinities +cannot exist together." + +"But nothing can exist if you get to reasoning. The moment you argue the +Catholic dogma everything goes to pieces. The proof that two infinities +can coexist is that this idea passes beyond reason and enters the +category of those things referred to in Ecclesiasticus: 'Inquire not +into things higher than thou, for many things have shown themselves to +be above the sense of men.' + +"Manicheism, you see, must have had some good in it, because it was +bathed in blood. At the end of the twelfth century thousands of +Albigenses were roasted for practising this doctrine. Of course, I +can't say that the Manicheans didn't abuse their cult, mostly made up of +devil worship, because we know very well they did. + +"On this point I am not with them," he went on slowly, after a silence. +He was waiting till Mme. Carhaix, who had got up to remove the plates, +should go out of the room to fetch the beef. + +"While we are alone," he said, seeing her disappear through the stairway +door, "I can tell you what they did. An excellent man named Psellus has +revealed to us, in a book entitled _De operatione Dæmonum_, the fact +that they tasted of the two excrements at the beginning of their +ceremonial, and that they mixed human semen with the host." + +"Horrible!" exclaimed Carhaix. + +"Oh, as they took both kinds of communion, they did better than that," +returned Des Hermies. "They cut children's throats and mixed the blood +with ashes, and this paste, dissolved in liquid, constituted the +Eucharistic wine." + +"You bring us right back to Satanism," said Durtal. + +"Why, yes, as you see, I haven't strayed off your subject." + +"I am sure Monsieur Des Hermies has been saying something awful," +murmured Mme. Carhaix as she came in, bearing a platter on which was a +piece of beef smothered in vegetables. + +"Oh, Madame," protested Des Hermies. + +They burst out laughing and Carhaix cut up the meat, while his wife +poured the cider and Durtal uncorked the bottle of anchovies. + +"I am afraid it's cooked too much," said the woman, who was a great deal +more interested in the beef than in other-world adventures, and she +added the famous maxim of housekeepers, "When the broth is good the beef +won't cut." + +The men protested that it wasn't stringy a bit, it was cooked just +right. + +"Have an anchovy and a little butter with your meat, Monsieur Durtal." + +"Wife, let's have some of the red cabbage that you preserved," said +Carhaix, whose pale face was lighted up while his great canine eyes were +becoming suspiciously moist. Visibly he was jubilant. He was at table +with friends, in his tower, safe from the cold. "But, empty your +glasses. You are not drinking," he said, holding up the cider pot. + +"Let's see, Des Hermies, you were claiming yesterday that Satanism has +pursued an uninterrupted course since the Middle Ages," said Durtal, +wishing to get back to the subject which haunted him. + +"Yes, and the documents are irrefutable. I'll put you into a position to +prove them whenever you wish. + +"At the end of the fifteenth century, that is to say at the time of +Gilles de Rais--to go no further back--Satanism had assumed the +proportions that you know. In the sixteenth it was worse yet. No need to +remind you, I think, of the demoniac pactions of Catherine de Medici and +of the Valois, of the trial of the monk Jean de Vaulx, of the +investigations of the Sprengers and the Lancres and those learned +inquisitors who had thousands of necromancers and sorcerers roasted +alive. All that is known, too well known. One case is not too well known +for me to cite here: that of the priest Benedictus who cohabited with +the she-devil Armellina and consecrated the hosts holding them upside +down. Here are the diabolical threads which bind that century to this. +In the seventeenth century, in which the sorcery trials continue, and in +which the 'possessed' of Loudun appear, the black religion nourishes, +but already it has been driven under cover. + +"I will cite you an example, one among many, if you like. + +"A certain abbé Guibourg made a specialty of these abominations. On a +table serving as tabernacle a woman lay down, naked or with her skirts +lifted up over her head, and with her arms outstretched. She held the +altar lights during the whole office. + +"Guibourg thus celebrated masses on the abdomen of Mme. de Montespan, of +Mme. d'Argenson, of Mme. de Saint-Pont. As a matter of fact these +masses were very frequent under the Grand Monarch. Numbers of women went +to them as in our times women flock to have their fortunes told with +cards. + +"The ritual of these ceremonies was sufficiently atrocious. Generally a +child was kidnapped and burnt in a furnace out in the country somewhere, +the ashes were saved and mixed with the blood of another child whose +throat had been cut, and of this mixture a paste was made resembling +that of the Manicheans of which I was speaking. Abbé Guibourg +officiated, consecrated the host, cut it into little pieces and mixed it +with this mixture of blood and ashes. That was the material of the +Sacrament." + +"What a horrible priest!" cried Mme. Carhaix, indignant. + +"Yes, he celebrated another kind of mass, too, that abbé did. It was +called--hang it--it's unpleasant to say--" + +"Say it, Monsieur des Hermies. When people have as great a hatred for +that sort of thing as we here, they need not blink any fact. It isn't +that kind of thing which is going to take me away from my prayers." + +"Nor me," added her husband. + +"Well, this sacrifice was called the Spermatic Mass." + +"Oh!" + +"Guibourg, wearing the alb, the stole, and the maniple, celebrated this +mass with the sole object of making pastes to conjure with. The archives +of the Bastille inform us that he acted thus at the request of a lady +named Des Oeillettes: + +"This woman, who was indisposed, gave some of her blood; the man who +accompanied her stood patiently beside the bed where the scene took +place, and Guibourg gathered up some of his semen into the chalice, then +added powdered blood and some flour, and after sacrilegious ceremonies +the Des Oeillettes woman departed bearing her paste." + +"My heavenly Saviour!" sighed the bell-ringer's wife, "what a lot of +filth." + +"But," said Durtal, "in the Middle Ages the mass was celebrated in a +different fashion. The altar then was the naked buttocks of a woman; in +the seventeenth century it was the abdomen, and now?" + +"Nowadays a woman is hardly ever used for an altar, but let us not +anticipate. In the eighteenth century we shall again find abbés--among +how many other monsters--who defile holy objects. One Canon Duer +occupied himself specially with black magic and the evocation of the +devil. He was finally executed as a sorcerer in the year of grace 1718. +There was another who believed in the Incarnation of the Holy Ghost as +the Paraclete, and who, in Lombary, which he stirred up to a feverish +pitch of excitement, ordained twelve apostles and twelve apostolines to +preach his gospel. This man, abbé Beccarelli, like all the other priests +of his ilk, abused both sexes, and he said mass without confessing +himself of his lecheries. As his cult grew he began to celebrate +travestied offices in which he distributed to his congregation +aphrodisiac pills presenting this peculiarity, that after having +swallowed them the men believed themselves changed into women and the +women into men. + +"The recipe for these hippomanes is lost," continued Des Hermies with +almost a sad smile. "To make a long story short, Beccarelli met with a +very miserable end. He was prosecuted for sacrilege and sentenced, in +1708, to row in the galleys for seven years." + +"These frightful stories seem to have taken away your appetite," said +Mme. Carhaix. "Come, Monsieur des Hermies, a little more salad?" + +"No, thanks. But now we've come to the cheese, I think it's time to open +the wine," and he uncapped one of the bottles which Durtal had brought. + +"It's a light Chinon wine, but not too weak. I discovered it in a little +shop down by the quay," said Durtal. + +"I see," he went on after a silence, "that the tradition of unspeakable +crimes has been maintained by worthy successors of Gilles de Rais. I see +that in all centuries there have been fallen priests who have dared +commit sins against the Holy Ghost. But at the present time it all seems +incredible. Surely nobody is cutting children's throats as in the days +of Bluebeard and of abbé Guibourg." + +"You mean that nobody is brought to justice for doing it. They don't +assassinate now, but they kill designated victims by methods unknown to +official science--ah, if the confessionals could speak!" cried the +bell-ringer. + +"But tell me, what class of people are these modern covenanters with the +Devil?" + +"Prelates, abbesses, mission superiors, confessors of communities; and +in Rome, the centre of present-day magic, they're the very highest +dignitaries," answered Des Hermies. "As for the laymen, they are +recruited from the wealthy class. That explains why these scandals are +hushed up if the police chance to discover them. + +"Then, let us assume that the sacrifices to the Devil are not preceded +by preliminary murders. Perhaps in some cases they aren't. The +worshippers probably content themselves with bleeding a foetus which had +been aborted as soon as it became matured to the point necessary. +Bloodletting is supererogatory anyway, and serves merely to whet the +appetite. The main business is to consecrate the host and put it to an +infamous use. The rest of the procedure varies. There is at present no +regular ritual for the black mass." + +"Well, then, is a priest absolutely essential to the celebration of +these offices?" + +"Certainly. Only a priest can operate the mystery of Transubstantiation. +I know there are certain occultists who claim to have been consecrated +by the Lord, as Saint Paul was, and who think they can consummate a +veritable sacrifice just like a real priest. Absurd! But even in default +of real masses with ordained celebrants, the people possessed by the +mania of sacrilege do none the less realize the sacred stupration of +which they dream. + +"Listen to this. In 1855 there existed at Paris an association composed +of women, for the most part. These women took communion several times a +day and retained the sacred wafer in their mouths to be spat out later +and trodden underfoot or soiled by disgusting contacts." + +"You are sure of it?" + +"Perfectly. These facts were revealed by a religious journal, _Les +annales de la sainteté_, and the archbishop of Paris could not deny +them. I add that in 1874 women were likewise enrolled at Paris to +practise this odious commerce. They were paid so much for every wafer +they brought in. That explains why they presented themselves at the +sacred table of different churches every day." + +"And that is not the half of it! Look," said Carhaix, in his turn, +rising and taking from his bookshelf a blue brochurette. "Here is a +review, _La voix de la septaine_, dated 1843. It informs us that for +twenty-five years, at Agen, a Satanistic association regularly +celebrated black masses, and committed murder, and polluted three +thousand three hundred and twenty hosts! And Monsignor the Bishop of +Agen, who was a good and ardent prelate, never dared deny the +monstrosities committed in his diocese!" + +"Yes, we can say it among ourselves," Des Hermies returned, "in the +nineteenth century the number of foul-minded abbés has been legion. +Unhappily, though the documents are certain, they are difficult to +verify, for no ecclesiastic boasts of such misdeeds. The celebrants of +Deicidal masses dissemble and declare themselves devoted to Christ. They +even affirm that they defend Him by exorcising the possessed. + +"That's a good one. The 'possessed' are made so or kept so by the +priests themselves, who are thus assured of subjects and accomplices, +especially in the convents. All kinds of murderous and sadistic follies +can be covered with the antique and pious mantle of exorcism." + +"Let us be just," said Carhaix. "The Satanist would not be complete if +he were not an abominable hypocrite." + +"Hypocrisy and pride are perhaps the most characteristic vices of the +perverse priest," suggested Durtal. + +"But in the long run," Des Hermies went on, "in spite of the most +adroit precautions, everything comes out. Up to now I have spoken only +of local Satanistic associations, but there are others, more extensive, +which ravage the old world and the new, for Diabolism is quite up to +date in one respect. It is highly centralized and very capably +administered. There are committees, subcommittees, a sort of curia, +which rules America and Europe, like the curia of a pope. + +"The biggest of these societies founded as long ago as 1855 is the +society of the Re-Theurgistes-Optimates. Beneath an apparent unity it is +divided into two camps, one aspiring to destroy the universe and reign +over the ruins, the other thinking simply of imposing upon the world a +demoniac cult of which it shall be high priest. + +"This society has its seat in America. It was formerly directed by one +Longfellow, an adventurer, born in Scotland, who entitled himself grand +priest of the New Evocative Magism. For a long time it has had branches +in France, Italy, Germany, Russia, Austria, even Turkey. + +"It is at the present moment moribund, or perhaps quite dead, but +another has just been created. The object of this one is to elect an +antipope who will be the exterminating Antichrist. And those are only +two of them. How many others are there, more or less important +numerically, more or less secret, which, by common accord, at ten +o'clock the morning of the Feast of the Holy Sacrament, celebrate black +masses at Paris, Rome, Bruges, Constantinople, Nantes, Lyons, and in +Scotland--where sorcerers swarm! + +"Then, outside of these universal associations and local assemblies, +isolated cases abound, on which little light can be shed, and that with +great difficulty. Some years ago there died, in a state of penitence, a +certain comte de Lautree, who presented several churches with statues +which he had bewitched so as to satanize the faithful. At Bruges a +priest of my acquaintance contaminates the holy ciboria and uses them to +prepare spells and conjurements. Finally one may, among all these, cite +a clear case of possession. It is the case of Cantianille, who in 1865 +turned not only the city of Auxerre, but the whole diocese of Sens, +upside down. + +"This Cantianille, placed in a convent of Mont-Saint-Sulpice, was +violated, when she was barely fifteen years old, by a priest who +dedicated her to the Devil. This priest himself had been corrupted, in +early childhood, by an ecclesiastic belonging to a sect of possessed +which was created the very day Louis XVI was guillotined. + +"What happened in this convent, where many nuns, evidently mad with +hysteria, were associated in erotic devilry and sacrilegious rages with +Cantianille, reads for all the world like the procedure in the trials of +wizards of long ago, the histories of Gaufrédy and Madeleine Palud, of +Urbain Grandier and Madeleine Bavent, or the Jesuit Girard and La +Cadière, histories, by the way, in which much might be said about +hystero-epilepsy on one hand and about Diabolism on the other. At any +rate, Cantianille, after being sent away from the convent, was exorcised +by a certain priest of the diocese, abbé Thorey, who seems to have been +contaminated by his patient. Soon at Auxerre there were such scandalous +scenes, such frenzied outbursts of Diabolism, that the bishop had to +intervene. Cantianille was driven out of the country, abbé Thorey was +disciplined, and the affair went to Rome. + +"The curious thing about it is that the bishop, terrified by what he had +seen, requested to be dismissed, and retired to Fontainebleau, where he +died, still in terror, two years later." + +"My friends," said Carhaix, consulting his watch, "it is a quarter to +eight. I must be going up into the tower to sound the angelus. Don't +wait for me. Have your coffee. I shall rejoin you in ten minutes." + +He put on his Greenland costume, lighted a lantern, and opened the door. +A stream of glacial air poured in. White molecules whirled in the +blackness. + +"The wind is driving the snow in through the loopholes along the stair," +said the woman. "I am always afraid that Louis will take cold in his +chest this kind of weather. Oh, well, Monsieur des Hermies, here is the +coffee. I appoint you to the task of serving it. At this hour of day my +poor old limbs won't hold me up any longer. I must go lie down." + +"The fact is," sighed Des Hermies, when they had wished her good night, +"the fact is that mama Carhaix is rapidly getting old. I have vainly +tried to brace her up with tonics. They do no good. She has worn herself +out. She has climbed too many stairs in her life, poor woman!" + +"All the same, it's very curious, what you have told me," said Durtal. +"To sum up, the most important thing about Satanism is the black mass." + +"That and the witchcraft and incubacy and succubacy which I will tell +you about; or rather, I will get another more expert than I in these +matters to tell you about them. Sacrilegious mass, spells, and +succubacy. There you have the real quintessence of Satanism." + +"And these hosts consecrated in blasphemous offices, what use is made of +them when they are not simply destroyed?" + +"But I already told you. They are used to consummate infamous acts. +Listen," and Des Hermies took from the bell-ringers bookshelf the fifth +volume of the _Mystik_ of Görres. "Here is the flower of them all: + + "'These priests, in their baseness, often go so far as to + celebrate the mass with great hosts which then they cut through + the middle and afterwards glue to a parchment, similarly cloven, + and use abominably to satisfy their passions.'" + +"Holy sodomy, in other words?" + +"Exactly." + +At this moment the bell, set in motion in the tower, boomed out. The +chamber in which Durtal and Des Hermies were sitting trembled and a +droning filled the air. It seemed that waves of sound came out of the +walls, unrolling in a spiral from the very rock, and that one was +transported, in a dream, into the inside of one of these shells which, +when held up to the ear, simulate the roar of rolling billows. Des +Hermies, accustomed to the mighty resonance of the bells at short range, +thought only of the coffee, which he had put on the stove to keep hot. + +Then the booming of the bell came more slowly. The humming departed from +the air. The window panes, the glass of the bookcase, the tumblers on +the table, ceased to rattle and gave off only a tenuous tinkling. + +A step was heard on the stair. Carhaix entered, covered with snow. + +"Cristi, boys, it blows!" He shook himself, threw his heavy outer +garments on a chair, and extinguished his lantern. "There were blinding +clouds of snow whirling in between the sounding-shutters. I can hardly +see. Dog's weather. The lady has gone to bed? Good. But you haven't +drunk your coffee?" he asked as he saw Durtal filling the glasses. + +Carhaix went up to the stove and poked the fire, then dried his eyes, +which the bitter cold had filled with tears, and drank a great draught +of coffee. + +"Now. That hits the spot. How far had you got with your lecture, Des +Hermies?" + +"I finished the rapid expose of Satanism, but I haven't yet spoken of +the genuine monster, the only real master that exists at the present +time, that defrocked abbé--" + +"Oh!" exclaimed Carhaix. "Take care. The mere name of that man brings +disaster." + +"Bah! Canon Docre--to utter his ineffable name--can do nothing to us. I +confess I cannot understand why he should inspire any terror. But never +mind. I should like for Durtal, before we hunt up the canon, to see your +friend Gévingey, who seems to be best and most intimately acquainted +with him. A conversation with Gévingey would considerably amplify my +contributions to the study of Satanism, especially as regards venefices +and succubacy. Let's see. Would you mind if we invited him here to +dine?" + +Carhaix scratched his head, then emptied the ashes of his pipe on his +thumbnail. + +"Well, you see, the fact is, we have had a slight disagreement." + +"What about?" + +"Oh, nothing very serious. I interrupted his experiments here one day. +But pour yourself some liqueur, Monsieur Durtal, and you, Des Hermies, +why, you aren't drinking at all," and while, lighting their cigarettes, +both sipped a few drops of almost proof cognac, Carhaix resumed, +"Gévingey, who, though an astrologer, is a good Christian and an honest +man--whom, indeed, I should be glad to see again--wished to consult my +bells. + +"That surprises you, but it's so. Bells formerly played quite an +important part in the forbidden science. The art of predicting the +future with their sounds is one of the least known and most disused +branches of the occult. Gévingey had dug up some documents, and wished +to verify them in the tower." + +"Why, what did he do?" + +"How do I know? He stood under the bell, at the risk of breaking his +bones--a man of his age on the scaffolding there! He was halfway into +the bell, the bell like a great hat, you see, coming clear down over his +hips. And he soliloquized aloud and listened to the repercussions of his +voice making the bronze vibrate. + +"He spoke to me also of the interpretation of dreams about bells. +According to him, whoever, in his sleep, sees bells swinging, is menaced +by an accident; if the bell chimes, it is presage of slander; if it +falls, ataxia is certain; if it breaks, it is assurance of afflictions +and miseries. Finally he added, I believe, that if the night birds fly +around a bell by moonlight one may be sure that sacrilegious robbery +will be committed in the church, or that the curate's life is in danger. + +"Be all that as it may, this business of touching the bells, getting up +into them--and you know they're consecrated--of attributing to them the +gift of prophecy, of involving them in the interpretation of dream--an +art formally forbidden in Leviticus--displeased me, and I demanded, +somewhat rudely, that he desist." + +"But you did not quarrel?" + +"No, and I confess I regret having been so hasty." + +"Well then, I will arrange it. I shall go see him--agreed?" said Des +Hermies. + +"By all means." + +"With that we must run along and give you a chance to get to bed, seeing +that you have to be up at dawn." + +"Oh, at half-past five for the six o'clock angelus, and then, if I want +to, I can go back to bed, for I don't have to ring again till a quarter +to eight, and then all I have to do is sound a couple of times for the +curate's mass. As you can see, I have a pretty easy thing of it." + +"Mmmm!" exclaimed Durtal, "if I had to get up so early!" + +"It's all a matter of habit. But before you go won't you have another +little drink? No? Really? Well, good night!" + +He lighted his lantern, and in single file, shivering, they descended +the glacial, pitch-dark, winding stair. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +Next morning Durtal woke later than usual. Before he opened his eyes +there was a sudden flash of light in his brain, and troops of demon +worshippers, like the societies of which Des Hermies had spoken, went +defiling past him, dancing a saraband. "A swarm of lady acrobats hanging +head downward from trapezes and praying with joined feet!" he said, +yawning. He looked at the window. The panes were flowered with crystal +fleurs de lys and frost ferns. Then he quickly drew his arms back under +the covers and snuggled up luxuriously. + +"A fine day to stay at home and work," he said. "I will get up and light +a fire. Come now, a little courage--" and--instead of tossing the covers +aside he drew them up around his chin. + +"Ah, I know that you are not pleased to see me taking a morning off," he +said, addressing his cat, which was hunched up on the counterpane at his +feet, gazing at him fixedly, its eyes very black. + +This beast, though affectionate and fond of being caressed, was crabbed +and set in its ways. It would tolerate no whims, no departures from the +regular course of things. It understood that there was a fixed hour for +rising and for going to bed, and when it was displeased it allowed a +shade of annoyance to pass into its eyes, the sense of which its master +could not mistake. + +If he returned before eleven at night, the cat was waiting for him in +the vestibule, scratching the wood of the door, miaouing, even before +Durtal was in the hall; then it rolled its languorous green-golden eyes +at him, rubbed against his trouser leg, stood up on its hind feet like +a tiny rearing horse and affectionately wagged its head at him as he +approached. If eleven o'clock had passed it did not run along in front +of him, but would only, very grudgingly, rise when he came up, and then +it would arch its back and suffer no caresses. When he came later yet, +it would not budge, and would complain and groan if he took the liberty +of stroking its head or scratching its throat. + +This morning it had no patience with Durtal's laziness. It squatted on +its hunkers, and swelled up, then it approached stealthily and sat down +two steps away from its master's face, staring at him with an +atrociously false eye, signifying that the time had come for him to +abdicate and leave the warm place for a cold cat. + +Amused by its manoeuvres, Durtal did not move, but returned its stare. +The cat was enormous, common, and yet bizarre with its rusty coat +yellowish like old coke ashes and grey as the fuzz on a new broom, with +little white tufts like the fleece which flies up from the burnt-out +faggot. It was a genuine gutter cat, long-legged, with a wild-beast +head. It was regularly striped with waving lines of ebony, its paws were +encircled by black bracelets and its eyes lengthened by two great +zigzags of ink. + +"In spite of your kill-joy character and your single track mind you +testy, old bachelor, you are a very nice cat," said Durtal, in an +insinuating, wheedling tone. "Then too, for many years now, I have told +you what one tells no man. You are the drain pipe of my soul, you +inattentive and indulgent confessor. Never shocked, you vaguely approve +the mental misdeeds which I confess to you. You let me relieve myself +and you don't charge me anything for the service. Frankly, that is what +you are here for. I spoil you with care and attentions because you are +the spiritual vent of solitude and celibacy, but that doesn't prevent +you, with your spiteful way of looking at me, from being insufferable at +times, as you are today, for instance!" + +The cat continued to stare at him, its ears sticking straight up as if +they would catch the sense of his words from the inflections of his +voice. It understood, doubtless, that Durtal was not disposed to jump +out of bed, for it went back to its old place, but now turned its back +full on him. + +"Oh come," said Durtal, discouraged, looking at his watch, "I've simply +got to get up and go to work on Gilles de Rais," and with a bound he +sprang into his trousers. The cat, rising suddenly, galloped across the +counterpane and rolled itself up into the warm covers, without waiting +an instant longer. + +"How cold it is!" and Durtal slipped on a knit jacket and went into the +other room to start a fire. "I shall freeze!" he murmured. + +Fortunately his apartment was easy to heat. It consisted simply of a +hall, a tiny sitting-room, a minute bedroom, and a large enough +bathroom. It was on the fifth floor, facing a sufficiently airy court. +Rent, eight hundred francs. + +It was furnished without luxury. The little sitting-room Durtal had +converted into a study, hiding the walls behind black wood bookcases +crammed with books. In front of the window were a great table, a leather +armchair, and a few straight chairs. He had removed the glass from the +mantelpiece, and in the panel, just over the mantelshelf, which was +covered with an old fabric, he had nailed an antique painting on wood, +representing a hermit kneeling beside a cardinal's hat and purple cloak, +beneath a hut of boughs. The colours of the landscape background had +faded, the blues to grey, the whites to russet, the greens to black, and +time had darkened the shadows to a burnt-onion hue. Along the edges of +the picture, almost against the black oak frame, a continuous narrative +unfolded in unintelligible episodes, intruding one upon the other, +portraying Lilliputian figures, in houses of dwarfs. Here the Saint, +whose name Durtal had sought in vain, crossed a curly, wooden sea in a +sailboat; there he marched through a village as big as a fingernail; +then he disappeared into the shadows of the painting and was discovered +higher up in a grotto in the Orient, surrounded by dromedaries and +bales of merchandise; again he was lost from sight, and after another +game of hide-and-seek he emerged, smaller than ever, quite alone, with a +staff in his hand and a knapsack on his back, mounting toward a strange, +unfinished cathedral. + +It was a picture by an unknown painter, an old Dutchman, who had perhaps +visited certain of the Italian masters, for he had appropriated colours +and processes peculiar to them. + +The bedroom contained a big bed, a chest of drawers waist-high, and some +easy chairs. On the mantel were an antique clock and copper +candlesticks. On the wall there was a fine photograph of a Botticelli in +the Berlin museum, representing a plump and penitent Virgin who was like +a housewife in tears. She was surrounded by gentleman-, lady-, and +little-boy-angels. The languishing young men held spliced wax tapers +that were like bits of rope; the coquettish hoydens had flowers stuck in +their long hair; and the mischievous cherub-pages looked rapturously at +the infant Jesus, who stood beside the Virgin and held out his hands in +benediction. + +Then there was a print of Breughel, engraved by Cock, "The wise and the +foolish virgins": a little panel, cut in the middle by a corkscrew cloud +which was flanked at each side by angels with their sleeves rolled up +and their cheeks puffed out, sounding the trumpet, while in the middle +of the cloud another angel, bizarre and sacerdotal, with his navel +indicated beneath his languorously flowing robe, unrolled a banderole on +which was written the verse of the Gospel, "_Ecce sponsus venit, exite +obviam ei_." + +Beneath the cloud, at one side, sat the wise virgins, good Flemings, +with their lighted lamps, and sang canticles as they turned the spinning +wheel. At the other side were the foolish virgins with their empty +lamps. Four joyous gossips were holding hands and dancing in a ring on +the greensward, while the fifth played the bagpipe and beat time with +her foot. Above the cloud the five wise virgins, slender and ethereal +now, naked and charming, brandished flaming tapers and mounted toward a +Gothic church where Christ stood to welcome them; while on the other +side the foolish virgins, imperfectly draped, beat vainly on a closed +door with their dead torches. + +The blessed naïveté of the Primitives, the homely touches in the scenes +of earth and of heaven! Durtal loved this old engraving. He saw in it a +union of the art of an Ostade purified and that of a Thierry Bouts. + +Waiting for his grate, in which the charcoal was crackling and peeling +and running like frying grease, to become red, he sat down in front of +his desk and ran over his notes. + +"Let's see," he said to himself, rolling a cigarette, "we had come to +the time when that excellent Gilles de Rais begins the quest of the +'great work.' It is easy to figure what knowledge he possessed about the +method of transmuting metals into gold. + +"Alchemy was already highly developed a century before he was born. The +writings of Albertus Magnus, Arnaud de Villeneuve, and Raymond Lully +were in the hands of the hermetics. The manuscripts of Nicolas Flamel +circulated, and there is no doubt that Gilles had acquired them, for he +was an avid collector of the rare. Let us add that at that epoch the +edict of Charles interdicting spagyric labours under pain of prison and +hanging, and the bull, _Spondent pariter quas non exhibent_, which Pope +John XXII fulminated against the alchemists, were still in vigour. These +treatises were, then, forbidden, and in consequence desirable. It is +certain that Gilles had long studied them, but from that to +understanding them is a far cry. + +"For they were written in an impossible jargon of allegories, twisted +and obscure metaphors, incoherent symbols, ambiguous parables, enigmas, +and ciphers. And here is an example." He took from one of the shelves of +the library a manuscript which was none other than the Asch-Mezareph, +the book of the Jew Abraham and of Nicolas Flamel, restored, translated, +and annotated by Eliphas Levi. This manuscript had been lent him by Des +Hermies, who had discovered it one day among some old papers. + +"In this is what claims to be the recipe for the philosopher's stone, +for the grand quintessential and tinctural essence. The figures are not +precisely clear," he said to himself, as he ran his eye over the pen +drawings, retouched in colour, representing, under the title of "_The +chemical coitus_" various bottles and flasks each containing a liquid +and imprisoning an allegorical creature. A green lion, with a crescent +moon over him, hung head downward. Doves were trying to fly out through +the neck of the bottle or to peck a way through the bottom. The liquid +was black and undulated with waves of carmine and gold, or white and +granulated with dots of ink, which sometimes took the shape of a frog or +a star. Sometimes the liquid was milky and troubled, sometimes flames +rose from it as if there were a film of alcohol over the surface. + +Eliphas Levi explained the symbolism of these bottled volatiles as fully +as he cared to, but abstained from giving the famous recipe for the +grand magisterium. He was keeping up the pleasantry of his other books, +in which, beginning with an air of solemnity, he affirmed his intention +of unveiling the old arcana, and, when the time came to fulfil his +promise, begged the question, alleging the excuse that he would perish +if he betrayed such burning secrets. The same excuse, which had done +duty through the ages, served in masking the perfect ignorance of the +cheap occultists of the present day. + +"As a matter of fact, the 'great work' is simple," said Durtal to +himself, folding up the manuscript of Nicolas Flamel. "The hermetic +philosophers discovered--and modern science, after long evading the +issue, no longer denies--that the metals are compounds, and that their +components are identical. They vary from each other according to the +different proportions of their elements. With the aid of an agent which +will displace these proportions one may transmute mercury, for example, +into silver, and lead into gold. + +"And this agent is the philosopher's stone: mercury--not the vulgar +mercury, which to the alchemists was but an aborted metallic sperm--but +the philosophers' mercury, called also the green lion, the serpent, the +milk of the Virgin, the pontic water. + +"Only the recipe for this mercury, or stone of the sages, has ever been +revealed--and it is this that the philosophers of the Middle Ages, the +Renaissance, all centuries, including our own, have sought so +frantically. + +"And in what has it not been sought?" said Durtal, thumbing his notes. +"In arsenic, in ordinary mercury, tin, salts of vitriol, saltpetre and +nitre; in the juices of spurge, poppy, and purslane; in the bellies of +starved toads; in human urine, in the menstrual fluid and the milk of +women." + +Now Gilles de Rais must have been completely baffled. Alone at +Tiffauges, without the aid of initiates, he was incapable of making +fruitful experiments. At that time Paris was the centre of the hermetic +science in France. The alchemists gathered under the vaults of Notre +Dame and studied the hieroglyphics which Nicolas Flamel, before he died, +had written on the walls of the charnal Des Innocents and on the portal +of Saint Jacques de la Boucherie, describing cabalistically the +preparation of the famous stone. + +The Marshal could not go to Paris because the English soldiers barred +the roads. There was only one thing to do. He wrote to the most +celebrated of the southern transmuters, and had them brought to +Tiffauges at great expense. + +"From documents which we posses we can see his supervising the +construction of the athanor, or alchemists' furnace, buying pelicans, +crucibles, and retorts. He turned one of the wings of his château into a +laboratory and shut himself up in it with Antonio di Palermo, François +Lombard, and 'Jean Petit, goldsmith of Paris,' all of whom busied +themselves night and day with the concoction of the 'great work.'" + +They were completely unsuccessful. At the end of their resources, these +hermetists disappeared, and there ensued at Tiffauges an incredible +coming-and-going of adepts and their helpers. They arrived from all +parts of Brittany, Poitou, and Maine, alone or escorted by promoters and +sorcerers. Gilles de Sillé and Roger de Bricqueville, cousins and +friends of the Marshal, scurried about the country, beating up the game +and driving it in to Gilles de Rais, while a priest of his chapel, +Eustache Blanchet, went to Italy where workers in metals were legion. + +While waiting, Gilles de Rais, not to be discouraged, continued his +experiments, all of which missed fire. He finally came to believe that +the magicians were right after all, and that no discovery was possible +without the aid of Satan. + +And one night, with a sorcerer newly arrived from Poitiers, Jean de la +Rivière, he betakes himself to a forest in the vicinity of the château +de Tiffauges. With his servitors Henriet and Poitou, he remains on the +verge of the wood into which the sorcerer penetrates. The night is heavy +and there is no moon. Gilles becomes nervous, scrutinizing the shadows, +listening to the muted sounds of the nocturnal landscape; his +companions, terrified, huddle close together, trembling and whispering +at the slightest stirring of the air. Suddenly a cry of anguish is +raised. They hesitate, then they advance, groping in the darkness. In a +sudden flare of light they perceive de la Rivière trembling and deathly +pale, clutching the handle of his lantern convulsively. In a low voice +he recounts how the Devil has risen in the form of a leopard and rushed +past without looking at the evocator, without saying a word. + +The next day the sorcerer vanished, but another arrived. This was a +bungler named Du Mesnil. He required Gilles to sign with blood a deed +binding him to give the Devil all the Devil asked of him "except his +life and soul," but, although to aid the conjurements Gilles consented +to have the Office of the Damned sung in his chapel on All Saints' Day, +Satan did not appear. + +The Marshal was beginning to doubt the powers of his magicians, when +the outcome of a new endeavor convinced him that frequently the Devil +does appear. + +An evocator whose name has been lost held a séance with Gilles and de +Sillé in a chamber at Tiffauges. + +On the ground he traces a great circle and commands his two companions +to step inside it. Sillé refuses. Gripped by a terror which he cannot +explain, he begins to tremble all over. He goes to the window, opens it, +and stands ready for flight, murmuring exorcisms under his breath. +Gilles, bolder, stands in the middle of the circle, but at the first +conjurgations he too trembles and tries to make the sign of the cross. +The sorcerer orders him not to budge. At one moment he feels something +seize him by the neck. Panic-stricken, he vacillates, supplicating Our +Lady to save him. The evocator, furious, throws him out of the circle. +Gilles precipitates himself through the door, de Sillé jumps out of the +window, they meet below and stand aghast. Howls are heard in the chamber +where the magician is operating. There is "a sound as of sword strokes +raining on a wooden billet," then groans, cries of distress, the appeals +of a man being assassinated. + +They stand rooted to the spot. When the clamour ceases they venture to +open the door and find the sorcerer lying; in pools of blood, his +forehead caved in, his body horribly mangled. + +They carry him out. Gilles, smitten with remorse, gives the man his own +bed, bandages him, and has him confessed. For several days the sorcerer +hovers between life and death but finally recovers and flees from the +castle. + +Gilles was despairing of obtaining from the Devil the recipe for the +sovereign magisterium, when Eustache Blanchet's return from Italy was +announced. Eustache brought the master of Florentine magic, the +irresistible evoker of demons and larvæ, Francesco Prelati. + +This man struck awe into Gilles. Barely twenty-three years old, he was +one of the wittiest, the most erudite, and the most polished men of the +time. What had he done before he came to install himself at Tiffauges, +there to begin, with Gilles, the most frightful series of sins against +the Holy Ghost that has ever been known? His testimony in the criminal +trial of Gilles does not furnish us any very detailed information on his +own score. He was born in the diocese of Lucca, at Pistoia, and had been +ordained a priest by the Bishop of Arezzo. Some time after his entrance +into the priesthood, he had become the pupil of a thaumaturge of +Florence, Jean de Fontenelle, and had signed a pact with a demon named +Barron. From that moment onward, this insinuating and persuasive, +learned and charming abbé, must have given himself over to the most +abominable of sacrileges and the most murderous practices of black +magic. + +At any rate Gilles came completely under the influence of this man. The +extinguished furnaces were relighted, and that Stone of the Sages, which +Prelati had seen, flexible, frail, red and smelling of calcinated marine +salt, they sought together furiously, invoking Hell. + +Their incantations were all in vain. Gilles, disconsolate, redoubled +them, but they finally produced a dreadful result and Prelati narrowly +escaped with his life. + +One afternoon Eustache Blanchet, in a gallery of the château, perceives +the Marshal weeping bitterly. Plaints of supplication are heard through +the door of a chamber in which Prelati has been evoking the Devil. + +"The Demon is in there beating my poor Francis. I implore you, go in!" +cries Gilles, but Blanchet, frightened, refuses. Then Gilles makes up +his mind, in spite of his fear. He is advancing to force the door, when +it opens and Prelati staggers out and falls, bleeding, into his arms. +Prelati is able, with the support of his friends, to gain the chamber of +the Marshal, where he is put to bed, but he has sustained so merciless a +thrashing that he goes into delirium and his fever keeps mounting. +Gilles, in despair, stays beside him, cares for him, has him confessed, +and weeps for joy when Prelati is out of danger. + +"The fate of the unknown sorcerer and of Prelati, both getting +dangerously wounded in an empty room, under identical circumstances--I +tell you, it's a remarkable coincidence," said Durtal to himself. + +"And the documents which relate these facts are authentic. They are, +indeed, excerpts from the procedure in Gilles's trial. The confessions +of the accused and the depositions of the witnesses agree, and it is +impossible to think that Gilles and Prelati lied, for in confessing +these Satanic evocations they condemned themselves, by their own words, +to be burned alive. + +"If in addition they had declared that the Evil One had appeared to +them, that they had been visited by succubi; if they had affirmed that +they had heard voices, smelled odours, even touched a body; we might +conclude that they had had hallucinations similar to those of certain +Bicêtre subjects, but as it was there could have been no misfunctioning +of the senses, no morbid visions, because the wounds, the marks of the +blows, the material fact, visible and tangible, are present for +testimony. + +"Imagine how thoroughly convinced of the reality of the Devil a mystic +like Gilles de Rais must have been after witnessing such scenes! + +"In spite of his discomfitures, he could not doubt--and Prelati, +half-killed, must have doubted even less--that if Satan pleased, they +should finally find this powder which would load them with riches and +even render them almost immortal--for at that epoch the philosopher's +stone passed not only for an agent in the transmutation of base metals, +such as tin, lead, copper, into noble metals like silver and gold, but +also for a panacea curing all ailments and prolonging life, without +infirmities, beyond the limits formerly assigned to the patriarchs. + +"Singular science," ruminated Durtal, raising the fender of his +fireplace and warming his feet, "in spite of the railleries of this +time, which, in the matter of discoveries but exhumes lost things, the +hermetic philosophy was not wholly vain. + +"The master of contemporary science, Dumas, recognizes, under the name +of isomery, the theories of the alchemists, and Berthelot declares, 'No +one can affirm _a priori_ that the fabrication of bodies reputed to be +simple is impossible.' Then there have been verified and certified +achievements. Besides Nicolas Flamel, who really seems to have succeeded +in the 'great work,' the chemist Van Helmont, in the eighteenth century, +received from an unknown man a quarter of a grain of philosopher's stone +and with it transformed eight ounces of mercury into gold. + +"At the same epoch, Helvetius, who combated the dogma of the spagyrics, +received from another unknown a powder of projection with which he +converted an ingot of lead into gold. Helvetius was not precisely a +charlatan, neither was Spinoza, who verified the experiment, a credulous +simpleton. + +"And what is to be thought of that mysterious man Alexander Sethon who, +under the name of the Cosmopolite, went all over Europe, operating +before princes, in public, transforming all metals into gold? This +alchemist, who seems to have had a sincere disdain for riches, as he +never kept the gold which he created, but lived in poverty and prayer, +was imprisoned by Christian II, Elector of Saxony, and endured martyrdom +like a saint. He suffered himself to be beaten with rods and pierced +with pointed stakes, and he refused to give up a secret which he +claimed, like Nicolas Flamel, to have received from God. + +"And to think that these researches are being carried on at the present +time! Only, most of the hermetics now deny medical and divine virtues to +the famous stone. They think simply that the grand magisterium is a +ferment, which, thrown into metals in fusion, produces a molecular +transformation similar to that which organic matter undergoes when +fermented with the aid of a leaven. + +"Des Hermies, who is well acquainted with the underworld of science, +maintains that more than forty alchemic furnaces are now alight in +France, and that in Hanover and Bavaria the adepts are more numerous +yet. + +"Have they rediscovered the incomparable secret of antiquity? In spite +of certain affirmations, it is hardly probable. Nobody need manufacture +artificially a metal whose origins are so unaccountable that a deposit +is likely to be found anywhere. For instance, in a law suit which took +place at Paris in the month of November, 1886, between M. Popp, +constructor of pneumatic city clocks, and financiers who had been +backing him, certain engineers and chemists of the School of Mines +declared that gold could be extracted from common silex, so that the +very walls sheltering us might be placers, and the mansards might be +loaded with nuggets! + +"At any rate," he continued, smiling, "these sciences are not +propitious." + +He was thinking of an old man who had installed an alchemic laboratory +on the fifth floor of a house in the rue Saint Jacques. This man, named +Auguste Redoutez, went every afternoon to the Bibliothèque Nationale and +pored over the works of Nicolas Flamel. Morning and evening he pursued +the quest of the "great work" in front of his furnace. + +The 16th of March the year before, he came out of the Bibliothèque with +a man who had been sitting at the same table with him, and as they +walked along together Redoutez declared that he was finally in +possession of the famous secret. Arriving in his laboratory, he threw +pieces of iron into a retort, made a projection, and obtained crystals +the colour of blood. The other examined the salts and made a flippant +remark. The alchemist, furious, threw himself upon him, struck him with +a hammer, and had to be overpowered and carried in a strait-jacket to +Saint Anne, pending investigation. + +"In the sixteenth century, in Luxemburg, initiates were roasted in iron +cages. The following century, in Germany, they were clothed in rags and +hanged on gilded gibbets. Now that they are tolerated and left in peace +they go mad. Decidedly, fate is against them," Durtal concluded. + +He rose and went to answer a ring at the door. He came back with a +letter which the concierge had brought. He opened it. + +"Why, what is this?" he exclaimed. His astonishment grew as he read: + + "Monsieur, + + "I am neither an adventuress nor a seeker of adventures, nor am + I a society woman grown weary of drawing-room conversation. Even + less am I moved by the vulgar curiosity to find out whether an + author is the same in the flesh as he is in his books. Indeed I + am none of the things which you may think I am, from my writing + to you this way. The fact is that I have just finished reading + your last book," + +"She has taken her time," murmured Durtal, "it appeared a year ago." + + "melancholy as an imprisoned soul vainly beating its wings + against the bars of its cage." + +"Oh, hell! What a compliment. Anyway, it rings false, like all of them." + + "And now, Monsieur, though I am convinced that it is always + folly and madness to try to realize a desire, will you permit + that a sister in lassitude meet you some evening in a place + which you shall designate, after which we shall return, each of + us, into our own interior, the interior of persons destined to + fall because they are out of line with their 'fellows'? Adieu, + Monsieur, be assured that I consider you a somebody in a century + of nobodies. + + "Not knowing whether this note will elicit a reply, I abstain + from making myself known. This evening a maid will call upon + your concierge and ask him if there is a letter for Mme. + Maubel." + +"Hmm!" said Durtal, folding up the letter. "I know her. She must be one +of these withered dames who are always trying to cash outlawed +kiss-tickets and soul-warrants in the lottery of love. Forty-five years +old at least. Her _clientele_ is composed of boys, who are always +satisfied if they don't have to pay, and men of letters, who are yet +more easily satisfied--for the ugliness of authors' mistresses is +proverbial. Unless this is simply a practical joke. But who would be +playing one on me--I don't know anybody--and why?" + +In any case, he would simply not reply. + +But in spite of himself he reopened the letter. + +"Well now, what do I risk? If this woman wants to sell me an over-ripe +heart, there is nothing forcing me to purchase it. I don't commit myself +to anything by going to an assignation. But where shall I meet her? +Here? No! Once she gets into my apartment complications arise, for it is +much more difficult to throw a woman out of your house than simply to +walk off and leave her at a street corner. Suppose I designated the +corner of the rue de Sèvres and the rue de la Chaise, under the wall of +the Abbaye-au-Bois. It is solitary, and then, too, it is only a minute's +walk from here. Or no, I will begin vaguely, naming no meeting-place at +all. I shall solve that problem later, when I get her reply." + +He wrote a letter in which he spoke of his own spiritual lassitude and +declared that no good could come of an interview, for he no longer +sought happiness on earth. + +"I will add that I am in poor health. That is always a good one, and it +excuses a man from 'being a man' if necessary," he said to himself, +rolling a cigarette. + +"Well, that's done, and she won't get much encouragement out of it. Oh, +wait. I omitted something. To keep from giving her a hold on me I shall +do well to let her know that a serious and sustained liaison with me is +impossible 'for family reasons.' And that's enough for one time." + +He folded the letter and scrawled the address. + +Then he held the sealed envelope in his hand and reflected. + +"Of course I am a fool to answer her. Who knows what situations a thing +like this is going to lead to? I am well aware that whoever she be, a +woman is an incubator of sorrow and annoyance. If she is good she is +probably stupid, or perhaps she is an invalid, or perhaps she is so +disastrously fecund that she gets pregnant if you look at her. If she is +bad, one may expect to be dragged through every disgusting kind of +degradation. Oh, whatever you do, you're in for it." + +He regurgitated the memories of his youthful amours. Deception. +Disenchantment. How pitilessly base a woman is while she is young! + +" ... To be thinking of things like that now at my age! As if I had any +need of a woman now!" + +But in spite of all, his pseudonymous correspondent interested him. + +"Who knows? Perhaps she is good-looking, or at least not very +ill-looking. It doesn't cost me anything to find out." + +He re-read her letter. No misspelling. The handwriting not commercial. +Her ideas about his book were mediocre enough, but who would expect her +to be a critic? "Discreet scent of heliotrope," he added, sniffing the +envelope. + +"Oh, well, let's have our little fling." + +And as he went out to get some breakfast he left his reply with the +concierge. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +"If this continues I shall lose my mind," murmured Durtal as he sat in +front of his table reperusing the letters which he had been receiving +from that woman for the last week. She was an indefatigable +letter-writer, and since she had begun her advances he had not had time +to answer one letter before another arrived. + +"My!" he said, "let's try and see just where we do stand. After that +ungracious answer to her first note she immediately sends me this: + + "'Monsieur, + + "'This is a farewell. If I were weak enough to write you any + more letters they would become as tedious as the life I lead. + Anyway, have I not had the best part of you, in that hesitant + letter of yours which shook me out of my lethargy for an + instant? Like yourself, monsieur, I know, alas! that nothing + happens, and that our only certain joys are those we dream of. + So, in spite of my feverish desire to know you, I fear that you + were right in saying that a meeting would be for both of us the + source of regrets to which we ought not voluntarily expose + ourselves....' + +"Then what bears witness to the perfect futility of this exordium is the +way the missive ends: + + "'If you should take the fancy to write me, you can safely + address your letters "Mme. Maubel, rue Littré, general + delivery." I shall be passing the rue Littré post-office Monday. + If you wish to let matters remain just where they are--and thus + cause me a great deal of pain--will you not tell me so, + frankly?' + +"Whereupon I was simple-minded enough to compose an epistle as +ambiguous as the first, concealing my furtive advances under an apparent +reluctance, thus letting her know that I was securely hooked. As her +third note proves: + + "'Never accuse yourself, monsieur--I repress a tenderer name + which rises to my lips--of being unable to give me consolation. + Weary, disabused, as we are, and done with it all, let us + sometimes permit our souls to speak to each other--low, very + low--as I have spoken to you this night, for henceforth my + thought is going to follow you wherever you are.' + +"Four pages of the same tune," he said, turning the leaves, "but this is +better: + + "'Tonight, my unknown friend, one word only. I have passed a + horrible day, my nerves in revolt and crying out against the + petty sufferings they are subjected to every minute. A slamming + door, a harsh or squeaky voice floating up to me out of the + street.... Yet there are whole hours when I am so far from being + sensitive that if the house were burning I should not move. Am I + about to send you a page of comic lamentations? Ah, when one has + not the gift of rendering one's grief superbly and transforming + it into literary or musical passages which weep magnificently, + the best thing is to keep still about it. + + "'I bid you a silent goodnight. As on the first day, I am + harassed by the conflict of the desire to see you and the dread + of touching a dream lest it perish. Ah, yes, you spoke truly. + Miserable, miserable wretches that we are, our timorous souls + are so afraid of any reality that they dare not think a sympathy + which has taken possession of them capable of surviving an + interview with the person who gave it birth. Yet, in spite of + this fine casuistry, I simply must confess to you--no, no, + nothing. Guess if you can, and forgive me for this banal + letter. Or rather, read between the lines, and perhaps you will + find there a little bit of my heart and a great deal of what I + leave unsaid. + + "'A foolish letter with "I" written all over it. Who would + suspect that while I wrote it my sole thought was of You?'" + +"So far, so good. This woman at least piqued my curiosity. And what +peculiar ink," he thought. It was myrtle green, very thin, very pale. +With his finger-nail he detached some of the fine dust of rice powder, +perfumed with heliotrope, clinging to the seal of the letters. + +"She must be blonde," he went on, examining the tint of the powder, "for +it isn't the 'Rachel' shade that brunettes use. Now up to that point +everything had been going nicely, but then and there I spoiled it. Moved +by I know not what folly, I wrote her a yet more roundabout letter, +which, however, was very pressing. In attempting to fan her flame I +kindled myself--for a spectre--and at once I received this: + + "'What shall I do? I neither wish to see you, nor can I consent + to annihilate my overwhelming desire to meet you. Last night, in + spite of me, your name, which was burning me, sprang from my + lips. My husband, one of your admirers, it seems, appeared to be + somewhat humiliated by the preoccupation which, indeed, was + absorbing me and causing unbearable shivers to run all through + me. A common friend of yours and mine--for why should I not tell + you that you know me, if to have met socially is to "know" + anyone?--one of your friends, then, came up and said that + frankly he was very much taken with you. I was in a state of + such utter lack of self-control that I don't know what I should + have done had it not been for the unwitting assistance which + somebody gave me by pronouncing the name of a grotesque person + of whom I can never think without laughing. Adieu. You are + right. I tell myself that I will never write you again, and I go + and do it anyway. + + "'Your own--as I cannot be in reality without wounding us both.' + +"Then when I wrote a burning reply, this was brought by a maid on a dead +run: + + "'Ah, if I were not afraid, afraid!--and you know you are just + as much afraid as I am--how I should fly to you! No, you cannot + hear the thousand conversations with which my soul fatigues + yours.... Oh, in my miserable existence there are hours when + madness seizes me. Judge for yourself. The whole night I spent + appealing to you furiously. I wept with exasperation. This + morning my husband came into the room. My eyes were bloodshot. I + began to laugh crazily, and when I could speak I said to him, + "What would you think of a person who, questioned as to his + profession, replied, 'I am a chamber succubus'?" "Ah, my dear, + you are ill," said he. "Worse than you think," said I. + + "'But if I come to see you, what could we talk about, in the + state you yourself are in? Your letter has completely unbalanced + me. You arraign your malady with a certain brutality which makes + my body rejoice but alienates my soul a little. Ah, what if our + dreams could really come true! + + "'Ah, say a word, just one word, from out your own heart. Don't + be afraid that even one of your letters can possibly fall into + other hands than mine.' + +"So, so, so. This is getting to be no laughing matter," concluded +Durtal, folding up the letter. "The woman is married to a man who knows +me, it seems. What a situation! Let's see, now. Whom have I ever +visited?" He tried vainly to remember. No woman he had ever met at an +evening party would address such declarations to him. And that common +friend. "But I have no friends, except Des Hermies. I'd better try and +find out whom he has been seeing recently. But as a physician he meets +scores of people! And then, how can I explain to him? Tell him the +story? He will burst into a roar and disillusion me before I have got +halfway through the narrative." + +And Durtal became irritated, for within him a really incomprehensible +phenomenon was taking place. He was burning for this unknown woman. He +was positively obsessed by her. He who had renounced all carnal +relations years ago, who, when the barns of his senses were opened, +contented himself with driving the disgusting herd of sin to the +commercial shambles to be summarily knocked in the head by the butcher +girls of love, he, he! was getting himself to believe--in the teeth of +all experience, in the teeth of good judgment--that with a woman as +passionate as this one seemed to be, he would experience superhuman +sensations and novel abandon. + +And he imagined her as he would have her, blonde, firm of flesh, lithe, +feline, melancholy, capable of frenzies; and the picture of her brought +on such a tension of nerves that his teeth rattled. + +For a week, in the solitude in which he lived, he had dreamed of her and +had become thoroughly aroused and incapable of doing any work, even of +reading, for the image of this woman interposed itself between him and +the page. + +He tried suggesting to himself ignoble visions. He would imagine this +creature in moments of corporal distress and thus calm his desires with +unappetizing hallucinations; but the procedure which had formerly been +very effective when he desired a woman and could not have her now failed +utterly. He somehow could not imagine his unknown in quest of bismuth or +of linen. He could not see her otherwise than rebellious, melancholy, +dizzy with desire, kindling him with her eyes, inflaming him with her +pale hands. + +And his sensual resurrection was incredible--an aberrated Dog Star +flaming in a physical November, at a spiritual All Hallows. Tranquil, +dried up, safe from crises, without veritable desires, almost impotent, +or rather completely forgetful of sex for months at a time, he was +suddenly roused--and for an unreality!--by the mystery of mad letters. + +"Enough!" he cried, smiting the table a jarring blow. + +He clapped on his hat and went out, slamming the door behind him. + +"I know how to make my imagination behave!" and he rushed over to the +Latin Quarter to see a prostitute he knew. "I have been a good boy too +long," he murmured as he hurried down the street. "One can't stay on the +straight and narrow path for ever." + +He found the woman at home and had a miserable time. She was a buxom +brunette with festive eyes and the teeth of a wolf. An expert, she +could, in a few seconds, drain one's marrow, granulate the lungs, and +demolish the loins. + +She chid him for having been away so long, then cajoled him and kissed +him. He felt pathetic, listless, out of breath, out of place, for he had +no genuine desires. He finally flung himself on a couch and, enervated +to the point of crying, he went through the back-breaking motions +mechanically, like a dredge. + +Never had he so execrated the flesh, never had he felt such repugnance +and lassitude, as when he issued from that room. He strolled haphazard +down the rue Soufflot, and the image of the unknown obsessed him, more +irritating, more tenacious. + +"I begin to understand the superstition of the succubus. I must try some +bromo-exorcism. Tonight I will swallow a gram of bromide of potassium. +That will make my senses be good." + +But he realized that the trouble was not primarily physical, that really +it was only the consequence of an extraordinary state of mind. His love +for that which departed from the formula, for that projection _out of +the world_ which had recently cheered him in art, had deviated and +sought expression in a woman. She embodied his need to soar upward from +the terrestrial humdrum. + +"It is those precious unworldly studies, those cloister thoughts +picturing ecclesiastical and demoniac scenes, which have prepared me for +the present folly," he said to himself. His unsuspected, and hitherto +unexpressed, mysticism, which had determined his choice of subject for +his last work was now sending him out, in disorder, to seek new pains +and pleasures. + +As he walked along he recapitulated what he knew of the woman. She was +married, blonde, in easy circumstances because she had her own sleeping +quarters and a maid. She lived in the neighbourhood, because she went to +the rue Littré post-office for her mail. Her name, supposing she had +prefixed her own initial to the name of Maubel, was Henriette, Hortense, +Honorine, Hubertine, or Hélène. What else? She must frequent the society +of artists, because she had met him, and for years he had not been in a +bourgeois drawing-room. She was some kind of a morbid Catholic, because +that word succubus was unknown to the profane. That was all. Then there +was her husband, who, gullible as he might be, must nevertheless suspect +their liaison, since, by her own confession, she dissembled her +obsession very badly. + +"This is what I get for letting myself be carried away. For I, too, +wrote at first to amuse myself with aphrodisiac statements. Then I ended +by becoming completely hysterical. We have taken turns fanning +smouldering ashes which now are blazing. It is too bad that we have both +become inflamed at the same time--for her case must be the same as mine, +to judge from the passionate letters she writes. What shall I do? Keep +on tantalizing myself for a chimera? No! I'll bring matters to a head, +see her, and if she is good-looking, sleep with her. I shall have peace, +anyway." + +He looked about him. Without knowing how he had got there he found +himself in the Jardin des Plantes. He oriented himself, remembered that +there was a café on the side facing the quay, and went to find it. + +He tried to control himself and write a letter at once ardent and firm, +but the pen shook in his fingers. He wrote at a gallop, confessed that +he regretted not having consented, at the outset, to the meeting she +proposed, and, attempting to check himself, declared, "We must see each +other. Think of the harm we are doing ourselves, teasing each other at a +distance. Think of the remedy we have at hand, my poor darling, I +implore you." + +He must indicate a place of meeting. He hesitated. "Let me think," he +said to himself. "I don't want her to alight at my place. Too dangerous. +Then the best thing to do would be to offer her a glass of port and a +biscuit and conduct her to Lavenue's, which is a hotel as well as a +café. I will reserve a room. That will be less disgusting than an +assignation house. Very well, then, let us put in place of the rue de la +Chaise the waiting-room of the Gare Montparnasse. Sometimes it is quite +empty. Well, that's done." He gummed the envelope and felt a kind of +relief. "Ah! I was forgetting. Garçon! The Bottin de Paris." + +He searched for the name Maubel, thinking that by some chance it might +be her own. Of course it was hardly probable, but she seemed so +imprudent that with her anything was to be expected. He might very +easily have met a Mme. Maubel and forgotten her. He found a Maubé and a +Maubec, but no Maubel. "Of course, that proves nothing," he said, +closing the directory. He went out and threw his letter into the box. +"The joker in this is the husband. But hell, I am not likely to take his +wife away from him very long." + +He had an idea of going home, but he realized that he would do no work, +that alone he would relapse into daydream. "If I went up to Des +Hermies's place. Yes, today was his consultation day, it's an idea." + +He quickened his pace, came to the rue Madame, and rang at an entresol. +The housekeeper opened the door. + +"Ah, Monsieur Durtal, he is out, but he will be in soon. Will you wait?" + +"But you are sure he is coming back?" + +"Why, yes. He ought to be here now," she said, stirring the fire. + +As soon as she had retired Durtal sat down, then, becoming bored, he +went over and began browsing among the books which covered the wall as +in his own place. + +"Des Hermies certainly has some curious items," he murmured, opening a +very old book. Here's a treatise written centuries ago to suit my case +exactly. _Manuale exorcismorum_. Well, I'll be damned! It's a Plantin. +And what does this manual have to recommend in the treatment of the +possessed? + +"Hmmm. Contains some quaint counter-spells. Here are some for +energumens, for the bewitched; here are some against love-philtres and +against the plague; against spells cast on comestibles; some, even, to +keep butter and milk sweet. That isn't odd. The Devil entered into +everything in the good old days. And what can this be?" In his hand he +held two little volumes with crimson edges, bound in fawn-coloured calf. +He opened them and looked at the title, _The anatomy of the mass_, by +Pierre du Moulin, dated, Geneva, 1624. "Might prove interesting." He +went to warm his feet, and hastily skimmed through one of the volumes. +"Why!" he said, "it's mighty good." + +On the page which he was reading was a discussion of the priesthood. The +author affirmed that none might exercise the functions of the priesthood +if he was not sound in body, or if any of his members had been +amputated, and asking apropos of this, if a castrated man could be +ordained a priest, he answered his own question, "No, unless he carries +upon him, reduced to powder, the parts which are wanting." He added, +however, that Cardinal Tolet did not admit this interpretation, which +nevertheless had been universally adopted. + +Durtal, amused, read on. Now du Moulin was debating with himself the +point whether it was necessary to interdict abbés ravaged by lechery. +And in answer he cited himself the melancholy glose of Canon Maximianus, +who, in his Distinction 81, sighs, "It is commonly said that none ought +to be deposed from his charge for fornication, in view of the fact that +few can be found exempt from this vice." + +"Why! You here?" said Des Hermies, entering. "What are you reading? _The +anatomy of the mass?_ Oh, it's a poor thing, for Protestants. I am just +about distracted. Oh, my friend, what brutes those people are," and like +a man with a great weight on his chest he unburdened himself. + +"Yes, I have just come from a consultation with those whom the journals +characterize as 'princes of science.' For a quarter of an hour I have +had to listen to the most contradictory opinions. On one point, however, +all agreed: that my patient was a dead man. Finally they compromised and +decided that the poor wretch's torture should be needlessly prolonged by +a course of moxas. I timidly remarked that it would be simpler to send +for a confessor, and then assuage the sufferings of the dying man with +repeated injections of morphine. If you had seen their faces! They came +as near as anything to denouncing me as a tout for the priests. + +"And such is contemporary science. Everybody discovers a new or +forgotten disease, and trumpets a forgotten or a new remedy, and nobody +knows a thing! And then, too, what good does it do one not to be +hopelessly ignorant since there is so much sophistication going on in +pharmacy that no physician can be sure of having his prescriptions +filled to the letter? One example among many: at present, sirup of white +poppy, the diacodia of the old Codex, does not exist. It is manufactured +with laudanum and sirup of sugar, as if they were the same thing! + +"We have got so we no longer dose substances but prescribe ready-made +remedies and use those surprising specifics which fill up the fourth +pages of the journals. It's a compromise medicine, a democratic +medicine, one cure for all cases. It's scandalous, it's silly. + +"No, there is no use in talking. The old therapeutics based on +experience was better than this. At least it know that remedies ingested +in pill, powder, or bolus form were treacherous, so it prescribed them +only in the liquid state. Now, too, every physician specializes. The +oculists see only the eyes, and, to cure them, quite calmly poison the +body. With their pilocarpine they have ruined the health of how many +people for ever! Others treat cutaneous affections. They drive an eczema +inward on an old man who as soon as he is 'cured' becomes childish or +dangerous. There is no more solidarity. Allegiance to one party means +hostility to all others. Its a mess. Now my honourable confrères are +stumbling around, taking a fancy to medicaments which they don't even +know how to use. Take antipyrine, for example. It is one of the very few +really active products that the chemists have found in a long time. +Well, where is the doctor who knows that, applied in a compress with +iodide and cold Bondonneau spring water, antipyrine combats the +supposedly incurable ailment, cancer? And if that seems incredible, it +is true, nevertheless." + +"Honestly," said Durtal, "you believe that the old-time doctors came +nearer healing?" + +"Yes, because, miraculously, they know the effects of certain invariable +remedies prepared without fraud. Of course it is self-evident that when +old Paré eulogized 'sack medicine' and ordered his patients to carry +pulverized medicaments in a little sack whose form varied according to +the organ to be healed, assuming the form of a cap for the head, of a +bagpipe for the stomach, of an ox tongue for the spleen, he probably did +not obtain very signal results. His claim to have cured gastralgia by +appositions of powder of red rose, coral and mastic, wormwood and mint, +aniseed and nutmeg, is certainly not to be borne out, but he also had +other systems, and often he cured, because he possessed the science of +simples, which is now lost. + +"The present-day physicians shrug their shoulders when the name of +Ambrose Paré is mentioned. They used to pooh-pooh the idea of the +alchemists that gold had medicinal virtue. Their fine scorn does not now +prevent them from using alternate doses of the salts and of the filings +of this metal. They use concentrated arseniate of gold against anemia, +muriate against syphilis, cyanide against amenorrhea and scrofula, and +chloride of sodium and gold against old ulcers. No, I assure you, it is +disgusting to be a physician, for in spite of the fact that I am a +doctor of science and have extensive hospital experience I am quite +inferior to humble country herborists, solitaries, who know a great deal +more than I about what is useful to know--and I admit it." + +"And homeopathy?" + +"It has some good things about it and some bad ones. It also palliates +without curing. It sometimes represses maladies, but for grave and acute +cases it is impotent, just like this Mattei system, which, however, is +useful as an intermediary to stave off a crisis. With its blood- and +lymph-purifying products, its antiscrofoloso, its angiotico, its +anti-canceroso, it sometimes modifies morbid states in which other +methods are of no avail. For instance, it permits a patient whose +kidneys have been demoralized by iodide of potassium to gain time and +recuperate so that he can safely begin to drink iodide again! + +"I add that terrific shooting pains, which rebel even against chloroform +and morphine, often yield to an application of 'green electricity.' You +ask me, perhaps, of what ingredients this liquid electricity is made. I +answer that I know absolutely nothing about it. Mattei claims that he +has been able to fix in his globules and liquors the electrical +properties of certain plants, but he has never given out his recipe, +hence he can tell whatever stories suit him. What is curious, anyway, +is that this system, thought out by a Roman count, a Catholic, has its +most important following and propaganda among Protestant pastors, whose +original asininity becomes abysmal in the unbelievable homilies which +accompany their essays on healing. Indeed, considered seriously, these +systems are a lot of wind. The truth is that in the art of healing we +grope along at hazard. Nevertheless, with a little experience and a +great deal of nerve we can manage so as not too shockingly to depopulate +the cities. Enough of that, old man, and now where have you been keeping +yourself?" + +"Just what I was going to ask you. You haven't been to see me for over a +week." + +"Well, just now everybody in the world is ill and I am racing around all +the time. By the way, I've been attending Chantelouve, who has a pretty +serious attack of gout. He complains of your absence, and his wife, whom +I should not have taken for an admirer of your books, of your last novel +especially, speaks to me unceasingly of them and you. For a person +customarily so reserved, she seems to me to have become quite +enthusiastic about you, does Mme. Chantelouve. Why, what's the matter?" +he exclaimed, seeing how red Durtal had become. + +"Oh, nothing, but I've got to be going. Good night." + +"Why, aren't you feeling well?" + +"Oh, it's nothing, I assure you." + +"Oh, well," said Des Hermies, knowing better than to insist. "Look at +this," and took him into the kitchen and showed him a superb leg of +mutton hanging beside the window. "I hung it up in a draft so as to get +some of the crass freshness out of it. We'll eat it when we have the +astrologer Gévingey to dine with us at Carhaix's. As I am the only +person alive who knows how to boil a _gigot à l'Anglaise_, I am going to +be the cook, so I shan't come by for you. You will find me in the tower, +disguised as a scullery maid." + +Once outside, Durtal took a long breath. Well, well, his unknown was +Chantelouve's wife. Impossible! She had never paid the slightest +attention to him. She was silent and cold. Impossible! And yet, why had +she spoken that way to Des Hermies? But surely if she had wanted to see +him she would have come to his apartment, since they were acquaintances. +She would not have started this correspondence under a pseudonym-- + +"H. de Maubel!" he said suddenly, "why, Mme. Chantelouve's name is +Hyacinthe, a boy's name which suits her very well. She lives in the rue +Babneux not vary far from the rue Littré post-office. She is a blonde, +she has a maid, she is a fervent Catholic. She's the one." + +And he experienced, almost simultaneously, two absolutely distinct +sensations. + +Of disappointment, first, for his unknown pleased him better. Mme. +Chantelouve would never realize the ideal he had fashioned for himself, +the tantalizing features, the agile, wild animal body, the melancholy +and ardent bearing, which he had dreamed. Indeed, the mere fact of +knowing the unknown rendered her less desirable, more vulgar. +Accessibility killed the chimera. + +At the same time he experienced a lively relief. He might have been +dealing with a hideous old crone, and Hyacinthe, as he immediately began +to call her, was desirable. Thirty-three at most, not pretty, but +peculiar; blonde, slight and supple, with no hips, she seemed thin +because she was small-boned. The face, mediocre, spoiled by too big a +nose, but the lips incandescent, the teeth superb, her complexion ever +so faint a rose in the slightly bluish milk white of rice water a little +troubled. + +Then her real charm, the really deceptive enigma of her, was in her +eyes; ash-grey eyes which seemed uncertain, myopic, and which conveyed +an expression of resigned boredom. At certain moments the pupils glowed +like a gem of grey water and sparks of silver twinkled to the surface. +By turns they were dolent, forsaken, languorous, and haughty. He +remembered that those eyes had often brought his heart into his throat! + +In spite of circumstantial evidence, he reflected that those +impassioned letters did not correspond in any way to this woman in the +flesh. Never was woman more controlled, more adept in the lies of good +breeding. He remembered the Chantelouve at-homes. She seemed attentive, +made no contribution to the conversation, played the hostess smiling, +without animation. It was a kind of case of dual personality. In one +visible phase a society woman, prudent and reserved, in another +concealed phase a wild romantic, mad with passion, hysterical of body, +nymphomaniac of soul. It hardly seemed probable. + +"No," he said, "I am on the wrong track. It's merely by chance that Mme. +Chantelouve spoke of my books to Des Hermies, and I mustn't jump to the +conclusion that she is smitten with me and that she has been writing me +these hot letters. It isn't she, but who on earth is it?" + +He continued to revolve the question, without coming any nearer a +solution. Again he called before his eyes the image of this woman, and +admitted that she was really potently seductive, with a fresh, girlish +body, flexible, and without a lot of repugnant flesh--and mysterious, +with her concentrated air, her plaintive eyes, and even her coldness, +real or feigned. + +He summarized all that he really knew about her: simply that she was a +widow when she married Chantelouve, that she had no children, that her +first husband, a manufacturer of chasubles, had, for unknown reasons, +committed suicide. That was all. On the other hand, too, too much was +known about Chantelouve! + +Author of a history of Poland and the cabinets of the north; of a +history of Boniface VIII and his times; a life of the blessed Jeanne de +Valois, founder of the Annonciade; a biography of the Venerable Mother +Anne de Xaintonge, teacher of the Company of Saint Ursula; and other +books of the same kind, published by Lecoffre, Palmé, Poussielgue, in +the inevitable shagreen or sheep bindings stamped with dendriform +patterns: Chantelouve was preparing his candidacy for the Académie des +Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, and hoped for the support of the party +of the Ducs. That was why he received influential hypocrites, provincial +Tartufes, and priests every week. He doubtless had to drive himself to +do this, because in spite of his slinking slyness he was jovial and +enjoyed a joke. On the other hand, he aspired to figure in the +literature that counts at Paris, and he expended a good deal of +ingenuity inveigling men of letters to his house on another evening +every week, to make them his aides, or at least keep them from openly +attacking him, so soon as his candidacy--an entirely clerical +affair--should be announced. It was probably to attract and placate his +adversaries that he had contrived these baroque gatherings to which, out +of curiosity as a matter of fact, the most utterly different kinds of +people came. + +He had other motives. It was said that he had no scruples about +exploiting his social acquaintances. Durtal had even noticed that at +each of the dinners given by Chantelouve a well-dressed stranger was +present, and the rumour went about that this guest was a wealthy +provincial to whom men of letters were exhibited like a wax-work +collection, and from whom, before or afterward, important sums were +borrowed. + +"It is undeniable that the Chantelouves have no income and that they +live in style. Catholic publishing houses and magazines pay even worse +than the secular, so in spite of his established reputation in the +clerical world, Chantelouve cannot possibly maintain such a standard of +living on his royalties. + +"There simply is no telling what these people are up to. That this +woman's home life is unhappy, and that she does not love the sneaky +sacristan to whom she is married, is quite possible, but what is her +real rôle in that household? Is she accessory to Chantelouve's pecuniary +dodges? If that is the case I don't see why she should pick on me. If +she is in connivance with her husband, she certainly ought to have sense +enough to seek an influential or wealthy lover, and she is perfectly +aware that I fulfil neither the one nor the other condition. Chantelouve +knows very well that I am incapable of paying for her gowns and thus +contributing to the upkeep of their establishment. I make about three +thousand livres, and I can hardly contrive to keep myself going. + +"So that is not her game. I don't know that I want to have anything to +do with their kind of people," he concluded, somewhat chilled by these +reflections. "But I am a big fool. What I know about them proves that my +unknown beloved is not Chantelouve's wife, and, all things considered, I +am glad she isn't." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +Next day his ferment had subsided. The unknown never left him, but she +kept her distance. Her less certain features were effaced in mist, her +fascination became feebler, and she no longer was his sole +preoccupation. + +The idea, suddenly formed on a word of Des Hermies, that the unknown +must be Chantelouve's wife, had, in fashion, checked his fever. If it +was she--and his contrary conclusions of the evening before seemed +hardly valid when he took up one by one the arguments by which he had +arrived at them--then her reasons for wanting him were obscure, +dangerous, and he was on his guard, no longer letting himself go in +complete self-abandon. + +And yet, there was another phenomenon taking place within him. He had +never paid any especial attention to Hyacinthe Chantelouve, he had never +been in love with her. She interested him by the mystery of her person +and her life, but outside her drawing-room he had never given her a +thought. Now ruminating about her he began almost to desire her. + +Suddenly she benefited by the face of the unknown, for when Durtal +evoked her she came confused to his sight, her physiognomy mingled with +that which he had visualized when the first letters came. + +Though the sneaking scoundrelism of her husband displeased him, he did +not think her the less attractive, but his desires were no longer beyond +control. In spite of the distrust which she aroused, she might be an +interesting mistress, making up for her barefaced vices by her good +grace, but she was no longer the non-existent, the chimera raised in a +moment of uncertainty. + +On the other hand, if his conjectures were false, if it was not Mme. +Chantelouve who had written the letters, then the other, the unknown, +lost a little of her subtlety by the mere fact that she could be +incarnated in a creature whom he knew. Still remote, she became less so; +then her beauty deteriorated, because, in turn, she took on certain +features of Mme. Chantelouve, and if the latter had profited, the +former, on the contrary, lost by the confusion which Durtal had +established. + +In one as in the other case, whether she were Mme. Chantelouve or not, +he felt appeased, calmed. At heart he did not know, when he revolved the +adventure, whether he preferred his chimera, even diminished, or this +Hyacinthe, who at least, in her reality, was not a disenchanting frump, +wrinkled with age. He profited by the respite to get back to work, but +he had presumed too much upon his powers. When he tried to begin his +chapter on the crimes of Gilles de Rais he discovered that he was +incapable of sewing two sentences together. He wandered in pursuit of +the Marshal and caught up with him, but the prose in which he wished to +embody the man remained listless and lifeless, and he could think only +patchily. + +He threw down his pen and sank into an armchair. In revery he was +transported to Tiffauges, where Satan, who had refused so obstinately to +show himself, now became incarnate in the unwitting Marshal, to wallow +him, vociferating, in the joys of murder. + +"For this, basically, is what Satanism is," said Durtal to himself. "The +external semblance of the Demon is a minor matter. He has no need of +exhibiting himself in human or bestial form to attest his presence. For +him to prove himself, it is enough that he choose a domicile in souls +which he ulcerates and incites to inexplicable crimes. Then, he can hold +his victims by that hope which he breathes into them, that instead of +living in them as he does, and as they don't often know, he will obey +evocations, appear to them, and deal out, duly, legally, the advantages +he concedes in exchange for certain forfeits. Our very willingness to +make a pact with him must be able often to produce his infusion into us. + +"All the modern theories of the followers of Maudsley and Lombroso do +not, in fact, render the singular abuses of the Marshal comprehensible. +Nothing could be more just than to class him as a monomaniac, for he was +one, if by the word monomaniac we designate every man who is dominated +by a fixed idea. But so is every one of us, more or less, from the +business man, all whose thoughts converge on the one idea of gain, to +the artist absorbed in bringing his masterpiece into the world. But why +was the Marshal a monomaniac, how did he become one? That is what all +the Lombrosos in the world can't tell you. Encephalic lesions, adherence +of the _pia mater_ to the cerebrum, mean absolutely nothing in this +question. For they are simple resultants, effects derived from a cause +which ought to be explained, and which no materialist can explain. It is +easy to declare that a disturbance of the cerebral lobes produces +assassins and demonomaniacs. The famous alienists of our time claim that +analysis of the brain of an insane woman disclosed a lesion or a +deterioration of the grey matter. And suppose it did! It would still be +a question whether, in the case of a woman possessed with demonomania, +the lesion produced the demonomania, or the demonomania produced the +lesion.... Admitting that there was a lesion! The spiritual Comprachicos +have never resorted to cerebral surgery. They don't amputate the +lobes--supposed to be reliably identified--after carefully trepanning. +They simply act upon the pupil by inculcating ignoble ideas in him, +developing his bad instincts, pushing him little by little into the +paths of vice; and if this gymnastic of persuasion deteriorates the +cerebral tissues in the subject, that proves precisely that the lesion +is only the derivative and not the cause of the psychological state. + +"And then, and then, these doctrines which consist nowadays in +confounding the criminal with the insane, the demonomaniac with the mad, +have absolutely no foundation. Nine years ago a lad of fourteen, Felix +Lemaîre, assassinated a little boy whom he did not know. He just wanted +to see the child suffer, just wanted to hear him cry. Felix slashed the +little fellow's stomach with a knife, turned the blade round and round +in the warm flesh, then slowly sawed his victim's head off. Felix +manifested no remorse, and in the ensuing investigation proved himself +to be intelligent and atrocious. Dr. Legrand Du Saule and other +specialists kept him under vigilant surveillance for months, and could +not discover the slightest pathological symptom. And he had had fairly +good rearing and certainly had not been corrupted by others. + +"His behaviour was like that of the conscious or unconscious +demonomaniacs who do evil for evil's sake. They are no more mad than the +rapt monk in his cell, than the man who does good for good's sake. +Anybody but a medical theorist can see that the desire for good and the +desire for evil simply form the two opposing poles of the soul. In the +fifteenth century these extremes were represented by Jeanne d'Arc and +the Marshal de Rais. Now there is no more reason for attributing madness +to Gilles than there is for attributing it to Jeanne d'Arc, whose +admirable excesses certainly have no connection with vesania and +delirium. + +"All the same, some frightful nights must have been passed in that +fortress," said Durtal. He was thinking of the château de Tiffauges, +which he had visited a year ago, believing that it would aid him in his +work to live in the country where Gilles had lived and to dig among the +ruins. + +He had established himself in the little hamlet which stretches along +the base of the abandoned donjon. He learned what a living thing the +legend of Bluebeard was in this isolated part of La Vendée on the border +of Brittany. + +"He was a young man who came to a bad end," said the young women. More +fearful, their grandmothers crossed themselves as they went along the +foot of the wall in the evening. The memory of the disembowelled +children persisted. The Marshal, known only by his surname, still had +power to terrify. + +Durtal had gone every day from the inn where he lodged to the château, +towering over the valleys of the Crume and of the Sèvre, facing hills +excoriated with blocks of granite and overgrown with formidable oaks, +whose roots, protruding out of the ground, resembled monstrous nests of +frightened snakes. + +One might have believed oneself transported into the real Brittany. +There was the same melancholy, heavy sky, the same sun, which seemed +older than in other parts of the world and which but feebly gilded the +sorrowful, age-old forests and the mossy sandstone. There were the same +endless stretches of broken, rocky soil, pitted with ponds of rusty +water, dotted with scattered clumps of gorse and furze copse, and +sprinkled with pink harebells and nameless yellow prairie flowers. + +One felt that this iron-grey sky; this starving soil, empurpled only +here and there by the bleeding flower of the buckwheat; that these +roads, bordered with stones placed one on top of the other, without +cement or plaster; that these paths, bordered with impenetrable hedges; +that these grudging plants; these inhospitable fields; these crippled +beggars, eaten with vermin, plastered with filth; that even the flocks, +undersized and wasted, the dumpy little cows, the black sheep whose blue +eyes had the cold, pale gleam that is in the eyes of the Slav or of the +tribade; had perpetuated their primordial state, preserving an identical +landscape through all the centuries. + +Except for an incongruous factory chimney further away on the bank of +the Sèvre, the countryside of Tiffauges remained in perfect harmony with +the immense château, erect among its ruins. Within the close, still to +be traced by the ruins of the towers, was a whole plain, now converted +into a miserable truck garden. Cabbages, in long bluish lines, +impoverished carrots, consumptive navews, spread over this enormous +circle where iron mail had clanked in the tournament and where +processionals had slowly devolved, in the smoke of incense, to the +chanting of psalms. + +A thatched hut had been built in a corner. The peasant inhabitants, +returned to a state of savagery, no longer understood the meaning of +words, and could be roused out of their apathy only by the display of a +silver coin. Seizing the coin, they would hand over the keys. + +For hours one could browse around at ease among the ruins, and smoke and +daydream. Unfortunately, certain parts were inaccessible. The donjon was +still shut off, on the Tiffauges side, by a vast moat, at the bottom of +which mighty trees were growing. One would have had to pass over the +tops of the trees, growing to the very verge of the wall, to gain a +porch on the other side, for there was now no drawbridge. + +But quite accessible was another part which overhung the Sèvre. There +the wings of the castle, overgrown with ivy and white-crested viburnum, +were intact. Spongy, dry as pumice stone, silvered with lichen and +gilded with moss, the towers rose entire, though from their crenelated +collarettes whole blocks were blown away on windy nights. + +Within, room succeeded glacial room, cut into the granite, surmounted +with vaulted roofs, and as close as the hold of a ship. Then by spiral +stairways one descended into similar chambers, joined by cellar +passageways into the walls of which were dug deep niches and lairs of +unknown utility. + +Beneath, those corridors, so narrow that two persons could not walk +along them abreast, descended at a gentle slope, and bifurcated so that +there was a labyrinth of lanes, leading to veritable cells, on the walls +of which the nitre scintillated in the light of the lantern like steel +mica or twinkling grains of sugar. In the cells above, in the dungeons +beneath, one stumbled over rifts of hard earth, in the centre or in a +corner of which yawned now the mouth of an unsealed oubliette, now a +well. + +Finally, at the summit of one of the towers, that at the left as one +entered, there was a roofed gallery running parallel to a circular +foothold cut from the rock. There, without doubt, the men-at-arms had +been stationed to fire on their assailants through wide loopholes +opening overhead and underfoot. In this gallery the voice, even the +lowest, followed the curving walls and could be heard all around the +circuit. + +Briefly, the exterior of the castle revealed a fortified place built to +stand long sieges, and the dismantled interior made one think of a +prison in which flesh, mildewed by the moisture, must rot in a few +months. Out in the open air again, one felt a sensation of well-being, +of relief, which one lost on traversing the ruins of the isolated chapel +and penetrating, by a cellar door, to the crypt below. + +This chapel, low, squat, its vaulted roof upheld by massive columns on +whose capitals lozenges and bishop's croziers were carved, dated from +the eleventh century. The altar stone survived intact. Brackish +daylight, which seemed to have been filtered through layers of horn, +came in at the openings, hardly lighting the shadowed, begrimed walls +and the earth floor, which too was pierced by the entrance to an +oubliette or by a well shaft. + +In the evening after dinner he had often climbed up on the embankment +and followed the cracked walls of the ruins. On bright nights one part +of the castle was thrown back into shadow, and the other, by contrast, +stood forth, washed in silver and blue, as if rubbed with mercurial +lusters, above the Sèvre, along whose surface streaks of moonlight +darted like the backs of fishes. The silence was overpowering. After +nine o'clock not a dog, not a soul. He would return to the poor chamber +of the inn, where an old woman, in black, wearing the cornet head-dress +her ancestors wore in the sixteenth century, waited with a candle to bar +the door as soon as he returned. + +"All this," said Durtal to himself, "is the skeleton of a dead keep. To +reanimate it we must revisualize the opulent flesh which once covered +these bones of sandstone. Documents give us every detail. This carcass +was magnificently clad, and if we are to see Gilles in his own +environment, we must remember all the sumptuosity of fifteenth century +furnishing. + +"We must reclothe these walls with wainscots of Irish wood or with high +warp tapestries of gold and thread of Arras, so much sought after in +that epoch. Then this hard, black soil must be repaved with green and +yellow bricks or black and white flagstones. The vault must be starred +with gold and sown with crossbows on a field _azur_, and the Marshal's +cross, _sable_ on shield _or_, must be set shining there." + +Of themselves the furnishings returned, each to its own place. Here and +there were high-backed signorial chairs, thrones, and stools. Against +the walls were sideboards on whose carved panels were bas-reliefs +representing the Annunciation and the Adoration of the Magi. On top of +the sideboards, beneath lace canopies, stood the painted and gilded +statues of Saint Anne, Saint Marguerite, and Saint Catherine, so often +reproduced by the wood-carvers of the Middle Ages. There were +linen-chests, bound in iron, studded with great nails, and covered with +sowskin leather. Then there were coffers fastened by great metal clasps +and overlaid with leather or fabric on which fair faced angels, cut from +illuminated missal-backgrounds, had been mounted. There were great beds +reached by carpeted steps. There were tasselled pillows and counterpanes +heavily perfumed, and canopies and curtains embroidered with armories or +sprinkled with stars. + +So one must reconstruct the decorations of the other rooms, in which +nothing was standing but the walls and the high, basket-funneled +fireplaces, whose spacious hearths, wanting andirons, were still charred +from the old fires. One could easily imagine the dining-rooms and those +terrible repasts which Gilles deplored in his trial at Nantes. Gilles +admitted with tears that he had ordered his diet so as to kindle the +fury of his senses, and these reprobate menus can be easily reproduced. +When he was at table with Eustache Blanchet, Prelati, Gilles de Sillé, +all his trusted companions, in the great room, the plates and the ewers +filled with water of medlar, rose, and melilote for washing the hands, +were placed on credences. Gilles ate beef-, salmon-, and bream-pies; +levert- and squab-tarts; roast heron, stork, crane, peacock, bustard, and +swan; venison in verjuice; Nantes lampreys; salads of briony, hops, +beard of judas, mallow; vehement dishes seasoned with marjoram and mace, +coriander and sage, peony and rosemary, basil and hyssop, grain of +paradise and ginger; perfumed, acidulous dishes, giving one a violent +thirst; heavy pastries; tarts of elder-flower and rape; rice with milk +of hazelnuts sprinkled with cinnamon; stuffy dishes necessitating +copious drafts of beer and fermented mulberry juice, of dry wine, or +wine aged to tannic bitterness, of heady hypocras charged with cinnamon, +with almonds, and with musk, of raging liquors clouded with golden +particles--mad drinks which spurred the guests in this womanless castle +to frenzies of lechery and made them, at the end of the meal, writhe in +monstrous dreams. + +"Remain the costumes to be restored," said Durtal to himself, and he +imagined Gilles and his friends, not in their damaskeened field harness, +but in their indoor costumes, their robes of peace. He visualized them +in harmony with the luxury of their surroundings. They wore glittering +vestments, pleated jackets, bellying out in a little flounced skirt at +the waist. The legs were encased in dark skin-tight hose. On their heads +were the artichoke chaperon hats like that of Charles VII in his +portrait in the Louvre. The torso was enveloped in silver-threaded +damask, which was crusted with jewelleries and bordered with marten. + +He thought of the costume of the women of the time, robes of precious +tentered stuffs, with tight sleeves, great collars thrown back over the +shoulders, cramping bodices, long trains lined with fur. And as he thus +dressed an imaginary manikin, hanging ropes of heavy stones, purplish +or milky crystals, cloudy uncut gems, over the slashed corsage, a woman +slipped in, filled the robe, swelled the bodice, and thrust her head +under the two-horned steeple-headdress. From behind the pendent lace +smiled the composite features of the unknown and of Mme. Chantelouve. +Delighted, he gazed at the apparition without ever perceiving whom he +had evoked, when his cat, jumping into his lap, distracted his thoughts +and brought him back to his room. + +"Well, well, she won't let me alone," and in spite of himself he began +to laugh at the thought of the unknown following him even to the château +de Tiffauges. "It's foolish to let my thoughts wander this way," he +said, drawing himself up, "but daydream is the only good thing in life. +Everything else is vulgar and empty. + +"No doubt about it, that was a singular epoch, the Middle Epoch of +ignorance and darkness, the history professors and Ages," he went on, +lighting a cigarette. "For some it's all white and for others utterly +black. No intermediate shade, atheists reiterate. Dolorous and exquisite +epoch, say the artists and the religious savants. + +"What is certain is that the immutable classes, the nobility, the +clergy, the bourgeoisie, the people, had loftier souls at that time. You +can prove it: society has done nothing but deteriorate in the four +centuries separating us from the Middle Ages. + +"True, a baron then was usually a formidable brute. He was a drunken and +lecherous bandit, a sanguinary and boisterous tyrant, but he was a child +in mind and spirit. The Church bullied him, and to deliver the Holy +Sepulchre he sacrificed his wealth, abandoned home, wife, and children, +and accepted unconscionable fatigues, extraordinary sufferings, +unheard-of dangers. + +"By pious heroism he redeemed the baseness of his morals. The race has +since become moderate. It has reduced, sometimes even done away with, +its instincts of carnage and rape, but it has replaced them by the +monomania of business, the passion for lucre. It has done worse. It has +sunk to such a state of abjectness as to be attracted by the doings of +the lowest of the low. The aristocracy disguises itself as a mountebank, +puts on tights and spangles, gives public trapeze performances, jumps +through hoops, and does weight-lifting stunts in the trampled tan-bark +ring! + +"The clergy, then a good example--if we except a few convents ravaged by +frenzied Satanism and lechery--launched itself into superhuman +transports and attained God. Saints swarmed, miracles multiplied, and +while still omnipotent the Church was gentle with the humble, it +consoled the afflicted, defended the little ones, and mourned or +rejoiced with the people of low estate. Today it hates the poor, and +mysticism dies in a clergy which checks ardent thoughts and preaches +sobriety of mind, continence of postulation, common sense in prayer, +bourgeoisie of the soul! Yet here and there, buried in cloisters far +from these lukewarm priests, there perhaps still are real saints who +weep, monks who pray, to the point of dying of sorrow and prayer, for +each of us. And they--with the demoniacs--are the sole connecting link +between that age and this. + +"The smug, sententious side of the bourgeoisie already existed in the +time of Charles VII. But cupidity was repressed by the confessor, and +the tradesman, just like the labourer, was maintained by the +corporations, which denounced overcharging and fraud, saw that decried +merchandise was destroyed, and fixed a fair price and a high standard of +excellence for commodities. Trades and professions were handed down from +father to son. The corporations assured work and pay. People were not, +as now, subject to the fluctuations of the market and the merciless +capitalistic exploitation. Great fortunes did not exist and everybody +had enough to live on. Sure of the future, unhurried, they created +marvels of art, whose secret remains for ever lost. + +"All the artisans who passed the three degrees of apprentice, +journeyman, and master, developed subtlety and became veritable artists. +They ennobled the simplest of iron work, the commonest faience, the most +ordinary chests and coffers. Those corporations, putting themselves +under the patronage of Saints--whose images, frequently besought, +figured on their banners--preserved through the centuries the honest +existence of the humble and notably raised the spiritual level of the +people whom they protected. + +"All that is decisively at an end. The bourgeoise has taken the place +forfeited by a wastrel nobility which now subsists only to set ignoble +fashions and whose sole contribution to our 'civilization' is the +establishment of gluttonous dining clubs, so-called gymnastic societies, +and pari-mutuel associations. Today the business man has but these aims, +to exploit the working man, manufacture shoddy, lie about the quality of +merchandise, and give short weight. + +"As for the people, they have been relieved of the indispensable fear of +hell, and notified, at the same time, that they are not to expect to be +recompensed, after death, for their sufferings here. So they scamp their +ill-paid work and take to drink. From time to time, when they have +ingurgitated too violent liquids, they revolt, and then they must be +slaughtered, for once let loose they would act as a crazed stampeded +herd. + +"Good God, what a mess! And to think that the nineteenth century takes +on airs and adulates itself. There is one word in the mouths of all. +Progress. Progress of whom? Progress of what? For this miserable century +hasn't invented anything great. + +"It has constructed nothing and destroyed everything. At the present +hour it glorifies itself in this electricity which it thinks it +discovered. But electricity was known and used in remotest antiquity, +and if the ancients could not explain its nature nor even its essence, +the moderns are just as incapable of identifying that force which +conveys the spark and carries the voice--acutely nasalized--along the +wire. This century thinks it discovered the terrible science of +hypnotism, which the priests and Brahmins in Egypt and India knew and +practised to the utmost. No, the only thing this century has invented +is the sophistication of products. Therein it is passed master. It has +even gone so far as to adulterate excrement. Yes, in 1888 the two houses +of parliament had to pass a law destined to suppress the falsification +of fertilizer. Now that's the limit." + +The doorbell rang. He opened the door and nearly fell over backward. + +Mme. Chantelouve was before him. + +Stupefied, he bowed, while Mme. Chantelouve, without a word, went +straight into the study. There she turned around, and Durtal, who had +followed, found himself face to face with her. + +"Won't you please sit down?" He advanced an armchair and hastened to +push back, with his foot, the edge of the carpet turned up by the cat. +He asked her to excuse the disorder. She made a vague gesture and +remained standing. + +In a calm but very low voice she said, "It is I who wrote you those mad +letters. I have come to drive away this bad fever and get it over with +in a quite frank way. As you yourself wrote, no liaison between us is +possible. Let us forget what has happened. And before I go, tell me that +you bear me no grudge." + +He cried out at this. He would not have it so. He had not been beside +himself when he wrote her those ardent pages, he was in perfectly good +faith, he loved her-- + +"You love me! Why, you didn't even know that those letters were from me. +You loved an unknown, a chimera. Well, admitting that you are telling +the truth, the chimera does not exist now, for here I am." + +"You are mistaken. I knew perfectly that it was Mme. Chantelouve hiding +behind the pseudonym of Mme. Maubel." And he half-explained to her, +without, of course, letting her know of his doubts, how he had lifted +her mask. + +"Ah!" She reflected, blinking her troubled eyes. "At any rate," she +said, again facing him squarely, "you could not have recognized me in +the first letters, to which you responded with cries of passion. Those +cries were not addressed to me." + +He contested this observation, and became entangled in the dates and +happenings and in the sequence of the notes. She at length lost the +thread of his remarks. The situation was so ridiculous that both were +silent. Then she sat down and burst out laughing. + +Her strident, shrill laugh, revealing magnificent, but short and pointed +teeth, in a mocking mouth, vexed him. + +"She has been playing with me," he said to himself, and dissatisfied +with the turn the conversation had taken, and furious at seeing this +woman so calm, so different from her burning letters, he asked, in a +tone of irritation, "Am I to know why you laugh?" + +"Pardon me. It's a trick my nerves play on me, sometimes in public +places. But never mind. Let us be reasonable and talk things over. You +tell me you love me--" + +"And I mean it." + +"Well, admitting that I too am not indifferent, where is this going to +lead us? Oh, you know so well, you poor dear, that you refused, right at +first, the meeting which I asked in a moment of madness--and you gave +well-thought-out reasons for refusing." + +"But I refused because I did not know then that you were the women in +the case! I have told you that it was several days later that Des +Hermies unwittingly revealed your identity to me. Did I hesitate as soon +as I knew? No! I immediately implored you to come." + +"That may be, but you admit that I'm right when I claim that you wrote +your first letters to another and not me." + +She was pensive for a moment. Durtal began to be prodigiously bored by +this discussion. He thought it more prudent not to answer, and was +seeking a change of subject that would put an end to the deadlock. + +She herself got him out of his difficulty. "Let us not discuss it any +more," she said, smiling, "we shall not get anywhere. You see, this is +the situation: I am married to a very nice man who loves me and whose +only crime is that he represents the rather insipid happiness which one +has right at hand. I started this correspondence with you, so I am to +blame, and believe me, on his account I suffer. You have work to do, +beautiful books to write. You don't need to have a crazy woman come +walking into your life. So, you see, the best thing is for us to remain +friends, but true friends, and go no further." + +"And it is the woman who wrote me such vivid letters, who now speaks to +me of reason, good sense, and God knows what!" + +"But be frank, now. You don't love me." + +"I don't?" + +He took her hands, gently. She made no resistance, but looking at him +squarely she said, "Listen. If you had loved me you would have come to +see me; and yet for months you haven't tried to find out whether I was +alive or dead." + +"But you understand that I could not hope to be welcomed by you on the +terms we now are on, and too, in your parlour there are guests, your +husband--I have never had you even a little bit to myself at your home." + +He pressed her hands more tightly and came closer to her. She regarded +him with her smoky eyes, in which he now saw that dolent, almost +dolorous expression which had captivated him. He completely lost control +of himself before this voluptuous and plaintive face, but with a firm +gesture she freed her hands. + +"Enough. Sit down, now, and let's talk of something else. Do you know +your apartment is charming? Which saint is that?" she asked, examining +the picture, over the mantel, of the monk on his knees beside a +cardinal's hat and cloak. + +"I do not know." + +"I will find out for you. I have the lives of all the saints at home. It +ought to be easy to find out about a cardinal who renounced the purple +to go live in a hut. Wait. I think Saint Peter Damian did, but I am not +sure. I have such a poor memory. Help me think." + +"But I don't know who he is!" + +She came closer to him and put her hand on his shoulder. + +"Are you angry at me?" + +"I should say I am! When I desire you frantically, when I've been +dreaming for a whole week about this meeting, you come here and tell me +that all is over between us, that you do not love me--" + +She became demure. "But if I did not love you, would I have come to you? +Understand, then, that reality kills a dream; that it is better for us +not to expose ourselves to fearful regrets. We are not children, you +see. No! Let me go. Do not squeeze me like that!" Very pale, she +struggled in his embrace. "I swear to you that I will go away and that +you shall never see me again if you do not let me loose." Her voice +became hard. She was almost hissing her words. He let go of her. "Sit +down there behind the table. Do that for me." And tapping the floor with +her heel, she said, in a tone of melancholy, "Then it is impossible to +be friends, only friends, with a man. But it would be very nice to come +and see you without having evil thoughts to fear, wouldn't it?" She was +silent. Then she added, "Yes, just to see each other--and if we did not +have any sublime things to say to each other, it is also very nice to +sit and say nothing!" + +Then she said, "My time is up. I must go home." + +"And leave me with no hope?" he exclaimed, kissing her gloved hands. + +She did not answer, but gently shook her head, then, as he looked +pleadingly at her, she said, "Listen. If you will promise to make no +demands on me and to be good, I will come here night after next at nine +o'clock." + +He promised whatever she wished. And as he raised his head from her +hands and as his lips brushed lightly over her breast, which seemed to +tighten, she disengaged her hands, caught his nervously, and, clenching +her teeth, offered her neck to his lips. Then she fled. + +"Oof!" he said, closing the door after her. He was at the same time +satisfied and vexed. + +Satisfied, because he found her enigmatic, changeful, charming. Now that +he was alone he recalled her to memory. He remembered her tight black +dress, her fur cloak, the warm collar of which had caressed him as he +was covering her neck with kisses. He remembered that she wore no +jewellery, except sparkling blue sapphire eardrops. He remembered the +wayward blonde hair escaping from under the dark green otter hat. +Holding his hands to his nostrils he sniffed again the sweet and distant +odour, cinnamon lost among stronger perfumes, which he had caught from +the contact of her long, fawn-coloured suède gloves, and he saw again +her moist, rodent teeth, her thin, bitten lips, and her troubled eyes, +of a grey and opaque lustre which could suddenly be transfigured with +radiance. "Oh, night after next it will be great to kiss all that!" + +Vexed also, both with himself and with her. He reproached himself with +having been brusque and reserved. He ought to have shown himself more +expansive and less restrained. But it was her fault, for she had abashed +him! The incongruity between the woman who cried with voluptuous +suffering in her letters and the woman he had seen, so thoroughly +mistress of herself in her coquetries, was truly too much! + +"However you look at them, these women are astonishing creatures," he +thought. "Here is one who accomplishes the most difficult thing you can +imagine: coming to a man's room after having written him excessive +letters. I, I act like a goose. I stand there ill at ease. She, in a +second, has the self-assurance of a person in her own home, or visiting +in a drawing-room. No awkwardness, pretty gestures, a few words, and +eyes which supply everything! She isn't very agreeable," he thought, +reminded of the curt tone she had used when disengaging herself, "and +yet she has her tender spots," he continued dreamily, remembering not +so much her words as certain inflections of her voice and a certain +bewildered look in her eyes. "I must go about it prudently that night," +he concluded, addressing his cat, which, never having seen a woman +before, had fled at the arrival of Mme. Chantelouve and taken refuge +under the bed, but had now advanced almost grovelling, to sniff the +chair where she had sat. + +"Come to think of it, she is an old hand, Mme. Hyacinthe! She would not +have a meeting in a café nor in the street. She scented from afar the +assignation house or the hotel. And though, from the mere fact of my not +inviting her here, she could not doubt that I did not want to introduce +her to my lodging, she came here deliberately. Then, this first denial, +come to think of it, is only a fine farce. If she were not seeking a +liaison she would not have visited me. No, she wanted me to beg her to +do what she wanted to do. Like all women, she wanted me to offer her +what she desired. I have been rolled. Her arrival has knocked the props +out from under my whole method. But what does it matter? She is no less +desirable," he concluded, happy to get rid of disagreeable reflections +and plunge back into the delirious vision which he retained of her. +"That night won't be exactly dreary," he thought, seeing again her eyes, +imagining them in surrender, deceptive and plaintive, as he would +disrobe her and make a body white and slender, warm and supple, emerge +from her tight skirt. "She has no children. That is an earnest promise +that her flesh is quite firm, even at thirty!" + +A whole draft of youth intoxicated him. Durtal, astonished, took a look +at himself in the mirror. His tired eyes brightened, his face seemed +more youthful, less worn. "Lucky I had just shaved," he said to himself. +But gradually, as he mused, he saw in this mirror, which he was so +little in the habit of consulting, his features droop and his eyes lose +their sparkle. His stature, which had seemed to increase in this +spiritual upheaval, diminished again. Sadness returned to his +thoughtful mien. "I haven't what you would call the physique of a lady's +man," he concluded. "What does she see in me? for she could very easily +find someone else with whom to be unfaithful to her husband. Enough of +these rambling thoughts. Let's cease to think them. To sum up the +situation: I love her with my head and not my heart. That's the +important thing. Under such conditions, whatever happens, a love affair +is brief, and I am almost certain to get out of it without committing +any follies." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +The next morning he woke, thinking of her, just as he had been doing +when he went to sleep. He tried to rationalize the episode and revolved +his conjectures over and over. Once again he put himself this question: +"Why, when I went to her house, did she not let me see that I pleased +her? Never a look, never a word to encourage me. Why this +correspondence, when it was so easy to insist on having me to dine, so +simple to prepare an occasion which would bring us together, either at +her home or elsewhere?" And he answered himself, "It would have been +usual and not at all diverting. She is perhaps skilled in these matters. +She knows that the unknown frightens a man's reason away, that the +unembodied puts the soul in ferment, and she wished to give me a fever +before trying an attack--to call her advances by their right name. + +"It must be admitted that if my conjectures are correct she is strangely +astute. At heart she is, perhaps, quite simply a crazy romantic or a +comedian. It amuses her to manufacture little adventures, to throw +tantalizing obstacles in the way of the realization of a vulgar desire. +And Chantelouve? He is probably aware of his wife's goings on, which +perhaps facilitate his career. Otherwise, how could she arrange to come +here at nine o'clock at night, instead of the morning or afternoon on +pretence of going shopping?" + +To this new question there could be no answer, and little by little he +ceased to interrogate himself on the point. He began to be obsessed by +the real woman as he had been by the imaginary creature. The latter had +completely vanished. He did not even remember her physiognomy now. Mme. +Chantelouve, just as she was in reality, without borrowing the other's +features, had complete possession of him and fired his brain and senses +to white heat. He began to desire her madly and to wish furiously for +tomorrow night. And if she did not come? He felt cold in the small of +his back at the idea that she might be unable to get away from home or +that she might wilfully stay away. + +"High time it was over and done with," he said, for this Saint Vitus' +dance went on not without certain diminution of force, which disturbed +him. In fact he feared, after the febrile agitation of his nights, to +reveal himself as a sorry paladin when the time came. "But why bother?" +he rejoined, as he started toward Carhaix's, where he was to dine with +the astrologer Gévingey and Des Hermies. + +"I shall be rid of my obsession awhile," he murmured, groping along in +the darkness of the tower. + +Des Hermies, hearing him come up the stair, opened the door, casting a +shaft of light into the spiral. Durtal, reaching the landing, saw his +friend in shirt sleeves and enveloped in an apron. + +"I am, as you see, in the heat of composition," and upon a stew-pan +boiling on the stove Des Hermies cast that brief and sure look which a +mechanic gives his machine, then he consulted, as if it were a +manometer, his watch, hanging to a nail. "Look," he said, raising the +pot lid. + +Durtal bent over and through a cloud of vapour he saw a coiled napkin +rising and falling with the little billows. "Where is the leg of +mutton?" + +"It, my friend, is sewn into that cloth so tightly that the air cannot +enter. It is cooking in this pretty, singing sauce, into which I have +thrown a handful of hay, some pods of garlic and slices of carrot and +onion, some grated nutmeg, and laurel and thyme. You will have many +compliments to make me if Gévingey doesn't keep us waiting too long, +because a _gigot à l'Anglaise_ won't stand being cooked to shreds." + +Carhaix's wife looked in. + +"Come in," she said. "My husband is here." + +Durtal found him dusting the books. They shook hands. Durtal, at random, +looked over some of the dusted books lying on the table. + +"Are these," he asked, "technical works about metals and bell-founding +or are they about the liturgy of bells?" + +"They are not about founding, though there is sometimes reference to the +founders, the 'sainterers' as they were called in the good old days. You +will discover here and there some details about alloys of red copper and +fine tin. You will even find, I believe, that the art of the 'sainterer' +has been in decline for three centuries, probably due to the fact that +the faithful no longer melt down their ornaments of precious metals, +thus modifying the alloy. Or is it because the founders no longer invoke +Saint Anthony the Eremite when the bronze is boiling in the furnace? I +do not know. It is true, at any rate, that bells are now made in carload +lots. Their voices are without personality. They are all the same. +They're like docile and indifferent hired girls when formerly they were +like those aged servants who became part of the family whose joys and +griefs they have shared. But what difference does that make to the +clergy and the congregation? At present these auxiliaries devoted to the +cult do not represent any symbol. And that explains the whole +difficulty. + +"You asked me, a few seconds ago, whether these books treated of bells +from the liturgical point of view. Yes, most of them give tabulated +explanations of the significance of the various component parts. The +interpretations are simple and offer little variety." + +"What are a few of them?" + +"I can sum them all up for you in a very few words. According to the +_Rational_ of Guillaume Durand, the hardness of the metal signifies the +force of the preacher. The percussion of the clapper on the sides +expresses the idea that the preacher must first scourge himself to +correct himself of his own vices before reproaching the vices of others. +The wooden frame represents the cross of Christ, and the cord, which +formerly served to set the bell swinging, allegorizes the science of the +Scriptures which flows from the mystery of the Cross itself. + +"The most ancient liturgists expound practically the same symbols. Jean +Beleth, who lived in 1200, declares also that the bell is the image of +the preacher, but adds that its motion to and fro, when it is set +swinging, teaches that the preacher must by turns elevate his language +and bring it down within reach of the crowd. For Hugo of Saint Victor +the clapper is the tongue of the officiating priest, which strikes the +two sides of the vase and announces thus, at the same time, the truth of +the two Testaments. Finally, if we consult Fortunatus Amalarius, perhaps +the most ancient of the liturgists, we find simply that the body of the +bell denotes the mouth of the preacher and the hammer his tongue." + +"But," said Durtal, somewhat disappointed, "it isn't--what shall I +say?--very profound." + +The door opened. + +"Why, how are you!" said Carhaix, shaking hands with Gévingey, and then +introducing him to Durtal. + +While the bell-ringer's wife finished setting the table, Durtal examined +the newcomer. He was a little man, wearing a soft black felt hat and +wrapped up like an omnibus conductor in a cape with a military collar of +blue cloth. + +His head was like an egg with the hollow downward. The skull, waxed as +if with siccatif, seemed to have grown up out of the hair, which was +hard and like filaments of dried coconut and hung down over his neck. +The nose was bony, and the nostrils opened like two hatchways, over a +toothless mouth which was hidden by a moustache grizzled like the goatee +springing from the short chin. At first glance one would have taken him +for an art-worker, a wood engraver or a glider of saints' images, but on +looking at him more closely, observing the eyes, round and grey, set +close to the nose, almost crossed, and studying his solemn voice and +obsequious manners, one asked oneself from what quite special kind of +sacristy the man had issued. + +He took off his things and appeared in a black frock coat of square, +boxlike cut. A fine gold chain, passed about his neck, lost itself in +the bulging pocket of an old vest. Durtal gasped when Gévingey, as soon +as he had seated himself, complacently put his hands on exhibition, +resting them on his knees. Enormous, freckled with blotches of orange, +and terminating in milk-white nails cut to the quick, the fingers were +covered with huge rings, the sets of which formed a phalanx. + +Seeing Durtal's gaze fixed on his fingers, he smiled. "You examine my +valuables, monsieur. They are of three metals, gold, platinum, and +silver. This ring bears a scorpion, the sign under which I was born. +That with its two accoupled triangles, one pointing downward and the +other upward, reproduces the image of the macrocosm, the seal of +Solomon, the grand pantacle. As for the little one you see here," he +went on, showing a lady's ring set with a tiny sapphire between two +roses, "that is a present from a person whose horoscope I was good +enough to cast." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, somewhat surprised at the man's self-satisfaction. + +"Dinner is ready," said the bell-ringer's wife. + +Des Hermies, doffing his apron, appeared in his tight cheviot garments. +He was not so pale as usual, his cheeks being red from the heat of the +stove. He set the chairs around. + +Carhaix served the broth, and everyone was silent, taking spoonfuls of +the cooler broth at the edge of the bowl. Then madame brought Des +Hermies the famous leg of mutton to cut. It was a magnificent red, and +large drops flowed beneath the knife. Everybody ecstasized when tasting +this robust meat, aromatic with a purée of turnips sweetened with caper +sauce. + +Des Hermies bowed under a storm of compliments. Carhaix filled the +glasses, and, somewhat confused in the presence of Gévingey, paid the +astrologer effusive attention to make him forget their former +ill-feeling. Des Hermies assisted in this good work, and wishing also to +be useful to Durtal, brought the conversation around to the subject of +horoscopes. + +Then Gévingey mounted the rostrum. In a tone of satisfaction he spoke of +his vast labours, of the six months a horoscope required, of the +surprise of laymen when he declared that such work was not paid for by +the price he asked, five hundred francs. + +"But you see I cannot give my science for nothing," he said. "And now +people doubt astrology, which was revered in antiquity. Also in the +Middle Ages, when it was almost sacred. For instance, messieurs, look at +the portal of Notre Dame. The three doors which archeologists--not +initiated into the symbolism of Christianity and the occult--designate +by the names of the door of Judgment, the door of the Virgin, and the +door of Saint Marcel or Saint Anne, really represent Mysticism, +Astrology, and Alchemy, the three great sciences of the Middle Ages. +Today you find people who say, 'Are you quite sure that the stars have +an influence on the destiny of man?' But, messieurs, without entering +here into details reserved for the adept, in what way is this spiritual +influence stranger than that corporal influence which certain planets, +the moon, for example, exercise on the organs of men and women? + +"You are a physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, and you are not unaware that +the doctors Gillespin, Jackson, and Balfour, of Jamaica, have +established the influence of the constellations on human health in the +West Indies. At every change of the moon the number of sick people +augments. The acute crises of fever coincide with the phases of our +satellite. Finally, there are _lunatics_. Go out in the country and +ascertain at what periods madness becomes epidemic. But does this serve +to convince the incredulous?" he asked sorrowfully, contemplating his +rings. + +"It seems to me, on the contrary, that astrology is picking up," said +Durtal. "There are now two astrologers casting horoscopes in the next +column to the secret remedies on the fourth page of the newspapers." + +"And it's a shame! Those people don't even know the first thing about +the science. They are simply tricksters who hope thus to pick up some +money. What's the use of speaking of them when they _don't even exist_! +Really it must be admitted that only in England and America is there +anybody who knows how to establish the genethliac theme and construct a +horoscope." + +"I am very much afraid," said Des Hermies, "that not only these +so-called astrologers, but also all the mages, theosophists, occultists, +and cabalists of the present day, know absolutely nothing--those with +whom I am acquainted are indubitably, incontestably, ignorant imbeciles. +And that is the pure truth, messieurs. These people are, for the most +part, down-and-out journalists or broken spendthrifts seeking to exploit +the taste of a public weary of positivism. They plagiarize Eliphas Levi, +steal from Fabre d'Olivet, and write treatises of which they themselves +are incapable of making head or tail. It's a real pity, when you come to +think of it." + +"The more so as they discredit sciences which certainly contain verities +omitted in their jumble," said Durtal. + +"Then another lamentable thing," said Des Hermies, "is that in addition +to the dupes and simpletons, these little sects harbour some frightful +charlatans and windbags." + +"Péladan, among others. Who does not know that shoddy mage, +commercialized to his fingertips?" cried Durtal. + +"Oh, yes, that fellow--" + +"Briefly, messieurs," resumed Gévingey, "all these people are incapable +of obtaining in practise any effect whatever. The only man in this +century who, without being either a saint or a diabolist, has penetrated +the mysteries, is William Crookes." And as Durtal, who appeared to doubt +the apparitions sworn to by this Englishman, declared that no theory +could explain them, Gévingey perorated, "Permit me, messieurs. We have +the choice between two diverse, and I venture to say, very clear-cut +doctrines. Either the apparition is formed by the fluid disengaged by +the medium in trance to combine with the fluid of the persons present; +or else there are in the air immaterial beings, elementals as they are +called, which manifest themselves under very nearly determinable +conditions; or else, and this is the theory of pure spiritism, the +phenomena are produced by souls evoked from the dead." + +"I know it," Durtal said, "and that horrifies me. I know also the Hindu +dogma of the migrations of souls after death. These disembodied souls +stray until they are reincarnated or until they attain, from avatar to +avatar, to complete purity. Well, I think it's quite enough to live +once. I'd prefer nothingness, a hole in the ground, to all those +metamorphoses. It's more consoling to me. As for the evocation of the +dead, the mere thought that the butcher on the corner can force the soul +of Hugo, Balzac, Baudelaire, to converse with him, would put me beside +myself, if I believed it. Ah, no. Materialism, abject as it is, is less +vile than that." + +"Spiritism," said Carhaix, "is only a new name for the ancient +necromancy condemned and cursed by the Church." + +Gévingey looked at his rings, then emptied his glass. + +"In any case," he returned, "you will admit that these theories can be +upheld, especially that of the elementals, which, setting Satanism +aside, seems the most veridic, and certainly is the most clear. Space is +peopled by microbes. Is it more surprising that space should also be +crammed with spirits and larvæ? Water and vinegar are alive with +animalcules. The microscope shows them to us. Now why should not the +air, inaccessible to the sight and to the instruments of man, swarm, +like the other elements, with beings more or less corporeal, embryos +more or less mature?" + +"That is probably why cats suddenly look upward and gaze curiously into +space at something that is passing and that we can't see," said the +bell-ringer's wife. + +"No, thanks," said Gévingey to Des Hermies, who was offering him another +helping of egg-and-dandelion salad. + +"My friends," said the bell-ringer, "you forget only one doctrine, that +of the Church, which attributes all these inexplicable phenomena to +Satan. Catholicism has known them for a long time. It did not need to +wait for the first manifestations of the spirits--which were produced, I +believe, in 1847, in the United States, through the Fox family--before +decreeing that spirit rapping came from the Devil. You will find in +Saint Augustine the proof, for he had to send a priest to put an end to +noises and overturning of objects and furniture, in the diocese of +Hippo, analogous to those which Spiritism points out. At the time of +Theodoric also, Saint Cæsaræus ridded a house of lemurs haunting it. You +see, there are only the City of God and the City of the Devil. Now, +since God is above these cheap manipulations, the occultists and +spiritists satanize more or less, whether they wish to or not." + +"Nevertheless, Spiritism has accomplished one important thing. It has +violated the threshold of the unknown, broken the doors of the +sanctuary. It has brought about in the extranatural a revolution similar +to that which was effected in the terrestrial order in France in 1789. +It has democratized evocation and opened a whole new vista. Only, it has +lacked initiates to lead it, and, proceeding at random without science, +it has agitated good and bad spirits together. In Spiritism you will +find a jumble of everything. It is the hash of mystery, if I may be +permitted the expression." + +"The saddest thing about it," said Des Hermies, laughing, "is that at a +séance one never sees a thing! I know that experiments have been +successful, but those which I have witnessed--well, the experimenters +seemed to take a long shot and miss." + +"That is not surprising," said the astrologer, spreading some firm +candied orange jelly on a piece of bread, "the first law to observe in +magism and Spiritism is to send away the unbelievers, because very often +their fluid is antagonistic to that of the clairvoyant or the medium." + +"Then how can there be any assurance of the reality of the phenomena?" +thought Durtal. + +Carhaix rose. "I shall be back in ten minutes." He put on his greatcoat, +and soon the sound of his steps was lost in the tower. + +"True," murmured Durtal, consulting his watch. "It's a quarter to +eight." + +There was a moment of silence in the room. As all refused to have any +more dessert, Mme. Carhaix took up the tablecloth and spread an oilcloth +in its place. + +The astrologer played with his rings, turning them about; Durtal was +rolling a pellet of crumbled bread between his fingers; Des Hermies, +leaning over to one side, pulled from his patch pocket his embossed +Japanese pouch and made a cigarette. + +Then when the bell-ringer's wife had bidden them good night and retired +to her room, Des Hermies got the kettle and the coffee pot. + +"Want any help?" Durtal proposed. + +"You can get the little glasses and uncork the liqueur bottles, if you +will." + +As he opened the cupboard, Durtal swayed, dizzy from the strokes of the +bells which shook the walls and filled the room with clamour. + +"If there are spirits in this room, they must be getting knocked to +pieces," he said, setting the liqueur glasses on the table. + +"Bells drive phantoms and spectres away," Gévingey answered, doctorally, +filling his pipe. + +"Here," said Des Hermies, "will you pour hot water slowly into the +filter? I've got to feed the stove. It's getting chilly here. My feet +are freezing." + +Carhaix returned, blowing out his lantern. "The bell was in good voice, +this clear, dry night," and he took off his mountaineer cap and his +overcoat. + +"What do you think of him?" Des Hermies asked Durtal in a very low +voice, and pointed at the astrologer, now lost in a cloud of pipe smoke. + +"In repose he looks like an old owl, and when he speaks he makes me +think of a melancholy and discursive schoolmaster." + +"Only one," said Des Hermies to Carhaix, who was holding a lump of sugar +over Des Hermies's coffee cup. + +"I hear, monsieur, that you are occupied with a history of Gilles de +Rais," said Gévingey to Durtal. + +"Yes, for the time being I am up to my eyes in Satanism with that man." + +"And," said Des Hermies, "we were just going to appeal to your extensive +knowledge. You only can enlighten my friend on one of the most obscure +questions of Diabolism." + +"Which one?" + +"That of incubacy and succubacy." + +Gévingey did not answer at once. "That is a much graver question than +Spiritism," he said at last, "and grave in a different way. But monsieur +already knows something about it?" + +"Only that opinions differ. Del Rio and Bodin, for instance, consider +the incubi as masculine demons which couple with women and the succubi +as demons who consummate the carnal act with men. + +"According to their theories the incubi take the semen lost by men in +dream and make use of it. So that two questions arise: first, can a +child be born of such a union? The possibility of this kind of +procreation has been upheld by the Church doctors, who affirm, even, +that children of such commerce are heavier than others and can drain +three nurses without taking on flesh. The second question is whether the +demon who copulates with the mother or the man whose semen has been +taken is the father of the child. To which Saint Thomas answers, with +more or less subtle arguments, that the real father is not the incubus +but the man." + +"For Sinistrari d'Ameno," observed Durtal, "the incubi and succubi are +not precisely demons, but animal spirits, intermediate between the demon +and the angel, a sort of satyr or faun, such as were revered in the time +of paganism, a sort of imp, such as were exorcised in the Middle Ages. +Sinistrari adds that they do not need to pollute a sleeping man, since +they possess genitals and are endowed with prolificacy." + +"Well, there is nothing further," said Gévingey. "Görres, so learned, so +precise, in his _Mystik_ passes rapidly over this question, even +neglects it, and the Church, you know, is completely silent, for the +Church does not like to treat this subject and views askance the priest +who does occupy himself with it." + +"I beg your pardon," said Carhaix, always ready to defend the Church. +"The Church has never hesitated to declare itself on this detestable +subject. The existence of succubi and incubi is certified by Saint +Augustine, Saint Thomas, Saint Bonaventure, Denys le Chartreux, Pope +Innocent VIII, and how many others! The question is resolutely settled +for every Catholic. It also figures in the lives of some of the saints, +if I am not mistaken. Yes, in the legend of Saint Hippolyte, Jacques de +Voragine tells how a priest, tempted by a naked succubus, cast his stole +at its head and it suddenly became the corpse of some dead woman whom +the Devil had animated to seduce him." + +"Yes," said Gévingey, whose eyes twinkled. "The Church recognizes +succubacy, I grant. But let me speak, and you will see that my +observations are not uncalled for. + +"You know very well, messieurs," addressing Des Hermies and Durtal, +"what the books teach, but within a hundred years everything has +changed, and if the facts I am are unknown to the many members of the +clergy, and you will not find them cited in any book whatever. + +"At present it is less frequently demons than bodies raised from the +dead which fill the indispensable rôle of incubus and succubus. In other +words, formerly the living being subject to succubacy was known to be +possessed. Now that vampirism, by the evocation of the dead, is joined +to demonism, the victim is worse than possessed. The Church did not know +what to do. Either it must keep silent or reveal the possibility of the +evocation of the dead, already forbidden by Moses, and this admission +was dangerous, for it popularized the knowledge of acts that are easier +to produce now than formerly, since without knowing it Spiritism has +traced the way. + +"So the Church has kept silent. And Rome is not unaware of the frightful +advance incubacy has made in the cloisters in our days." + +"That proves that continence is hard to bear in solitude," said Des +Hermies. + +"It merely proves that the soul is feeble and that people have forgotten +how to pray," said Carhaix. + +"However that may be, messieurs, to instruct you completely in this +matter, I must divide the creatures smitten with incubacy or succubacy +into two classes. The first is composed of persons who have directly and +voluntarily given themselves over to the demoniac action of the spirits. +These persons are quite rare and they all die by suicide or some other +form of violent death. The second is composed of persons on whom the +visitation of spirits has been imposed by a spell. These are very +numerous, especially in the convents dominated by the demoniac +societies. Ordinarily these victims end in madness. The psychopathic +hospitals are crowded with them. The doctors and the majority of the +priests do not know the cause of their madness, but the cases are +curable. A thaumaturge of my acquaintance has saved a good many of the +bewitched who without his aid would be howling under hydrotherapeutic +douches. There are certain fumigations, certain exsufflations, certain +commandments written on a sheet of virgin parchment thrice blessed and +worn like an amulet which almost always succeed in delivering the +patient." + +"I want to ask you," said Des Hermies, "does a woman receive the visit +of the incubus while she is asleep or while she is awake?" + +"A distinction must be made. If the woman is not the victim of a spell, +if she voluntarily consorts with the impure spirit, she is always awake +when the carnal act takes place. If, on the other hand, the woman is the +victim of sorcery, the sin is committed either while she is asleep or +while she is awake, but in the latter case she is in a cataleptic state +which prevents her from defending herself. The most powerful of +present-day exorcists, the man who has gone most thoroughly into this +matter, one Johannès, Doctor of Theology, told me that he had saved nuns +who had been ridden without respite for two, three, even four days by +incubi!" + +"I know that priest," remarked Des Hermies. + +"And the act is consummated in the same manner as the normal human act?" + +"Yes and no. Here the dirtiness of the details makes me hesitate," said +Gévingey, becoming slightly red. "What I can tell you is more than +strange. Know, then, that the organ of the incubus is bifurcated and at +the same time penetrates both vases. Formerly it extended, and while one +branch of the fork acted in the licit channels, the other at the same +time reached up to the lower part of the face. You may imagine, +gentlemen, how life must be shortened by operations which are multiplied +through all the senses." + +"And you are sure that these are facts?" + +"Absolutely." + +"But come now, you have proofs?" + +Gévingey was silent, then, "The subject is so grave and I have gone so +far that I had better go the rest of the way. I am not mad nor the +victim of hallucination. Well, messieurs, I slept one time in the room +of the most redoubtable master Satanism now can claim." + +"Canon Docre," Des Hermies interposed. + +"Yes, and my sleep was fitful. It was broad daylight. I swear to you +that the succubus came, irritant and palpable and most tenacious. +Happily, I remembered the formula of deliverance, which kept me-- + +"So I ran that very day to Doctor Johannès, of whom I have spoken. He +immediately and forever, I hope, liberated me from the spell." + +"If I did not fear to be indiscreet, I would ask you what kind of thing +this succubus was, whose attack you repulsed." + +"Why, it was like any naked woman," said the astrologer hesitantly. + +"Curious, now, if it had demanded its little gifts, its little gloves--" +said Durtal, biting his lips. + +"And do you know what has become of the terrible Docre?" Des Hermies +inquired. + +"No, thank God. They say he is in the south, somewhere around Nîmes, +where he formerly resided." + +"But what does this abbé do?" inquired Durtal. + +"What does he do? He evokes the Devil, and he feeds white mice on the +hosts which he consecrates. His frenzy for sacrilege is such that he had +the image of Christ tattooed on his heels so that he could always step +on the Saviour!" + +"Well," murmured Carhaix, whose militant moustache bristled while his +great eyes flamed, "if that abominable priest were here, I swear to you +that I would respect his feet, but that I would throw him downstairs +head first." + +"And the black mass?" inquired Des Hermies. + +"He celebrates it with foul men and women. He is openly accused of +having influenced people to make wills in his favor and of causing +inexplicable death. Unfortunately, there are no laws to repress +sacrilege, and how can you prosecute a man who sends maladies from a +distance and kills slowly in such a way that at the autopsy no traces of +poison appear?" + +"The modern Gilles de Rais!" exclaimed Durtal. + +"Yes, less savage, less frank, more hypocritically cruel. He does not +cut throats. He probably limits himself to 'sendings' or to causing +suicide by suggestion," said Des Hermies, "for he is, I believe, a +master hypnotist." + +"Could he insinuate into a victim the idea to drink, regularly, in +graduated doses, a toxin which he would designate, and which would +simulate the phases of a malady?" asked Durtal. + +"Nothing simpler. 'Open window burglars' that the physicians of the +present day are, they recognize perfectly the ability of a more skilful +man to pull off such jobs. The experiments of Beaunis, Liégois, Liébaut, +and Bernheim are conclusive: you can even get a person assassinated by +another to whom you suggest, without his knowledge, the will to the +crime." + +"I was thinking of something, myself," said Carhaix, who had been +reflecting and not listening to this discussion of hypnotism. "Of the +Inquisition. It certainly had its reason for being. It is the only agent +that could deal with this fallen priest whom the Church has swept out." + +"And remember," said Des Hermies, with his crooked smile playing around +the corner of his mouth, "that the ferocity of the Inquisition has been +greatly exaggerated. No doubt the benevolent Bodin speaks of driving +long needles between the nails and the flesh of the sorcerers' fingers. +'An excellent gehenna,' says he. He eulogizes equally the torture by +fire, which he characterizes as 'an exquisite death.' But he wishes only +to turn the magicians away from their detestable practises and save +their souls. Then Del Rio declares that 'the question' must not be +applied to demoniacs after they have eaten, for fear they will vomit. He +worried about their stomachs, this worthy man. Wasn't it also he who +decreed that the torture must not be repeated twice in the same day, so +as to give fear and pain a chance to calm down? Admit that the good +Jesuit was not devoid of delicacy!" + +"Docre," Gévingey went on, not paying any attention to the words of Des +Hermies, "is the only individual who has rediscovered the ancient +secrets and who obtains results in practise. He is rather more powerful, +I would have you believe, than all those fools and quacks of whom we +have been speaking. And they know the terrible canon, for he has sent +many of them serious attacks of ophthalmia which the oculists cannot +cure. So they tremble when the name Docre is pronounced in their +presence." + +"But how did a priest fall so low?" + +"I can't say. If you wish ampler information about him," said Gévingey, +addressing Des Hermies, "question your friend Chantelouve." + +"Chantelouve!" cried Durtal. + +"Yes, he and his wife used to be quite intimate with Canon Docre, but I +hope for their sakes that they have long since ceased to have dealings +with the monster." + +Durtal listened no more. Mme. Chantelouve knew Canon Docre! Ah, was she +Satanic, too? No, she certainly did not act like a possessed. "Surely +this astrologer is cracked," he thought. She! And he called her image +before him, and thought that tomorrow night she would probably give +herself to him. Ah, those strange eyes of hers, those dark clouds +suddenly cloven by radiant light! + +She came now and took complete possession of him, as before he had +ascended to the tower. "But if I didn't love you would I have come to +you?" That sentence which she had spoken, with a caressing inflection of +the voice, he heard again, and again he saw her mocking and tender face. + +"Ah, you are dreaming," said Des Hermies, tapping him on the shoulder. +"We have to go. It's striking ten." + +When they were in the street they said good night to Gévingey, who lived +on the other side of the river. Then they walked along a little way. + +"Well," said Des Hermies, "are you interested in my astrologer?" + +"He is slightly mad, isn't he?" + +"Slightly? Humph." + +"Well, his stories are incredible." + +"Everything is incredible," said Des Hermies placidly, turning up the +collar of his overcoat. "However, I will admit that Gévingey astounds me +when he asserts that he was visited by a succubus. His good faith is not +to be doubted, for I know him to be a man who means what he says, though +he is vain and doctorial. I know, too, that at La Salpêtrière such +occurrences are not rare. Women smitten with hystero-epilepsy see +phantoms beside them in broad daylight and mate with them in a +cataleptic state, and every night couch with visions that must be +exactly like the fluid creatures of incubacy. But these women are +hystero-epileptics, and Gévingey isn't, for I am his physician. Then, +what can be believed and what can be proved? The materialists have taken +the trouble to revise the accounts of the sorcery trials of old. They +have found in the possession-cases of the Ursulines of Loudun and the +nuns of Poitiers, in the history, even, of the convulsionists of Saint +Médard, the symptoms of major hysteria, the same contractions of the +whole system, the same muscular dissolutions, the same lethargies, even, +finally, the famous arc of the circle. And what does this demonstrate, +that these demonomaniacs were hystero-epileptics? Certainly. The +observations of Dr. Richet, expert in such matters, are conclusive, but +wherein do they invalidate possession? From the fact that the patients +of La Salpêtrière are not possessed, though they are hysterical, does it +follow that others, smitten with the same malady as they, are not +possessed? It would have to be demonstrated also that all demonopathics +are hysterical, and that is false, for there are women of sound mind and +perfectly good sense who are demonopathic without knowing it. And +admitting that the last point is controvertible, there remains this +unanswerable question: is a woman possessed because she is hysterical, +or is she hysterical because she is possessed? Only the Church can +answer. Science cannot. + +"No, come to think it over, the effrontery of the positivists is +appalling. They decree that Satanism does not exist. They lay everything +at the account of major hysteria, and they don't even know what this +frightful malady is and what are its causes. No doubt Charcot determines +very well the phases of the attack, notes the nonsensical and passional +attitudes, the contortionistic movements; he discovers hysterogenic +zones and can, by skilfully manipulating the ovaries, arrest or +accelerate the crises, but as for foreseeing them and learning the +sources and the motives and curing them, that's another thing. Science +goes all to pieces on the question of this inexplicable, stupefying +malady, which, consequently, is subject to the most diversified +interpretations, not one of which can be declared exact. For the soul +enters into this, the soul in conflict with the body, the soul +overthrown in the demoralization of the nerves. You see, old man, all +this is as dark as a bottle of ink. Mystery is everywhere and reason +cannot see its way." + +"Mmmm," said Durtal, who was now in front of his door. "Since anything +can be maintained and nothing is certain, succubacy has it. Basically it +is more literary--and cleaner--than positivism." + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +The day was long and hard to kill. Waking at dawn, full of thoughts of +Mme. Chantelouve, he could not stay in one place, and kept inventing +excuses for going out. He had no cakes, bonbons, and exotic liqueurs, +and one must not be without all the little essentials when expecting a +visit from a woman. He went by the longest route to the avenue de +l'Opéra to buy fine essences of cedar and of that alkermes which makes +the person tasting it think he is in an Oriental pharmaceutic +laboratory. "The idea is," he said, "not so much to treat Hyacinthe as +to astound her by giving her a sip of an unknown elixir." + +He came back laden with packages, then went out again, and in the street +was assailed by an immense ennui. After an interminable tour of the +quays he finally tumbled into a beer hall. He fell on a bench and opened +a newspaper. + +What was he thinking as he sat, not reading but just looking at the +police news? Nothing, not even of her. From having revolved the same +matter over and over again and again his mind had reached a deadlock and +refused to function. Durtal merely found himself very tired, very +drowsy, as one in a warm bath after a night of travel. + +"I must go home pretty soon," he said when he could collect himself a +little, "for Père Rateau certainly has not cleaned house in the thorough +fashion which I commanded, and of course I don't want the furniture to +be covered with dust. Six o'clock. Suppose I dine, after a fashion, in +some not too unreliable place." + +He remembered a nearby restaurant where he had eaten before without a +great deal of dread. He chewed his way laboriously through an extremely +dead fish, then through a piece of meat, flabby and cold; then he found +a very few lentils, stiff with insecticide, beneath a great deal of +sauce; finally he savoured some ancient prunes, whose juice smelt of +mould and was at the same time aquatic and sepulchral. + +Back in his apartment, he lighted fires in his bedroom and in his study, +then he inspected everything. He was not mistaken. The concierge had +upset the place with the same brutality, the same haste, as customarily. +However, he must have tried to wash the windows, because the glass was +streaked with finger marks. + +Durtal effaced the imprints with a damp cloth, smoothed out the folds in +the carpet, drew the curtains, and put the bookcases in order after +dusting them with a napkin. Everywhere he found grains of tobacco, +trodden cigarette ashes, pencil sharpenings, pen points eaten with rust. +He also found cocoons of cat fur and crumpled bits of rough draft +manuscript which had been whirled into all corners by the furious +sweeping. + +He finally could not help asking himself why he had so long tolerated +the fuzzy filth which obscured and incrusted his household. While he +dusted, his indignation against Rateau increased mightily. "Look at +that," he said, perceiving his wax candles grown as yellow as tallow +ones. He changed them. "That's better." He arranged his desk into +studied disarray. Notebooks, and books with paper-cutters in them for +book-marks, he laid in careful disorder. "Symbol of work," he said, +smiling, as he placed an old folio, open, on a chair. Then he passed +into his bedroom. With a wet sponge he freshened up the marble of the +dresser, then he smoothed the bed cover, straightened his photographs +and engravings, and went into the bathroom. Here he paused, +disheartened. In a bamboo rack over the wash-bowl there was a chaos of +phials. Resolutely he grabbed the perfume bottles, scoured the bottoms +and necks with emery, rubbed the labels with gum elastic and bread +crumbs, then he soaped the tub, dipped the combs and brushes in an +ammoniac solution, got his vapourizer to working and sprayed the room +with Persian lilac, washed the linoleum, and scoured the seat and the +pipes. Seized with a mania for cleanliness, he polished, scrubbed, +scraped, moistened, and dried, with great sweeping strokes of the arm. +He was no longer vexed at the concierge; he was even sorry the old +villain had not left him more to do. + +Then he shaved, touched up his moustache, and proceeded to make an +elaborate toilet, asking himself, as he dressed, whether he had better +wear button shoes or slippers. He decided that shoes were less familiar +and more dignified but resolved to wear a flowing tie and a blouse, +thinking that this artistic negligée would please a woman. + +"All ready," he said, after a last stroke of the brush. He made the turn +of the other rooms, poked the fires, and fed the cat, which was running +about in alarm, sniffing all the cleaned objects and doubtless thinking +that those he rubbed against every day without paying any attention to +them had been replaced by new ones. + +"Oh, the 'little essentials' I am forgetting!" Durtal put the teakettle +on the hob and placed cups, teapot, sugar bowl, cakes, bonbons, and tiny +liqueur glasses on an old lacquered "waiter" so as to have everything on +hand when it was time to serve. + +"Now I'm through. I've given the place a thorough cleaning. Let her +come," he said to himself, realigning some books whose backs stuck out +further than the others on the shelves. "Everything in good shape. +Except the chimney of the lamp. Where it bulges, there are caramel +specks and blobs of soot, but I can't get the thing out; I don't want to +burn my fingers; and anyway, with the shade lowered a bit she won't +notice. + +"Well, how shall I proceed when she does come?" he asked himself, +sinking into an armchair. "She enters. Good. I take her hands. I kiss +them. Then I bring her into this room. I have her sit down beside the +fire, in this chair. I station myself, facing her, on this stool. +Advancing a little, touching her knees, I can seize her. I make her bend +over. I am supporting her whole weight. I bring her lips to mine and I +am saved! + +"--Or rather lost. For then the bother begins. I can't bear to think of +getting her into the bedroom. Undressing and going to bed! That part is +appalling unless you know each other very well. And when you are just +becoming acquainted! The nice way is to have a cosy little supper for +two. The wine has an ungodly kick to it. She immediately passes out, and +when she comes to she is lying in bed under a shower of kisses. As we +can't do it that way we shall have to avoid mutual embarrassment by +making a show of passion. If I speed up the tempo and pretend to be in a +frenzy perhaps we shall not have time to think about the miserable +details. So I must possess her here, in this very spot, and she must +think I have lost my head when she succumbs. + +"It's hard to arrange in this room, because there isn't any divan. The +best way would be to throw her down on the carpet. She can put her hands +over her eyes, as they always do. I shall take good care to turn down +the lamp before she rises. + +"Well, I had better prepare a cushion for her head." He found one and +slid it under the chair. "And I had better not wear suspenders, for they +often cause ridiculous delays." He took them off and put on a belt. "But +then there is that damned question of the skirts! I admire the novelists +who can get a virgin unharnessed from her corsets and deflowered in the +winking of an eye--as if it were possible! How annoying to have to fight +one's way through all those starched entanglements! I do hope Mme. +Chantelouve will be considerate and avoid those ridiculous difficulties +as much as possible--for her own sake." + +He consulted his watch. "Half-past eight. I mustn't expect her for +nearly an hour, because, like all women, she will come late. What kind +of an excuse will she make to Chantelouve, to get away tonight? Well, +that is none of my business. Hmmm. This water heater beside the fire +looks like the invitation to the toilet, but no, the tea things handy +banish any gross idea." + +And if Hyacinthe did not come? + +"She will come," he said to himself, suddenly moved. "What motive would +she have for staying away? She knows that she cannot inflame me more +than I am inflamed." Then, jumping from phase to phase of the same old +question, "This will turn out badly, of course," he decided. "Once I am +satisfied, disenchantment is inevitable. Oh, well, so much the better, +for with this romance going on I cannot work." + +"Miserable me! relapsing--only in mind, alas!--to the age of twenty. I +am waiting for a woman. I who have scorned the doings of lovers for +years and years. I look at my watch every five minutes, and I listen, in +spite of myself, thinking it is her step I hear on the stair. + +"No, there is no getting around it. The little blue flower, the +perennial of the soul, is difficult to extirpate, and it keeps growing +up again. It does not show itself for twenty years, and then all of a +sudden, you know not why nor how, it sprouts, and then forth comes a +burst of blossoms. My God! I am getting foolish." + +He jumped from his chair. There was a gentle ring. "Not nine o'clock +yet. It isn't she," he murmured, opening the door. + +He squeezed her hands and thanked her for being so punctual. + +She said she was not feeling well. "I came only because I didn't want to +keep you waiting in vain." + +His heart sank. + +"I have a fearful headache," she said, passing her gloved hands over her +forehead. + +He took her furs and motioned her to the armchair. Prepared to follow +his plan of attack, he sat down on the stool, but she refused the +armchair and took a seat beside the table. Rising, he bent over her and +caught hold of her fingers. + +"Your hand is burning," she said. + +"Yes, a bit of fever, because I get so little sleep. If you knew how +much I have thought about you! Now I have you here, all to myself," and +he spoke of that persistent odour of cinnamon, faint, distant, expiring +amid the less definite odours which her gloves exhaled, "well," and he +sniffed her fingers, "you will leave some of yourself here when you go +away." + +She rose, sighing. "I see you have a cat. What is his name?" + +"Mouche." + +She called to the cat, which fled precipitately. + +"Mouche! Mouche!" Durtal called, but Mouche took refuge under the bed +and refused to come out. "You see he is rather bashful. He has never +seen a woman." + +"Oh, would you try to make me think you have never received a woman +here?" + +He swore that he never had, that she was the first.... + +"And you were not really anxious that this--first--should come?" + +He blushed. "Why do you say that?" + +She made a vague gesture. "I want to tease you," she said, sitting down +in the armchair. "To tell you the truth, I do not know why I like to ask +you such presumptuous questions." + +He had sat down in front of her. So now, at last, the scene was set as +he wished and he must begin the attack. His knee touched hers. + +"You know," he said, "that you cannot presume here. You have claims +on--" + +"No, I haven't and I want none." + +"Why?" + +"Because.... Listen," and her voice became grave and firm. "The more I +reflect, the more inclined I am to ask you, for heaven's sake, not to +destroy our dream. And then.... Do you want me to be frank, so frank +that I shall doubtless seem a monster of selfishness? Well, personally, +I do not wish to spoil the--the--what shall I say?--the extreme +happiness our relation gives me. I know I explain badly and confusedly, +but this is the way it is: I possess you when and how I please, just as, +for a long time, I have possessed Byron, Baudelaire, Gérard de Nerval, +those I love--" + +"You mean ...?" + +"That I have only to desire them, to desire you, before I go to +sleep...." + +"And?" + +"And you would be inferior to my chimera, to the Durtal I adore, whose +caresses make my nights delirious!" + +He looked at her in stupefaction. She had that dolent, troubled look in +her eyes. She even seemed not to see him, but to be looking into space. +He hesitated.... In a sudden flash of thought he saw the scenes of +incubacy of which Gévingey had spoken. "We shall untangle all this +later," he thought within himself, "meanwhile--" He took her gently by +the arms, drew her to him and abruptly kissed her mouth. + +She rebounded as if she had had an electric shock. She struggled to +rise. He strained her to him and embraced her furiously, then with a +strange gurgling cry she threw her head back and caught his leg between +both of hers. + +He emitted a howl of rage, for he felt her haunches move. He understood +now--or thought he understood! She wanted a miserly pleasure, a sort of +solitary vice.... + +He pushed her away. She remained there, quite pale, choking, her eyes +closed, her hands outstretched like those of a frightened child. Then +Durtal's wrath vanished. With a little cry he came up to her and caught +her again, but she struggled, crying, "No! I beseech you, let me go." + +He held her crushed against his body and attempted to make her yield. + +"I implore you, let me go." + +Her accent was so despairing that he relinquished her. Then he debated +with himself whether to throw her brutally on the floor and violate her. +But her bewildered eyes frightened him. + +She was panting and her arms hung limp at her sides as she leaned, very +pale, against the bookcase. + +"Ah!" he said, marching up and down, knocking into the furniture, "I +must really love you, if in spite of your supplications and refusals--" + +She joined her hands to keep him away. + +"Good God!" he said, exasperated, "what are you made of?" + +She came to herself, and, offended, she said to him, "Monsieur, I too +suffer. Spare me," and pell-mell she spoke of her husband, of her +confessor, and became so incoherent that Durtal was frightened. She was +silent, then in a singing voice she said, "Tell me, you will come to my +house tomorrow night, won't you?" + +"But I suffer too!" + +She seemed not to hear him. In her smoky eyes, far, far back, there +seemed to be a twinkle of feeble light. She murmured, in the cadence of +a canticle, "Tell me, dear, you will come tomorrow night, won't you?" + +"Yes," he said at last. + +Then she readjusted herself and without saying a word quitted the room. +In silence he accompanied her to the entrance. She opened the door, +turned around, took his hand and very lightly brushed it with her lips. + +He stood there stupidly, not knowing what to make of her behaviour. + +"What does she mean?" he exclaimed, returning to the room, putting the +furniture back in place and smoothing the disordered carpet. "Heavens, I +wish I could as easily restore order to my brain. Let me think, if I +can. What is she after? Because, of course, she has something in view. +She does not want our relation to culminate in the act itself. Does she +really fear disillusion, as she claims? Is she really thinking how +grotesque the amorous somersaults are? Or is she, as I believe, a +melancholy and terrible player-around-the-edges, thinking only of +herself? Well, her obscene selfishness is one of those complicated sins +that have to be shriven by the very highest confessor. She's a plain +teaser! + +"I don't know. Incubacy enters into this. She admits--so placidly!--that +in dream she cohabits at will with dead or living beings. Is she +Satanizing, and is this some of the work of Canon Docre? He's a friend +of hers. + +"So many riddles impossible to solve. What is the meaning of this +unexpected invitation for tomorrow night? Does she wish to yield nowhere +except in her own home? Does she feel more at ease there, or does she +think the propinquity of her husband will render the sin more piquant? +Does she loathe Chantelouve, and is this a meditated vengeance, or does +she count on the fear of danger to spur our senses? + +"After all, I think it is probably a final coquetry, an appetizer before +the repast. And women are so funny anyway! She probably thinks these +delays and subterfuges are necessary to differentiate her from a +cocotte. Or perhaps there is a physical necessity for stalling me off +another day." + +He sought other reasons but could find none. + +"Deep down in my heart," he said, vexed in spite of himself by this +rebuff, "I know I have been an imbecile. I ought to have acted the cave +man and paid no attention to her supplications and lies. I ought to have +taken violent possession of her lips and breast. Then it would be +finished, whereas now I must begin at the beginning again, and God damn +her! I have other things to do. + +"Who knows whether she isn't laughing at me this very moment? Perhaps +she wanted me to be more violent and bold--but no, her soul-sick voice +was not feigned, her poor eyes did not simulate bewilderment, and then +what would she have meant by that _respectful_ kiss--for there was an +impalpable shade of respect and gratitude in that kiss which she planted +on my hand!" + +She was too much for him. "Meanwhile, in this hurly-burly I have +forgotten my refreshments. Suppose I take off my shoes, now that I am +alone, for my feet are swollen from parading up and down the room. +Suppose I do better yet and go to bed, for I am incapable of working or +reading," and he drew back the covers. + +"Decidedly, nothing happens the way one foresees it, yet my plan of +attack wasn't badly thought out," he said, crawling in. With a sigh he +blew out the lamp, and the cat, reassured, passed over him, lighter than +a breath, and curled up without a sound. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +Contrary to his expectations, he slept all night, with clenched fists, +and woke next morning quite calm, even gay. The scene of the night +before, which ought to have exacerbated his senses, produced exactly the +opposite effect. The truth is that Durtal was not of those who are +attracted by difficulties. He always made one hardy effort to surmount +them, then when that failed he would withdraw, with no desire to renew +the combat. If Mme. Chantelouve thought to entice him by delays, she had +miscalculated. This morning, already, he was weary of the comedy. + +His reflections began to be slightly tinged with bitterness. He was +angry at the woman for having wished to keep him in suspense, and he was +angry at himself for having permitted her to make a fool of him. Then +certain expressions, the impertinence of which had not struck him at +first, chilled him now. "Her nervous trick of laughing, which sometimes +caught her in public places," then her declaration that she did not need +his permission, nor even his person, in order to possess him, seemed to +him unbecoming, to say the least, and uncalled for, as he had not run +after her nor indeed made any advances to her at all. + +"I will fix you," he said, "when I get some hold over you." + +But in the calm awakening of this morning the spell of the woman had +relaxed. Resolutely he thought, "Keep two dates with her. This one +tonight at her house. It won't count, because nothing can be done. For I +intend neither to allow myself to be assaulted nor to attempt an +assault. I certainly have no desire to be caught by Chantelouve _in +flagrante delicto_, and probably get into a shooting scrape and be haled +into police court. Have her here once. If she does not yield then, why, +the matter is closed. She can go and tickle somebody else." + +And he made a hearty breakfast, and sat down to his writing table and +ran over the scattered notes for his book. + +"I had got," he said, glancing at his last chapter, "to where the +alchemic experiments and diabolic evocations have proved unavailing. +Prelati, Blanchet, all the sorcerers and sorcerers' helpers whom the +Marshal has about him, admit that to bring Satan to him Gilles must make +over his soul and body to the Devil or commit crimes. + +"Gilles refuses to alienate his existence and sell his soul, but he +contemplates murder without any horror. This man, so brave on the +battlefield, so courageous when he accompanied Jeanne d'Arc, trembles +before the Devil and is afraid when he thinks of eternity and of Christ. +The same is true of his accomplices. He has made them swear on the +Testament to keep the secret of the confounding turpitudes which the +château conceals, and he can be sure that not one will violate the oath, +for, in the Middle Ages, the most reckless of freebooters would not +commit the inexpiable sin of deceiving God. + +"At the same time that his alchemists abandon their unfruitful furnaces, +Gilles begins a course of systematic gluttony, and his flesh, set on +fire by the essences of inordinate potations and spiced dishes, seethes +in tumultuous eruption. + +"Now, there are no women in the château. Gilles appears to have despised +the sex ever since leaving the court. After experience of the ribalds of +the camps and frequentation, with Xaintrailles and La Hire, of the +prostitutes of Charles VII, it seems that a dislike for the feminine +form came over him. Like others whose ideal of concupiscence is +deteriorated and deviated, he certainly comes to be disgusted by the +delicacy of the grain of the skin of women and by that odour of +femininity which all sodomists abhor. + +"He depraves the choir boys who are under his authority. He chose them +in the first place, these little psaltry ministrants, for their beauty, +and 'beautiful as angels' they are. They are the only ones he loves, the +only ones he spares in his murderous transports. + +"But soon infantile pollution seems to him an insipid delicacy. The law +of Satanism which demands that the elect of Evil, once started, must go +the whole way, is once more fulfilled. Gilles's soul must become +thoroughly cankered, a red tabernacle, that in it the Very Low may dwell +at ease. + +"The litanies of lust arise in an atmosphere that is like the wind over +a slaughter house. The first victim is a very small boy whose name we do +not know. Gilles disembowels him, and, cutting off the hands and tearing +out the eyes and heart, carries these members into Prelati's chamber. +The two men offer them, with passionate objurgations, to the Devil, who +holds his peace. Gilles, confounded, flees. Prelati rolls up the poor +remains in linen and, trembling, goes out at night to bury them in +consecrated ground beside a chapel dedicated to Saint Vincent. + +"Gilles preserves the blood of this child to write formulas of evocation +and conjurements. It manures a horrible crop. Not long afterward the +Marshal reaps the most abundant harvest of crimes that has ever been +sown. + +"From 1432 to 1440, that is to say during the eight years between the +Marshal's retreat and his death, the inhabitants of Anjou, Poitou, and +Brittany walk the highways wringing their hands. All the children +disappear. Shepherd boys are abducted from the fields. Little girls +coming out of school, little boys who have gone to play ball in the +lanes or at the edge of the wood, return no more. + +"In the course of an investigation ordered by the duke of Brittany, the +scribes of Jean Touscheronde, duke's commissioner in these matters, +compile interminable lists of lost children. + +"Lost, at la Rochebernart, the child of the woman Péronne, 'a child who +did go to school and who did apply himself to his book with exceeding +diligence.' + +"Lost, at Saint Etienne de Montluc, the son of Guillaume Brice, 'and +this was a poor man and sought alms.' + +"Lost, at Mâchecoul, the son of Georget le Barbier, 'who was seen, a +certain day, knocking apples from a tree behind the hôtel Rondeau, and +who since hath not been seen.' + +"Lost, at Thonaye, the child of Mathelin Thouars, 'and he had been heard +to cry and lament and the said child was about twelve years of age.' + +"At Mâchecoul, again, the day of Pentecost, mother and father Sergent +leave their eight-year-old boy at home, and when they return from the +fields 'they did not find the said child of eight years of age, +wherefore they marvelled and were exceeding grieved.' + +"At Chantelou, it is Pierre Badieu, mercer of the parish, who says that +a year or thereabouts ago, he saw, in the domain de Rais, 'two little +children of the age of nine who were brothers and the children of Robin +Pavot of the aforesaid place, and since that time neither have they been +seen neither doth any know what hath become of them.' + +"At Nantes, it is Jeanne Darel who deposes that 'on the day of the feast +of the Holy Father, her true child named Olivier did stray from her, +being of the age of seven and eight years, and since the day of the +feast of the Holy Father neither did she see him nor hear tidings.' + +"And the account of the investigation goes on, revealing hundreds of +names, describing the grief of the mothers who interrogate passersby on +the highway, and telling of the keening of the families from whose very +homes children have been spirited away when the elders went to the +fields to hoe or to sow the hemp. These phrases, like a desolate +refrain, recur again and again, at the end of every deposition: 'They +were seen complaining dolorously,' 'Exceedingly they did lament.' +Wherever the bloodthirsty Gilles dwells the women weep. + +"At first the frantic people tell themselves that evil fairies and +malicious genii are dispersing the generation, but little by little +terrible suspicions are aroused. As soon as the Marshal quits a place, +as he goes from the château de Tiffauges to the château de Champtocé, +and from there to the castle of La Suze or to Nantes, he leaves behind +him a wake of tears. He traverses a countryside and in the morning +children are missing. Trembling, the peasant realizes also that wherever +Prelati, Roger de Bricqueville, Gilles de Sillé, any of the Marshal's +intimates, have shown themselves, little boys have disappeared. Finally, +the peasant learns to look with horror upon an old woman, Perrine +Martin, who wanders around, clad in grey, her face covered--as is that +of Gilles de Sillé--with a black stamin. She accosts children, and her +speech is so seductive, her face, when she raises her veil, so benign, +that all follow her to the edge of a wood, where men carry them off, +gagged, in sacks. And the frightened people call this purveyor of flesh, +this ogress, 'La Meffraye,' from the name of a bird of prey. + +"These emissaries spread out, covering all the villages and hamlets, +tracking the children down at the orders of the Chief Huntsman, the sire +de Bricqueville. Not content with these beaters, Gilles takes to +standing at a window of the château, and when young mendicants, +attracted by the renown of his bounty, ask an alms, he runs an +appraising eye over them, has any who excite his lust brought in and +thrown into an underground prison and kept there until, being in +appetite, he is pleased to order a carnal supper. + +"How many children did he disembowel after deflowering them? He himself +did not know, so many were the rapes he had consummated and the murders +he had committed. The texts of the times enumerate between seven and +eight hundred, but the estimate is inaccurate and seems +overconservative. Entire regions were devastated. The hamlet of +Tiffauges had no more young men. La Suze was without male posterity. At +Champtocé the whole foundation room of a tower was filled with corpses. +A witness cited in the inquest, Guillaume Hylairet, declared also, "that +one hight Du Jardin hath heard say that there was found in the said +castle a wine pipe full of dead little children.' + +"Even today traces of these assassinations linger. Two years ago at +Tiffauges a physician discovered an oubliette and brought forth piles of +skulls and bones. + +"Gilles confessed to frightful holocausts, and his friends confirmed the +atrocious details. + +"At dusk, when their senses are phosphorescent, enkindled by +inflammatory spiced beverages and by 'high' venison, Gilles and his +friends retire to a distant chamber of the château. The little boys are +brought from their cellar prisons to this room. They are disrobed and +gagged. The Marshal fondles them and forces them. Then he hacks them to +pieces with a dagger, taking great pleasure in slowly dismembering them. +At other times he slashes the boy's chest and drinks the breath from the +lungs; sometimes he opens the stomach also, smells it, enlarges the +incision with his hands, and seats himself in it. Then while he +macerates the warm entrails in mud, he turns half around and looks over +his shoulder to contemplate the supreme convulsions, the last spasms. He +himself says afterwards, 'I was happier in the enjoyment of tortures, +tears, fright, and blood, than in any other pleasure.' + +"Then he becomes weary of these fecal joys. An unpublished passage in +his trial proceedings informs us that 'The said sire heated himself with +little boys, sometimes also with little girls, with whom he had congress +in the belly, saying that he had more pleasure and less pain than acting +in nature.' After which, he slowly saws their throats, cuts them to +pieces, and the corpses, the linen and the clothing, are put in the +fireplace, where a smudge fire of logs and leaves is burning, and the +ashes are thrown into the latrine, or scattered to the winds from the +top of a tower, or buried in the moats and mounds. + +"Soon his furies become aggravated. Until now he has appeased the rage +of his senses with living or moribund beings. He wearies of stuprating +palpitant flesh and becomes a lover of the dead. A passionate artist, he +kisses, with cries of enthusiasm, the well-made limbs of his victims. He +establishes sepulchral beauty contests, and whichever of the truncated +heads receives the prize he raises by the hair and passionately kisses +the cold lips. + +"Vampirism satisfies him for months. He pollutes dead children, +appeasing the fever of his desires in the blood smeared chill of the +tomb. He even goes so far--one day when his supply of children is +exhausted--as to disembowel a pregnant woman and sport with the foetus. +After these excesses he falls into horrible states of coma, similar to +those heavy lethargies which overpowered Sergeant Bertrand after his +violations of the grave. But if that leaden sleep is one of the known +phases of ordinary vampirism, if Gilles de Rais was merely a sexual +pervert, we must admit that he distinguished himself from the most +delirious sadists, the most exquisite virtuosi in pain and murder, by a +detail which seems extrahuman, it is so horrible. + +"As these terrifying atrocities, these monstrous outrages, no longer +suffice him, he corrodes them with the essence of a rare sin. It is no +longer the resolute, sagacious cruelty of the wild beast playing with +the body of a victim. His ferocity does not remain merely carnal; it +becomes spiritual. He wishes to make the child suffer both in body and +soul. By a thoroughly Satanic cheat he deceives gratitude, dupes +affection, and desecrates love. At a leap he passes the bounds of human +infamy and lands plump in the darkest depth of Evil. + +"He contrives this: One of the unfortunate children is brought into his +chamber, and hanged, by Bricqueville, Prelati, and de Sillé, to a hook +fixed into the wall. Just at the moment when the child is suffocating, +Gilles orders him to be taken down and the rope untied. With some +precaution, he takes the child on his knees, revives him, caresses him, +rocks him, dries his tears, and pointing to the accomplices, says, +'These men are bad, but you see they obey me. Do not be afraid. I will +save your life and take you back to your mother,' and while the little +one, wild with joy, kisses him and at that moment loves him, Gilles +gently makes an incision in the back of the neck, rendering the child +'languishing,' to follow Gilles's own expression, and when the head, not +quite detached, bows, Gilles kneads the body, turns it about, and +violates it, bellowing. + +"After these abominable pastimes he may well believe that the art of the +charnalist has beneath his fingers expressed its last drop of pus, and +in a vaunting cry he says to his troop of parasites, 'There is no man on +earth who dare do as I have done.' + +"But if in Love and Well-doing the infinite is approachable for certain +souls, the out-of-the-world possibilities of Evil are limited. In his +excesses of stupration and murder the Marshal cannot go beyond a fixed +point. In vain he may dream of unique violations, of more ingenious slow +tortures, but human imagination has a limit and he has already reached +it--even passed it, with diabolic aid. Insatiable he seethes--there is +nothing material in which to express his ideal. He can verify that axiom +of demonographers, that the Evil One dupes all persons who give +themselves, or are willing to give themselves, to him. + +"As he can descend no further, he tries returning on the way by which he +has come, but now remorse overtakes him, overwhelms him, and wrenches +him without respite. His nights are nights of expiation. Besieged by +phantoms, he howls like a wounded beast. He is found rushing along the +solitary corridors of the château. He weeps, throws himself on his +knees, swears to God that he will do penance. He promises to found pious +institutions. He does establish, at Mâchecoul, a boys' academy in honour +of the Holy Innocents. He speaks of shutting himself up in a cloister, +of going to Jerusalem, begging his bread on the way. + +"But in this fickle and aberrated mind ideas superpose themselves on +each other, then pass away, and those which disappear leave their shadow +on those which follow. Abruptly, even while weeping with distress, he +precipitates himself into new debauches and, raving with delirium, hurls +himself upon the child brought to him, gouges out the eyes, runs his +finger around the bloody, milky socket, then he seizes a spiked club and +crushes the skull. And while the gurgling blood runs over him, he +stands, smeared with spattered brains, and grinds his teeth and laughs. +Like a hunted beast he flees into the wood, while his henchmen remove +the crimson stains from the ground and dispose prudently of the corpse +and the reeking garments. + +"He wanders in the forests surrounding Tiffauges, dark, impenetrable +forests like those which Brittany still can show at Carnoet. He sobs as +he walks along. He attempts to thrust aside the phantoms which accost +him. Then he looks about him and beholds obscenity in the shapes of the +aged trees. It seems that nature perverts itself before him, that his +very presence depraves it. For the first time he understands the +motionless lubricity of trees. He discovers priapi in the branches. + +"Here a tree appears to him as a living being, standing on its +root-tressed head, its limbs waving in the air and spread wide apart, +subdivided and re-subdivided into haunches, which again are divided and +re-subdivided. Here between two limbs another branch is jammed, in a +stationary fornication which is reproduced in diminished scale from +bough to twig to the top of the tree. There it seems the trunk is a +phallus which mounts and disappears into a skirt of leaves or which, on +the contrary, issues from a green clout and plunges into the glossy +belly of the earth. + +"Frightful images rise before him. He sees the skin of little boys, the +lucid white skin, vellum-like, in the pale, smooth bark of the slender +beeches. He recognizes the pachydermatous skin of the beggar boys in the +dark and wrinkled envelope of the old oaks. Beside the bifurcations of +the branches there are yawning holes, puckered orifices in the bark, +simulating emunctoria, or the protruding anus of a beast. In the joints +of the branches there are other visions, elbows, armpits furred with +grey lichens. Even in the trunks there are incisions which spread out +into great lips beneath tufts of brown, velvety moss. + +"Everywhere obscene forms rise from the ground and spring, disordered, +into a firmament which satanizes. The clouds swell into breasts, divide +into buttocks, bulge as if with fecundity, scattering a train of spawn +through space. They accord with the sombre bulging of the foliage, in +which now there are only images of giant or dwarf hips, feminine +triangles, great V's, mouths of Sodom, glowing cicatrices, humid vents. +This landscape of abomination changes. Gilles now sees on the trunks +frightful cancers and horrible wens. He observes exostoses and ulcers, +membranous sores, tubercular chancres, atrocious caries. It is an +arboreal lazaret, a venereal clinic. + +"And there, at a detour of the forest aisle, stands a mottled red beech. + +"Amid the sanguinary falling leaves he feels that he has been spattered +by a shower of blood. He goes into a rage. He conceives the delusion +that beneath the bark lives a wood nymph, and he would feel with his +hands the palpitant flesh of the goddess, he would trucidate the Dryad, +violate her in a place unknown to the follies of men. + +"He is jealous of the woodman who can murder, can massacre, the trees, +and he raves. Tensely he listens and hears in the soughing wind a +response to his cries of desire. Overwhelmed, he resumes his walk, +weeping, until he arrives at the château and sinks to his bed exhausted, +an inert mass. + +"The phantoms take more definite shape, now that he sleeps. The lubric +enlacements of the branches, dilated crevices and cleft mosses, the +coupling of the diverse beings of the wood, disappear; the tears of the +leaves whipped by the wind are dried; the white abscesses of the clouds +are resorbed into the grey of the sky; and--in an awful silence--the +incubi and succubi pass. + +"The corpses of his victims, reduced to ashes and scattered, return to +the larva state and attack his lower parts. He writhes, with the blood +bursting his veins. He rebounds in a somersault, then he crawls to the +crucifix, like a wolf, on all fours, and howling, strains his lips to +the feet of the Christ. + +"A sudden reaction overwhelms him. He trembles before the image whose +convulsed face looks down on him. He adjures Christ to have pity, +supplicates Him to spare a sinner, and sobs and weeps, and when, +incapable of further effort, he whimpers, he hears, terrified, in his +own voice, the lamentations of the children crying for their mothers and +pleading for mercy." + + * * * * * + +And Durtal, coming slowly out of the vision he had conjured up, closed +his notebook and remarked, "Rather petty, my own spiritual conflict +regarding a woman whose sin--like my own, to be sure--is commonplace and +bourgeois." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +"Easy to find an excuse for this visit, though it will seem strange to +Chantelouve, whom I have neglected for months," said Durtal on his way +toward the rue Bagneux. "Supposing he is home this evening--and he +probably isn't, because surely Hyacinthe will have seen to that--I can +tell him that I have learned of his illness through Des Hermies and that +I have come to see how he is getting along." + +He paused on the stoop of the building in which Chantelouve lived. At +each side and over the door were these antique lamps with reflectors, +surmounted by a sort of casque of sheet iron painted green. There was an +old iron balustrade, very wide, and the steps, with wooden sides, were +paved with red tile. About this house there was a sepulchral and also +clerical odour, yet there was also something homelike--though a little +too imposing--about it such as is not to be found in the cardboard +houses they build nowadays. You could see at a glance that it did not +harbour the apartment house promiscuities: decent, respectable couples +with kept women for neighbours. The house pleased him, and he considered +Hyacinthe the more desirable for her substantial environment. + +He rang at a first-floor apartment. A maid led him through a long hall +into a sitting-room. He noticed, at a glance, that nothing had changed +since his last visit. It was the same vast, high-ceilinged room with +windows reaching to heaven. There was the huge fireplace; on the +mantelpiece the same reproduction, reduced, in bronze, of Fremiet's +Jeanne d'Arc, between the two globe lamps of Japanese porcelain. He +recognized the grand piano, the table loaded with albums, the divan, the +chairs in the style of Louis XV with tapestried covers. In front of +every window there were imitation Chinese vases, mounted on tripods of +imitation ebony and containing sickly palms. On the walls were religious +pictures, without expression, and a portrait of Chantelouve in his +youth, three-quarter length, his hand resting on a pile of his works. An +ancient Russian icon in nielloed silver and one of these Christs in +carved wood, executed in the seventeenth century by Bogard de Nancy, in +an antique frame of gilded wood backed with velvet, were the only things +that slightly relieved the banality of the decoration. The rest of the +furniture looked like that of a bourgeois household fixed up for Lent, +or for a charity dance or for a visit from the priest. A great fire +blazed on the hearth. The room was lighted by a very high lamp with a +wide shade of pink lace-- + +"Stinks of the sacristy!" Durtal was saying to himself at the moment the +door opened. + +Mme. Chantelouve entered, the lines of her figure advantageously +displayed by a wrapper of white swanskin, which gave off a fragrance of +frangipane. She pressed Durtal's hand and sat down facing him, and he +perceived under the wrap her indigo silk stockings in little patent +leather bootines with straps across the insteps. + +They talked about the weather. She complained of the way the winter hung +on, and declared that although the furnace seemed to be working all +right she was always shivering, was always frozen to death. She told him +to feel her hands, which indeed were cold, then she seemed worried about +his health. + +"You look pale," she said. + +"You might at least say that I _am_ pale," he replied. + +She did not answer immediately, then, "Yesterday I saw how much you +desire me," she said. "But why, why, want to go so far?" + +He made a gesture, indicating vague annoyance. + +"How funny you are!" she went on. "I was re-reading one of your books +today, and I noticed this phrase, 'The only women you can continue to +love are those you lose.' Now admit that you were right when you wrote +that." + +"It all depends. I wasn't in love then." + +She shrugged her shoulders. "Well," she said, "I must tell my husband +you are here." + +Durtal remained silent, wondering what rôle Chantelouve actually played +in this triangle. + +Chantelouve returned with his wife. He was in his dressing-gown and had +a pen in his mouth. He took it out and put it on the table, and after +assuring Durtal that his health was completely restored, he complained +of overwhelming labours. "I have had to quit giving dinners and +receptions," he said, "I can't even go visiting. I am in harness every +day at my desk." + +And when Durtal asked him the nature of these labours, he confessed to a +whole series of unsigned volumes on the lives of the saints, to be +turned out by the gross by a Tours firm for exportation. + +"Yes," said his wife, laughing, "and these are _sadly neglected_ saints +whose biographies he is preparing." + +And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, Chantelouve, also laughing, +said, "It was their persons that were _sadly neglected_. The subjects +are chosen for me, and it does seem as if the publisher enjoyed making +me eulogize frowziness. I have to describe Blessed Saints most of whom +were deplorably unkempt: Labre, who was so lousy and ill-smelling as to +disgust the beasts in the stables; Saint Cunegonde who 'through +humility' neglected her body; Saint Oportune who never used water and +who washed her bed only with her tears; Saint Silvia who never removed +the grime from her face; Saint Radegonde who never changed her hair +shirt and who slept on a cinder pile; and how many others, around whose +heads I must draw a golden halo!" + +"There are worse than those," said Durtal. "Read the life of Marie +Alacoque. You will see that she, to mortify herself, licked up with her +tongue the dejections of one sick person and sucked an abscess from the +toe of another." + +"I know, but I must admit that I am less touched than revolted by these +tales." + +"I prefer Saint Lucius the martyr," said Mme. Chantelouve. "His body was +so transparent that he could see through his chest the vileness of his +heart. His kind of 'vileness' at least we can stand. But I must admit +that this utter disregard of cleanliness makes me suspicious of the +monasteries and renders your beloved Middle Ages odious to me." + +"Pardon me, my dear," said her husband, "you are greatly mistaken. The +Middle Ages were not, as you believe, an epoch of uncleanliness. People +frequented the baths assiduously. At Paris, for example, where these +establishments were numerous, the 'stove-keepers' went about the city +announcing that the water was hot. It is not until the Renaissance that +uncleanliness becomes rife in France. When you think that that delicious +Reine Margot kept her body macerated with perfumes but as grimy as the +inside of a stovepipe! and that Henri Quatre plumed himself on having +'reeking feet and a fine armpit.'" + +"My dear, for heaven's sake," said madame, "spare us the details." + +While Chantelouve was speaking, Durtal was watching him. He was small +and rotund, with a bay window which his arms would not have gone around. +He had rubicund cheeks, long hair very much pomaded, trailing in the +back and drawn up in crescents along his temples. He had pink cotton in +his ears. He was smooth shaven and looked like a pious but convivial +notary. But his quick, calculating eye belied his jovial and sugary +mien. One divined in his look the cool, unscrupulous man of affairs, +capable, for all his honeyed ways, of doing one a bad turn. + +"He must be aching to throw me into the street," said Durtal to +himself, "because he certainly knows all about his wife's goings-on." + +But if Chantelouve wished to be rid of his guest he did not show it. +With his legs crossed and his hands folded one over the other, in the +attitude of a priest, he appeared to be mightily interested in Durtal's +work. Inclining a little, listening as if in a theatre, he said, "Yes, I +know the material on the subject. I read a book some time ago about +Gilles de Rais which seemed to me well handled. It was by abbé Bossard." + +"It is the most complete and reliable of the biographies of the +Marshal." + +"But," Chantelouve went on, "there is one point which I never have been +able to understand. I have never been able to explain to myself why the +name Bluebeard should have been attached to the Marshal, whose history +certainly has no relation to the tale of the good Perrault." + +"As a matter of fact the real Bluebeard was not Gilles de Rais, but +probably a Breton king, Comor, a fragment of whose castle, dating from +the sixth century, is still standing, on the confines of the forest of +Carnoet. The legend is simple. The king asked Guerock, count of Vannes, +for the hand of his daughter, Triphine. Guerock refused, because he had +heard that the king maintained himself in a constant state of +widowerhood by cutting his wives' throats. Finally Saint Gildas promised +Guerock to return his daughter to him safe and sound when he should +reclaim her, and the union was celebrated. + +"Some months later Triphine learned that Comor did indeed kill his +consorts as soon as they became pregnant. She was big with child, so she +fled, but her husband pursued her and cut her throat. The weeping father +commanded Saint Gildas to keep his promise, and the Saint resuscitated +Triphine. + +"As you see, this legend comes much nearer than the history of our +Bluebeard to the told tale arranged by the ingenious Perrault. Now, why +and how the name Bluebeard passed from King Comor to the Marshal de +Rais, I cannot tell. You know what pranks oral tradition can play." + +"But with your Gilles de Rais you must have to plunge into Satanism +right up to the hilt," said Chantelouve after a silence. + +"Yes, and it would really be more interesting if these scenes were not +so remote. What would have a timely appeal would be a study of the +Diabolism of the present day." + +"No doubt," said Chantelouve, pleasantly. + +"For," Durtal went on, looking at him intently, "unheard-of things are +going on right now. I have heard tell of sacrilegious priests, of a +certain canon who has revived the sabbats of the Middle Ages." + +Chantelouve did not betray himself by so much as a flicker of the +eyelids. Calmly he uncrossed his legs and looking up at the ceiling he +said, "Alas, certain scabby wethers succeed in stealing into the fold, +but they are so rare as hardly to be worth thinking about." And he +deftly changed the subject by speaking of a book he had just read about +the Fronde. + +Durtal, somewhat embarrassed, said nothing. He understood that +Chantelouve refused to speak of his relations with Canon Docre. + +"My dear," said Mme. Chantelouve, addressing her husband, "you have +forgotten to turn up your lamp wick. It is smoking. I can smell it from +here, even through the closed door." + +She was most evidently conveying him a dismissal. Chantelouve rose and, +with a vaguely malicious smile, excused himself as being obliged to +continue his work. He shook hands with Durtal, begged him not to stay +away so long in future, and gathering up the skirts of his dressing-gown +he left the room. + +She followed him with her eyes, then rose, in her turn, ran to the +door, assured herself with a glance that it was closed, then returned to +Durtal, who was leaning against the mantel. Without a word she took his +head between her hands, pressed her lips to his mouth and opened it. + +He grunted furiously. + +She looked at him with indolent and filmy eyes, and he saw sparks of +silver dart to their surface. He held her in his arms. She was swooning +but vigilantly listening. Gently she disengaged herself, sighing, while +he, embarrassed, sat down at a little distance from her, clenching and +unclenching his hands. + +They spoke of banal things: she boasting of her maid, who would go +through fire for her, he responding only by gestures of approbation and +surprise. + +Then suddenly she passed her hands over her forehead. "Ah!" she said, "I +suffer cruelly when I think that he is there working. No, it would cost +me too much remorse. What I say is foolish, but if he were a different +man, a man who went out more and made conquests, it would not be so +bad." + +He was irritated by the inconsequentiality of her plaints. Finally, +feeling completely safe, he came closer to her and said, "You spoke of +remorse, but whether we embark or whether we stand on the bank, isn't +our guilt exactly the same?" + +"Yes, I know. My confessor talks to me like that--only more +severely--but I think you are both wrong." + +He could not help laughing, and he said to himself, "Remorse is perhaps +the condiment which keeps passion from being too unappetizing to the +blasé." Then aloud he jestingly, "Speaking of confessors, if I were a +casuist it seems to me I would try to invent new sins. I am not a +casuist, and yet, having looked about a bit, I believe I _have_ found a +new sin." + +"You?" she said, laughing in turn. "Can I commit it?" + +He scrutinized her features. She had the expression of a greedy child. + +"You alone can answer that. Now I must admit that the sin is not +absolutely new, for it fits into the known category of lust. But it has +been neglected since pagan days, and was never well defined in any +case." + +"Do not keep me in suspense. What is this sin?" + +"It isn't easy to explain. Nevertheless I will try. Lust, I believe, can +be classified into: ordinary sin, sin against nature, bestiality, and +let us add _demoniality_ and sacrilege. Well, there is, in addition to +these, what I shall call Pygmalionism, which embraces at the same time +cerebral onanism and incest. + +"Imagine an artist falling in love with his child, his creation: with an +Hérodiade, a Judith, a Helen, a Jeanne d'Arc, whom he has either +described or painted, and evoking her, and finally possessing her in +dream. + +"Well, this love is worse than normal incest. In the latter sin the +guilty one commits only a half-offence, because his daughter is not born +solely of his substance, but also of the flesh of another. Thus, +logically, in incest there is a quasi-natural side, almost licit, +because part of another person has entered into the engendering of the +_corpus delicti_; while in Pygmalionism the father violates the child of +his soul, of that which alone is purely and really his, which alone he +can impregnate without the aid of another. The offence is, then, entire +and complete. Now, is there not also disdain of nature, of the work of +God, since the subject of the sin is no longer--as even in bestiality--a +palpable and living creature, but an unreal being created by a +projection of the desecrated talent, a being almost celestial, since, by +genius, by artistry, it often becomes immortal? + +"Let us go further, if you wish. Suppose that an artist depicts a saint +and becomes enamoured of her. Thus we have complications of crime +against nature and of sacrilege. An enormity!" + +"Which, perhaps, is exquisite!" + +He was taken aback by the word she had used. She rose, opened the door, +and called her husband. "Dear," she said, "Durtal has discovered a new +sin!" + +"Surely not," said Chantelouve, his figure framed in the doorway. "The +book of sins is an edition _ne varietur_. New sins cannot be invented, +but old ones may be kept from falling into oblivion. Well, what is this +sin of his?" + +Durtal explained the theory. + +"But it is simply a refined expression of succubacy. The consort is not +one's work become animate, but a succubus which by night takes that +form." + +"Admit, at any rate, that this cerebral hermaphrodism, self-fecundation, +is a distinguished vice at least--being the privilege of the artist--a +vice reserved for the elect, inaccessible to the mob." + +"If you like exclusive obscenity--" laughed Chantelouve. "But I must get +back to the lives of the saints; the atmosphere is fresher and more +benign. So excuse me, Durtal. I leave it to my wife to continue this +Marivaux conversation about Satanism with you." + +He said it in the simplest, most debonair fashion to be imagined, but +with just the slightest trace of irony. + +Which Durtal perceived. "It must be quite late," he thought, when the +door closed after Chantelouve. He consulted his watch. Nearly eleven. He +rose to take leave. + +"When shall I see you?" he murmured, very low. + +"Your apartment tomorrow night at nine." + +He looked at her with beseeching eyes. She understood, but wished to +tease him. She kissed him maternally on the forehead, then consulted his +eyes again. The expression of supplication must have remained unchanged, +for she responded to their imploration by a long kiss which closed them, +then came down to his lips, drinking their dolorous emotion. + +Then she rang and told her maid to light Durtal through the hall. He +descended, satisfied that she had engaged herself to yield tomorrow +night. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +He began again, as on the other evening, to clean house and establish a +methodical disorder. He slipped a cushion under the false disarray of +the armchair, then he made roaring fires to have the rooms good and warm +when she came. + +But he was without impatience. That silent promise which he had +obtained, that Mme. Chantelouve would not leave him panting this night, +moderated him. Now that his uncertainty was at an end, he no longer +vibrated with the almost painful acuity which hitherto her malignant +delays had provoked. He soothed himself by poking the fire. His mind was +still full of her, but plethoric, content. When his thoughts stirred at +all it was, at the very most, to revolve the question, "How shall I go +about it, when the time comes, so as not to be ridiculous?" This +question, which had so harassed him the other night, left him troubled +but inert. He did not try to solve it, but decided to leave everything +to chance, since the best planned strategy was almost always abortive. + +Then he revolted against himself, accused himself of stagnation, and +walked up and down to shake himself out of a torpor which might have +been attributed to the hot fire. Well, well, was it because he had had +to wait so long that his desires had left him, or at least quit +bothering him--no, they had not, why, he was yearning now for the moment +when he might crush that woman! He thought he had the explanation of his +lack of enthusiasm in the stage fright inseparable from any beginning. +"It will not be really exquisite tonight until after the newness wears +off and the grotesque with it. After I know her I shall be able to +consort with her again without feeling solicitous about her and +conscious of myself. I wish we were on that happy basis now." + +The cat, sitting on the table, cocked up its ears, gazed at the door +with its black eyes, and fled. The bell rang and Durtal went to let her +in. + +Her costume pleased him. He took off her furs. Her skirt was of a plum +colour so dark that it was almost black, the material thick and supple, +outlining her figure, squeezing her arms, making an hourglass of her +waist, accentuating the curve of her hips and the bulge of her corset. + +"You are charming," he said, kissing her wrists, and he was pleased to +find that his lips had accelerated her pulse. She did not speak, could +hardly breathe. She was agitated and very pale. + +He sat down facing her. She looked at him with her mysterious, half +sleepy eyes. He felt that he was falling in love all over again. He +forgot his reasonings and his fears, and took acute pleasure in +penetrating the mystery of these eyes and studying the vague smile of +this dolorous mouth. + +He enlaced her fingers in his, and for the first time, in a low voice, +he called her Hyacinthe. + +She listened, her breast heaving, her hands in a fever. Then in a +supplicating voice, "I implore you," she said, "let us have none of +that. Only desire is good. Oh, I am rational, I mean what I say. I +thought it all out on the way here. I left him very sad tonight. If you +knew how I feel--I went to church today and was afraid and hid myself +when I saw my confessor--" + +These plaints he had heard before, and he said to himself, "You may sing +whatever tune you want to, but you shall dance tonight." Aloud he +answered in monosyllables as he continued to take possession of her. + +He rose, thinking she would do the same, or that if she remained seated +he could better reach her lips by bending over her. + +"Your lips, your lips--the kiss you gave me last night--" he murmured, +as his face came close to hers. She put up her lips and stood, and they +embraced, but as his hands went seeking she recoiled. + +"Think how ridiculous it all is," she said in a low voice, "to undress, +put on night clothes--and that silly scene, getting into bed!" + +He avoided declaring, but attempted, by an embrace which bent her over +backward, to make her understand that she could spare herself those +embarrassments. Tacitly, in his own turn, feeling her body stiffen under +his fingers, he understood that she absolutely would not give herself in +the room here, in front of the fire. + +"Oh well," she said, disengaging herself, "if you will have it!" + +He made way to allow her to go into the other room, and seeing that she +desired to be alone he drew the portière. + +Sitting before the fire he reflected. Perhaps he ought to have pulled +down the bed covers, and not left her the task, but without doubt the +action would have been too direct, too obvious a hint. Ah! and that +water heater! He took it and, keeping away from the bedroom door, went +to the bathroom, placed the heater on the toilet table, and then, +swiftly, he set out the rice powder box, the perfumes, the combs, and, +returning into his study, he listened. + +She was making as little noise as possible, walking on tiptoe as if in +the presence of the dead. She blew out the candles, doubtless wishing no +more light than the rosy glow of the hearth. + +He felt positively annihilated. The irritating impression of the lips +and eyes of Hyacinthe was far from him now. She was nothing but a woman, +like any other, undressing in a man's room. Memories of similar scenes +overwhelmed him. He remembered girls who like her had crept about on the +carpet so as not to be heard, and who had stopped short, ashamed, for a +whole second, if they bumped against the water pitcher. And then, what +good was this going to do him? Now that she was yielding he no longer +desired her! Disillusion had come even before possession, not waiting, +as usual, till afterward. He was distressed to the point of tears. + +The frightened cat glided under the curtain, ran from one room to the +other, and finally came back to his master and jumped onto his knees. +Caressing him, Durtal said to himself, "Decidedly, she was right when +she refused. It will be grotesque, atrocious. I was wrong to insist, but +no, it's her fault, too. She must have wanted to do this or she wouldn't +have come. What a fool to think she could aggravate passion by delay. +She is fearfully clumsy. A moment ago when I was embracing her and +really was aroused, it would perhaps have been delicious, but now! And +what do I look like? A young bridegroom waiting--or a green country boy. +Oh God, how stupid! Well," he said, straining his ears and hearing no +sound from the other room, "she's in bed. I must go in. + +"I suppose it took her all this time to unharness herself from her +corset. She was a fool to wear one," he concluded, when, drawing the +curtain, he stepped into the other room. + +Mme. Chantelouve was buried under the thick coverlet, her mouth +half-open and her eyes closed; but he saw that she was peering at him +through the fringe of her blonde eyelashes. He sat down on the edge of +the bed. She huddled up, drawing the cover over her chin. + +"Cold, dear?" + +"No," and she opened wide her eyes, which flashed sparks. + +He undressed, casting a rapid glance at Hyacinthe's face. It was hidden +in the darkness, but was sometimes revealed by a flare of the red hot +fire, as a stick, half consumed and smouldering, would suddenly burst +into flame. Swiftly he slipped between the covers. He clasped a corpse; +a body so cold that it froze him, but the woman's lips were burning as +she silently gnawed his features. He lay stupified in the grip of this +body wound around his own, supple as the ... and hard! He could not +move; he could not speak for the shower of kisses traveling over his +face. Finally, he succeeded in disengaging himself, and, with his free +arm he sought her; then suddenly, while she devoured his lips he felt a +nervous inhibition, and, naturally, without profit, he withdrew. + +"I detest you!" she exclaimed. + +"Why?" + +"I detest you!" + +He wanted to cry out, "And I you!" He was exasperated, and would have +given all he owned to get her to dress and go home. + +The fire was burning low, unflickering. Appeased, now, he sat up and +looked into the darkness. He would have liked to get up and find another +nightshirt, because the one he had on was tearing and getting in his +way. But Hyacinthe was lying on top of it--then he reflected that the +bed was deranged and the thought affected him, because he liked to be +snug in winter, and knowing himself incapable of respreading the covers, +he foresaw a cold night. + +Once more, he was enlaced; the gripe of the woman's on his own was +renewed; rational, this time, he attended to her and crushed her with +mighty caresses. In a changed voice, lower, more guttural, she uttered +ignoble things and silly cries which gave him pain--"My dear!--oh, +hon!--oh I can't stand it!"--aroused nevertheless, he took this body +which creaked as it writhed, and he experienced the extraordinary +sensation of a spasmodic burning within a swaddle of ice-packs. + +He finally jumped over her, out of bed, and lighted the candles. On the +dresser the cat sat motionless, considering Durtal and Mme. Chantelouve +alternately. Durtal saw an inexpressible mockery in those black eyes +and, irritated, chased the beast away. + +He put some more wood on the fire, dressed, and started to leave the +room. Hyacinthe called him gently, in her usual voice. He approached the +bed. She threw her arms around his neck and hung there, kissing him +hungrily. Then sinking back and putting her arms under the cover, she +said, "The deed is done. Now will you love me any better?" + +He did not have the heart to answer. Ah yes, his disillusion was +complete. The satiety following justified his lack of appetite +preceding. She revolted him, horrified him. Was it possible to have so +desired a woman, only to come to--that? He had idealized her in his +transports, he had dreamed in her eyes--he knew not what! He had wished +to exalt himself with her, to rise higher than the delirious ravenings +of the senses, to soar out of the world into joys supernal and +unexplored. And his dream had been shattered. He remained fettered to +earth. Was there no means of escaping out of one's self, out of earthly +limitations, and attaining an upper ether where the soul, ravished, +would glory in its giddy flight? + +Ah, the lesson was hard and decisive. For having one time hoped so much, +what regrets, what a tumble! Decidedly, Reality does not pardon him who +despises her; she avenges herself by shattering the dream and trampling +it and casting the fragments into a cesspool. + +"Don't be vexed, dear, because it is taking me so long," said Mme. +Chantelouve behind the curtain. + +He thought crudely, "I wish you would get to hell out of here," and +aloud he asked politely if she had need of his services. + +"She was so mysterious, so enticing," he resumed to himself. "Her eyes, +remote, deep as space, and reflecting cemeteries and festivals at the +same time. And she has shown herself up for all she is, within an hour. +I have seen a new Hyacinthe, talking like a silly little milliner in +heat. All the nastinesses of women unite in her to exasperate me." + +After a thoughtful silence he concluded, "I must be young indeed to have +lost my head the way I did." + +As if echoing his thought, Mme. Chantelouve, coming out through the +portière, laughed nervously and said, "A woman of my age doing a mad +thing like that!" She looked at him, and though he forced a smile she +understood. + +"You will sleep tonight," she said, sadly, alluding to Durtal's former +complaints of sleeplessness on her account. + +He begged her to sit down and warm herself, but she said she was not +cold. + +"Why, in spite of the warmth of the room you were cold as ice!" + +"Oh, I am always that way. Winter and summer my flesh is chilly." + +He thought that in August this frigid body might be agreeable, but now! + +He offered her some bonbons, which she refused, then she said she would +take a sip of the alkermes, which he poured into a tiny silver goblet. +She took just a drop, and amicably they discussed the taste of this +preparation, in which she recognized an aroma of clove, tempered by +flower of cinnamon moistened with distillate of rose water. + +Then he became silent. + +"My poor dear," she said, "how I should love him if he were more +confiding and not always on his guard." + +He asked her to explain herself. + +"Why, I mean that you can't forget yourself and simply let yourself be +loved. Alas, you were reasoning all the time--" + +"I was not!" + +She kissed him tenderly. "You see I love you, anyway." And he was +surprised to see how sad and moved she looked, and he observed a sort of +frightened gratitude in her eyes. + +"She is easily satisfied," he said to himself. + +"What are you thinking about?" + +"You!" + +She sighed. Then, "What time is it?" + +"Half past ten." + +"I must go. He is waiting for me. No, don't say anything--" + +She passed her hands over her cheeks. He seized her gently by the waist +and kissed her, holding her thus enlaced until they were at the door. + +"You will come again soon, won't you?" + +"Yes.... Yes." + +He returned to the fireside. + +"Oof! it's done," he thought, in a whirl of confused emotions. His +vanity was satisfied, his selfesteem was no longer bleeding, he had +attained his ends and possessed this woman. Moreover, her spell over him +had lost its force. He was regaining his entire liberty of mind, but who +could tell what trouble this liaison had yet in store for him? Then, in +spite of everything, he softened. + +After all, what could he reproach her with? She loved as well as she +could. She was, indeed, ardent and plaintive. Even this dualism of a +mistress who was a low cocotte in bed and a fine lady when dressed--or +no, too intelligent to be called a fine lady--was a delectable pimento. +Her carnal appetites were excessive and bizarre. What, then, was the +matter with him? + +And at last he quite justly accused himself. It was his own fault if +everything was spoiled. He lacked appetite. He was not really tormented +except by a cerebral erethism. He was used up in body, filed away in +soul, inept at love, weary of tendernesses even before he received them +and disgusted when he had. His heart was dead and could not be revived. +And his mania for thinking, thinking! previsualizing an incident so +vividly that actual enactment was an anticlimax--but probably would not +be if his mind would leave him alone and not be always jeering at his +efforts. For a man in his state of spiritual impoverishment all, save +art, was but a recreation more or less boring, a diversion more or less +vain. "Ah, poor woman, I am afraid she is going to get pretty sick of +me. If only she would consent to come no more! But no, she doesn't +deserve to be treated in that fashion," and, seized by pity, he swore to +himself that the next time she visited him he would caress her and try +to persuade her that the disillusion which he had so ill concealed did +not exist. + +He tried to spread up the bed, get the tousled blankets together, and +plump the pillows, then he lay down. + +He put out his lamp. In the darkness his distress increased. With death +in his heart he said to himself, "Yes, I was right in declaring that the +only women you can continue to love are those you lose. + +"To learn, three years later, when the woman is inaccessible, chaste and +married, dead, perhaps, or out of France--to learn that she loved you, +though you had not dared believe it while she was near you, ah, that's +the dream! These real and intangible loves, these loves made up of +melancholy and distant regrets, are the only ones that count. Because +there is no flesh in them, no earthly leaven. + +"To love at a distance and without hope; never to possess; to dream +chastely of pale charms and impossible kisses extinguished on the waxen +brow of death: ah, that is something like it. A delicious straying away +from the world, and never the return. As only the unreal is not ignoble +and empty, existence must be admitted to be abominable. Yes, imagination +is the only good thing which heaven vouchsafes to the skeptic and +pessimist, alarmed by the eternal abjectness of life." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +From this scene he had learned an alarming lesson: that the flesh +domineers the soul and refuses to admit any schism. The flesh decisively +does not intend that one shall get along without it and indulge in +out-of-the-world pleasures which it can partake only on condition that +it keep quiet. For the first time, reviewing these turpitudes, he really +understood the meaning of that now obsolete word _chastity_, and he +savoured it in all its pristine freshness. Just as a man who has drunk +too deeply the night before thinks, the morning after, of drinking +nothing but mineral water in future, so he dreamed, today, of pure +affection far from a bed. + +He was still ruminating these thoughts when Des Hermies entered. + +They spoke of amorous misadventures. Astonished at once by Durtal's +languor and the ascetic tone of his remarks, Des Hermies exclaimed, "Ah, +we had a gay old time last night?" + +With the most decisive bad grace Durtal shook his head. + +"Then," replied Des Hermies, "you are superior and inhuman. To love +without hope, immaculately, would be perfect if it did not induct such +brainstorms. There is no excuse for chastity, unless one has a pious end +in view, or unless the senses are failing, and if they are one had best +see a doctor, who will solve the question more or less unsatisfactorily. +To tell the truth, everything on earth culminates in the act you +reprove. The heart, which is supposed to be the noble part of man, has +the same form as the penis, which is the so-called ignoble part of man. +There's symbolism in that similarity, because every love which is of +the heart soon extends to the organ resembling it. The human +imagination, the moment it tries to create artificially animated beings, +involuntarily reproduces in them the movements of animals propagating. +Look at the machines, the action of the piston and the cylinder; Romeos +of steel and Juliets of cast iron. Nor do the loftier expressions of the +human intellect get away from the advance and withdrawal copied by the +machines. One must bow to nature's law if one is neither impotent nor a +saint. Now you are neither the one nor the other, I think, but if, from +inconceivable motives, you desire to live in temporary continence, +follow the prescription of an occultist of the sixteenth century, the +Neapolitan Piperno. He affirms that whoever eats vervain cannot approach +a woman for seven days. Buy a jar, and let's try it." + +Durtal laughed. "There is perhaps a middle course: never consummate the +carnal act with her you love, and, to keep yourself quiet, frequent +those you do not love. Thus, in a certain measure, you would conjure +away possible disgust." + +"No, one would never get it out of one's head that with the woman of +whom one was enamoured one would experience carnal delights absolutely +different from those which one feels with the others, so your method +also would end badly. And too, the women who would not be indifferent to +one, have not charity and discretion enough to admire the wisdom of this +selfishness, for of course that's what it is. But what say, now, to +putting on your shoes? It's almost six o'clock and Mama Carhaix's beef +can't wait." + +It had already been taken out of the pot and couched on a platter amid +vegetables when they arrived. Carhaix, sprawling in an armchair, was +reading his breviary. + +"What's going on in the world?" he asked, closing his book. + +"Nothing. Politics doesn't interest us, and General Boulanger's +American tricks of publicity weary you as much as they do us, I suppose. +The other newspaper stories are just a little more shocking or dull than +usual.--Look out, you'll burn your mouth," as Durtal was preparing to +take a spoonful of soup. + +"In fact," said Durtal, grimacing, "this marrowy soup, so artistically +golden, is like liquid fire. But speaking of the news, what do you mean +by saying there is nothing of pressing importance? And the trial of that +astonishing abbé Boudes going on before the Assizes of Aveyron! After +trying to poison his curate through the sacramental wine, and committing +such other crimes as abortion, rape, flagrant misconduct, forgery, +qualified theft and usury, he ended by appropriating the money put in +the coin boxes for the souls in purgatory, and pawning the ciborium, +chalice, all the holy vessels. That case is worth following." + +Carhaix raised his eyes to heaven. + +"If he is not sent to jail, there will be one more priest for Paris," +said Des Hermies. + +"How's that?" + +"Why, all the ecclesiastics who get in bad in the provinces, or who have +a serious falling out with the bishop, are sent here where they will be +less in view, lost in the crowd, as it were. They form a part of that +corporation known as 'scratch priests.'" + +"What are they?" + +"Priests loosely attached to a parish. You know that in addition to a +curate, ministrants, vicars, and regular clergy, there are in every +church adjunct priests, supply priests. Those are the ones I am talking +about. They do the heavy work, celebrate the morning masses when +everybody is asleep and the late masses when everybody is doing. It is +they who get up at night to take the sacrament to the poor, and who sit +up with the corpses of the devout rich and catch cold standing under the +dripping church porches at funerals, and get sunstroke or pneumonia in +the cemetery. They do all the dirty work. For a five or ten franc fee +they act as substitutes for colleagues who have good livings and are +tired of service. They are men under a cloud for the most part. Churches +take them on, ready to fire them at a moment's notice, and keep strict +watch over them while waiting for them to be interdicted or to have +their _celebret_ taken away. I simply mean that the provincial parishes +excavate on the city the priests who for one reason or another have +ceased to please." + +"But what do the curates and other titulary abbés _do_, if they unload +their duties onto the backs of others?" + +"They do the elegant, easy work, which requires no effort, no charity. +They shrive society women who come to confession in their most stunning +gowns; they teach proper little prigs the catechism, and preach, and +play the limelight rôles in the gala ceremonials which are got up to +pander to the tastes of the faithful. At Paris, not counting the scratch +priests, the clergy is divided thus: Man-of-the-world priests in easy +circumstances: these are placed at la Madeleine and Saint Roch where the +congregations are wealthy. They are wined and dined, they pass their +lives in drawing-rooms, and comfort only elegant souls. Other priests +who are good desk clerks, for the most part, but who have neither the +education nor the fortune necessary to participate in the +inconsequentialities of the idle rich. They live more in seclusion and +visit only among the middle class. They console themselves for their +unfashionableness by playing cards with each other and uttering crude +commonplaces at the table." + +"Now, Des Hermies," said Carhaix, "you are going too far. I claim to +know the clerical world myself, and there are, even in Paris, honest men +who do their duty. They are covered with opprobrium and spat on. Every +Tom, Dick, and Harry accuses them of the foulest vices. But after all, +it must be said that the abbé Boudes and the Canon Docres are +exceptions, thank God! and outside of Paris there are veritable saints, +especially among the country clergy." + +"It's a fact that Satanic priests are relatively rare, and the +lecheries of the clergy and the knaveries of the episcopate are +evidently exaggerated by an ignoble press. But that isn't what I have +against them. If only they were gamblers and libertines! But they're +lukewarm, mediocre, lazy, imbeciles. That is their sin against the Holy +Ghost, the only sin which the All Merciful does not pardon." + +"They are of their time," said Durtal. "You wouldn't expect to find the +soul of the Middle Ages inculcated by the milk-and-water seminaries." + +"Then," Carhaix observed, "our friend forgets that there are impeccable +monastic orders, the Carthusians, for instance." + +"Yes, and the Trappists and the Franciscans. But they are cloistered +orders which live in shelter from an infamous century. Take, on the +other hand, the order of Saint Dominic, which exists for the fashionable +world. That is the order which produces jewelled dudes like Monsabre and +Didon. Enough said." + +"They are the hussars of religion, the jaunty lancers, the spick and +span and primped-up Zouaves, while the good Capuchins are the humble +poilus of the soul," said Durtal. + +"If only they loved bells," sighed Carhaix, shaking his head. "Well, +pass the Coulommiers," he said to his wife, who was taking up the salad +bowl and the plates. + +In silence they ate this Brie-type cheese. Des Hermies filled the +glasses. + +"Tell me," Durtal asked Des Hermies, "do you know whether a woman who +receives visits from the incubi necessarily has a cold body? In other +words, is a cold body a presumable symptom of incubacy, as of old the +inability to shed tears served the Inquisition as proof positive to +convict witches?" + +"Yes, I can answer you. Formerly women smitten with incubacy had frigid +flesh even in the month of August. The books of the specialists bear +witness. But now the majority of the creatures who voluntarily or +involuntarily summon or receive the amorous larvæ have, on the contrary, +a skin that is burning and dry to the touch. This transformation is not +yet general, but tends to become so. I remember very well that Dr. +Johannès, he of whom Gévingey told you, was often obliged, at the moment +when he attempted to deliver the patient, to bring the body back to +normal temperature with lotions of dilute hydriodate of potassium." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, who was thinking of Mme. Chantelouve. + +"You don't know what has become of Dr. Johannès?" asked Carhaix. + +"He is living very much in retirement at Lyons. He continues, I believe, +to cure venefices, and he preaches the blessed coming of the Paraclete." + +"For heaven's sake, who is this doctor?" asked Durtal. + +"He is a very intelligent and learned priest. He was superior of a +community, and he directed, here in Paris, the only review which ever +was really mystical. He was a theologian much consulted, a recognized +master of divine jurisprudence; then he had distressing quarrels with +the papal Curia at Rome and with the Cardinal-Archbishop of Paris. His +exorcisms and his battles against the incubi, especially in the female +convents, ruined him. + +"Ah, I remember the last time I saw him, as if it were yesterday. I met +him in the rue Grenelle coming out of the Archbishop's house, the day he +quitted the Church, after a scene which he told me all about. Again I +can see that priest walking with me along the deserted boulevard des +Invalides. He was pale, and his defeated but impressive voice trembled. +He had been summoned and commanded to explain his actions in the case of +an epileptic woman whom he claimed to have cured with the aid of a +relic, the seamless robe of Christ preserved at Argenteuil. The +Cardinal, assisted by two grand vicars, listened to him, standing. + +"When he had likewise furnished the information which they demanded +about his cures of witch spells, Cardinal Guibert said, 'You had best go +to La Trappe.' + +"And I remember word for word his reply, 'If I have violated the laws +of the Church, I am ready to undergo the penalty of my fault. If you +think me culpable, pass a canonical judgment and I will execute it, I +swear on my sacerdotal honour; but I wish a formal sentence, for, in +law, nobody is bound to condemn himself: "_Nemo se tradere tenetur_," +says the Corpus Juris Canonici.' + +"There was a copy of his review on the table. The Cardinal pointed to a +page and asked, 'Did you write that?' + +"'Yes, Eminence.' + +"'Infamous doctrines!' and he went from his office into the next room, +crying, 'Out of my sight!' + +"Then Johannès advanced as far as the threshold of the other room, and +falling on his knees, he said, 'Eminence, I had no intention of +offending. If I have done so, I beg forgiveness.' + +"The Cardinal cried more loudly, 'Out of my sight before I call for +assistance!' + +"Johannès rose and left. + +"'All my old ties are broken,' he said, as he parted from me. He was so +sad that I had not the heart to question him further." + +There was a silence. Carhaix went up to his tower to ring a peal. His +wife removed the dessert dishes and the cloth. Des Hermies prepared the +coffee. Durtal, pensive, rolled his cigarette. + +Carhaix, when he returned, as if enveloped in a fog of sounds, +exclaimed, "A while ago, Des Hermies, you were speaking of the +Franciscans. Do you know that that order, to live up to its professions +of poverty, was supposed not to possess even a bell? True, this rule has +been relaxed somewhat. It was too severe! Now they have a bell, but only +one." + +"Just like most other abbeys, then." + +"No, because all communities have at least three, in honour of the holy +and triple Hypostasis." + +"Do you mean to say that the number of bells a monastery or church can +have is limited by rule?" + +"Formerly it was. There was a pious hierarchy of ringing: the bells of a +convent could not sound when the bells of a church pealed. They were the +vassals, and, respectful and submissive as became their rank, they were +silent when the Suzerain spoke to the multitudes. These principles of +procedure, consecrated, in 1590, by a canon of the Council of Toulouse +and confirmed by two decrees of the Congress of Rites, are no longer +followed. The rulings of San Carlo Borromeo, who decreed that a church +should have from five to seven bells, a boy's academy three, and a +parochial school two, are abolished. Today churches have more or fewer +bells as they are more or less rich.... Oh, well, why worry? Where are +the little glasses?" + +His wife brought them, shook hands with the guests, and retired. + +Then while Carhaix was pouring the cognac, Des Hermies said in a low +voice, "I did not want to speak before her, because these matters +distress and frighten her, but I received a singular visit this morning +from Gévingey, who is running over to Lyons to see Dr. Johannès. He +claims to have been bewitched by Canon Docre, who, it seems, is making a +flying visit to Paris. What have been their relations? I don't know. +Anyway, Gévingey is in a deplorable state." + +"Just what seems to be the matter with him?" asked Durtal. + +"I positively do not know. I made a careful auscultation and examined +him thoroughly. He complains of needles pricking him around the heart. I +observed nervous trouble and nothing else. What I am most worried about +is a state of enfeeblement inexplicable in a man who is neither +cancerous nor diabetical." + +"Ah," said Carhaix, "I suppose people are not betwitched now with wax +images and needles, with the 'Manei' or the 'Dagyde' as it was called in +the good old days." + +"No, those practises are now out of date and almost everywhere fallen +into disuse. Gévingey who took me completely into his confidence this +morning, told me what extraordinary recipes the frightful canon uses. +These are, it seems, the unrevealed secrets of modern magic." + +"Ah, that's what interests me," exclaimed Durtal. + +"Of course I limit myself to repeating what was told me," resumed Des +Hermies, lighting his cigarette. "Well, Docre keeps white mice in cages, +and he takes them along when he travels. He feeds them on consecrated +hosts and on pastes impregnated with poisons skilfully dosed. When these +unhappy beasts are saturated, he takes them, holds them over a chalice, +and with a very sharp instrument he pricks them here and there. The +blood flows into the vase and he uses it, in a way which I shall explain +in a moment, to strike his enemies with death. Formerly he operated on +chickens and guinea pigs, but he used the grease, not the blood, of +these animals, become thus execrated and venomous tabernacles. + +"Formerly he also used a recipe discovered by the Satanic society of the +Re-Theurgistes-Optimates, of which I have spoken before, and he prepared +a hash composed of flour, meat, Eucharist bread, mercury, animal semen, +human blood, acetate of morphine and aspic oil. + +"Latterly, and according to Gévingey this abomination is more perilous +yet, he stuffs fishes with communion bread and with toxins skilfully +graduated. These toxins are chosen from those which produce madness or +lockjaw when absorbed through the pores. Then, when these fishes are +thoroughly permeated with the substances sealed by sacrilege, Docre +takes them out of the water, lets them rot, distills them, and expresses +from them an essential oil one drop of which will produce madness. This +drop, it appears, is applied externally, by touching the hair, as in +Balzac's _Thirteen_." + +"Hmmm," said Durtal, "I am afraid that a drop of this oil long ago fell +on the scalp of poor old Gévingey." + +"What is interesting about this story is not the outlandishness of these +diabolical pharmacopoeia so much as the psychology of the persons who +invent and manipulate them. Think. This is happening at the present day, +and it is the priests who have invented philtres unknown to the +sorcerers of the Middle Ages." + +"The priests, no! A priest. And what a priest!" remarked Carhaix. + +"Gévingey is very precise. He affirms that others use them. Bewitchment +by veniniferous blood of mice took place in 1879 at Châlons-sur-Marne in +a demoniac circle--to which the canon belonged, it is true. In 1883, in +Savoy, the oil of which I have spoken was prepared in a group of +defrocked abbés. As you see, Docre is not the only one who practises +this abominable science. It is known in the convents; some laymen, even, +have an inkling of it." + +"But now, admitting that these preparations are real and that they are +active, you have not explained how one can poison a man with them either +from a distance or near at hand." + +"Yes, that's another matter. One has a choice of two methods to reach +the enemy one is aiming at. The first and least used is this: the +magician employs a voyant, a woman who is known in that world as 'a +flying spirit'; she is a somnambulist, who, put into a hypnotic state, +can betake herself, in spirit, wherever one wishes her to go. It is then +possible to have her transmit the magic poisons to a person whom one +designates, hundreds of leagues away. Those who are stricken in this +manner have seen no one, and they go mad or die without suspecting the +venefice. But these voyants are not only rare, they are also unreliable, +because other persons can likewise fix them in a cataleptic state and +extract confessions from them. So you see why persons like Docre have +recourse to the second method, which is surer. It consists in evoking, +just as in Spiritism, the soul of a dead person and sending it to strike +the victim with the prepared spell. The result is the same but the +vehicle is different. There," concluded Des Hermies, "reported with +painstaking exactness, are the confidences which our friend Gévingey +made me this morning." + +"And Dr. Johannès cures people poisoned in this manner?" asked Carhaix. + +"Yes, Dr. Johannès--to my knowledge--has made inexplicable cures." + +"But with what?" + +"Gévingey tells me, in this connection, that the doctor celebrates a +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek. I haven't the faintest idea what +this sacrifice is, but Gévingey will perhaps enlighten us if he returns +cured." + +"In spite of all, I should not be displeased, once in my life to get a +good look at Canon Docre," said Durtal. + +"Not I! He is the incarnation of the Accursed on earth!" cried Carhaix, +assisting his friends to put on their overcoats. + +He lighted his lantern, and while they were descending the stair, as +Durtal complained of the cold, Des Hermies burst into a laugh. + +"If your family had known the magical secrets of the plants, you would +not shiver this way," he said. "It was learned in the sixteenth century +that a child might be immune to heat or cold all his life if his hands +were rubbed with juice of absinth before the twelfth month of his life +had passed. That, you see, is a tempting prescription, less dangerous +than those which Canon Docre abuses." + +Once below, after Carhaix had closed the door of his tower, they +hastened their steps, for the north wind swept the square. + +"After all," said Des Hermies, "Satanism aside--and yet Satanism also is +a phase of religion--admit that, for two miscreants of our sort, we hold +singularly pious conversations. I hope they will be counted in our +favour up above." + +"No merit on our part," replied Durtal, "for what else is there to talk +about? Conversations which do not treat of religion or art are so base +and vain." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +The memory of these frightful magisteria kept racing through his head +next day, and, while smoking cigarettes beside the fire, Durtal thought +of Docre and Johannès fighting across Gévingey's back, smiting and +parrying with incantations and exorcisms. + +"In the Christian symbolism," he said to himself, "the fish is one of +the representations of Christ. Doubtless the Canon thinks to aggravate +his sacrileges by feeding fishes on genuine hosts. His is the reverse of +the system of the mediæval witches who chose a vile beast dedicated to +the Devil to submit the body of the Saviour to the processes of +digestion. How real is the pretended power which the deicide chemists +are alleged to wield? What faith can we put in the tales of evoked larvæ +killing a designated person to order with corrosive oil and blood virus? +None, unless one is extremely credulous, and even a bit mad. + +"And yet, come to think of it, we find today, unexplained and surviving +under other names, the mysteries which were so long reckoned the product +of mediæval imagination and superstition. At the charity hospital Dr. +Louis transfers maladies from one hypnotized person to another. Wherein +is that less miraculous than evocation of demons, than spells cast by +magicians or pastors? A larva, a flying spirit, is not, indeed, more +extraordinary than a microbe coming from afar and poisoning one without +one's knowledge, and the atmosphere can certainly convey spirits as well +as bacilli. Certainly the ether carries, untransformed, emanations, +effluences, electricity, for instance, or the fluids of a magnet which +sends to a distant subject an order to traverse all Paris to rejoin it. +Science has no call to contest these phenomena. On the other hand, Dr. +Brown-Sequard rejuvenates infirm old men and revitalizes the impotent +with distillations from the parts of rabbits and cavies. Were not the +elixirs of life and the love philtres which the witches sold to the +senile and impotent composed of similar or analogous substances? Human +semen entered almost always, in the Middle Ages, into the compounding of +these mixtures. Now, hasn't Dr. Brown-Sequard, after repeated +experiments, recently demonstrated the virtues of semen taken from one +man and instilled into another? + +"Finally, the apparitions, doppelgänger, bilocations--to speak thus of +the spirits--that terrified antiquity, have not ceased to manifest +themselves. It would be difficult to prove that the experiments carried +on for three years by Dr. Crookes in the presence of witnesses were +cheats. If he has been able to photograph visible and tangible spectres, +we must recognize the veracity of the mediæval thaumaturges. Incredible, +of course--and wasn't hypnotism, possession of one soul by another which +could dedicate it to crime--incredible only ten years ago? + +"We are groping in shadow, that is sure. But Des Hermies hit the +bull's-eye when he remarked, 'It is less important to know whether the +modern pharmaceutic sacrileges are potent, than to study the motives of +the Satanists and fallen priests who prepare them.' + +"Ah, if there were some way of getting acquainted with Canon Docre, of +insinuating oneself into his confidence, perhaps one would attain clear +insight into these questions. I learned long ago that there are no +people interesting to know except saints, scoundrels, and cranks. They +are the only persons whose conversation amounts to anything. Persons of +good sense are necessarily dull, because they revolve over and over +again the tedious topics of everyday life. They are the crowd, more or +less intelligent, but they are the crowd, and they give me a pain. Yes, +but who will put me in touch with this monstrous priest?" and, as he +poked the fire, Durtal said to himself, "Chantelouve, if he would, but +he won't. There remains his wife, who used to be well acquainted with +Docre. I must interrogate her and find out whether she still corresponds +with him and sees him." + +The entrance of Mme. Chantelouve into his reflections saddened him. He +took out his watch and murmured, "What a bore. She will come again, and +again I shall have to--if only there were any possibility of convincing +her of the futility of the carnal somersaults! In any case, she can't be +very well pleased, because, to her frantic letter soliciting a meeting, +I responded three days later by a brief, dry note, inviting her to come +here this evening. It certainly was lacking in lyricism, too much so, +perhaps." + +He rose and went into his bedroom to make sure that the fire was burning +brightly, then he returned and sat down, without even arranging his room +as he had the other times. Now that he no longer cared for this woman, +gallantry and self-consciousness had fled. He awaited her without +impatience, his slippers on his feet. + +"To tell the truth, I have had nothing pleasant from Hyacinthe except +that kiss we exchanged when her husband was only a few feet away. I +certainly shall not again find her lips a-flame and fragrant. Here her +kiss is insipid." + +Mme. Chantelouve rang earlier than usual. + +"Well," she said, sitting down. "You wrote me a nice letter." + +"How's that?" + +"Confess frankly that you are through with me." + +He denied this, but she shook her head. + +"Well," he said, "what have you to reproach me with? Having written you +only a short note? But there was someone here, I was busy and I didn't +have time to assemble pretty speeches. Not having set a date sooner? I +told you our relation necessitates precautions, and we can't see each +other very often. I think I gave you clearly to understand my +motives--" + +"I am so stupid that I probably did not understand them. You spoke to me +of 'family reasons,' I believe." + +"Yes." + +"Rather vague." + +"Well, I couldn't go into detail and tell you that--" + +He stopped, asking himself whether the time had come to break decisively +with her, but he remembered that he wanted her aid in getting +information about Docre. + +"That what? Tell me." + +He shook his head, hesitating, not to tell her a lie, but to insult and +humiliate her. + +"Well," he went on, "since you force me to do it, I will confess, at +whatever cost, that I have had a mistress for several years--I add that +our relations are now purely amical--" + +"Very well," she interrupted, "your family reasons are sufficient." + +"And then," he pursued, in a lower tone, "if you wish to know all, +well--I have a child by her." + +"A child! Oh, you poor dear." She rose. "Then there is nothing for me to +do but withdraw." + +But he seized her hands, and, at the same time satisfied with the +success of his deception and ashamed of his brutality, he begged her to +stay awhile. She refused. Then he drew her to him, kissed her hair, and +cajoled her. Her troubled eyes looked deep into his. + +"Ah, then!" she said. "No, let me undress." + +"Not for the world!" + +"Yes!" + +"Oh, the scene of the other night beginning all over again," he +murmured, sinking, overwhelmed, into a chair. He felt borne down, +burdened by an unspeakable weariness. + +He undressed beside the fire and warmed himself while waiting for her to +get to bed. When they were in bed she enveloped him with her supple, +cold limbs. + +"Now is it true that I am to come here no more?" + +He did not answer, but understood that she had no intention of going +away and that he had to do with a person of the staying kind. + +"Tell me." + +He buried his head in her breast to keep from having to answer. + +"Tell me in my lips." + +He beset her furiously, to make her keep silent, then he lay disabused, +weary, happy that it was over. When they lay down again she put her arm +about his neck and ran her tongue around in his mouth like an auger, but +he paid little heed to caresses and remained feeble and pathetic. Then +she bent over, reached him, and he groaned. + +"Ah!" she exclaimed suddenly, rising, "at last I have heard you cry!" + +He lay, broken in body and spirit, incapable of thinking two thoughts in +sequence. His brain seemed to whir, undone, in his skull. + +He collected himself, however, rose and went into the other room to +dress and let her do the same. + +Through the drawn portière separating the two rooms he saw a little +pinhole of light which came from the wax candle placed on the mantel +opposite the curtain. Hyacinthe, going back and forth, would momentarily +intercept this light, then it would flash out again. + +"Ah," she said, "my poor darling, you have a child." + +"The shot struck home," said he to himself, and aloud, "Yes, a little +girl." + +"How old?" + +"She will soon be six," and he described her as flaxen-haired, lively, +but in very frail health, requiring multiple precautions and constant +care. + +"You must have very sad evenings," said Mme. Chantelouve, in a voice of +emotion, from behind the curtain. + +"Oh yes! If I were to die tomorrow, what would become of those two +unfortunates?" + +His imagination took wing. He began himself to believe the mother and +her. His voice trembled. Tears very nearly came to his eyes. + +"He is unhappy, my darling is," she said, raising the curtain and +returning, clothed, into the room. "And that is why he looks so sad, +even when he smiles!" + +He looked at her. Surely at that moment her affection was not feigned. +She really clung to him. Why, oh, why, had she had to have those rages +of lust? If it had not been for those they could probably have been good +comrades, sin moderately together, and love each other better than if +they wallowed in the sty of the senses. But no, such a relation was +impossible with her, he concluded, seeing those sulphurous eyes, that +ravenous, despoiling mouth. + +She had sat down in front of his writing table and was playing with a +penholder. "Were you working when I came in? Where are you in your +history of Gilles de Rais?" + +"I am getting along, but I am hampered. To make a good study of the +Satanism of the Middle Ages one ought to get really into the +environment, or at least fabricate a similar environment, by becoming +acquainted with the practitioners of Satanism all about us--for the +psychology is the same, though the operations differ." And looking her +straight in the eye, thinking the story of the child had softened her, +he hazarded all on a cast, "Ah! if your husband would give me the +information he has about Canon Docre!" + +She stood motionless, but her eyes clouded over. She did not answer. + +"True," he said, "Chantelouve, suspecting our liaison--" + +She interrupted him. "My husband has no concern with the relations which +may exist between you and me. He evidently suffers when I go out, as +tonight, for he knows where I am going; but I admit no right of control +either on his part or mine. He is free, and I am free, to go wherever we +please. I must keep house for him, watch out for his interests, take +care of him, love him like a devoted companion, and that I do, with all +my heart. As to being responsible for my acts, they're none of his +business, no more his than anybody else's." + +She spoke in a crisp, incisive tone. + +"The devil;" said Durtal. "You certainly reduce the importance of the +rôle of husband." + +"I know that my ideas are not the ideas of the world I live in, and they +appear not to be yours. In my first marriage they were a source of +trouble and disaster--but I have an iron will and I bend the people who +love me. In addition, I despise deceit, so when a few years after +marriage I became smitten on a man I quite frankly told my husband and +confessed my fault." + +"Dare I ask you in what spirit he received this confidence?" + +"He was so grieved that in one night his hair turned white. He could not +bear what he called--wrongly, I think--my treason, and he killed +himself." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, dumbfounded by the placid and resolute air of this +woman, "but suppose he had strangled you first?" + +She shrugged her shoulders and picked a cat hair off her skirt. + +"The result," he resumed after a silence, "being that you are now almost +free, that your second husband tolerates--" + +"Let us not discuss my second husband. He is an excellent man who +deserves a better wife. I have absolutely no reason to speak of +Chantelouve otherwise than with praise, and then--oh, let's talk of +something else, for I have had sufficient botheration on this subject +from my confessor, who interdicts me from the Holy Table." + +He contemplated her, and saw yet another Hyacinthe, a hard, pertinacious +woman whom he had not known. Not a sign nor an accent of emotion, +nothing, while she was describing the suicide of her first husband--she +did not even seem to imagine that she had a crime on her conscience. She +remained pitiless, and yet, a moment ago, when she was commiserating him +because of his fictitious parenthood, he had thought she was trembling. +"After all, perhaps she is acting a part--like myself." + +He remained awed by the turn the conversation had taken. He sought, +mentally, a way of getting back to the subject from which Hyacinthe had +diverted him, of the Satanism of Canon Docre. + +"Well, let us think of that no more," she said, coming very near. She +smiled, and was once more the Hyacinthe he knew. + +"But if on my account you can no longer take communion--" + +She interrupted him. "Would you be sorry if I did not love you?" and she +kissed his eyes. He squeezed her politely in his arms, but he felt her +trembling, and from motives of prudence he got away. + +"Is he so inexorable, your confessor?" + +"He is an incorruptible man, of the old school. I chose him expressly." + +"If I were a woman it seems to me I should take, on the contrary, a +confessor who was pliable and caressible and who would not violently +pillory my dainty little sins. I would have him indulgent, oiling the +hinges of confession, enticing forth with beguiling gestures the +misdeeds that hung back. It is true there would be risk of seducing a +confessor who perhaps would be defenceless--" + +"And that would be incest, because the priest is a spiritual father, and +it would also be sacrilege, because the priest is consecrated.--Oh," +speaking to herself, "I was mad, mad--" suddenly carried away. + +He observed her; sparks glinted in the myopic eyes of this extraordinary +woman. Evidently he had just stumbled, unwittingly, onto a guilty secret +of hers. + +"Well," and he smiled, "do you still commit infidelities to me with a +false me?" + +"I do not understand." + +"Do you receive, at night, the visit of the incubus which resembles +me?" + +"No. Since I have been able to possess you in the flesh I have no need +to evoke your image." + +"What a downright Satanist you are!" + +"Maybe. I have been so constantly associated with priests." + +"You're a great one," he said, bowing. "Now listen to me, and do me a +great favour. You know Canon Docre?" + +"I should say!" + +"Well, what in the world is this man, about whom I hear so much?" + +"From whom?" + +"Gévingey and Des Hermies." + +"Ah, you consult the astrologer! Yes, he met the Canon in my own house, +but I didn't know that Docre was acquainted with Des Hermies, who didn't +attend our receptions in those days." + +"Des Hermies has never seen Docre. He knows him, as I do, only by +hearsay, from Gévingey. Now, briefly, how much truth is there in the +stories of the sacrileges of which this priest is accused?" + +"I don't know. Docre is a gentleman, learned and well bred. He was even +the confessor of royalty, and he would certainly have become a bishop if +he had not quitted the priesthood. I have heard a great deal of evil +spoken about him, but, especially in the clerical world, people are so +fond of saying all sorts of things." + +"But you knew him personally." + +"Yes, I even had him for a confessor." + +"Then it isn't possible that you don't know what to make of him?" + +"Very possible, indeed presumable. Look here, you have been beating +around the bush a long time. Exactly what do you want to know?" + +"Everything you care to tell me. Is he young or old, handsome or ugly, +rich or poor?" + +"He is forty years old, very fastidious of his person, and he spends a +lot of money." + +"Do you believe that he indulges in sorcery, that he celebrates the +black mass?" + +"It is quite possible." + +"Pardon me for dunning you, for extorting information from you as if +with forceps--suppose I were to ask you a really personal question--this +faculty of incubacy ...?" + +"Why, certainly I got it from him. I hope you are satisfied." + +"Yes and no. Thanks for your kindness in telling me--I know I am abusing +your good nature--but one more question. Do you know of any way whereby +I may see Canon Docre in person?" + +"He is at Nîmes." + +"Pardon me. For the moment, he is in Paris." + +"Ah, you know that! Well, if I knew of a way, I would not tell you, be +sure. It would not be good for you to get to seeing too much of this +priest." + +"You admit, then, that he is dangerous?" + +"I do not admit nor deny. I tell you simply that you have nothing to do +with him." + +"Yes I have. I want to get material for my book from him." + +"Get it from somebody else. Besides," she said, putting on her hat in +front of the glass, "my husband got a bad scare and broke with that man +and refuses to receive him." + +"That is no reason why--" + +"What do you mean?" + +"Oh, nothing." He repressed the remark: "Why you should not see him." + +She did not insist. She was poking her hair under her veil. "Heavens! +what a fright I look!" + +He took her hands and kissed them. "When shall I see you again?" + +"I thought I wasn't to come here any more." + +"Oh, now, you know I love you as a good friend. Tell me, when will you +come again?" + +"Tomorrow night, unless it is inconvenient for you." + +"Not at all." + +"Then, _au revoir_." + +Their lips met. + +"And above all, don't think about Canon Docre," she said, turning and +shaking her finger at him threateningly as she went out. + +"Devil take you and your reticence," he said to himself, closing the +door after her. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +"When I think," said Durtal to himself the next morning, "that in bed, +at the moment when the most pertinacious will succumbs, I held firm and +refused to yield to the instances of Hyacinthe wishing to establish a +footing here, and that after the carnal decline, at that instant when +annihilated man recovers--alas!--his reason, I supplicated her, myself, +to continue her visits, why, I simply cannot understand myself. Deep +down, I have not got over my firm resolution of breaking with her, but I +could not dismiss her like a cocotte. And," to justify his +inconsistency, "I hoped to get some information about the canon. Oh, on +that subject I am not through with her. She's got to make up her mind to +speak out and quit answering me by monosyllables and guarded phrases as +she did yesterday. + +"Indeed, what can she have been up to with that abbé who was her +confessor and who, by her own admission, launched her into incubacy? She +has been his mistress, that is certain. And how many other of these +priests she has gone around with have been her lovers also? For she +confessed, in a cry, that those are the men she loves. Ah, if one went +about much in the clerical world one would doubtless learn remarkable +things concerning her and her husband. It is strange, all the same that +Chantelouve, who plays a singular rôle in that household, has acquired a +deplorable reputation, and she hasn't. Never have I heard anybody speak +of her dodges--but, oh, what a fool I am! It isn't strange. Her husband +doesn't confine himself to religious and polite circles. He hobnobs with +men of letters, and in consequence exposes himself to every sort of +slander, while she, if she takes a lover, chooses him out of a pious +society in which not one of us would ever be received. And then, abbés +are discreet. But how explain her infatuation with me? By the simple +fact that she is surfeited of priests and a layman serves as a change of +diet. + +"Just the same, she is quite singular, and the more I see her the less I +understand her. There are in her three distinct beings. + +"First the woman seated or standing up, whom I knew in her drawing-room, +reserved, almost haughty, who becomes a good companion in private, +affectionate and even tender. + +"Then the woman in bed, completely changed in voice and bearing, a +harlot spitting mud, losing all shame. + +"Third and last, the pitiless vixen, the thorough Satanist, whom I +perceived yesterday. + +"What is the binding-alloy that amalgamates all these beings of hers? I +can't say. Hypocrisy, no doubt. No. I don't think so, for she is often +of a disconcerting frankness--in moments, it is true, of forgetfulness +and unguardedness. Seriously, what is the use of trying to understand +the character of this pious harlot? And to be candid with myself, what I +wish ideally will never be realized; she does not ask me to take her to +swell places, does not force me to dine with her, exacts no revenue: she +isn't trying to compromise and blackmail me. I shan't find a +better--but, oh, Lord! I now prefer to find no one at all. It suits me +perfectly to entrust my carnal business to mercenary agents. For my +twenty francs I shall receive more considerate treatment. There is no +getting around it, only professionals know how to cook up a delicious +sensual dish. + +"Odd," he said to himself after a reflective silence, "but, all +proportions duly observed, Gilles de Rais divides himself like her, into +three different persons. + +"First, the brave and honest fighting man. + +"Then the refined and artistic criminal. + +"Finally the repentant sinner, the mystic. + +"He is a mass of contradictions and excesses. Viewing his life as a +whole one finds each of his vices compensated by a contradictory virtue, +but there is no key characteristic which reconciles them. + +"He is of an overweening arrogance, but when contrition takes possession +of him, he falls on his knees in front of the people of low estate, and +has the tears, the humility of a saint. + +"His ferocity passes the limits of the human scale, and yet he is +generous and sincerely devoted to his friends, whom he cares for like a +brother when the Demon has mauled them. + +"Impetuous in his desires, and nevertheless patient; brave in battle, a +coward confronting eternity; he is despotic and violent, yet he is putty +in the hands of his flatterers. He is now in the clouds, now in the +abyss, never on the trodden plain, the lowlands of the soul. His +confessions do not throw any light on his invariable tendency to +extremes. When asked who suggested to him the idea of such crimes, he +answers, 'No one. The thought came to me only from myself, from my +reveries, my daily pleasures, my taste for debauchery.' And he arraigns +his indolence and constantly asserts that delicate repasts and strong +drink have helped uncage the wild animal in him. + +"Unresponsive to mediocre passions, he is carried away alternately by +good as well as evil, and he bounds from spiritual pole to spiritual +pole. He dies at the age of thirty-six, but he has completely exhausted +the possibilities of joy and grief. He has adored death, loved as a +vampire, kissed inimitable expressions of suffering and terror, and has, +himself, been racked by implacable remorse, insatiable fear. He has +nothing more to try, nothing more to learn, here below. + +"Let's see," said Durtal, running over his notes. "I left him at the +moment when the expiation begins. As I had written in one of my +preceding chapters, the inhabitants of the region dominated by the +châteaux of the Marshal know now who the inconceivable monster is who +carries children off and cuts their throats. But no one dare speak. +When, at a turn in the road, the tall figure of the butcher is seen +approaching, all flee, huddle behind the hedges, or shut themselves up +in the cottages. + +"And Gilles passes, haughty and sombre, in the solitude of villages +where no one dares venture abroad. Impunity seems assured him, for what +peasant would be mad enough to attack a master who could have him +gibbeted at a word? + +"Again, if the humble give up the idea of bringing Gilles de Rais to +justice, his peers have no intention of combating him for the benefit of +peasants whom they disdain, and his liege, the duke of Brittany, Jean V, +burdens him with favours and blandishments in order to extort his lands +from him at a low price. + +"A single power can rise and, above feudal complicities, above earthly +interest, avenge the oppressed and the weak. The Church. And it is the +Church in fact, in the person of Jean de Malestroit, which rises up +before the monster and fells him. + +"Jean de Malestroit, Bishop of Nantes, belongs to an illustrious line. +He is a near kinsman of Jean V, and his incomparable piety, his +infallible Christian wisdom, and his enthusiastic charity, make him +venerated, even by the duke. + +"The wailing of Gilles's decimated flock reaches his ears. In silence he +begins an investigation and, setting spies upon the Marshal, waits only +for an opportune moment to begin the combat. And Gilles suddenly commits +an inexplicable crime which permits the Bishop to march forthwith upon +him and smite him. + +"To recuperate his shattered fortune, Gilles has sold his signorie of +Saint Etienne de Mer Morte to a subject of Jean V, Guillaume le Ferron, +who delegates his brother, Jean le Ferron, to take possession of the +domain. + +"Some days later the Marshal gathers the two hundred men of his military +household and at their head marches on Saint Etienne. There, the day of +Pentecost, when the assembled people are hearing mass, he precipitates +himself, sword in hand, into the church, sweeps aside the faithful, +throwing them into tumult, and, before the dumbfounded priest, threatens +to cleave Jean le Ferron, who is praying. The ceremony is broken off, +the congregation take flight. Gilles drags le Ferron, pleading for +mercy, to the château, orders that the drawbridge be let down, and by +force occupies the place, while his prisoner is carried away to +Tiffauges and thrown into an underground dungeon. + +"Gilles has, at one and the same time, violated the unwritten law of +Brittany forbidding any baron to raise troops without the consent of the +duke, and committed double sacrilege in profaning a chapel and seizing +Jean le Ferron, who is a tonsured clerk of the Church. + +"The Bishop learns of this outrage and prevails upon the reluctant Jean +V to march against the rebel. Then, while one army advances on Saint +Etienne, which Gilles abandons to take refuge with his little band in +the fortified manor of Mâchecoul, another army lays siege to Tiffauges. + +"During this time the priest hastens his redoubled investigations. He +delegates commissioners and procurators in all the villages where +children have disappeared. He himself quits his palace at Nantes, +travels about the countryside, and takes the depositions of the bereft. +The people at last speak, and on their knees beseech the Bishop to +protect them. Enraged by the atrocities which they reveal, he swears +that justice shall be done. + +"It takes a month to hear all the reports. By letters-patent Jean de +Malestroit establishes publicly the '_infamatio_' of Gilles, then, when +all the forms of canonic procedure have been gone through with, he +launches the mandate of arrest. + +"In this writ of warrant, given at Nantes the 13th day of September in +the year of Our Lord 1440, the Bishop notes all the crimes imputed to +the Marshal, then, in an energetic style, he commands his diocese to +march against the assassin and dislodge him. 'Thus we do enjoin you, +each and all, individually, by these presents, that ye cite immediately +and peremptorily, without counting any man upon his neighbor, without +discharging the burden any man upon his neighbour, that ye cite before +us or before the Official of our cathedral church, for Monday of the +feast of Exaltation of the Holy Cross, the 19th of September, Gilles, +noble baron de Rais, subject to our puissance and to our jurisdiction; +and we do ourselves cite him by these presents to appear before our bar +to answer for the crimes which weigh upon him. Execute these orders, and +do each of you cause them to be executed.' + +"And the next day the captain-at-arms, Jean Labbé, acting in the name of +the duke, and Robin Guillaumet, notary, acting in the name of the +Bishop, present themselves, escorted by a small troop, before the +château of Mâchecoul. + +"What sudden change of heart does the Marshal now experience? Too feeble +to hold his own in the open field, he can nevertheless defend himself +behind the sheltering ramparts--yet he surrenders. + +"Roger de Bricqueville and Gilles de Sillé, his trusted councillors, +have taken flight. He remains alone with Prelati, who also attempts, in +vain, to escape. He, like Gilles, is loaded with chains. Robin +Guillaumet searches the fortress from top to bottom. He discovers bloody +clothes, imperfectly calcinated ashes which Prelati has not had time to +throw into the latrines. Amid universal maledictions and cries of horror +Gilles and his servitors are conducted to Nîmes and incarcerated in the +château de la Tour Neuve. + +"Now this part is not very clear," said Durtal to himself. "Remembering +what a daredevil the Marshal had been, how can we reconcile ourselves to +the idea that he could give himself up to certain death and torture +without striking a blow? + +"'Was he softened, weakened by his nights of debauchery, terrified by +the audacity of his own sacrileges, ravaged and torn by remorse? Was he +tired of living as he did, and did he give himself up, as so many +murderers do, because he was irresistibly attracted to punishment? +Nobody knows. Did he think himself above the law because of his lofty +rank? Or did he hope to disarm the duke by playing upon his venality, +offering him a ransom of manors and farm land? + +"One answer is as plausible as another. He may also have known how +hesitant Jean V had been, for fear of rousing the wrath of the nobility +of his duchy, about yielding to the objurgations of the Bishop and +raising troops for the pursuit and arrest. + +"Well, there is no document which answers these questions. An author can +take some liberties here and set down his own conjectures. But that +curious trial is going to give me some trouble. + +"As soon as Gilles and his accomplices are incarcerated, two tribunals +are organized, one ecclesiastical to judge the crimes coming under the +jurisdiction of the Church, the other civil to judge those on which the +state must pass. + +"To tell the truth, the civil tribunal, which is present at the +ecclesiastical hearings, effaces itself completely. As a matter of form +it makes a brief cross-examination--but it pronounces the sentence of +death, which the Church cannot permit itself to utter, according to the +old adage, '_Ecclesia abhorret a sanguine_.' + +"The ecclesiastical trial lasts five weeks, the civil, forty-eight +hours. It seems that, to hide behind the robes of the Bishop, the duke +of Brittany has voluntarily subordinated the rôle of civil justice, +which ordinarily stands up for its rights against the encroachments of +the ecclesiastical court. + +"Jean de Malestroit presides over the hearings. He chooses for +assistants the Bishops of Mans, of Saint Brieuc, and of Saint Lô, then +in addition he surrounds himself with a troop of jurists who work in +relays in the interminable sessions of the trial. Some of the more +important are Guillaume de Montigné, advocate of the secular court; +Jean Blanchet, bachelor of laws; Guillaume Groyguet and Robert de la +Rivière, licentiates _in utroque jure_, and Hervé Lévi, senescal of +Quimper. Pierre de l'Hospital, chancellor of Brittany, who is to preside +over the civil hearings after the canonic judgment, assists Jean de +Malestroit. + +"The public prosecutor is Guillaume Chapeiron, curate of Saint Nicolas, +an eloquent and subtile man. Adjunct to him, to relieve him of the +fatigue of the readings, are Geoffroy Pipraire, dean of Sainte Marie, +and Jacques de Pentcoetdic, Official of the Church of Nantes. + +"In connection with the episcopal jurisdiction, the Church has called in +the assistance of the extraordinary tribunal of the Inquisition, for the +repression of the crime of heresy, then comprehending perjury, +blasphemy, sacrilege, all the crimes of magic. + +"It sits at the side of Jean de Malestroit in the redoubtable and +learned person of Jean Blouyn of the order of Saint Dominic, delegated +by the Grand Inquisitor of France, Guillaume Merici, to the functions of +Vice Inquisitor of the city and diocese of Nantes. + +"The tribunal constituted, the trial opens the first thing in the +morning, because judges and witnesses, in accordance with the custom of +the times, must proceed fasting to the giving and hearing of evidence. +The testimony of the parents of the victims is heard, and Robin +Guillaumet, acting sergeant-at-arms, the man who arrested the Marshal at +Mâchecoul, reads the citation bidding Gilles de Rais appear. He is +brought in and declares disdainfully that he does not recognize the +competence of the Tribunal, but, as canonic procedure demands, the +Prosecutor at once 'in order that by this means the correction of +sorcery be not prevented,' petitions for and obtains from the tribunal a +ruling that this objection be quashed as being null in law and +'frivolous.' He begins to read to the accused the counts on which he is +to be tried. Gilles cries out that the Prosecutor is a liar and a +traitor. Then Guillaume Chapeiron extends his hand toward the crucifix, +swears that he is telling the truth, and challenges the Marshal to take +the same oath. But this man, who has recoiled from no sacrilege, is +troubled. He refuses to perjure himself before God, and the session ends +with Gilles still vociferating outrageous denunciations of the +Prosecutor. + +"The preliminaries completed, a few days later, the public hearings +begin. The act of indictment is read aloud to the accused, in front of +an audience who shudder when Chapeiron indefatigably enumerates the +crimes one by one, and formally accuses the Marshal of having practised +sorcery and magic, of having polluted and slain little children, of +having violated the immunities of Holy Church at Saint Etienne de Mer +Morte. + +"Then after a silence he resumes his discourse, and making no account of +the murders, but dwelling only on the crimes of which the punishment, +foreseen by canonic law, can be fixed by the Church, he demands that +Gilles be smitten with double excommunication, first as an evoker of +demons, a heretic, apostate and renegade, second as a sodomist and +perpetrator of sacrilege. + +"Gilles, who has listened to this incisive and scathing indictment, +completely loses control of himself. He insults the judges, calls them +simonists and ribalds, and refuses to answer the questions put to him. +The Prosecutor and advocates are unmoved; they invite him to present his +defence. + +"Again he denounces them, insults them, but when called upon to refute +them he remains silent. + +"The Bishop and Vice Inquisitor declare him in contempt and pronounce +against him the sentence of excommunication, which is soon made public. +They decide in addition that the hearing shall be continued next day--" + +A ring of the doorbell interrupted Durtal's perusal of his notes. Des +Hermies entered. + +"I have just seen Carhaix. He is ill," he said. + +"That so? What seems to be the matter?" + +"Nothing very serious. A slight attack of bronchitis. He'll be up in a +few days if he will consent to keep quiet." + +"I must go see him tomorrow," said Durtal. + +"And what are you doing?" enquired Des Hermies. "Working hard?" + +"Why, yes. I am digging into the trial of the noble baron de Rais. It +will be as tedious to read as to write!" + +"And you don't know yet when you will finish your volume?" + +"No," answered Durtal, stretching. "As a matter of fact I wish it might +never be finished. What will become of me when it is? I'll have to look +around for another subject, and, when I find one, do all the drudgery of +planning and then getting the introductory chapter written--the mean +part of any literary work is getting started. I shall pass mortal hours +doing nothing. Really, when I think it over, literature has only one +excuse for existing; it saves the person who makes it from the +disgustingness of life." + +"And, charitably, it lessens the distress of us few who still love art." + +"Few indeed!" + +"And the number keeps diminishing. The new generation no longer +interests itself in anything except gambling and jockeys." + +"Yes, you're quite right. The men can't spare from gambling the time to +read, so it is only the society women who buy books and pass judgment on +them. It is to The Lady, as Schopenhauer called her, to the little +goose, as I should characterize her, that we are indebted for these +shoals of lukewarm and mucilaginous novels which nowadays get puffed." + +"You think, then, that we are in for a pretty literature. Naturally you +can't please women by enunciating vigorous ideas in a crisp style." + +"But," Durtal went on, after a silence, "it is perhaps best that the +case should be as it is. The rare artists who remain have no business to +be thinking about the public. The artist lives and works far from the +drawing-room, far from the clamour of the little fellows who fix up the +custom-made literature. The only legitimate source of vexation to an +author is to see his work, when printed, exposed to the contaminating +curiosity of the crowd." + +"That is," said Des Hermies, "a veritable prostitution. To advertise a +thing for sale is to accept the degrading familiarities of the first +comer." + +"But our impenitent pride--and also our need of the miserable sous--make +it impossible for us to keep our manuscripts sheltered from the asses. +Art ought to be--like one's beloved--out of reach, out of the world. Art +and prayer are the only decent ejaculations of the soul. So when one of +my books appears, I let go of it with horror. I get as far as possible +from the environment in which it may be supposed to circulate. I care +very little about a book of mine until years afterward, when it has +disappeared from all the shop windows and is out of print. Briefly, I am +in no hurry to finish the history of Gilles de Rais, which, +unfortunately, is getting finished in spite of me. I don't give a damn +how it is received." + +"Are you doing anything this evening?" + +"No. Why?" + +"Shall we dine together?" + +"Certainly." + +And while Durtal was putting on his shoes, Des Hermies remarked, "To me +the striking thing about the so-called literary world of this epoch is +its cheap hypocrisy. What a lot of laziness, for instance, that word +dilettante has served to cover." + +"Yes, it's a great old alibi. But it is confounding to see that the +critic who today decrees himself the title of dilettante accepts it as a +term of praise and does not even suspect that he is slapping himself. +The whole thing can be resolved into syllogism: + +"The dilettante has no personal temperament, since he objects to nothing +and likes everything. + +"Whoever has no personal temperament has no talent." + +"Then," rejoined Des Hermies, putting on his hat, "an author who boasts +of being a dilettante, confesses by that very thing that he is no +author?" + +"Exactly." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +Toward the end of the afternoon Durtal quit work and went up to the +towers of Saint Sulpice. + +He found Carhaix in bed in a chamber connecting with the one in which +they were in the habit of dining. These rooms were very similar, with +their walls of unpapered stone, and with their vaulted ceilings, only, +the bedroom was darker. The window opened its half-wheel not on the +place Saint Sulpice but on the rear of the church, whose roof prevented +any light from getting in. This cell was furnished with an iron bed, +whose springs shrieked, with two cane chairs, and with a table that had +a shabby covering of green baize. On the bare wall was a crucifix of no +value, with a dry palm over it. That was all. Carhaix was sitting up in +bed reading, with books and papers piled all around him. His eyes were +more watery and his face paler than usual. His beard, which had not been +shaved for several days, grew in grey clumps on his hollow cheeks, but +his poor features were radiant with an affectionate, affable smile. + +To Durtal's questions he replied, "It is nothing. Des Hermies gives me +permission to get up tomorrow. But what a frightful medicine!" and he +showed Durtal a potion of which he had to take a teaspoonful every hour. + +"What is it he's making you take?" + +But the bell-ringer did not know. Doubtless to spare him the expense, +Des Hermies himself always brought the bottle. + +"Isn't it tiresome lying in bed?" + +"I should say! I am obliged to entrust my bells to an assistant who is +no good. Ah, if you heard him ring! It makes me shudder, it sets my +teeth on edge." + +"Now you mustn't work yourself up," said his wife. "In two days you will +be able to ring your bells yourself." + +But he went on complaining. "You two don't understand. My bells are used +to being well treated. They're like domestic animals, those instruments, +and they obey only their master. Now they won't harmonize, they jangle. +I can hardly recognize their voices." + +"What are you reading?" asked Durtal, wishing to change a subject which +he judged to be dangerous. + +"Books about bells! Ah, Monsieur Durtal, I have some inscriptions here +of truly rare beauty. Listen," and he opened a worm-bored book, "listen +to this motto printed in raised letters on the bronze robe of the great +bell of Schaffhausen, 'I call the living, I mourn the dead, I break the +thunder.' And this other which figured on an old bell in the belfry of +Ghent, 'My name is Roland. When I toll, there is a fire; when I peal, +there is a tempest in Flanders.'" + +"Yes," Durtal agreed, "there is a certain vigour about that one." + +"Ah," said Carhaix, seeming not to have heard the other's remark, "it's +ridiculous. Now the rich have their names and titles inscribed on the +bells which they give to the churches, but they have so many qualities +and titles that there is no room for a motto. Truly, humility is a +forgotten virtue in our day." + +"If that were the only forgotten virtue!" sighed Durtal. + +"Ah!" replied Carhaix, not to be turned from his favourite subject, "and +if this were the only abuse! But bells now rust from inactivity. The +metal is no longer hammer-hardened and is not vibrant. Formerly these +magnificent auxiliaries of the ritual sang without cease. The canonical +hours were sounded, Matins and Laudes before daybreak, Prime at dawn, +Tierce at nine o'clock, Sexte at noon, Nones at three, and then Vespers +and Compline. Now we announce the curate's mass, ring three angeluses, +morning, noon, and evening, occasionally a Salute, and on certain days +launch a few peals for prescribed ceremonies. And that's all. It's only +in the convents where the bells do not sleep, for these, at least, the +night offices are kept up." + +"You mustn't talk about that," said his wife, straightening the pillows +at his back. "If you keep working yourself up, you will never get well." + +"Quite right," he said, resigned, "but what would you have? I shall +still be a man with a grievance, whom nothing can pacify," and he smiled +at his wife who was bringing him a spoonful of the potion to swallow. + +The doorbell rang. Mme. Carhaix went to answer it and a hilarious and +red-faced priest entered, crying in a great voice, "It's Jacob's ladder, +that stairway! I climbed and climbed and climbed, and I'm all out of +breath," and he sank, puffing, into an armchair. + +"Well, my friend," he said at last, coming into the bedroom, "I learned +from the beadle that you were ill, and I came to see how you were +getting on." + +Durtal examined him. An irrepressible gaiety exuded from this sanguine, +smooth-shaven face, blue from the razor. Carhaix introduced them. They +exchanged a look, of distrust on the priest's side, of coldness on +Durtal's. + +Durtal felt embarrassed and in the way, while the honest pair were +effusively and with excessive humility thanking the abbé for coming up +to see them. It was evident that for this pair, who were not ignorant of +the sacrileges and scandalous self-indulgences of the clergy, an +ecclesiastic was a man elect, a man so superior that as soon as he +arrived nobody else counted. + +Durtal took his leave, and as he went downstairs he thought, "That +jubilant priest sickens me. Indeed, a gay priest, physician, or man of +letters must have an infamous soul, because they are the ones who see +clearly into human misery and console it, or heal it, or depict it. If +after that they can act the clown--they are unspeakable! Though I'll +admit that thoughtless persons deplore the sadness of the novel of +observation and its resemblance to the life it represents. These people +would have it jovial, smart, highly coloured, aiding them, in their base +selfishness, to forget the hag-ridden existences of their brothers. + +"Truly, Carhaix and his wife are peculiar. They bow under the paternal +despotism of the priests--and there are moments when that same despotism +must be no joke--and revere them and adore them. But then these two are +simple believers, with humble, unsmirched souls. I don't know the priest +who was there, but he is rotund and rubicund, he shakes in his fat and +seems bursting with joy. Despite the example of Saint Francis of Assisi, +who was gay--spoiling him for me--I have difficulty in persuading myself +that this abbé is an elevated being. It's all right to say that the best +thing for him is to be mediocre; to ask how, if he were otherwise, he +would make his flock understand him; and add that if he really had +superior gifts he would be hated by his colleagues and persecuted by his +bishop." + +While conversing thus disjointedly with himself Durtal had reached the +base of the tower. He stopped under the porch. "I intended to stay +longer up there," thought he. "It's only half-past five. I must kill at +least half an hour before dinner." + +The weather was almost mild. The clouds had been swept away. He lighted +a cigarette and strolled about the square, musing. Looking up he hunted +for the bell-ringer's window and recognized it. Of the windows which +opened over the portico it alone had a curtain. + +"What an abominable construction," he thought, contemplating the church. +"Think. That cube flanked by two towers presumes to invite comparison +with the façade of Notre Dame. What a jumble," he continued, examining +the details. "From the foundation to the first story are Ionic columns +with volutes, then from the base of the tower to the summit are +Corinthian columns with acanthus leaves. What significance can this +salmagundi of pagan orders have on a Christian church? And as a rebuke +to the over-ornamented bell tower there stands the other tower +unfinished, looking like an abandoned grain elevator, but the less +hideous of the two, at that. + +"And it took five or six architects to erect this indigent heap of +stones. Yet Servandoni and Oppenord and their ilk were the real major +prophets, the Ezekiels of building. Their work is the work of seers +looking beyond the eighteenth century to the day of transportation by +steam. For Saint Sulpice is not a church, it's a railway station! + +"And the interior of the edifice is not more religious nor artistic than +the exterior. The only thing in it that pleases me is good Carhaix's +aërial cave." Then he looked about him. "This square is very ugly, but +how provincial and homelike it is! Surely nothing could equal the +hideousness of that seminary, which exhales the rancid, frozen odour of +a hospital. The fountain with its polygonal basins, its saucepan urns, +its lion-headed spouts, its niches with prelates in them, is no +masterpiece. Neither is the city hall, whose administrative style is a +cinder in the eye. But on this square, as in the neighbouring streets, +Servandoni, Garancière, and Ferrou, one respires an atmosphere +compounded of benign silence and mild humidity. You think of a +clothes-press that hasn't been open for years, and, somehow, of incense. +This square is in perfect harmony with the houses in the decayed streets +around here, with the shops where religious paraphernalia are sold, the +image and ciborium factories, the Catholic bookstores with books whose +covers are the colour of apple seeds, macadam, nutmeg, bluing. + +"Yes, it's dilapidated and quiet." + +The square was then almost deserted. A few women were going up the +church steps, met by mendicants who murmured paternosters as they +rattled their tin cups. An ecclesiastic, carrying under his arm a book +bound in black cloth, saluted white-eyed women. A few dogs were running +about. Children were chasing each other or jumping rope. The enormous +chocolate-coloured la Villette omnibus and the little honey-yellow bus +of the Auteuil line went past, almost empty. Hackmen were standing +beside their hacks on the sidewalk, or in a group around a comfort +station, talking. There were no crowds, no noise, and the great trees +gave the square the appearance of the silent mall of a little town. + +"Well," said Durtal, considering the church again, "I really must go up +to the top of the tower some clear day." Then he shook his head. "What +for? A bird's-eye view of Paris would have been interesting in the +Middle Ages, but now! I should see, as from a hill top, other heights, a +network of grey streets, the whiter arteries of the boulevards, the +green plaques of gardens and squares, and, away in the distance, files +of houses like lines of dominoes stood up on end, the black dots being +windows. + +"And then the edifices emerging from this jumble of roofs, Notre Dame, +la Sainte Chapelle, Saint Severin, Saint Etienne du Mont, the Tour Saint +Jacques, are put out of countenance by the deplorable mass of newer +edifices. And I am not at all eager to contemplate that specimen of the +art of the maker of toilet articles which l'Opéra is, nor that bridge +arch, l'arc de la Triomphe, nor that hollow chandelier, the Tour Eiffel! +It's enough to see them separately, from the ground, as you turn a +street corner. Well, I must go and dine, for I have an engagement with +Hyacinthe and I must be back before eight." + +He went to a neighbouring wine shop where the dining-room, depopulated +at six o'clock, permitted one to ruminate in tranquillity, while eating +fairly sanitary food and drinking not too dangerously coloured wines. He +was thinking of Mme. Chantelouve, but more of Docre. The mystery of this +priest haunted him. What could be going on in the soul of a man who had +had the figure of Christ tattooed on his heels the better to trample +Him? + +What hate the act revealed! Did Docre hate God for not having given him +the blessed ecstasies of a saint, or more humanly for not having raised +him to the highest ecclesiastical dignities? Evidently the spite of this +priest was inordinate and his pride unlimited. He seemed not displeased +to be an object of terror and loathing, for thus he was somebody. Then, +for a thorough-paced scoundrel, as this man seemed to be, what delight +to make his enemies languish in slow torment by casting spells on them +with perfect impunity. + +"And sacrilege carries one out of oneself in furious transports, in +voluptuous delirium, which nothing can equal. Since the Middle Ages it +has been the coward's crime, for human justice does not prosecute it, +and one can commit it with impunity, but it is the most extreme of +excesses for a believer, and Docre believes in Christ, or he wouldn't +hate Him so. + +"A monster! And what ignoble relations he must have had with +Chantelouve's wife! Now, how shall I make her speak up? She gave me +quite clearly to understand, the other day, that she refused to explain +herself on this topic. Meanwhile, as I have not intention of submitting +to her young girl follies tonight, I will tell her that I am not feeling +well, and that absolute rest and quiet are necessary." + +He did so, an hour later when she came in. + +She proposed a cup of tea, and when he refused, she embraced him and +nursed him like a baby. Then withdrawing a little, "You work too hard. +You need some relaxation. Come now, to pass the time you might court me +a little, because up to now I have done it all. No? That idea does not +amuse him. Let us try something else. Shall we play hide-and-seek with +the cat? He shrugs his shoulders. Well, since there is nothing to change +your grouchy expression, let us talk. What has become of your friend Des +Hermies?" + +"Nothing in particular." + +"And his experiments with Mattei medicine?" + +"I don't know whether he continues to prosecute them or not." + +"Well, I see that the conversational possibilities of that topic are +exhausted. You know your replies are not very encouraging, dear." + +"But," he said, "everybody sometimes gets so he doesn't answer questions +at great length. I even know a young woman who becomes excessively +laconic when interrogated on a certain subject." + +"Of a canon, for instance." + +"Precisely." + +She crossed her legs, very coolly. "That young woman undoubtedly had +reasons for keeping still. But perhaps that young woman is really eager +to oblige the person who cross-examines her; perhaps, since she last saw +him, she has gone to a great deal of trouble to satisfy his curiosity." + +"Look here, Hyacinthe darling, explain yourself," he said, squeezing her +hands, an expression of joy on his face. + +"If I have made your mouth water so as not to have a grouchy face in +front of my eyes, I have succeeded remarkably." + +He kept still, wondering whether she was making fun of him or whether +she really was ready to tell him what he wanted to know. + +"Listen," she said. "I hold firmly by my decision of the other night. I +will not permit you to become acquainted with Canon Docre. But at a +settled time I can arrange, without your forming any relations with him, +to have you be present at the ceremony you most desire to know about." + +"The Black Mass?" + +"Yes. Within a week Docre will have left Paris. If once, in my company, +you see him, you will never see him afterward. Keep your evenings free +all this week. When the time comes I will notify you. But you may thank +me, dear, because to be useful to you I am disobeying the commands of my +confessor, whom I dare not see now, so I am damning myself." + +He kissed her, then, "Seriously, that man is really a monster?" + +"I fear so. In any case I would not wish anybody the misfortune of +having him for an enemy." + +"I should say not, if he poisons people by magic, as he seems to have +done Gévingey." + +"And he probably has. I should not like to be in the astrologer's +shoes." + +"You believe in Docre's potency, then. Tell me, how does he operate, +with the blood of mice, with broths, or with oil?" + +"So you know about that! He does employ these substances. In fact, he is +one of the very few persons who know how to manage them without +poisoning themselves. It's as dangerous as working with explosives. +Frequently, though, when attacking defenceless persons, he uses simpler +recipes. He distils extracts of poison and adds sulphuric acid to fester +the wound, then he dips in this compound the point of a lancet with +which he has his victim pricked by a flying spirit or a larva. It is +ordinary, well-known magic, that of Rosicrucians and tyros." + +Durtal burst out laughing. "But, my dear, to hear you, one would think +death could be sent to a distance like a letter." + +"Well, isn't cholera transmitted by letters? Ask the sanitary corps. +Don't they disinfect all mail in the time of epidemics?" + +"I don't contradict that, but the case is not the same." + +"It is too, because it is the question of transmission, invisibility, +distance, which astonishes you." + +"What astonishes me more than that is to hear of the Rosicrucians +actively satanizing. I confess that I had never considered them as +anything more than harmless suckers and funereal fakes." + +"But all societies are composed of suckers and the wily leaders who +exploit them. That's the case of the Rosicrucians. Yes, their leaders +privately attempt crime. One does not need to be erudite or intelligent +to practise the ritual of spells. At any rate, and I affirm this, there +is among them a former man of letters whom I know. He lives with a +married woman, and they pass the time, he and she, trying to kill the +husband by sorcery." + +"Well, it has its advantages over divorce, that system has." + +She pouted. "I shan't say another word. I think you are making fun of +me. You don't believe in anything--" + +"Indeed. I was not laughing at you. I haven't very precise ideas on this +subject. I admit that at first blush all this seems improbable, to say +the least. But when I think that all the efforts of modern science do +but confirm the discoveries of the magic of other days, I keep my mouth +shut. It is true," he went on after a silence,--"to cite only one +fact--that people can no longer laugh at the stories of women being +changed into cats in the Middle Ages. Recently there was brought to M. +Charcot a little girl who suddenly got down on her hands and knees and +ran and jumped around, scratching and spitting and arching her back. So +that metamorphosis is possible. No, one cannot too often repeat it, the +truth is that we know nothing and have no right to deny anything. But to +return to your Rosicrucians. Using purely chemical formulæ, they get +along without sacrilege?" + +"That is as much as to say that their venefices--supposing they know how +to prepare them well enough to accomplish their purpose, though I doubt +that--are easy to defeat. Yet I don't mean to say that this group, one +member of which is an ordained priest, does not make use of contaminated +Eucharists at need." + +"Another nice priest! But since you are so well informed, do you know +how spells are conjured away?" + +"Yes and no. I know that when the poisons are sealed by sacrilege, when +the operation is performed by a master, Docre or one of the princes of +magic at Rome, it is not at all easy--nor healthy--to attempt to apply +an antidote. Though I have heard of a certain abbé at Lyons who, +practically alone, is succeeding right now in these difficult cures." + +"Dr. Johannès!" + +"You know him!" + +"No. But Gévingey, who has gone to seek his medical aid, has told me of +him." + +"Well, I don't know how he goes about it, but I know that spells which +are not complicated with sacrilege are usually evaded by the law of +return. The blow is sent back to him who struck it. There are, at the +present time, two churches, one in Belgium, the other in France, where, +when one prays before a statue of the Virgin, the spell which has been +cast on one flies off and goes and strikes one's adversary." + +"Rats!" + +"One of these churches is at Tougres, eighteen kilometres from Liége, +and the name of it is Notre Dame de Retour. The other is the church of +l'Epine, 'the thorn,' a little village near Châlons. This church was +built long ago to conjure away the spells produced with the aid of the +thorns which grew in that country and served to pierce images cut in the +shape of hearts." + +"Near Châlons," said Durtal, digging in his memory, "it does seem to me +now that Des Hermies, speaking of bewitchment by the blood of white +mice, pointed out that village as the habitation of certain diabolic +circles." + +"Yes, that country in all times has been a hotbed of Satanism." + +"You are mighty well up on these matters. Is it Docre who transmitted +this knowledge to you?" + +"Yes, I owe him the little I am able to pass on to you. He took a fancy +to me and even wanted to make me his pupil. I refused, and am glad now I +did, for I am much more wary than I was then of being constantly in a +state of mortal sin." + +"Have you ever attended the Black Mass?" + +"Yes. And I warn you in advance that you will regret having seen such +terrible things. It is a memory that persists and horrifies, +even--especially--when one does not personally take part in the +offices." + +He looked at her. She was pale, and her filmed eyes blinked rapidly. + +"It's your own wish," she continued. "You will have no complaint if the +spectacle terrifies you or wrings your heart." + +He was almost dumbfounded to see how sad she was and with what +difficulty she spoke. + +"Really. This Docre, where did he come from, what did he do formerly, +how did he happen to become a master Satanist?" + +"I don't know very much about him. I know he was a supply priest in +Paris, then confessor of a queen in exile. There were terrible stories +about him, which, thanks to his influential patronage, were hushed up +under the Empire. He was interned at La Trappe, then driven out of the +priesthood, excommunicated by Rome. I learned in addition that he had +several times been accused of poisoning, but had always been acquitted +because the tribunals had never been able to get any evidence. Today he +lives I don't know how, but at ease, and he travels a good deal with a +woman who serves as voyant. To all the world he is a scoundrel, but he +is learned and perverse, and then he is so charming." + +"Oh," he said, "how changed your eyes and voice are! Admit that you are +in love with him." + +"No, not now. But why should I not tell you that we were mad about each +other at one time?" + +"And now?" + +"It is over. I swear it is. We have remained friends and nothing more." + +"But then you often went to see him. What kind of a place did he have? +At least it was curious and heterodoxically arranged?" + +"No, it was quite ordinary, but very comfortable and clean. He had a +chemical laboratory and an immense library. The only curious book he +showed me was an office of the Black Mass on parchment. There were +admirable illuminations, and the binding was made of the tanned skin of +a child who had died unbaptized. Stamped into the cover, in the shape of +a fleuron, was a great host consecrated in a Black Mass." + +"What did the manuscript say?" + +"I did not read it." + +They were silent. Then she took his hands. + +"Now you are yourself again. I knew I should cure you of your bad +humour. Admit that I am awfully good-natured not to have got angry at +you." + +"Got angry? What about?" + +"Because it is not very flattering to a woman to be able to entertain a +man only by telling him about another one." + +"Oh, no, it isn't that way at all," he said, kissing her eyes tenderly. + +"Let me go now," she said, very low, "this enervates me, and I must get +home. It's late." + +She sighed and fled, leaving him amazed and wondering in what weird +activities the life of that woman had been passed. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +The day after that on which he had spewed such furious vituperation over +the Tribunal, Gilles de Rais appeared again before his judges. He +presented himself with bowed head and clasped hands. He had once more +jumped from one extreme to the other. A few hours had sufficed to break +the spirit of the energumen, who now declared that he recognized the +authority of the magistrates and begged forgiveness for having insulted +them. + +They affirmed that for the love of Our Lord they forgot his +imprecations, and, at his prayer, the Bishop and the Inquisitor revoked +the sentence of excommunication which they had passed on him the day +before. + +This hearing was, in addition, taken up with the arraignment of Prelati +and his accomplices. Then, authorized by the ecclesiastical text which +says that a confession cannot be regarded as sufficient if it is "dubia, +vaga, generalis illativa, jocosa," the Prosecutor asserted that to +certify the sincerity of his confessions Gilles must be subjected to the +"canonic question," that is, to torture. + +The Marshal besought the Bishop to wait until the next day, and claiming +the right of confessing immediately to such judges as the Tribunal were +pleased to designate, he swore that he would thereafter repeat his +confession before the public and the court. + +Jean de Malestroit granted this request, and the Bishop of Saint Brieuc +and Pierre de l'Hospital were appointed to hear Gilles in his cell. When +he had finished the recital of his debauches and murders they ordered +Prelati to be brought to them. + +At sight of him Gilles burst into tears and when, after the +interrogatory, preparations were made to conduct the Italian back to his +dungeon, Gilles embraced him, saying, "Farewell, Francis my friend, we +shall never see each other again in this world. I pray God to give you +good patience and I hope in Him that we may meet again in great joy in +Paradise. Pray God for me and I shall pray for you." + +And Gilles was left alone to meditate on his crimes which he was to +confess publicly at the hearing next day. That day was the impressive +day of the trial. The room in which the Tribunal sat was crammed, and +there were multitudes sitting on the stairs, standing in the corridors, +filling the neighbouring courts, blocking the streets and lanes. From +twenty miles around the peasants were come to see the memorable beast +whose very name, before his capture, had served to close the doors those +evenings when in universal trembling the women dared not weep aloud. + +This meeting of the Tribunal was to be conducted with the most minute +observance of all the forms. All the assize judges, who in a long +hearing generally had their places filled by proxies, were present. + +The courtroom, massive, obscure, upheld by heavy Roman pillars, had been +rejuvenated. The wall, ogival, threw to cathedral height the arches of +its vaulted ceiling, which were joined together, like the sides of an +abbatial mitre, in a point. The room was lighted by sickly daylight +which was filtered through small panes between heavy leads. The azure of +the ceiling was darkened to navy blue, and the golden stars, at that +height, were as the heads of steel pins. In the shadows of the vaults +appeared the ermine of the ducal arms, dimly seen in escutcheons which +were like great dice with black dots. + +Suddenly the trumpets blared, the room was lighted up, and the Bishops +entered. Their mitres of cloth of gold flamed like the lightning. About +their necks were brilliant collars with orphreys crusted, as were the +robes, with carbuncles. In silent processional the Bishops advanced, +weighted down by their rigid copes, which fell in a flare from their +shoulders and were like golden bells split in the back. In their hands +they carried the crozier from which hung the maniple, a sort of green +veil. + +At each step they glowed like coals blown upon. Themselves were +sufficient to light the room, as they reanimated with their jewels the +pale sun of a rainy October day and scattered a new lustre to all parts +of the room, over the mute audience. + +Outshone by the shimmer of the orphreys and the stones, the costumes of +the other judges appeared darker and discordant. The black vestments of +secular justice, the white and black robe of Jean Blouyn, the silk +symars, the red woollen mantles, the scarlet chaperons lined with fur, +seemed faded and common. + +The Bishops seated themselves in the front row, surrounding Jean de +Malestroit, who from a raised seat dominated the court. + +Under the escort of the men-at-arms Gilles entered. He was broken and +haggard and had aged twenty years in one night. His eyes burned behind +seared lids. His cheeks shook. Upon injunction he began the recital of +his crimes. + +In a laboured voice, choked by tears, he recounted his abductions of +children, his hideous tactics, his infernal stimulations, his impetuous +murders, his implacable violations. Obsessed by the vision of his +victims, he described their agonies drawn out or hastened, their cries, +the rattle in their throats. He confessed to having wallowed in the +elastic warmth of their intestines. He confessed that he had ripped out +their hearts through wounds enlarged and opening like ripe fruit. And +with the eyes of a somnambulist he looked down at his fingers and shook +them as if blood were dripping from them. + +The thunder-struck audience kept a mournful silence which was lacerated +suddenly by a few short cries, and the attendants, at a run, carried +out fainting women, mad with horror. + +He seemed to see nothing, to hear nothing. He continued to tell off the +frightful rosary of his crimes. Then his voice became raucous. He was +coming to the sepulchral violations, and now to the torture of the +little children whom he had cajoled in order to cut their throats as he +kissed them. + +He divulged every detail. The account was so formidable, so atrocious, +that beneath their golden caps the bishops blanched. These priests, +tempered in the fires of confessional, these judges who in that time of +demonomania and murder had never heard more terrifying confessions, +these prelates whom no depravity had ever astonished, made the sign of +the Cross, and Jean de Malestroit rose and for very shame veiled the +face of the Christ. + +Then all lowered their heads, and without a word they listened. The +Marshal, bathed in sweat, his face downcast, looked now at the crucifix +whose invisible head and bristling crown of thorns gave their shapes to +the veil. + +He finished his narrative and broke down completely. Till now he had +stood erect, speaking as if in a daze, recounting to himself, aloud, the +memory of his ineradicable crimes. But at the end of the story his +forces abandoned him. He fell on his knees and, shaken by terrific sobs, +he cried, "O God, O my Redeemer, I beseech mercy and pardon!" Then the +ferocious and haughty baron, the first of his caste no doubt, humiliated +himself. He turned toward the people and said, weeping, "Ye, the parents +of those whom I have so cruelly put to death, give, ah give me, the +succour of your pious prayers!" + +Then in its white splendour the soul of the Middle Ages burst forth +radiant. + +Jean de Malestroit left his seat and raised the accused, who was beating +the flagstones with his despairing forehead. The judge in de Malestroit +disappeared, the priest alone remained. He embraced the sinner who was +repenting and lamenting his fault. + +A shudder overran the audience when Jean de Malestroit, with Gilles's +head on his breast, said to him, "Pray that the just and rightful wrath +of the Most High be averted, weep that your tears may wash out the blood +lust from your being!" + +And with one accord everybody in the room knelt down and prayed for the +assassin. When the orisons were hushed there was an instant of wild +terror and commotion. Driven beyond human limits of horror and pity, the +crowd tossed and surged. The judges of the Tribunal, silent, enervated, +reconquered themselves. + +With a gesture, brushing away his tears, the Prosecutor arrested the +proceedings. He said that the crimes were "clear and apparent," that the +proofs were manifest, that the court would now "in its conscience and +soul" chastise the culprit, and he demanded that the day of passing +judgment be fixed. The Tribunal designated the day after the next. + +And that day the Official of the church of Nantes, Jacques de +Pentcoetdic, read in succession the two sentences. The first, passed by +the Bishop and the Inquisitor for the acts coming under their common +jurisdiction, began thus: + +"The Holy Name of Christ invoked, we, Jean, Bishop of Nantes, and +Brother Jean Blouyn, bachelor in our Holy Scriptures, of the order of +the preaching friars of Nantes, and delegate of the Inquisitor of +heresies for the city and diocese of Nantes, in session of the Tribunal +and having before our eyes God alone--" + +And after enumerating the crimes it concluded: + +"We pronounce, decide, and declare, that thou, Gilles de Rais, cited +unto our Tribunal, art heinously guilty of heresy, apostasy, and +evocation of demons; that for these crimes thou hast incurred the +sentence of excommunication and all other penalties determined by the +law." + +The second judgment, rendered by the Bishop alone, on the crimes of +sodomy, sacrilege, and violation of the immunities of the Church, which +more particularly concerned his authority, ended in the same +conclusions and in the pronunciation, in almost identical form, of the +same penalty. + +Gilles listened with bowed head to the reading of these judgments. When +it was over the Bishop and the Inquisitor said to him, "Will you, now +that you detest your errors, your evocations, and your crimes, be +reincorporated into the Church our Mother?" + +And upon the ardent prayers of the Marshal they relieved him of all +excommunication and admitted him to participate in the sacraments. The +justice of God was satisfied, the crime was recognized, punished, but +effaced by contrition and penitence. Only human justice remained. + +The Bishop and the Inquisitor remanded the culprit to the secular court, +which, holding against him the abductions and the murders, pronounced +the penalty of death and attainder. Prelati and the other accomplices +were at the same time condemned to be hanged and burned alive. + +"Cry to God mercy," said Pierre de l'Hospital, who presided over the +civil hearings, "and dispose yourself to die in good state with a great +repentance for having committed such crimes." + +The recommendation was unnecessary. Gilles now faced death without fear. +He hoped, humbly, avidly, in the mercy of the Saviour. He cried out +fervently for the terrestrial expiation, the stake, to redeem him from +the eternal flames after his death. + +Far from his châteaux, in his dungeon, alone, he had opened himself and +viewed the cloaca which had so long been fed by the residual waters +escaped from the abattoirs of Tiffauges and Mâchecoul. He had sobbed in +despair of ever draining this stagnant pool. And thunder-smitten by +grace, in a cry of horror and joy, he had suddenly seen his soul +overflow and sweep away the dank fen before a torrential current of +prayer and ecstasy. The butcher of Sodom had destroyed himself, the +companion of Jeanne d'Arc had reappeared, the mystic whose soul poured +out to God, in bursts of adoration, in floods of tears. + +Then he thought of his friends and wished that they also might die in a +state of grace. He asked the Bishop of Nantes that they might be +executed not before nor after him, but at the same time. He carried his +point that he was the most guilty and that he must instruct them in +saving their souls and assist them at the moment when they should mount +the scaffold. Jean de Malestroit granted the supplication. + +"What is curious," said Durtal, interrupting his writing to light a +cigarette, "is that--" + +A gentle ring. Mme. Chantelouve entered. + +She declared that she could stay only two minutes. She had a carriage +waiting below. "Tonight," she said, "I will call for you at nine. First +write me a letter in practically these terms," and she handed him a +paper. He unfolded it and read this declaration: + + "I certify that all that I have said and written about the Black + Mass, about the priest who celebrated it, about the place where + I claimed to have witnessed it, about the persons alleged to + have been there, is pure invention. I affirm that I imagined all + these incidents, that, in consequence, all that I have narrated + is false." + +"Docre's?" he asked, studying the handwriting, minute, pointed, twisted, +aggressive. + +"Yes, and he wants this declaration, not dated, to be made in the form +of a letter from you to a person consulting you on the subject." + +"Your canon distrusts me." + +"Of course. You write books." + +"It doesn't please me infinitely to sign that," murmured Durtal. "What +if I refuse?" + +"You will not go to the Black Mass." + +His curiosity overcame his reluctance. He wrote and signed the letter +and Mme. Chantelouve put it in her card-case. + +"And in what street is the ceremony to take place?" + +"In the rue Olivier de Serres." + +"Where is that?" + +"Near the rue de Vaugirard, away up." + +"Is that where Docre lives?" + +"No, we are going to a private house which belongs to a lady he knows. +Now, if you'll be so good, put off your cross-examination to some other +time, because I am in an awful hurry. At nine o'clock. Don't forget. Be +all ready." + +He had hardly time to kiss her and she was gone. + +"Well," said he, "I already had data on incubacy and poisoning by +spells. There remained only the Black Mass, to make me thoroughly +acquainted with Satanism as it is practised in our day. And I am to see +it! I'll be damned if I thought there were such undercurrents in Paris. +And how circumstances hang together and lead to each other! I had to +occupy myself with Gilles de Rais and the diabolism of the Middle Ages +to get contemporary diabolism revealed to me." And he thought of Docre +again. "What a sharper that priest is! Among the occultists who maunder +today in the universal decomposition of ideas he is the only one who +interests me. + +"The others, the mages, the theosophists, the cabalists, the spiritists, +the hermetics, the Rosicrucians, remind me, when they are not mere +thieves, of children playing and scuffling in a cellar. And if one +descend lower yet, into the hole-in-the-wall places of the pythonesses, +clairvoyants, and mediums, what does one find except agencies of +prostitution and gambling? All these pretended peddlers of the future +are extremely nasty; that's the only thing in the occult of which one +can be sure." + +Des Hermies interrupted the course of these reflections by ringing and +walking in. He came to announce that Gévingey had returned and that they +were all to dine at Carhaix's the night after next. + +"Is Carhaix's bronchitis cured?" + +"Yes, completely." + +Preoccupied with the idea of the Black Mass, Durtal could not keep +silent. He let out the fact that he was to witness the ceremony--and, +confronted by Des Hermies's stare of stupefaction, he added that he had +promised secrecy and that he could not, for the present, tell him more. + +"You're the lucky one!" said Des Hermies. "Is it too much to ask you the +name of the abbé who is to officiate?" + +"Not at all. Canon Docre." + +"Ah!" and the other was silent. He was evidently trying to divine by +what manipulations his friend had been able to get in touch with the +renegade. + +"Some time ago you told me," Durtal said, "that in the Middle Ages the +Black Mass was said on the naked buttocks of a woman, that in the +seventeenth century it was celebrated on the abdomen, and now?" + +"I believe that it takes place before an altar as in church. Indeed it +was sometimes celebrated thus at the end of the fifteenth century in +Biscay. It is true that the Devil then officiated in person. Clothed in +rent and soiled episcopal habits, he gave communion with round pieces of +shoe leather for hosts, saying, 'This is my body.' And he gave these +disgusting wafers to the faithful to eat after they had kissed his left +hand and his breech. I hope that you will not be obliged to render such +base homage to your canon." + +Durtal laughed. "No, I don't think he requires a pretend like that. But +look here, aren't you of the decided opinion that the creatures who so +piously, infamously, follow these offices are a bit mad?" + +"Mad? Why? The cult of the Demon is no more insane than that of God. One +is rotten and the other resplendent, that is all. By your reckoning all +people who worship any god whatever would be demented. No. The +affiliates of Satanism are mystics of a vile order, but they are +mystics. Now, it is highly probable that their exaltations into the +extra-terrestrial of Evil coincide with the rages of their frenzied +senses, for lechery is the wet nurse of Demonism. Medicine classes, +rightly or wrongly, the hunger for ordure in the unknown categories of +neurosis, and well it may, for nobody knows anything about neuroses +except that everybody has them. It is quite certain that in this, more +than in any previous century, the nerves quiver at the least shock. For +instance, recall the newspaper accounts of executions of criminals. We +learn that the executioner goes about his work timidly, that he is on +the point of fainting, that he has nervous prostration when he +decapitates a man. Then compare this nervous wreck with the invincible +torturers of the olden time. They would thrust your arm into a sleeve of +moistened parchment which when set on fire would draw up and in a +leisurely fashion reduce your flesh to dust. Or they would drive wedges +into your thighs and split the bones. They would crush your thumbs in +the thumbscrew. Or they would singe all the hair off your epidermis with +a poker, or roll up the skin from your abdomen and leave you with a kind +of apron. They would drag you at the cart's tail, give you the +strappado, roast you, drench you with ignited alcohol, and through it +all preserve an impassive countenance and tranquil nerves not to be +shaken by any cry or plaint. Only, as these exercises were somewhat +fatiguing, the torturers, after the operation, were ravenously hungry +and required a deal of drink. They were sanguinaries of a mental +stability not to be shaken, while now! But to return to your companions +in sacrilege. This evening, if they are not maniacs, you will find +them--doubt it not--repulsive lechers. Observe them closely. I am sure +that to them the invocation of Beelzebub is a prelibation of carnality. +Don't be afraid, because, Lord! in this group there won't be any to make +you imitate the martyr of whom Jacques de Voragine speaks in his history +of Saint Paul the Eremite. You know that legend?" + +"No." + +"Well, to refresh your soul I will tell you. This martyr, who was very +young, was stretched out, his hands and feet bound, on a bed, then a +superb specimen of femininity was brought in, who tried to force him. As +he was burning and was about to sin, he bit off his tongue and spat it +in the face of the woman, 'and thus pain drove out temptation,' says the +good de Voragine." + +"My heroism would not carry me so far as that, I confess. But must you +go so soon?" + +"Yes, I have a pressing engagement." + +"What a queer age," said Durtal, conducting him to the door. "It is just +at the moment when positivism is at its zenith that mysticism rises +again and the follies of the occult begin." + +"Oh, but it's always been that way. The tail ends of all centuries are +alike. They're always periods of vacillation and uncertainty. When +materialism is rotten-ripe magic takes root. This phenomenon reappears +every hundred years. Not to go further back, look at the decline of the +last century. Alongside of the rationalists and atheists you find +Saint-Germain, Cagliostro, Saint-Martin, Gabalis, Cazotte, the +Rosicrucian societies, the infernal circles, as now. With that, good-bye +and good luck." + +"Yes," said Durtal, closing the door, "but Cagliostro and his ilk had a +certain audacity, and perhaps a little knowledge, while the mages of our +time--what inept fakes!" + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +In a fiacre they went up the rue de Vaugirard. Mme. Chantelouve was as +in a shell and spoke not a word. Durtal looked closely at her when, as +they passed a street lamp, a shaft of light played over her veil a +moment, then winked out. She seemed agitated and nervous beneath her +reserve. He took her hand. She did not withdraw it. He could feel the +chill of it through her glove, and her blonde hair tonight seemed +disordered, dry, and not so fine as usual. + +"Nearly there?" + +But in a low voice full of anguish she said, "Do not speak." + +Bored by this taciturn, almost hostile tête-à -tête, he began to examine +the route through the windows of the cab. The street stretched out +interminable, already deserted, so badly paved that at every step the +cab springs creaked. The lamp-posts were beginning to be further and +further apart. The cab was approaching the ramparts. + +"Singular itinerary," he murmured, troubled by the woman's cold, +inscrutable reserve. + +Abruptly the vehicle turned up a dark street, swung around, and stopped. + +Hyacinthe got out. Waiting for the cabman to give him his change, Durtal +inspected the lay of the land. They were in a sort of blind alley. Low +houses, in which there was not a sign of life, bordered a lane that had +no sidewalk. The pavement was like billows. Turning around, when the cab +drove away, he found himself confronted by a long high wall above which +dry leaves rustled in the shadows. A little door with a square grating +in it was cut into the thick unlighted wall, which was seamed with +fissures. Suddenly, further away, a ray of light shot out of a show +window, and, doubtless attracted by the sound of the cab wheels, a man +wearing the black apron of a wineshop keeper lounged through the shop +door and spat on the threshold. + +"This is the place," said Mme. Chantelouve. + +She rang. The grating opened. She raised her veil. A shaft of lantern +light struck her full in the face, the door opened noiselessly, and they +penetrated into a garden. + +"Good evening, madame." + +"Good evening, Marie. In the chapel?" + +"Yes. Does madame wish me to guide her?" + +"No, thanks." + +The woman with the lantern scrutinized Durtal. He perceived, beneath a +hood, wisps of grey hair falling in disorder over a wrinkled old face, +but she did not give him time to examine her and returned to a tent +beside the wall serving her as a lodge. + +He followed Hyacinthe, who traversed the dark lanes, between rows of +palms, to the entrance of a building. She opened the doors as if she +were quite at home, and her heels clicked resolutely on the flagstones. + +"Be careful," she said, going through a vestibule. "There are three +steps." + +They came out into a court and stopped before an old house. She rang. A +little man advanced, hiding his features, and greeted her in an +affected, sing-song voice. She passed, saluting him, and Durtal brushed +a fly-blown face, the eyes liquid, gummy, the cheeks plastered with +cosmetics, the lips painted. + +"I have stumbled into a lair of sodomists.--You didn't tell me that I +was to be thrown into such company," he said to Hyacinthe, overtaking +her at the turning of a corridor lighted by a lamp. + +"Did you expect to meet saints here?" + +She shrugged her shoulders and opened a door. They were in a chapel +with a low ceiling crossed by beams gaudily painted with coal-tar +pigment. The windows were hidden by great curtains. The walls were +cracked and dingy. Durtal recoiled after a few steps. Gusts of humid, +mouldy air and of that indescribable new-stove acridity poured out of +the registers to mingle with an irritating odour of alkali, resin, and +burnt herbs. He was choking, his temples throbbing. + +He advanced groping, attempting to accustom his eyes to the +half-darkness. The chapel was vaguely lighted by sanctuary lamps +suspended from chandeliers of gilded bronze with pink glass pendants. +Hyacinthe made him a sign to sit down, then she went over to a group of +people sitting on divans in a dark corner. Rather vexed at being left +here, away from the centre of activity, Durtal noticed that there were +many women and few men present, but his efforts to discover their +features were unavailing. As here and there a lamp swayed, he +occasionally caught sight of a Junonian brunette, then of a +smooth-shaven, melancholy man. He observed that the women were not +chattering to each other. Their conversation seemed awed and grave. Not +a laugh, not a raised voice, was heard, but an irresolute, furtive +whispering, unaccompanied by gesture. + +"Hmm," he said to himself. "It doesn't look as if Satan made his +faithful happy." + +A choir boy, clad in red, advanced to the end of the chapel and lighted +a stand of candles. Then the altar became visible. It was an ordinary +church altar on a tabernacle above which stood an infamous, derisive +Christ. The head had been raised and the neck lengthened, and wrinkles, +painted in the cheeks, transformed the grieving face to a bestial one +twisted into a mean laugh. He was naked, and where the loincloth should +have been, there was a virile member projecting from a bush of +horsehair. In front of the tabernacle the chalice, covered with a pall, +was placed. The choir boy folded the altar cloth, wiggled his haunches, +stood tiptoe on one foot and flipped his arms as if to fly away like a +cherub, on pretext of reaching up to light the black tapers whose odour +of coal tar and pitch was now added to the pestilential smell of the +stuffy room. + +Durtal recognized beneath the red robe the "fairy" who had guarded the +chapel entrance, and he understood the rôle reserved for this man, whose +sacrilegious nastiness was substituted for the purity of childhood +acceptable to the Church. + +Then another choir boy, more hideous yet, exhibited himself. Hollow +chested, racked by coughs, withered, made up with white grease paint and +vivid carmine, he hobbled about humming. He approached the tripods +flanking the altar, stirred the smouldering incense pots and threw in +leaves and chunks of resin. + +Durtal was beginning to feel uncomfortable when Hyacinthe rejoined him. +She excused herself for having left him by himself so long, invited him +to change his place, and conducted him to a seat far in the rear, behind +all the rows of chairs. + +"This is a real chapel, isn't it?" he asked. + +"Yes. This house, this church, the garden that we crossed, are the +remains of an old Ursuline convent. For a long time this chapel was used +to store hay. The house belonged to a livery-stable keeper, who sold it +to that woman," and she pointed out a stout brunette of whom Durtal +before had caught a fleeting glimpse. + +"Is she married?" + +"No. She is a former nun who was debauched long ago by Docre." + +"Ah. And those gentlemen who seem to be hiding in the darkest places?" + +"They are Satanists. There is one of them who was a professor in the +School of Medicine. In his home he has an oratorium where he prays to a +statue of Venus Astarte mounted on an altar." + +"No!" + +"I mean it. He is getting old, and his demoniac orisons increase tenfold +his forces, which he is using up with creatures of that sort," and with +a gesture she indicated the choir boys. + +"You guarantee the truth of this story?" + +"You will find it narrated at great length in a religious journal. _Les +annales de la sainteté_. And though his identity was made pretty patent +in the article, the man did not dare prosecute the editors.--What's the +matter with you?" she asked, looking at him closely. + +"I'm strangling. The odour from those incense burners is unbearable." + +"You will get used to it in a few seconds." + +"But what do they burn that smells like that?" + +"Asphalt from the street, leaves of henbane, datura, dried nightshade, +and myrrh. These are perfumes delightful to Satan, our master." She +spoke in that changed, guttural voice which had been hers at times when +in bed with him. He looked her squarely in the face. She was pale, the +lips pressed tight, the pluvious eyes blinking rapidly. + +"Here he comes!" she murmured suddenly, while women in front of them +scurried about or knelt in front of the chairs. + +Preceded by the two choir boys the canon entered, wearing a scarlet +bonnet from which two buffalo horns of red cloth protruded. Durtal +examined him as he marched toward the altar. He was tall, but not well +built, his bulging chest being out of proportion to the rest of his +body. His peeled forehead made one continuous line with his straight +nose. The lips and cheeks bristled with that kind of hard, clumpy beard +which old priests have who have always shaved themselves. The features +were round and insinuating, the eyes, like apple pips, close together, +phosphorescent. As a whole his face was evil and sly, but energetic, and +the hard, fixed eyes were not the furtive, shifty orbs that Durtal had +imagined. + +The canon solemnly knelt before the altar, then mounted the steps and +began to say mass. Durtal saw then that he had nothing on beneath his +sacrificial habit. His black socks and his flesh bulging over the +garters, attached high up on his legs, were plainly visible. The +chasuble had the shape of an ordinary chasuble but was of the dark red +colour of dried blood, and in the middle, in a triangle around which was +an embroidered border of colchicum, savin, sorrel, and spurge, was the +figure of a black billy-goat presenting his horns. + +Docre made the genuflexions, the full- or half-length inclinations +specified by the ritual. The kneeling choir boys sang the Latin +responses in a crystalline voice which trilled on the ultimate syllables +of the words. + +"But it's a simple low mass," said Durtal to Mme. Chantelouve. + +She shook her head. Indeed, at that moment the choir boys passed behind +the altar and one of them brought back copper chafing-dishes, the other, +censers, which they distributed to the congregation. All the women +enveloped themselves in the smoke. Some held their heads right over the +chafing-dishes and inhaled deeply, then, fainting, unlaced themselves, +heaving raucous sighs. + +The sacrifice ceased. The priest descended the steps backward, knelt on +the last one, and in a sharp, tripidant voice cried: + +"Master of Slanders, Dispenser of the benefits of crime, Administrator +of sumptuous sins and great vices, Satan, thee we adore, reasonable God, +just God! + +"Superadmirable legate of false trances, thou receivest our beseeching +tears; thou savest the honour of families by aborting wombs impregnated +in the forgetfulness of the good orgasm; thou dost suggest to the mother +the hastening of untimely birth, and thine obstetrics spares the +still-born children the anguish of maturity, the contamination of +original sin. + +"Mainstay of the despairing Poor, Cordial of the Vanquished, it is thou +who endowest them with hypocrisy, ingratitude, and stiff-neckedness, +that they may defend themselves against the children of God, the Rich. + +"Suzerain of Resentment, Accountant of Humiliations, Treasurer of old +Hatreds, thou alone dost fertilize the brain of man whom injustice has +crushed; thou breathest into him the idea of meditated vengeance, sure +misdeeds; thou incitest him to murder; thou givest him the abundant joy +of accomplished reprisals and permittest him to taste the intoxicating +draught of the tears of which he is the cause. + +"Hope of Virility, Anguish of the Empty Womb, thou dost not demand the +bootless offering of chaste loins, thou dost not sing the praises of +Lenten follies; thou alone receivest the carnal supplications and +petitions of poor and avaricious families. Thou determinest the mother +to sell her daughter, to give her son; thou aidest sterile and reprobate +loves; Guardian of strident Neuroses, Leaden Tower of Hysteria, bloody +Vase of Rape! + +"Master, thy faithful servants, on their knees, implore thee and +supplicate thee to satisfy them when they wish the torture of all those +who love them and aid them; they supplicate thee to assure them the joy +of delectable misdeeds unknown to justice, spells whose unknown origin +baffles the reason of man; they ask, finally, glory, riches, power, of +thee, King of the Disinherited, Son who art to overthrow the inexorable +Father!" + +Then Docre rose, and erect, with arms outstretched, vociferated in a +ringing voice of hate: + +"And thou, thou whom, in my quality of priest, I force, whether thou +wilt or no, to descend into this host, to incarnate thyself in this +bread, Jesus, Artisan of Hoaxes, Bandit of Homage, Robber of Affection, +hear! Since the day when thou didst issue from the complaisant bowels of +a Virgin, thou hast failed all thine engagements, belied all thy +promises. Centuries have wept, awaiting thee, fugitive God, mute God! +Thou wast to redeem man and thou hast not, thou wast to appear in thy +glory, and thou sleepest. Go, lie, say to the wretch who appeals to +thee, 'Hope, be patient, suffer; the hospital of souls will receive +thee; the angels will assist thee; Heaven opens to thee.' Impostor! thou +knowest well that the angels, disgusted at thine inertness, abandon +thee! Thou wast to be the Interpreter of our plaints, the Chamberlain of +our tears; thou wast to convey them to the Father and thou hast not done +so, for this intercession would disturb thine eternal sleep of happy +satiety. + +"Thou hast forgotten the poverty thou didst preach, enamoured vassal of +Banks! Thou hast seen the weak crushed beneath the press of profit; thou +hast heard the death rattle of the timid, paralyzed by famine, of women +disembowelled for a bit of bread, and thou hast caused the Chancery of +thy Simoniacs, thy commercial representatives, thy Popes, to answer by +dilatory excuses and evasive promises, sacristy Shyster, huckster God! + +"Master, whose inconceivable ferocity engenders life and inflicts it on +the innocent whom thou darest damn--in the name of what original +sin?--whom thou darest punish--by the virtue of what covenants?--we +would have thee confess thine impudent cheats, thine inexpiable crimes! +We would drive deeper the nails into thy hands, press down the crown of +thorns upon thy brow, bring blood and water from the dry wounds of thy +sides. + +"And that we can and will do by violating the quietude of thy body, +Profaner of ample vices, Abstractor of stupid purities, cursed Nazarene, +do-nothing King, coward God!" "Amen!" trilled the soprano voices of the +choir boys. + +Durtal listened in amazement to this torrent of blasphemies and insults. +The foulness of the priest stupefied him. A silence succeeded the +litany. The chapel was foggy with the smoke of the censers. The women, +hitherto taciturn, flustered now, as, remounting the altar, the canon +turned toward them and blessed them with his left hand in a sweeping +gesture. And suddenly the choir boys tinkled the prayer bells. + +It was a signal. The women fell to the carpet and writhed. One of them +seemed to be worked by a spring. She threw herself prone and waved her +legs in the air. Another, suddenly struck by a hideous strabism, +clucked, then becoming tongue-tied stood with her mouth open, the tongue +turned back, the tip cleaving to the palate. Another, inflated, livid, +her pupils dilated, lolled her head back over her shoulders, then jerked +it brusquely erect and belaboured herself, tearing her breast with her +nails. Another, sprawling on her back, undid her skirts, drew forth a +rag, enormous, meteorized; then her face twisted into a horrible +grimace, and her tongue, which she could not control, stuck out, bitten +at the edges, harrowed by red teeth, from a bloody mouth. + +Suddenly Durtal rose, and now he heard and saw Docre distinctly. + +Docre contemplated the Christ surmounting the tabernacle, and with arms +spread wide apart he spewed forth frightful insults, and, at the end of +his forces, muttered the billingsgate of a drunken cabman. One of the +choir boys knelt before him with his back toward the altar. A shudder +ran around the priest's spine. In a solemn but jerky voice he said, +"_Hoc est enim corpus meum_," then, instead of kneeling, after the +consecration, before the precious Body, he faced the congregation, and +appeared tumefied, haggard, dripping with sweat. He staggered between +the two choir boys, who, raising the chasuble, displayed his naked +belly. Docre made a few passes and the host sailed, tainted and soiled, +over the steps. + +Durtal felt himself shudder. A whirlwind of hysteria shook the room. +While the choir boys sprinkled holy water on the pontiff's nakedness, +women rushed upon the Eucharist and, grovelling in front of the altar, +clawed from the bread humid particles and drank and ate divine ordure. + +Another woman, curled up over a crucifix, emitted a rending laugh, then +cried to Docre, "Father, father!" A crone tore her hair, leapt, whirled +around and around as on a pivot and fell over beside a young girl who, +huddled to the wall, was writhing in convulsions, frothing at the mouth, +weeping, and spitting out frightful blasphemies. And Durtal, terrified, +saw through the fog the red horns of Docre, who, seated now, frothing +with rage, was chewing up sacramental wafers, taking them out of his +mouth, wiping himself with them, and distributing them to the women, who +ground them underfoot, howling, or fell over each other struggling to +get hold of them and violate them. + +The place was simply a madhouse, a monstrous pandemonium of prostitutes +and maniacs. Now, while the choir boys gave themselves to the men, and +while the woman who owned the chapel, mounted the altar caught hold of +the phallus of the Christ with one hand and with the other held a +chalice between "His" naked legs, a little girl, who hitherto had not +budged, suddenly bent over forward and howled, howled like a dog. +Overcome with disgust, nearly asphyxiated, Durtal wanted to flee. He +looked for Hyacinthe. She was no longer at his side. He finally caught +sight of her close to the canon and, stepping over the writhing bodies +on the floor, he went to her. With quivering nostrils she was inhaling +the effluvia of the perfumes and of the couples. + +"The sabbatic odour!" she said to him between clenched teeth, in a +strangled voice. + +"Here, let's get out of this!" + +She seemed to wake, hesitated a moment, then without answering she +followed him. He elbowed his way through the crowd, jostling women whose +protruding teeth were ready to bite. He pushed Mme. Chantelouve to the +door, crossed the court, traversed the vestibule, and, finding the +portress' lodge empty, he drew the cord and found himself in the street. + +There he stopped and drew the fresh air deep into his lungs. Hyacinthe, +motionless, dizzy, huddled to the wall away from him. + +He looked at her. "Confess that you would like to go in there again." + +"No," she said with an effort. "These scenes shatter me. I am in a daze. +I must have a glass of water." + +And she went up the street, leaning on him, straight to the wine shop, +which was open. It was an ignoble lair, a little room with tables and +wooden benches, a zinc counter, cheap bar fixtures, and blue-stained +wooden pitchers; in the ceiling a U-shaped gas bracket. Two +pick-and-shovel labourers were playing cards. They turned around and +laughed. The proprietor took the excessively short-stemmed pipe from his +mouth and spat into the sawdust. He seemed not at all surprised to see +this fashionably gowned woman in his dive. Durtal, who was watching him, +thought he surprised an understanding look exchanged by the proprietor +and the woman. + +The proprietor lighted a candle and mumbled into Durtal's ear, +"Monsieur, you can't drink here with these people watching. I'll take +you to a room where you can be alone." + +"Hmmm," said Durtal to Hyacinthe, who was penetrating the mysteries of a +spiral staircase, "A lot of fuss for a glass of water!" + +But she had already entered a musty room. The paper was peeling from the +walls, which were nearly covered with pictures torn out of illustrated +weeklies and tacked up with hairpins. The floor was all in pieces. There +were a wooden bed without any curtains, a chamber pot with a piece +broken out of the side, a wash bowl and two chairs. + +The man brought a decanter of gin, a large one of water, some sugar, and +glasses, then went downstairs. + +Her eyes were sombre, mad. She enlaced Durtal. + +"No!" he shouted, furious at having fallen into this trap. "I've had +enough of that. It's late. Your husband is waiting for you. It's time +for you to go back to him--" + +She did not even hear him. + +"I want you," she said, and she took him treacherously and obliged him +to desire her. She disrobed, threw her skirts on the floor, opened wide +the abominable couch, and raising her chemise in the back she rubbed +her spine up and down over the coarse grain of the sheets. A look of +swooning ecstasy was in her eyes and a smile of joy on her lips. + +She seized him, and, with ghoulish fury, dragged him into obscenities of +whose existence he had never dreamed. Suddenly, when he was able to +escape, he shuddered, for he perceived that the bed was strewn with +fragments of hosts. + +"Oh, you fill me with horror! Dress, and let's get out of here." + +While, with a faraway look in her eyes, she was silently putting on +her clothes, he sat down on a chair. The fetidness of the room +nauseated him. Then, too--he was not absolutely convinced of +Transubstantiation--he did not believe very firmly that the Saviour +resided in that soiled bread--but--In spite of himself, the sacrilege he +had involuntarily participated in saddened him. + +"Suppose it were true," he said to himself, "that the Presence were +real, as Hyacinthe and that miserable priest attest--No, decidedly, I +have had enough. I am through. The occasion is timely for me to break +with this creature whom from our very first interview I have only +tolerated, and I'm going to seize the opportunity." + +Below, in the dive, he had to face the knowing smiles of the labourers. +He paid, and without waiting for his change, he fled. They reached the +rue de Vaugirard and he hailed a cab. + +As they were whirled along they sat lost in their thoughts, not looking +at each other. + +"Soon?" asked Mme. Chantelouve, in an almost timid tone when he left her +at her door. + +"No," he answered. "We have nothing in common. You wish everything and I +wish nothing. Better break. We might drag out our relation, but it would +finally terminate in recrimination and bitterness. Oh, and then--after +what happened this evening, no! Understand me? No!" + +And he gave the cabman his address and huddled himself into the furthest +corner of the fiacre. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +"He doesn't lead a humdrum life, that canon!" said Des Hermies, when +Durtal had related to him the details of the Black Mass. "It's a +veritable seraglio of hystero-epileptics and erotomaniacs that he has +formed for himself. But his vices lack warmth. Certainly, in the matter +of contumelious blasphemies, of sacrilegious atrocities, and sensual +excitation, this priest may seem to have exceeded the limits, to be +almost unique. But the bloody and investuous side of the old sabbats is +wanting. Docre is, we must admit, greatly inferior to Gilles de Rais. +His works are incomplete, insipid; weak, if I may say so." + +"I like that. You know it isn't easy to procure children whom one may +disembowel with impunity. The parents would raise a row and the police +would interfere." + +"Yes, and it is to difficulties of this sort that we must evidently +attribute the bloodless celebration of the Black Mass. But I am thinking +just now of the women you described, the ones that put their heads over +the chafing-dishes to drink in the smoke of the burning resin. They +employ the procedure of the Aissaouas, who hold their heads over the +braseros whenever the catalepsy necessary to their orgies is slow in +coming. As for the other phenomena you cite, they are known in the +hospitals, and except as symptoms of the demoniac effluence they teach +us nothing new. Now another thing. Not a word of this to Carhaix, +because he would be quite capable of closing his door in your face if he +knew you had been present at an office in honour of Satan." + +They went downstairs from Durtal's apartment and walked along toward the +tower of Saint Sulpice. + +"I didn't bring anything to eat, because you said you would look after +that," said Durtal, "but this morning I sent Mme. Carhaix--in lieu of +desserts and wine--some real Dutch gingerbread, and a couple of rather +surprising liqueurs, an elixir of life which we shall take, by way of +appetizer, before the repast, and a flask of crême de céléri. I have +discovered an honest distiller." + +"Impossible!" + +"You shall see. This elixir of life is manufactured from Socotra aloes, +little cardamom, saffron, myrrh, and a heap of other aromatics. It's +inhumanly bitter, but it's exquisite." + +"I am anxious to taste it. The least we can do is fête Gévingey a little +on his deliverance." + +"Have you seen him?" + +"Yes. He's looking fine. We'll make him tell us about his cure." + +"I keep wondering what he lives on." + +"On what his astrological skill brings him." + +"Then there are rich people who have their horoscopes cast?" + +"We must hope so. To tell you the truth, I think Gévingey is not in very +easy circumstances. Under the Empire he was astrologer to the Empress, +who was very superstitious and had faith--as did Napoleon, for that +matter--in predictions and fortune telling, but since the fall of the +Empire I think Gévingey's situation has changed a good deal for the +worse. Nevertheless he passes for being the only man in France who has +preserved the secrets of Cornelius Agrippa, Cremona, Ruggieri, Gauric, +Sinibald the Swordsman, and Tritemius." + +While discoursing they had climbed the stair and arrived at the +bell-ringer's door. + +The astrologer was already there and the table was set. All grimaced a +bit as they tasted the black and active liqueur which Durtal poured. + +Joyous to have all her family about her, Mama Carhaix brought the rich +soup. She filled the plates. + +When a dish of vegetables was passed and Durtal chose a leek, Des +Hermies said, laughing, "Look out! Porta, a thaumaturge of the late +sixteenth century, informs us that this plant, long considered an emblem +of virility, perturbs the quietude of the most chaste." + +"Don't listen to him," said the bell-ringer's wife. "And you, Monsieur +Gévingey, some carrots?" + +Durtal looked at the astrologer. His head still looked like a +sugar-loaf, his hair was the same faded, dirty brown of hydroquinine or +ipecac powders, his bird eyes had the same startled look, his enormous +hands were covered with the same phalanx of rings, he had the same +obsequious and imposing manner, and sacerdotal tone, but he was +freshened up considerably, the wrinkles had gone out of his skin, and +his eyes were brighter, since his visit to Lyons. + +Durtal congratulated him on the happy result of the treatment. + +"It was high time, monsieur, I was putting myself under the care of Dr. +Johannès, for I was nearly gone. Not possessing a shred of the gift of +voyance and knowing no extralucid cataleptic who could inform me of the +clandestine preparations of Canon Docre, I could not possibly defend +myself by using the laws of countersign and of the shock in return." + +"But," said Des Hermies, "admitting that you could, through the +intermediation of a flying spirit, have been aware of the operations of +the priest, how could you have parried them?" + +"The law of countersigns consists, when you know in advance the day and +hour of the attack, in going away from home, thus throwing the spell off +the track and neutralizing it, or in saying an hour beforehand, 'Here I +am. Strike!' The last method is calculated to scatter the fluids to the +wind and paralyze the powers of the assailant. In magic, any act known +and made public is lost. As for the shock in return, one must also know +beforehand of the attempt if one is to cast back the spells on the +person sending them before one is struck by them. + +"I was certain to perish. A day had passed since I was bewitched. Two +days more and I should have been ready for the cemetery." + +"How's that?" + +"Every individual struck by magic has three days in which to take +measures. That time past, the ill is incurable. So when Docre announced +to me that he condemned me to death by his own authority and when, two +hours later, on returning home, I felt desperately ill, I lost no time +packing my grip and starting for Lyons." + +"And there?" asked Durtal. + +"There I saw Dr. Johannès. I told him of Docre's threat and of my +illness. He said to me simply. 'That priest can dress the most virulent +poisons in the most frightful sacrileges. The fight will be bitter, but +I shall conquer,' and he immediately called in a woman who lives in his +house, a voyant. + +"He hypnotized her and she, at his injunction, explained the nature of +the sorcery of which I was the victim. She reconstructed the scene. She +literally saw me being poisoned by food and drink mixed with menstrual +fluid that had been reinforced with macerated sacramental wafers and +drugs skilfully dosed. That sort of spell is so terrible that aside from +Dr. Johannès no thaumaturge in France dare try to cure it. + +"So the doctor finally said to me, 'Your cure can be obtained only +through an invincible power. We must lose no time. We must at once +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek.' + +"He raised an altar, composed of a table and a wooden tabernacle. It was +shaped like a little house surmounted by a cross and encircled, under +the pediment, by the dial-like figure of the tetragram. He brought the +silver chalice, the unleavened bread and the wine. He donned his +sacerdotal habits, put on his finger the ring which has received the +supreme benedictions, then he began to read from a special missal the +prayers of the sacrifice. + +"Almost at once the voyant cried, 'Here are the spirits evoked for the +spell. These are they which have carried the venefice, obedient to the +command of the master of black magic, Canon Docre!' + +"I was sitting beside the altar. Dr. Johannès placed his left hand on my +head and raising toward heaven his right he besought the Archangel +Michael to assist him, and adjured the glorious legions of the +invincible seraphim to dominate, to enchain, the spirits of Evil. + +"I was already feeling greatly relieved. The sensation of internal +gnawing which tortured me in Paris was diminishing. Dr. Johannès +continued to recite his orisons, then when the moment came for the +deprecatory prayer, he took my hand, laid it on the altar, and three +times chanted: + +"'May the projects and the designs of the worker of iniquity, who has +made enchantment against you, be brought to naught; may any influence +obtained by Satanic means, any attack directed against you, be null and +void of effect; may all the maledictions of your enemy be transformed +into benedictions from the highest summits of the eternal hills; may his +fluids of death be transmuted into ferments of life; finally, may the +Archangels of Judgment and Chastisement decide the fate of the miserable +priest who has put his trust in the works of Darkness and Evil.' + +"'You,' he said to me, 'are delivered. Heaven has cured you. May your +heart therefore repay the living God and Jesus Christ, through the +glorious Mary, with the most ardent devotion.' + +"He offered me unleavened bread and wine. I was saved. You who are a +physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, can bear witness that human science was +impotent to aid me--and now look at me!" + +"Yes," Des Hermies replied, "without discussing the means, I certify the +cure, and, I admit, it is not the first time that to my knowledge +similar results have been obtained.--No thanks," to Mme. Carhaix, who +was inviting him to take another helping from a plate of sausages with +horseradish in creamed peas. "But," said Durtal, "permit me to ask you +several questions. Certain details interest me. What were the sacerdotal +ornaments of Dr. Johannès?" + +"His costume was a long robe of vermilion cashmere caught up at the +waist by a red and white sash. Above this robe he had a white mantle of +the same stuff, cut, over the chest, in the form of a cross upside +down." + +"Cross upside down?" + +"Yes, this cross, reversed like the figure of the Hanged Man in the +old-fashioned Tarot card deck, signifies that the priest Melchisedek +must die in the Old Man--that is, man affected by original sin--and live +again the Christ, to be powerful with the power of the Incarnate Word +which died for us." + +Carhaix seemed ill at ease. His fanatical and suspicious Catholicism +refused to countenance any save the prescribed ceremonies. He made no +further contribution to the conversation, and in significant silence +filled the glasses, seasoned the salad, and passed the plates. + +"What sort of a ring was that you spoke of?" + +"It is a symbolic ring of pure gold. It has the image of a serpent, +whose head, in relief, set with a ruby, is connected by a fine chain +with a tiny circlet which fastens the jaws of the reptile." + +"What I should like awfully to know is the origin and the aim of this +sacrifice. What has Melchisedek to do with your affair?" + +"Ah," said the astrologer, "Melchisedek is one of the most mysterious of +all the figures in the Holy Bible. He was king of Salem, sacrificer to +the Most High God. He blessed Abraham and Abraham gave him tithes of the +spoil of the vanquished kings of Sodom and Gomorrah. That is the story +in Genesis 14:18-20. But Saint Paul cites him also, in Hebrews 7, and in +the third verse of that chapter says that Melchisedek, 'without father, +without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of day, nor +end of life, but made like unto the Son of God, abideth, a priest +continually.' In Hebrews 5:6 Paul, quoting Psalm 110:4, says Jesus is +called 'a priest forever after the order of Melchisedek.' + +"All this, you see, is obscure enough. Some exegetes recognize in him +the prophetic figure of the Saviour, others, that of Saint Joseph, and +all admit that the sacrifice of Melchisedek offering to Abraham the +blood and wine of which he had first made oblation to the Lord +prefigures, to follow the expression of Isidore of Damietta, the +archetype of the divine mysteries, otherwise known as the holy mass." + +"Very well," said Des Hermies, "but all that Scripture does not explain +the alexipharmacal virtues which Dr. Johannès attributes to the +sacrifice." + +"You are asking more than I can answer. Only Dr. Johannès could tell +you. This much I can say. Theology teaches us that the mass, as it is +celebrated, is the re-enaction of the Sacrifice of Calvary, but the +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek is not that. It is, in some sort, +the future mass, the glorious office which will be known during the +earthly reign of the divine Paraclete. This sacrifice is offered to God +by man regenerated, redeemed by the infusion of the Love of the Holy +Ghost. Now, the hominal being whose heart has thus been purified and +sanctified is invincible, and the enchantments of hell cannot prevail +against him if he makes use of this sacrifice to dissipate the Spirits +of Evil. That explains to you the potency of Dr. Johannès, whose heart +unites, in this ceremony, with the divine heart of Jesus." + +"Your exposition is not very clear," Carhaix mildly objected. + +"Then it must be supposed that Johannès is a man amended ahead of time, +an apostle animated by the Holy Ghost?" + +"And so he is," said the astrologer, firmly assured. + +"Will you please pass the gingerbread?" Carhaix requested. + +"Here's the way to fix it," said Durtal. "First cut a slice very thin, +then take a slice of ordinary bread, equally thin, butter them and put +them together. Now tell me if this sandwich hasn't the exquisite taste +of fresh walnuts." + +"Well," said Des Hermies, pursuing his cross-examination, "aside from +that, what has Dr. Johannès been doing in this long time since I last +saw him?" + +"He leads what ought to be a peaceful life. He lives with friends who +revere and adore him. With them he rests from the tribulations of all +sorts--save one--that he has been subjected to. He would be perfectly +happy if he did not have to repulse the attacks launched at him almost +daily by the tonsured magicians of Rome." + +"Why do they attack him?" + +"A thorough explanation would take a long time. Johannès is commissioned +by Heaven to break up the venomous practises of Satanism and to preach +the coming of the glorified Christ and the divine Paraclete. Now the +diabolical Curia which holds the Vatican in its clutches has every +reason of self-interest for putting out of the way a man whose prayers +fetter their conjurements and neutralize their spells." + +"Ah!" exclaimed Durtal, "and would it be too much to ask you how this +former priest foresees and checks these astonishing assaults?" + +"No indeed. The doctor can tell by the flight and cry of certain birds. +Falcons and male sparrow-hawks are his sentinels. If they fly toward him +or away from him, to East or West, whether they emit a single cry or +many; these are omens, letting him know the hour of the combat so that +he can be on guard. Thus he told me one day, the sparrow-hawks are +easily influenced by the spirits, and he uses them as the hypnotist +makes use of somnambulism, as the spiritist makes use of tables and +slates." + +"They are the telegraph wires for magic despatches." + +"Yes. And of course you know that the method is not new. Indeed, its +origin is lost in the darkness of the ages. Ornithomancy is world-old. +One finds traces of it in the Holy Bible, and the Zohar asserts that one +may receive numerous notifications if one knows how to observe the +flight and distinguish the cries of birds." + +"But," said Durtal, "why is the sparrow-hawk chosen in preference to +other birds?" + +"Well, it has always been, since remotest antiquity, the harbinger of +charms. In Egypt the god with the head of a hawk was the one who +possessed the science of the hieroglyphics. Formerly in that country the +hierogrammatists swallowed the heart and blood of the hawk to prepare +themselves for the magic rites. Even today African chiefs put a hawk +feather in their hair, and this bird is sacred in India." + +"How does your friend go about it," asked Mme. Carhaix, "raising and +housing birds of prey?--because that is what they are." + +"He does not raise them nor house them. They nest in the high bluffs +along the Saône, near Lyons. They come and see him in time of need." + +Durtal, looking around this cozy dining-room and recalling the +extraordinary conversations which had been held here, was thinking, "How +far we are from the language and the ideas of modern times.--All that +takes us back to the Middle Ages," he said, finishing his thought aloud. + +"Happily!" exclaimed Carhaix, who was rising to go and ring his bells. + +"Yes," said Des Hermies, "and what is mighty strange in this day of +crass materialism is the idea of battles fought in space, over the +cities, between a priest of Lyons and prelates of Rome." + +"And between this priest and the Rosicrusians and Canon Docre." + +Durtal remembered that Mme. Chantelouve had assured him that the chiefs +of the Rosicrucians were making frantic efforts to establish connections +with the devil and prepare spells. + +"You think that the Rosicrucians are satanizing?" + +"They would like to, but they don't know how. They are limited to +reproducing, mechanically, the few fluidic and veniniferous operations +revealed to them by the three brahmins who visited Paris a few years +ago." + +"I am thankful, myself," said Mme. Carhaix, as she took leave of the +company, "that I am not mixed up in any of this frightful business, and +that I can pray and live in peace." + +Then while Des Hermies, as usual, prepared the coffee and Durtal brought +the liqueur glasses, Gévingey filled his pipe, and when the sound of the +bells died away--dispersed and as if absorbed by the pores of the +wall--he blew out a great cloud of smoke and said, "I passed some +delightful days with the family with whom Dr. Johannès is living. After +the shocks which I had received, it was a privilege without equal to +complete my convalescence in that sweet atmosphere of Christian Love. +And, too, Johannès is of all men I have ever met the most learned in the +occult sciences. No one, except his antithesis, the abominable Docre, +has penetrated so far into the arcana of Satanism. One may even say that +in France these two are the only ones who have crossed the terrestrial +threshold and obtained, each in his field, sure results. But in addition +to the charm of his conversation and the scope of his knowledge--for +even on the subject in which I excel, that of astrology, he surprised +me--Johannès delighted me with the beauty of his vision of the future +transformation of peoples. He is really, I swear, the prophet whose +earthly mission of suffering and glory has been authorized by the Most +High." + +"I don't doubt it," said Durtal, smiling, "but his theory of the +Paraclete is, if I am not mistaken, the very ancient heresy of Montanus +which the Church has formally condemned." + +"All depends on the manner in which the coming of the Paraclete is +conceived," interjected the bell-ringer, returning at that moment. "It +is also the orthodox doctrine of Saint Irenæus, Saint Justin, Scotus +Erigena, Amaury of Chartres, Saint Doucine, and that admirable mystic, +Joachim of Floris. This was the belief throughout the Middle Ages, and I +admit that it obsesses me and fills me with joy, that it responds to the +most ardent of my yearnings. Indeed," he said, sitting down and crossing +his legs, "if the third kingdom is an illusion, what consolation is left +for Christians in face of the general disintegration of a world which +charity requires us not to hate?" + +"I am furthermore obliged to admit," said Des Hermies, "that in spite of +the blood shed on Golgotha, I personally feel as if my ransom had not +been quite effected." + +"There are three kingdoms," the astrologer resumed, pressing down the +ashes of his pipe with his finger. "Of the Old Testament, that of the +Father, the kingdom of fear. Of the New Testament, that of the Son, the +kingdom of expiation. Of the Johannite Gospel, that of the Holy Ghost, +the kingdom of redemption and love. They are the past, present and +future; winter, spring and summer. The first, says Joachim of Floris, +gives us the blade, the second, the leaf, and the third, the ear. Two of +the Persons of the Trinity have shown themselves. Logically the Third +must appear." + +"Yes, and the Biblical texts abound, conclusive, explicit, irrefutable," +said Carhaix. "All the prophets, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Zachariah, +Malachi, speak of it. The Acts of the Apostles is very precise on this +point. In the first chapter you will read these lines, 'This same Jesus, +which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as +ye have seen him go into heaven.' Saint John also announces the tidings +in the Apocalypse, which is the gospel of the second coming of Christ, +'Christ shall come and reign a thousand years.' Saint Paul is +inexhaustible in revelations of this nature. In the epistle to Timothy +he invokes the Lord 'who shall judge the quick and the dead at his +appearance and his kingdom.' In the second epistle to the Thessalonians +he writes, 'And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall +consume with the Spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the +brightness of his coming.' Now, he declares that the Antichrist is not +yet, so the coming which he prophesies is not that already realized by +the birth of the Saviour at Bethlehem. In the Gospel according to Saint +Matthew, Jesus responds to Caiaphas, who asks Him if He is the Christ, +Son of God, 'Thou hast said, and nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter +shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power and +coming in the clouds of heaven.' And in another verse He says to His +apostles, 'Watch, therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth +come.' + +"And there are other texts I could put my finger on. No, there is no use +in talking, the partisans of the glorious kingdom are supported with +certitude by inspired passages, and can, under certain conditions and +without fear of heresy, uphold this doctrine, which, Saint Jerome +attests, was in the fourth century a dogma of faith recognized by all. +But what say we taste a bit of this crême de céléri which Monsieur +Durtal praises so highly?" + +It was a thick liqueur, sirupy like anisette, but even sweeter and more +feminine, only, when one had swallowed this inert semi-liquid, there +lingered in the roots of the papillæ a faint taste of celery. + +"It isn't bad," said the astrologer, "but there's no life to it," and he +poured into his glass a stiff tot of rum. + +"Come to think of it," said Durtal, "the third kingdom is also announced +in the words of the Paternoster, 'Thy kingdom come.'" + +"Certainly," said the bell-ringer. + +"But you see," interjected Gévingey, "heresy would gain the upper hand +and the whole belief would be turned into nonsense and absurdity if we +admitted, as certain Paracletists do, an authentic fleshly incarnation. +For instance, remember Fareinism, which has been rife, since the +eighteenth century, in Fareins, a village of the Doubs, where Jansenism +took refuge when driven out of Paris after the closing of the cemetery +of Saint Médard. There a priest, François Bonjour, reproduced the +'convulsionist' orgies which, under the Regency, desecrated the tomb of +Deacon Paris. Then Bonjour had an affair with a woman and she claimed to +be big with the prophet Elijah, who, according to the Apocalypse, is to +precede the last arrival of Christ. This child came into the world, then +there was a second who was none other than the Paraclete. The latter did +business as a woolen merchant in Paris, was a colonel in the National +Guard under Louis-Philippe, and died in easy circumstances in 1866. A +tradesman Paraclete, a Redeemer with epaulettes and gold braid! + +"In 1886 one Dame Brochard of Vouvray affirmed to whoever would listen +that Jesus was reincarnate in her. In 1889 a pious madman named David +published at Angers a brochure entitled _The Voice of God_, in which he +assumed the modest appellation of 'only Messiah of the Creator Holy +Ghost,' and informed the world that he was a sewer contractor and wore a +beard a yard and a half long. At the present moment his throne is not +empty for want of successors. An engineer named Pierre Jean rode all +over the Mediterranean provinces on horseback announcing that he was the +Holy Ghost. In Paris, Bérard, an omnibus conductor on the +Panthéon-Courcelles line, likewise asserts that he incorporates the +Paraclete, while a magazine article avers that the hope of Redemption +has dawned in the person of the poet Jhouney. Finally, in America, from +time to time, women claim to be Messiahs, and they recruit adherents +among persons worked up to fever pitch by Advent revivals." + +"They are no worse than the people who deny God and Creation," said +Carhaix. "God is immanent in His creatures. He is their Life principle, +the source of movement, the foundation of existence, says Saint Paul. He +has His personal existence, being the 'I AM,' as Moses says. + +"The Holy Ghost, through Christ in glory, will be immanent in all +beings. He will be the principle which transforms and regenerates them, +but there is no need for him to be incarnate. The Holy Ghost proceeds +from the Father through the Son. He is sent to act, not to materialize +himself. It is downright madness to maintain the contrary, thus falling +into the heresies of the Gnostics and the Fratricelli, into the errors +of Dulcin de Novare and his wife Marguerite, into the filth of abbé +Beccarelli, and the abominations of Segarelli of Parma, who, on pretext +of becoming a child the better to symbolize the simple, naïf love of the +Paraclete, had himself diapered and slept on the breast of a nurse." + +"But," said Durtal, "you haven't made yourself quite clear to me. If I +understand you, the Holy Ghost will act by an infusion into us. He will +transmute us, renovate our souls by a sort of 'passive purgation'--to +drop into the theological vernacular." + +"Yes, he will purify us soul and body." + +"How will he purify our bodies?" + +"The action of the Paraclete," the astrologer struck in, "will extend to +the principle of generation. The divine life will sanctify the organs +which henceforth can procreate only elect creatures, exempt from +original sin, creatures whom it will not be necessary to test in the +fires of humiliation, as the Holy Bible says. This was the doctrine of +the prophet Vintras, that extraordinary unlettered man who wrote such +impressive and ardent pages. The doctrine has been continued and +amplified, since Vintras's death, by his successor, Dr. Johannès." + +"Then there is to be Paradise on earth," said Des Hermies. + +"Yes, the kingdom of liberty, goodness, and love." + +"You've got me all mixed up," said Durtal. "Now you announce the +arrival of the Holy Ghost, now the glorious advent of Christ. Are these +kingdoms identical or is one to follow the other?" + +"There is a distinction," answered Gévingey, "between the coming of the +Paraclete and the victorious return of Christ. They occur in the order +named. First a society must be recreated, embraced by the third +Hypostasis, by Love, in order that Jesus may descend, as He has +promised, from the clouds and reign over the people formed in His +image." + +"What rôle is the Pope to play?" + +"Ah, that is one of the most curious points of the Johannite doctrine. +Time, since the first appearance of the Messiah, is divided, as you +know, into two periods, the period of the Victim, of the expiant +Saviour, the period in which we now are, and the other, that which we +await, the period of Christ bathed in the spittle of mockery but radiant +with the superadorable splendour of His person. Well, there is a +different pope for each of these eras. The Scriptures announce these two +sovereign pontificates--and so do my horoscopes, for that matter. + +"It is an axiom of theology that the spirit of Peter lives in his +successors. It will live in them, more or less hidden, until the +longed-for expansion of the Holy Ghost. Then John, who has been held in +reserve, as the Gospel says, will begin his ministry of love and will +live in the souls of the new popes." + +"I don't understand the utility of a pope when Jesus is to be visible," +said Des Hermies. + +"To tell the truth, there is no use in having one, and the papacy is to +exist only during the epoch reserved for the effluence of the divine +Paraclete. The day on which, in a shower of meteors, Jesus appears, the +pontificate of Rome ceases." + +"Without going more deeply into questions which we could discuss the +rest of our lives," said Durtal, "I marvel at the placidity of the +Utopian who imagines that man is perfectible. There is no denying that +the human creature is born selfish, abusive, vile. Just look around you +and see. Society cynical and ferocious, the humble heckled and pillaged +by the rich traffickers in necessities. Everywhere the triumph of the +mediocre and unscrupulous, everywhere the apotheosis of crooked politics +and finance. And you think you can make any progress against a stream +like that? No, man has never changed. His soul was corrupt in the days +of Genesis and is not less rotten at present. Only the form of his sins +varies. Progress is the hypocrisy which refines the vices." + +"All the more reason," Carhaix rejoined, "why society--if it is as you +have described it--should fall to pieces. I, too, think it is putrefied, +its bones ulcerated, its flesh dropping off. It can neither be poulticed +nor cured, it must be interred and a new one born. And who but God can +accomplish such a miracle?" + +"If we admit," said Des Hermies, "that the infamousness of the times is +transitory, it is self-evident that only the intervention of a God can +wash it away; for neither socialism nor any other chimera of the +ignorant and hate-filled workers will modify human nature and reform the +peoples. These tasks are above human forces." + +"And the time awaited by Johannès is at hand," Gévingey proclaimed. +"Here are some of the manifest proofs. Raymond Lully asserted that the +end of the old world would be announced by the diffusion of the +doctrines of Antichrist. He defined these doctrines. They are +materialism and the monstrous revival of magic. This prediction applies +to our age, I think. On the other hand, the good tidings was to be +realized, according to Our Lord, as reported by Saint Matthew, 'When ye +shall see the abomination of desolation ... stand in the holy place.' +And isn't it standing in the holy place now? Look at our timorous, +skeptical Pope, lukewarm and politic, our episcopate of simonists and +cowards, our flabby, indulgent clergy. See how they are ravaged by +Satanism, then tell me if the Church can fall any lower." + +"The promises are explicit and cannot fail," and with his elbows on the +table, his chin in his hands, and his eyes to heaven, the bell-ringer +murmured, "Our father--thy kingdom come!" + +"It's getting late," said Des Hermies, "time we were going." + +While they were putting on their coats, Carhaix questioned Durtal. "What +do you hope for if you have no faith in the coming of Christ?" + +"I hope for nothing at all." + +"I pity you. Really, you believe in no future amelioration?" + +"I believe, alas, that a dotard Heaven maunders over an exhausted +Earth." + +The bell-ringer raised his hands and sadly shook his head. + +When they had left Gévingey, Des Hermies, after walking in silence for +some time, said, "You are not astonished that all the events spoken of +tonight happened at Lyons." And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, he +continued, "You see I am well acquainted with Lyons. People's brains +there are as foggy as the streets when the morning mists roll up from +the Rhone. That city looks magnificent to travellers who like the long +avenues, wide boulevards, green grass, and penitentiary architecture of +modern cities. But Lyons is also the refuge of mysticism, the haven of +preternatural ideas and doubtful creeds. That's where Vintras died, the +one in whom, it seems, the soul of the prophet Elijah was incarnate. +That's where Naundorff found his last partisans. That is where +enchantment is rampant, because in the suburb of La Guillotière you can +have a person bewitched for a louis. Add that it is likewise, in spite +of its swarms of radicals and anarchists, an opulent market for a dour +Protestant Catholicism; a Jansenist factory, richly productive of +bourgeois bigotry. + +"Lyons is celebrated for delicatessen, silk, and churches. At the top of +every hill--and there's a hill every block--is a chapel or a convent, +and Notre Dame de Fourvière dominates them all. From a distance this +pile looks like an eighteenth century dresser turned upside down, but +the interior, which is in process of completion, is amazing. You ought +to go and take a look at it some day. You will see the most +extraordinary jumble of Assyrian, Roman, Gothic, and God knows what, +jacked together by Bossan, the only architect for a century who has +known how to create a cathedral interior. The nave glitters with inlays +and marble, with bronze and gold. Statues of angels diversify the rows +of columns and break up, with impressive grace, the known harmonies of +line. It's Asiatic and barbarous, and reminds one of the architecture +shown in Gustave Moreau's Hérodiade. + +"And there is an endless stream of pilgrims. They strike bargains with +Our Lady. They pray for an extension of markets, new outlets for +sausages and silks. They consult her on ways and means of getting rid of +spoiled vegetables and pushing off their shoddy. In the centre of the +city, in the church of Saint Boniface, I found a placard requesting the +faithful, out of respect for the holy place, not to give alms. It was +not seemly, you see, that the commercial orisons be disturbed by the +ridiculous plaints of the indigent." + +"Well," said Durtal, "it's a strange thing, but democracy is the most +implacable of the enemies of the poor. The Revolution, which, you would +think, ought to have protected them, proved for them the most cruel of +régimes. I will show you some day a decree of the Year II, pronouncing +penalties not only for those who begged but for those who gave." + +"And yet democracy is the panacea which is going to cure every ill," +said Des Hermies, laughing. And he pointed to enormous posters +everywhere in which General Boulanger peremptorily demanded that the +people of Paris vote for him in the coming election. + +Durtal shrugged his shoulders. "Quite true. The people are very sick. +Carhaix and Gévingey are perhaps right in maintaining that no human +agency is powerful enough to effect a cure." + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +Durtal had resolved not to answer Mme. Chantelouve's letters. Every day, +since their rupture, she had sent him an inflamed missive, but, as he +soon noticed, her Mænad cries were subsiding into plaints and +reproaches. She now accused him of ingratitude, and repented having +listened to him and having permitted him to participate in sacrileges +for which she would have to answer before the heavenly tribunal. She +pleaded to see him once more. Then she was silent for a while week. +Finally, tired, no doubt, of writing unanswered letters, she admitted, +in a last epistle, that all was over. + +After agreeing with him that their temperaments were incompatible, she +ended: + + "Thanks for the trig little love, ruled like music-paper, that + you gave me. My heart cannot be so straitly measured, it + requires more latitude--" + +"Her heart!" he laughed, then he continued to read: + + "I understand that it is not your earthly mission to satisfy my + heart but you might at least have conceded me a frank + comradeship which would have permitted me to leave my sex at + home and to come and spend an evening with you now and then. + This, seemingly, so simple, you have rendered impossible. + Farewell forever. I have only to renew my pact with Solitude, to + which I have tried to be unfaithful--" + +"With solitude! and that complaisant and paternal cuckold, her husband! +Well, he is the one most to be pitied now. Thanks to me, he had evenings +of quiet. I restored his wife, pliant and satisfied. He profited by my +fatigues, that sacristan. Ah, when I think of it, his sly, hypocritical +eyes, when he looked at me, told me a great deal. + +"Well, the little romance is over. It's a good thing to have your heart +on strike. In my brain I still have a house of ill fame, which sometimes +catches fire, but the hired myrmidons will stamp out the blaze in a +hurry. + +"When I was young and ardent the women laughed at me. Now that I am old +and stale I laugh at them. That's more in my character, old fellow," he +said to the cat, which, with ears pricked up, was listening to the +soliloquy. "Truly, Gilles de Rais is a great deal more interesting than +Mme. Chantelouve. Unfortunately, my relations with him are also drawing +to a close. Only a few more pages and the book is done. Oh, Lord! Here +comes Rateau to knock my house to pieces." + +Sure enough, the concierge entered, made an excuse for being late, took +off his vest, and cast a look of defiance at the furniture. Then he +hurled himself at the bed, grappled with the mattress, got a half-Nelson +on it, and balancing himself, turning half around, hurled it onto the +springs. + +Durtal, followed by his cat, went into the other room, but suddenly +Rateau ceased wrestling and came and stood before Durtal. + +"Monsieur, do you know what has happened?" he blubbered. + +"Why, no." + +"My wife has left me." + +"Left you! but she must be over sixty." + +Rateau raised his eyes to heaven. + +"And she ran off with another man?" + +Rateau, disconsolate, let the feather duster fall from his listless +hand. + +"The devil! Then, in spite of her age, your wife had needs which you +were unable to satisfy?" + +The concierge shook his head and finally succeeded in saying, "It was +the other way around." + +"Oh," said Durtal, considering the old caricature, shrivelled by bad air +and "three-six," "but if she is tired of that sort of thing, why did she +run off with a man?" + +Rateau made a grimace of pitying contempt, "Oh, he's impotent. Good for +nothing--" + +"Ah!" + +"It's my job I'm sore about. The landlord won't keep a concierge that +hasn't a wife." + +"Dear Lord," thought Durtal, "how hast thou answered my prayers!--Come +on, let's go over to your place," he said to Des Hermies, who, finding +Rateau's key in the door, had walked in. + +"Righto! since your housecleaning isn't done yet, descend like a god +from your clouds of dust, and come on over to the house." + +On the way Durtal recounted his concierge's conjugal misadventure. + +"Oh!" said Des Hermies, "many a woman would be happy to wreathe with +laurel the occiput of so combustible a sexagenarian.--Look at that! +Isn't it revolting?" pointing to the walls covered with posters. + +It was a veritable debauch of placards. Everywhere on lurid coloured +paper in box car letters were the names of Boulanger and Jacques. + +"Thank God, this will be over tomorrow." + +"There is one resource left," said Des Hermies. "To escape the horrors +of present day life never raise your eyes. Look down at the sidewalk +always, preserving the attitude of timid modesty. When you look only at +the pavement you see the reflections of the sky signs in all sorts of +fantastic shapes; alchemic symbols, talismanic characters, bizarre +pantacles with suns, hammers, and anchors, and you can imagine yourself +right in the midst of the Middle Ages." + +"Yes, but to keep from seeing the disenchanting crowd you would have to +wear a long-vizored cap like a jockey and blinkers like a horse." + +Des Hermies sighed. "Come in," he said, opening the door. They went in +and sitting down in easy chairs they lighted their cigarettes. + +"I haven't got over that conversation we had with Gévingey the other +night at Carhaix's," said Durtal. "Strange man, that Dr. Johannès. I +can't keep from thinking about him. Look here, do you sincerely believe +in his miraculous cures?" + +"I am obliged to. I didn't tell you all about him, for a physician can't +lightly make these dangerous admissions. But you may as well know that +this priest heals hopeless cases. + +"I got acquainted with him when he was still a member of the Parisian +clergy. It came about by one of those miracles of his which I don't +pretend to understand. + +"My mother's maid had a granddaughter who was paralyzed in her arms and +legs and suffered death and destruction in her chest and howled when you +touched her there. She had been in this condition two years. It had come +on in one night, how produced nobody knows. She was sent away from the +Lyons hospitals as incurable. She came to Paris, underwent treatment at +La Salpêtrière, and was discharged when nobody could find out what was +the matter with her nor what medication would give her any relief. One +day she spoke to me of this abbé Johannès, who, she said, had cured +persons in as bad shape as she. I did not believe a word, but hearing +that the priest refused to take any money for his services I did not +dissuade her from visiting him, and out of curiosity I went along. + +"They placed her in a chair. The ecclesiastic, little, active, +energetic, took her hand and applied to it, one after the other, three +precious stones. Then he said coolly, 'Mademoiselle, you are the victim +of consanguineal sorcery.' + +"I could hardly keep from laughing. + +"'Remember,' he said, 'two years back, for that is when your paralytic +stroke came on. You must have had a quarrel with a kinsman or +kinswoman?' + +"It was true. Poor Marie had been unjustly accused of the theft of a +watch which was an heirloom belonging to an aunt of hers. The aunt had +sworn vengeance. + +"'Your aunt lives in Lyons?' + +"She nodded. + +"'Nothing astonishing about that,' continued the priest. 'In Lyons, +among the lower orders, there are witch doctors who know a little about +the witchcraft practised in the country. But be reassured. These people +are not powerful. They know little more than the A B C's of the art. +Then, mademoiselle, you wish to be cured?' + +"And after she replied that she did, he said gently, 'That is all. You +may go.' + +"He did not touch her, did not prescribe any remedy. I came away +persuaded that he was a mountebank. But when, three days later, the girl +was able to raise her arms, and all her pain had left her, and when, at +the end of a week, she could walk, I had to yield in face of the +evidence. I went back to see him, had occasion to do him a service; and +thus our relations began." + +"But what are his methods?" + +"He opens, like the curate of Ars, with prayer. Then he evokes the +militant archangels, then he breaks the magic circles and +chases--'classes,' as he says--the spirits of Evil. I know very well +that this is confounding. Whenever I speak of this man's potency to my +confrères they smile with a superior air or serve up to me the specious +arguments which they have fabricated to explain the cures wrought by +Christ and the Virgin. The method they have imagined consists in +striking the patient's imagination, suggesting to him the will to be +cured, persuading him that he is well, hypnotizing him in a waking +state--so to speak. This done--say they--the twisted legs straighten, +the sores disappear, the consumption-torn lungs are patched up, the +cancers become benign pimples, and the blind eyes see. This procedure +they attribute to miracle workers to explain away the supernatural--why +don't they use the method themselves if it is so simple?" + +"But haven't they tried?" + +"After a fashion. I was present myself at an experiment attempted by Dr. +Luys. Ah, it was inspiring! At the charity hospital there was a poor +girl paralyzed in both legs. She was put to sleep and commanded to rise. +She struggled in vain. Then two interns held her up in a standing +posture, but her lifeless legs bent useless under her weight. Need I +tell you that she could not walk, and that after they had held her up +and pushed her along a few steps, they put her to bed again, having +obtained no result whatever." + +"But Dr. Johannès does not cure all sufferers, without discrimination?" + +"No. He will not meddle with any ailments which are not the result of +spells. He says he can do nothing with natural ills, which are the +province of the physician. He is a specialist in Satanic affections. He +has most to do with the possessed whose neuroses have proved obdurate to +hydrotherapeutic treatment." + +"What does he do with the precious stones you mentioned?" + +"First, before answering your question, I must explain the significance +and virtue of these stones. I shall be telling you nothing new when I +say that Aristotle, Pliny, all the sages of antiquity, attributed +medical and divine virtues to them. According to the pagans, agate and +carnelian stimulate, topaz consoles, jasper cures languor, hyacinth +drives away insomnia, turquoise prevents falls or lightens the shock, +amethyst combats drunkenness. + +"Catholic symbolism, in its turn, takes over the precious stones and +sees in them emblems of the Christian virtues. Then, sapphire represents +the lofty aspirations of the soul, chalcedony charity, sard and onyx +candor, beryl allegorizes theological science, hyacinth humility, while +the ruby appeases wrath, and emerald 'lapidifies' incorruptible faith. + +"Now in magic," Des Hermies rose and took from a shelf a very small +volume bound like a prayer book. He showed Durtal the title: _Natural +magic, or: The secrets and miracles of nature, in four volumes, by +Giambattista Porta of Naples. Paris. Nicolas Bonjour, rue Neuve Nostre +Dame at the sign Saint Nicolas_. 1584. + +"Natural magic," said Des Hermies, "which was merely the medicine of the +time, ascribes a new meaning to gems. Listen to this. After first +celebrating an unknown stone, the Alectorius, which renders its +possessor invincible if it has been taken out of the stomach of a cock +caponized four years before or if it has been ripped out of the +ventricle of a hen, Porta informs us that chalcedony wins law suits, +that carnelian stops bloody flux 'and is exceeding useful to women who +are sick of their flower,' that hyacinth protects against lightning and +keeps away pestilence and poison, that topaz quells 'lunatic' passions, +that turquoise is of advantage against melancholy, quartan fever, and +heart failure. He attests finally that sapphire preserves courage and +keeps the members vigorous, while emerald, hung about one's neck, keeps +away Saint John's evil and breaks when the wearer is unchaste. + +"You see, antique philosophy, mediæval Christianity, and sixteenth +century magic do not agree on the specific virtues of every stone. +Almost in every case the significations, more or less far-fetched, +differ. Dr. Johannès has revised these beliefs, adopted and rejected +great numbers of them, finally he has, on his own authority, admitted +new acceptations. According to him, amethyst does cure drunkenness; but +moral drunkenness, pride; ruby relieves sex pressure; beryl fortifies +the will; sapphire elevates the thoughts and turns them toward God. + +"In brief, he believes that every stone corresponds to a species of +malady, and also to a class of sins; and he affirms that when we have +chemically got possession of the active principle of gems we shall have +not only antidotes but preventatives. While waiting for this chimerical +dream to be realized and for our medicine to become the mock of lapidary +chemists, he uses precious stones to formulate diagnoses of illnesses +produced by sorcery." + +"How?" + +"He claims that when such or such a stone is placed in the hand or on +the affected part of the bewitched a fluid escapes from the stone into +his hands, and that by examining this fluid he can tell what is the +matter. In this connection he told me that a woman whom he did not know +came to him one day to consult him about a malady, pronounced incurable, +from which she had suffered since childhood. He could not get any +precise answers to his questions. He saw no signs of venefice. After +trying out his whole array of stones he placed in her hand lapis lazuli, +which, he says, corresponds to the sin of incest. He examined the stone. + +"'Your malady,' he said, 'is the consequence of an act of incest.' + +"'Well,' she said, 'I did not come here to confessional,' but she +finally admitted that her father had violated her before she attained +the age of puberty. + +"That, of course, is against reason and contrary to all accepted ideas, +but there is no getting around the fact that this priest cures patients +whom we physicians have given up for lost." + +"Such as the only astrologer Paris now can boast, the astounding +Gévingey, who would have been dead without his aid. I wonder how +Gévingey came to cast the Empress Eugenie's horoscope." + +"Oh, I told you. Under the Empire the Tuileries was a hotbed of magic. +Home, the American, was revered as the equal of a god. In addition to +spiritualistic séances he evoked demons at court. One evocation had +fatal consequences. A certain marquis, whose wife had died, implored +Home to let him see her again. Home took him to a room, put him in bed, +and left him. What ensued? What dreadful phantom rose from the tomb? Was +the story of Ligeia re-enacted? At any rate, the marquis was found dead +at the foot of the bed. This story has recently been reported by Le +Figaro from unimpeachable documents. + +"You see it won't do to play with the world spirits of Evil. I used to +know a rich bachelor who had a mania for the occult sciences. He was +president of a theosophic society and he even wrote a little book on the +esoteric doctrine, in the Isis series. Well, he could not, like the +Péladan and Papus tribe, be content with knowing nothing, so he went to +Scotland, where Diabolism is rampant. There he got in touch with the man +who, if you stake him, will initiate you into the Satanic arcana. My +friend made the experiment. Did he see him whom Bulwer Lytton in +_Zanoni_ calls 'the dweller of the threshold'? I don't know, but certain +it is that he fainted from horror and returned to France exhausted, half +dead." + +"Evidently all is not rosy in that line of work," said Durtal. "But it +is only spirits of Evil that can be evoked?" + +"Do you suppose that the Angels, who, of earth, obey only the saints, +would ever consent to take orders from the first comer?" + +"But there must be an intermediate order of angels, who are neither +celestial nor infernal, who, for instance, commit the well-known +asininities in the spiritist séances." + +"A priest told me one day that the neuter larvæ inhabit an invisible, +neutral territory, something like a little island, which is beseiged on +all sides by the good and evil spirits. The larvæ cannot long hold out +and are soon forced into one or the other camp. Now, because it is these +larvæ they evoke, the occultists, who cannot, of course, draw down the +angels, always get the ones who have joined the party of Evil, so +unconsciously and probably involuntarily the spiritist is always +diabolizing." + +"Yes, and if one admits the disgusting idea that an imbecile medium can +bring back the dead, one must, in reason, recognize the stamp of Satan +on these practises." + +"However viewed, Spiritism is an abomination." + +"So you don't believe in theurgy, white magic?" + +"It's a joke. Only a Rosicrucian who wants to hide his more repulsive +essays at black magic ever hints at such a thing. No one dare confess +that he satanizes. The Church, not duped by these hair-splitting +distinctions, condemns black and white magic indifferently." + +"Well," said Durtal, lighting a cigarette, after a silence, "this is a +better topic of conversation than politics or the races, but where does +it get us? Half of these doctrines are absurd, the other half so +mysterious as to produce only bewilderment. Shall we grant Satanism? +Well, gross as it is, it seems a sure thing. And if it is, and one is +consistent, one must also grant Catholicism--for Buddhism and the like +are not big enough to be substituted for the religion of Christ." + +"All right. Believe." + +"I can't. There are so many discouraging and revolting dogmas in +Christianity--" + +"I am uncertain about a good many things, myself," said Des Hermies, +"and yet there are moments when I feel that the obstacles are giving +way, that I almost believe. Of one thing I _am_ sure. The supernatural +does exist, Christian or not. To deny it is to deny evidence--and who +wants to be a materialist, one of these silly freethinkers?" + +"It is mighty tiresome to be vacillating forever. How I envy Carhaix his +robust faith!" + +"You don't want much!" said Des Hermies. "Faith is the breakwater of the +soul, affording the only haven in which dismasted man can glide along in +peace." + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +"You like that?" asked Mme. Carhaix. "For a change I served the broth +yesterday and kept the beef for tonight. So we'll have vermicelli soup, +a salad of cold meat with pickled herring and celery, some nice mashed +potatoes _au gratin_, and a dessert. And then you shall taste the new +cider we just got." + +"Oh!" and "Ah!" exclaimed Des Hermies and Durtal, who, while waiting for +dinner, were sipping the elixir of life. "Do you know, Mme. Carhaix, +your cooking tempts us to the sin of gluttony--If you keep on you will +make perfect pigs of us." + +"Oh, you are joking. I wonder what is keeping Louis." + +"Somebody is coming upstairs," said Durtal, hearing the creaking of +shoes in the tower. + +"No, it isn't his step," and she went and opened the door. "It's +Monsieur Gévingey." + +And indeed, clad in his blue cape, with his soft black hat on his head, +the astrologer entered, made a bow, like an actor taking a curtain call, +nibbed his great knuckles against his massive rings, and asked where the +bell-ringer was. + +"He is at the carpenter's. The oak beams holding up the big bell are +cracked and Louis is afraid they will break down." + +"Any news of the election?" and Gévingey took out his pipe and filled +it. + +"No. In this quarter we shan't know the results until nearly ten +o'clock. There's no doubt about the outcome, though, because Paris is +strong for this democratic stuff. General Boulanger will win hands +down." + +"This certainly is the age of universal imbecility." + +Carhaix entered and apologized for being so late. While his wife brought +in the soup he took off his goloshes and said, in answer to his friends' +questions, "Yes; the dampness had rusted the frets and warped the beams. +It was time for the carpenter to intervene. He finally promised that he +would be here tomorrow and bring his men without fail. Well, I am mighty +glad to get back. In the streets everything whirls in front of my eyes. +I am dizzy. I don't know what to do. The only places where I am at home +are the belfry and this room. Here, wife, let me do that," and he pushed +her aside and began to stir the salad. + +"How good it smells!" said Durtal, drinking in the incisive tang of the +herring. "Do you know what this perfume suggests? A basket funnelled +fireplace, twigs of juniper snapping in it, in a ground-floor room +opening on to a great harbour. It seems to me there is a sort of salt +water halo around these little rings of gold and rusted +iron.--Exquisite," he said as he tasted the salad. + +"We'll make it again for you, Monsieur Durtal," said Mme. Carhaix, "you +are not hard to please." + +"Alas!" said her husband, "his palate isn't, but his soul is. When I +think of his despairing aphorisms of the other night! However, we are +praying God to enlighten him. I'll tell you," he said to his wife, "we +will invoke Saint Nolasque and Saint Theodulus, who are always +represented with bells. They sort of belong to the family, and they will +certainly be glad to intercede for people who revere them and their +emblems." + +"It would take a stunning miracle to convince Durtal," said Des Hermies. + +"Bells have been known to perform them," said the astrologer. "I +remember to have read, though I forget where, that angels tolled the +knell when Saint Isidro of Madrid was dying." + +"And there are many other cases," said Carhaix. "Of their own accord +the bells chimed when Saint Sigisbert chanted the De Profundis over the +corpse of the martyr Placidus, and when the body of Saint Ennemond, +Bishop of Lyons, was thrown by his murderers into a boat without oars or +sails, the bells rang out, though nobody set them in motion, as the boat +passed down the Saône." + +"Do you know what I think?" asked Des Hermies, looking at Carhaix. "I +think you ought to prepare a compendium of hagiography or a really +informative work on heraldry." + +"What makes you think that?" + +"Well, you are, thank God, remote from this epoch and fond of things +which it knows nothing about or execrates, and a work of that kind would +take you still further away. My good friend, you are the man forever +unintelligible to the coming generations. To ring bells because you love +them, to give yourself over to the abandoned study of feudal art or +monasticism would make you complete--take you clear out of Paris, out of +the world, back into the Middle Ages." + +"Alas," said Carhaix, "I am only a poor ignorant man. But the type you +speak of does exist. In Switzerland, I believe, a bell-ringer has for +years been collecting material for a heraldic memorial. I should think," +he continued, laughing, "that his avocation would interfere with his +vocation." + +"And do you think," said Gévingey bitterly, "that the profession of +astrologer is less decried, less neglected?" + +"How do you like our cider?" asked the bell-ringer's wife. "Do you find +it a bit raw?" + +"No, it's tart if you sip it, but sweet if you take a good mouthful," +answered Durtal. + +"Wife, serve the potatoes. Don't wait for me. I delayed so long getting +my business done that it's time for the angelus. Don't bother about me. +Go on eating. I shall catch up with you when I get back." + +And as her husband lighted his lantern and left the room the woman +brought in on a plate what looked to be a cake covered with golden brown +caramel icing. + +"Mashed potatoes, I thought you said!" + +"_Au gratin_. Browned in the oven. Taste it. I put in everything that +ought to make it very good." + +All exclaimed over it. + +Then it became impossible to hear oneself. Tonight the bell boomed out +with unusual clarity and power. Durtal tried to analyze the sound which +seemed to rock the room. There was a sort of flux and reflux of sound. +First, the formidable shock of the clapper against the vase, then a sort +of crushing and scattering of the sounds as if ground fine with the +pestle, then a rounding of the reverberation; then the recoil of the +clapper, adding, in the bronze mortar, other sonorous vibrations which +it ground up and cast out and dispersed through the sounding shutters. + +Then the bell strokes came further apart. Now there was only the +whirring as of a spinning wheel; a few crumbs were slow about falling. +And now Carhaix returned. + +"It's a two-sided age," said Gévingey, pensive. "People believe nothing, +yet gobble everything. Every day a new science is invented. Nobody reads +that admirable Paracelsus who rediscovered all that had ever been found +and created everything that had not. Say now to your congress of +scientists that, according to this great master, life is a drop of the +essence of the stars, that each of our organs corresponds to a planet +and depends upon it; that we are, in consequence, a foreshortening of +the divine sphere. Tell them--and this, experience attests--that every +man born under the sign of Saturn is melancholy and pituitous, taciturn +and solitary, poor and vain; that that sluggish star predisposes to +superstition and fraud, directs epilepsies and varices, hemorrhoids and +leprosies; that it is, alas! the great purveyor to hospital and +prison--and the scientists will shrug their shoulders and laugh at you. +The glorified pedants and homiletic asses!" + +"Paracelsus," said Des Hermies, "was one of the most extraordinary +practitioners of occult medicine. He knew the now forgotten mysteries of +the blood, the still unknown medical effects of light. Professing--as +did also the cabalists, for that matter--that the human being is +composed of three parts, a material body, a soul, and a perispirit +called also an astral body, he attended this last especially and +produced reactions on the carnal envelope by procedures which are either +incomprehensible or fallen into disuse. He cared for wounds by treating +not the tissues, but the blood which came out of them. However, we are +assured that he healed certain ailments." + +"Thanks to his profound knowledge of astrology," said Gévingey. + +"But if the study of the sidereal influence is so important," said +Durtal, "why don't you take pupils?" + +"I can't get them. Where will you unearth people willing to study twenty +years without glory or profit? Because, to be able to establish a +horoscope one must be an astronomer of the first order, know mathematics +from top to bottom, and one must have put in long hours tussling with +the obscure Latin of the old masters. Besides, you must have the +vocation and the faith, and they are lost." + +"Just the way it is with bell ringing," said Carhaix. + +"No, you see, messieurs," Gévingey went on, "the day when the grand +sciences of the Middle Ages fell foul of the systematic and hostile +indifference of an impious people was the death-day of the soul in +France. All we can do now is fold our arms and listen to the wild +vagaries of society, which by turns shrieks with farcical joy and bitter +grief." + +"We must not despair. A better time is coming," said Mme. Carhaix in a +conciliating tone, and before she retired she shook hands with all her +guests. + +"The people," said Des Hermies, pouring the water into the coffee-pot, +"instead of being ameliorated with time, grow, from century to century, +more avaricious, abject, and stupid. Remember the Siege, the Commune; +the unreasonable infatuations, the tumultuous hatreds, all the dementia +of a deteriorated, malnourished people in arms. They certainly cannot +compare with the naïf and tender-hearted plebes of the Middle Ages. Tell +us, Durtal, how the people acted when Gilles de Rais was conducted to +the stake." + +"Yes, tell us," said Carhaix, his great eyes made watery by the smoke of +his pipe. + +"Well, you know, as a consequence of unheard-of crimes, the Marshal de +Rais was condemned to be hanged and burned alive. After the sentence was +passed, when he was brought back to his dungeon, he addressed a last +appeal to the Bishop, Jean de Malestroit, beseeching the Bishop to +intercede for him with the fathers and mothers of the children Gilles +had so ferociously violated and put to death, to be present when he +suffered. + +"The people whose hearts he had lacerated wept with pity. They now saw +in this demoniac noble only a poor man who lamented his crimes and was +about to confront the Divine Wrath. The day of execution, by nine +o'clock they were marching through the city in processional. They +chanted psalms in the streets and took vows in the churches to fast +three days in order to help assure the repose of the Marshal's soul." + +"Pretty far, as you see, from American lynch law," said Des Hermies. + +"Then," resumed Durtal, "at eleven they went to the prison to get Gilles +de Rais and accompanied him to the prairie of Las Biesse, where tall +stakes stood, surmounted by gibbets. + +"The Marshal supported his accomplices, embraced them, adjured them to +have 'great displeasure and contrition of their ill deeds' and, beating +his breast, he supplicated the Virgin to spare them, while the clergy, +the peasants, and the people joined in the psalmody, intoning the +sinister and imploring strophes of the chant for the departed: + + "'Nos timemus diem judicii + Quia mali et nobis conscii. + Sed tu, Mater summi concilii, + Para nobis locum refugii, + O Maria. + + "'Tunc iratus Judex--'" + +"Hurrah for Boulanger!" + +The noise as of a stormy sea mounted from the Place Saint Sulpice, and a +hubbub of cries floated up to the tower room. "Boulange--Lange--" Then +an enormous, raucous voice, the voice of an oyster woman, a push-cart +peddler, rose, dominating all others, howling, "Hurrah for Boulanger!" + +"The people are cheering the election returns in front of the city +hall," said Carhaix disdainfully. + +They looked at each other. + +"The people of today!" exclaimed Des Hermies. + +"Ah," grumbled Gévingey, "they wouldn't acclaim a sage, an artist, that +way, even--if such were conceivable now--a saint." + +"And they did in the Middle Ages." + +"Well, they were more naïf and not so stupid then," said Des Hermies. +"And as Gévingey says, where now are the saints who directed them? You +cannot too often repeat it, the spiritual councillors of today have +tainted hearts, dysenteric souls, and slovenly minds. Or they are worse. +They corrupt their flock. They are of the Docre order and Satanize." + +"To think that a century of positivism and atheism has been able to +overthrow everything but Satanism, and it cannot make Satanism yield an +inch." + +"Easily explained!" cried Carhaix. "Satan is forgotten by the great +majority. Now it was Father Ravignan, I believe, who proved that the +wiliest thing the Devil can do is to get people to deny his existence." + +"Oh, God!" murmured Durtal forlornly, "what whirlwinds of ordure I see +on the horizon!" + +"No," said Carhaix, "don't say that. On earth all is dead and +decomposed. But in heaven! Ah, I admit that the Paraclete is keeping us +waiting. But the texts announcing his coming are inspired. The future is +certain. There will be light," and with bowed head he prayed fervently. + +Des Hermies rose and paced the room. "All that is very well," he +groaned, "but this century laughs the glorified Christ to scorn. It +contaminates the supernatural and vomits on the Beyond. Well, how can we +hope that in the future the offspring of the fetid tradesmen of today +will be decent? Brought up as they are, what will they do in Life?" + +"They will do," replied Durtal, "as their fathers and mothers do now. +They will stuff their guts and crowd out their souls through their +alimentary canals." + + + + +FINIS + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Là -bas, by J. K. Huysmans + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14323 *** diff --git a/14323-8.txt b/14323-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3418c18 --- /dev/null +++ b/14323-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10626 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Là-bas, by J. K. Huysmans + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Là-bas + +Author: J. K. Huysmans + +Release Date: December 10, 2004 [EBook #14323] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LÀ-BAS *** + + + + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Cori Samuel and the PG Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + + + + +LÀ-BAS + +(DOWN THERE) + +by +J.K. HUYSMANS + +Translated +by +KEENE WALLACE + + +[Transcriber's note: +Original published 1891, +English translation privately published 1928.] + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +"You believe pretty thoroughly in these things, or you wouldn't abandon +the eternal triangle and the other stock subjects of the modern +novelists to write the story of Gilles de Rais," and after a silence Des +Hermies added, "I do not object to the latrine; hospital; and workshop +vocabulary of naturalism. For one thing, the subject matter requires +some such diction. Again, Zola, in _L'Assommoir_, has shown that a +heavy-handed artist can slap words together hit-or-miss and give an +effect of tremendous power. I do not really care how the naturalists +maltreat language, but I do strenuously object to the earthiness of +their ideas. They have made our literature the incarnation of +materialism--and they glorify the democracy of art! + +"Say what you will, their theory is pitiful, and their tight little +method squeezes all the life out of them. Filth and the flesh are their +all in all. They deny wonder and reject the extra-sensual. I don't +believe they would know what you meant if you told them that artistic +curiosity begins at the very point where the senses leave off. + +"You shrug your shoulders, but tell me, how much has naturalism done to +clear up life's really troublesome mysteries? When an ulcer of the +soul--or indeed the most benign little pimple--is to be probed, +naturalism can do nothing. 'Appetite and instinct' seem to be its sole +motivation and rut and brainstorm its chronic states. The field of +naturalism is the region below the umbilicus. Oh, it's a hernia clinic +and it offers the soul a truss! + +"I tell you, Durtal, it's superficial quackery, and that isn't all. +This fetid naturalism eulogizes the atrocities of modern life and +flatters our positively American ways. It ecstasizes over brute force +and apotheosizes the cash register. With amazing humility it defers to +the nauseating taste of the mob. It repudiates style, it rejects every +ideal, every aspiration towards the supernatural and the beyond. It is +so perfectly representative of bourgeois thought that it might be sired +by Homais and dammed by Lisa, the butcher girl in _Ventre de Paris_." + +"Heavens, how you go after it!" said Durtal, somewhat piqued. He lighted +his cigarette and went on, "I am as much revolted by materialism as you +are, but that is no reason for denying the unforgettable services which +naturalism has rendered. + +"It has demolished the inhuman puppets of romanticism and rescued our +literature from the clutches of booby idealists and sex-starved old +maids. It has created visible and tangible human beings--after +Balzac--and put them in accord with their surroundings. It has carried +on the work, which romanticism began, of developing the language. Some +of the naturalists have had the veritable gift of laughter, a very few +have had the gift of tears, and, in spite of what you say, they have not +all been carried away by an obsession for baseness." + +"Yes, they have. They are in love with the age, and that shows them up +for what they are." + +"Do you mean to tell me Flaubert and the De Goncourts were in love with +the age?" + +"Of course not. But those men were artists, honest, seditious, and +aloof, and I put them in a class by themselves. I will also grant that +Zola is a master of backgrounds and masses and that his tricky handling +of people is unequalled. Then, too, thank God, he has never followed +out, in his novels, the theories enunciated in his magazine articles, +adulating the intrusion of positivism upon art. But in the works of his +best pupil, Rosny, the only talented novelist who is really imbued with +the ideas of the master, naturalism has become a sickening jargon of +chemist's slang serving to display a layman's erudition, which is about +as profound as the scientific knowledge of a shop foreman. No, there is +no getting around it. Everything this whole poverty-stricken school has +produced shows that our literature has fallen upon evil days. The +grovellers! They don't rise above the moral level of the tumblebug. Read +the latest book. What do you find? Simple anecdotes: murder, suicide, +and accident histories copied right out of the newspaper, tiresome +sketches and wormy tales, all written in a colorless style and +containing not the faintest hint of an outlook on life nor an +appreciation of human nature. When I have waded through one of these +books its insipid descriptions and interminable harangues go instantly +out of my mind, and the only impression that remains is one of surprise +that a man can write three or four hundred pages when he has absolutely +nothing to reveal to us--nothing to say!" + +"If it's all the same to you, Des Hermies, let's speak of something +else. We shall never agree on the subject of naturalism, as the very +mention of it makes you see red. What about this Mattei system of +medicine? Your globules and electric phials at least relieve a few +sufferers?" + +"Hmph. A little better than the panaceas of the Codex, though I can't +say the effects are either lasting or sure. But, it serves, like +anything else. And now I must run along. The clock is striking ten and +your concierge is coming to put out the hall light. See you again very +soon, I hope. Good night." + +When the door closed Durtal put some more coke in the grate and resumed +a comfortless train of thought aggravated by this too pertinent +discussion with his friend. For some months Durtal had been trying to +reassemble the fragments of a shattered literary theory which had once +seemed inexpugnable, and Des Hermies's opinions troubled him, in spite +of their exaggerated vehemence. + +Certainly if naturalism confined one to monotonous studies of mediocre +persons and to interminable inventories of the objects in a drawing-room +or a landscape, an honest and clear-sighted artist would soon cease to +produce, and a less conscientious workman would be under the necessity +of repeating himself over and over again to the point of nausea. +Nevertheless Durtal could see no possibilities for the novelist outside +of naturalism. Were we to go back to the pyrotechnics of romanticism, +rewrite the lanuginous works of the Cherbuliez and Feuillet tribe, or, +worse yet, imitate the lachrymose storiettes of Theuriet and George +Sand? Then what was to be done? And Durtal, with desperate +determination, set to work sorting out a tangle of confused theories and +inchoate postulations. He made no headway. He felt but could not define. +He was afraid to. Definition of his present tendencies would plump him +back into his old dilemma. + +"We must," he thought, "retain the documentary veracity, the precision +of detail, the compact and sinewy language of realism, but we must also +dig down into the soul and cease trying to explain mystery in terms of +our sick senses. If possible the novel ought to be compounded of two +elements, that of the soul and that of the body, and these ought to be +inextricably bound together as in life. Their interreactions, their +conflicts, their reconciliation, ought to furnish the dramatic interest. +In a word, we must follow the road laid out once and for all by Zola, +but at the same time we must trace a parallel route in the air by which +we may go above and beyond.... A spiritual naturalism! It must be +complete, powerful, daring in a different way from anything that is +being attempted at present. Perhaps as approaching my concept I may cite +Dostoyevsky. Yet that _exorable_ Russian is less an elevated realist +than an evangelic socialist. In France right now the purely corporal +recipe has brought upon itself such discredit that two clans have +arisen: the liberal, which prunes naturalism of all its boldness of +subject matter and diction in order to fit it for the drawing-room, and +the decadent, which gets completely off the ground and raves +incoherently in a telegraphic patois intended to represent the language +of the soul--intended rather to divert the reader's attention from the +author's utter lack of ideas. As for the right wing verists, I can only +laugh at the frantic puerilities of these would-be psychologists, who +have never explored an unknown district of the mind nor ever studied an +unhackneyed passion. They simply repeat the saccharine Feuillet and the +saline Stendhal. Their novels are dissertations in school-teacher style. +They don't seem to realize that there is more spiritual revelation in +that one reply of old Hulot, in Balzac's _Cousine Bette_, 'Can't I take +the little girl along?' than in all their doctoral theses. We must +expect of them no idealistic straining toward the infinite. For me, +then, the real psychologist of this century is not their Stendhal but +that astonishing Ernest Hello, whose unrelenting unsuccess is simply +miraculous!" + +He began to think that Des Hermies was right. In the present +disorganized state of letters there was but one tendency which seemed to +promise better things. The unsatisfied need for the supernatural was +driving people, in default of something loftier, to spiritism and the +occult. + +Now his thoughts carried him away from his dissatisfaction with +literature to the satisfaction he had found in another art, in painting. +His ideal was completely realized by the Primitives. These men, in +Italy, Germany, and especially in Flanders, had manifested the amplitude +and purity of vision which are the property of saintliness. In authentic +and patiently accurate settings they pictured beings whose postures were +caught from life itself, and the illusion was compelling and sure. From +these heads, common enough, many of them, and these physiognomies, often +ugly but powerfully evocative, emanated celestial joy or acute anguish, +spiritual calm or turmoil. The effect was of matter transformed, by +being distended or compressed, to afford an escape from the senses into +remote infinity. + +Durtal's introduction to this naturalism had come as a revelation the +year before, although he had not then been so weary as now of _fin de +siècle_ silliness. In Germany, before a Crucifixion by Matthæus +Grünewald, he had found what he was seeking. + +He shuddered in his armchair and closed his eyes as if in pain. With +extraordinary lucidity he revisualized the picture, and the cry of +admiration wrung from him when he had entered the little room of the +Cassel museum was reechoing in his mind as here, in his study, the +Christ rose before him, formidable, on a rude cross of barky wood, the +arm an untrimmed branch bending like a bow under the weight of the body. + +This branch seemed about to spring back and mercifully hurl afar from +our cruel, sinful world the suffering flesh held to earth by the +enormous spike piercing the feet. Dislocated, almost ripped out of their +sockets, the arms of the Christ seemed trammelled by the knotty cords of +the straining muscles. The laboured tendons of the armpits seemed ready +to snap. The fingers, wide apart, were contorted in an arrested gesture +in which were supplication and reproach but also benediction. The +trembling thighs were greasy with sweat. The ribs were like staves, or +like the bars of a cage, the flesh swollen, blue, mottled with +flea-bites, specked as with pin-pricks by spines broken off from the +rods of the scourging and now festering beneath the skin where they had +penetrated. + +Purulence was at hand. The fluvial wound in the side dripped thickly, +inundating the thigh with blood that was like congealing mulberry juice. +Milky pus, which yet was somewhat reddish, something like the colour of +grey Moselle, oozed from the chest and ran down over the abdomen and the +loin cloth. The knees had been forced together and the rotulæ touched, +but the lower legs were held wide apart, though the feet were placed one +on top of the other. These, beginning to putrefy, were turning green +beneath a river of blood. Spongy and blistered, they were horrible, the +flesh tumefied, swollen over the head of the spike, and the gripping +toes, with the horny blue nails, contradicted the imploring gesture of +the hands, turning that benediction into a curse; and as the hands +pointed heavenward, so the feet seemed to cling to earth, to that ochre +ground, ferruginous like the purple soil of Thuringia. + +Above this eruptive cadaver, the head, tumultuous, enormous, encircled +by a disordered crown of thorns, hung down lifeless. One lacklustre eye +half opened as a shudder of terror or of sorrow traversed the expiring +figure. The face was furrowed, the brow seamed, the cheeks blanched; all +the drooping features wept, while the mouth, unnerved, its under jaw +racked by tetanic contractions, laughed atrociously. + +The torture had been terrific, and the agony had frightened the mocking +executioners into flight. + +Against a dark blue night-sky the cross seemed to bow down, almost to +touch the ground with its tip, while two figures, one on each side, kept +watch over the Christ. One was the Virgin, wearing a hood the colour of +mucous blood over a robe of wan blue. Her face was pale and swollen with +weeping, and she stood rigid, as one who buries his fingernails deep +into his palms and sobs. The other figure was that of Saint John, like a +gipsy or sunburnt Swabian peasant, very tall, his beard matted and +tangled, his robe of a scarlet stuff cut in wide strips like slabs of +bark. His mantle was a chamois yellow; the lining, caught up at the +sleeves, showed a feverish yellow as of unripe lemons. Spent with +weeping, but possessed of more endurance than Mary, who was yet erect +but broken and exhausted, he had joined his hands and in an access of +outraged loyalty had drawn himself up before the corpse, which he +contemplated with his red and smoky eyes while he choked back the cry +which threatened to rend his quivering throat. + +Ah, this coarse, tear-compelling Calvary was at the opposite pole from +those debonair Golgothas adopted by the Church ever since the +Renaissance. This lockjaw Christ was not the Christ of the rich, the +Adonis of Galilee, the exquisite dandy, the handsome youth with the +curly brown tresses, divided beard, and insipid doll-like features, whom +the faithful have adored for four centuries. This was the Christ of +Justin, Basil, Cyril, Tertullian, the Christ of the apostolic church, +the vulgar Christ, ugly with the assumption of the whole burden of our +sins and clothed, through humility, in the most abject of forms. + +It was the Christ of the poor, the Christ incarnate in the image of the +most miserable of us He came to save; the Christ of the afflicted, of +the beggar, of all those on whose indigence and helplessness the greed +of their brother battens; the human Christ, frail of flesh, abandoned by +the Father until such time as no further torture was possible; the +Christ with no recourse but His Mother, to Whom--then powerless to aid +Him--He had, like every man in torment, cried out with an infant's cry. + +In an unsparing humility, doubtless, He had willed to suffer the Passion +with all the suffering permitted to the human senses, and, obeying an +incomprehensible ordination, He, in the time of the scourging and of the +blows and of the insults spat in His face, had put off divinity, nor had +He resumed it when, after these preliminary mockeries, He entered upon +the unspeakable torment of the unceasing agony. Thus, dying like a +thief, like a dog, basely, vilely, physically, He had sunk himself to +the deepest depth of fallen humanity and had not spared Himself the last +ignominy of putrefaction. + +Never before had naturalism transfigured itself by such a conception and +execution. Never before had a painter so charnally envisaged divinity +nor so brutally dipped his brush into the wounds and running sores and +bleeding nail holes of the Saviour. Grünewald had passed all measure. He +was the most uncompromising of realists, but his morgue Redeemer, his +sewer Deity, let the observer know that realism could be truly +transcendent. A divine light played about that ulcerated head, a +superhuman expression illuminated the fermenting skin of the epileptic +features. This crucified corpse was a very God, and, without aureole, +without nimbus, with none of the stock accoutrements except the +blood-sprinkled crown of thorns, Jesus appeared in His celestial +super-essence, between the stunned, grief-torn Virgin and a Saint John +whose calcined eyes were beyond the shedding of tears. + +These faces, by nature vulgar, were resplendent, transfigured with the +expression of the sublime grief of those souls whose plaint is not +heard. Thief, pauper, and peasant had vanished and given place to +supraterrestial creatures in the presence of their God. + +Grünewald was the most uncompromising of idealists. Never had artist +known such magnificent exaltation, none had ever so resolutely bounded +from the summit of spiritual altitude to the rapt orb of heaven. He had +gone to the two extremes. From the rankest weeds of the pit he had +extracted the finest essence of charity, the mordant liquor of tears. In +this canvas was revealed the masterpiece of an art obeying the +unopposable urge to render the tangible and the invisible, to make +manifest the crying impurity of the flesh and to make sublime the +infinite distress of the soul. + +It was without its equivalent in literature. A few pages of Anne +Emmerich upon the Passion, though comparatively attenuated, approached +this ideal of supernatural realism and of veridic and exsurrected life. +Perhaps, too, certain effusions of Ruysbroeck, seeming to spurt forth in +twin jets of black and white flame, were worthy of comparison with the +divine befoulment of Grünewald. Hardly, either. Grünewald's masterpiece +remained unique. It was at the same time infinite and of earth earthy. + +"But," said Durtal to himself, rousing out of his revery, "if I am +consistent I shall have to come around to the Catholicism of the Middle +Ages, to _mystic_ naturalism. Ah, no! I will not--and yet, perhaps I +may!" + +Here he was in the old dilemma. How often before now had he halted on +the threshold of Catholicism, sounding himself thoroughly and finding +always that he had no faith. Decidedly there had been no effort on the +part of God to reclaim him, and he himself had never possessed the kind +of will that permits one to let oneself go, trustingly, without reserve, +into the sheltering shadows of immutable dogma. + +Momentarily at times when, after reading certain books, his disgust for +everyday life was accentuated, he longed for lenitive hours in a +cloister, where the monotonous chant of prayers in an incense-laden +atmosphere would bring on a somnolence, a dreamy rapture of mystical +ideas. But only a simple soul, on which life's wear and tear had left no +mark, was capable of savouring the delights of such a self-abandon, and +his own soul was battered and torn with earthly conflict. He must admit +that the momentary desire to believe, to take refuge in the timeless, +proceeded from a multitude of ignoble motives: from lassitude with the +petty and repeated annoyances of existence, quarrels with the laundress, +with the waiter, with the landlord; the sordid scramble for money; in a +word, from the general spiritual failure of a man approaching forty. He +thought of escaping into a monastery somewhat as street girls think of +going into a house where they will be free from the dangers of the +chase, from worry about food and lodging, and where they will not have +to do their own washing and ironing. + +Unmarried, without settled income, the voice of carnality now +practically stilled in him, he sometimes cursed the existence he had +shaped for himself. At times, weary of attempting to coerce words to do +his bidding, he threw down his pen and looked into the future. He could +see nothing ahead of him but bitterness and cause for alarm, and, +seeking consolation, he was forced to admit that only religion could +heal, but religion demanded in return so arrant a desertion of common +sense, so pusillanimous a willingness to be astonished at nothing, that +he threw up his hands and begged off. + +Yet he was always playing with the thought, indeed he could not escape +it. For though religion was without foundation it was also without limit +and promised a complete escape from earth into dizzy, unexplored +altitudes. Then, too, Durtal was attracted to the Church by its intimate +and ecstatic art, the splendour of its legends, and the radiant naïveté +of the histories of its saints. + +He did not believe, and yet he admitted the supernatural. Right here on +earth how could any of us deny that we are hemmed in by mystery, in our +homes, in the street,--everywhere when we came to think of it? It was +really the part of shallowness to ignore those extrahuman relations and +account for the unforeseen by attributing to fate the more than +inexplicable. Did not a chance encounter often decide the entire life of +a man? What was love, what the other incomprehensible shaping +influences? And, knottiest enigma of all, what was money? + +There one found oneself confronted by primordial organic law, atrocious +edicts promulgated at the very beginning of the world and applied ever +since. + +The rules were precise and invariable. Money attracted money, +accumulating always in the same places, going by preference to the +scoundrelly and the mediocre. When, by an inscrutable exception, it +heaped up in the coffers of a rich man who was not a miser nor a +murderer, it stood idle, incapable of resolving itself into a force for +good, however charitable the hands which fain would administer it. One +would say it was angry at having got into the wrong box and avenged +itself by going into voluntary paralysis when possessed by one who was +neither a sharper nor an ass. + +It acted still more strangely when by some extraordinary chance it +strayed into the home of a poor man. Immediately it defiled the clean, +debauched the chaste, and, acting simultaneously on the body and the +soul, it insinuated into its possessor a base selfishness, an ignoble +pride; it suggested that he spend for himself alone; it made the humble +man a boor, the generous man a skinflint. In one second it changed every +habit, revolutionized every idea, metamorphosed the most deeply rooted +passions. + +It was the instigator and vigilant accomplice of all the important sins. +If it permitted one of its detainers to forget himself and bestow a boon +it awakened hatred in the recipient, it replaced avarice with +ingratitude and re-established equilibrium so that the account might +balance and not one sin of commission be wanting. + +But it reached its real height of monstrosity when, concealing its +identity under an assumed name, it entitled itself capital. Then its +action was not limited to individual incitation to theft and murder but +extended to the entire human race. With one word capital decided +monopolies, erected banks, cornered necessities, and, if it wished, +caused thousands of human beings to starve to death. + +And it grew and begot itself while slumbering in a safe, and the Two +Worlds adored it on bended knee, dying of desire before it as before a +God. + +Well! money was the devil, otherwise its mastery of souls was +inexplicable. And how many other mysteries, equally unintelligible, how +many other phenomena were there to make a reflective man shudder! + +"But," thought Durtal, "seeing that there are so many more things +betwixt heaven and earth than are dreamed of in anybody's philosophy, +why not believe in the Trinity? Why reject the divinity of Christ? It is +no strain on one to admit the _Credo quia absurdum_ of Saint Augustine +and Tertullian and say that if the supernatural were comprehensible it +would not be supernatural, and that precisely because it passes the +faculties of man it is divine. + +"And--oh, to hell with it! What's it all about, anyway?" + +And again, as so often when he had found himself before this +unbridgeable gulf between reason and belief, he recoiled from the leap. + +Well, his thoughts had strayed far from the subject of that naturalism +so reviled by Des Hermies. He returned to Grünewald and said to himself +that the great Crucifixion was the masterpiece of an art driven out of +bounds. One need not go far in search of the extra-terrestrial as to +fall into perfervid Catholicism. Perhaps spiritualism would give one all +one required to formulate a supernaturalistic method. + +He rose and went into his tiny workroom. His pile of manuscript notes +about the Marshal de Rais, surnamed Bluebeard, looked at him derisively +from the table where they were piled. + +"All the same," he said, "it's good to be here, in out of the world and +above the limits of time. To live in another age, never read a +newspaper, not even know that the theatres exist--ah, what a dream! To +dwell with Bluebeard and forget the grocer on the corner and all the +other petty little criminals of an age perfectly typified by the café +waiter who ravishes the boss's daughter--the goose who lays the golden +egg, as he calls her--so that she will have to marry him!" + +Bed was a good place, he added, smiling, for he saw his cat, a creature +with a perfect time sense, regarding him uneasily as if to remind him of +their common convenience and to reproach him for not having prepared the +couch. Durtal arranged the pillows and pulled back the coverlet, and the +cat jumped to the foot of the bed but remained humped up, tail coiled +beneath him, waiting till his master was stretched out at length before +burrowing a little hollow to curl up in. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +Nearly two years ago Durtal had ceased to associate with men of letters. +They were represented in books and in the book-chat columns of magazines +as forming an aristocracy which had a monopoly on intelligence. Their +conversation, if one believed what one read, sparkled with effervescent +and stimulating wit. Durtal had difficulty accounting to himself for the +persistence of this illusion. His sad experience led him to believe that +every literary man belonged to one of two classes, the thoroughly +commercial or the utterly impossible. + +The first consisted of writers spoiled by the public, and drained dry in +consequence, but "successful." Ravenous for notice they aped the ways of +the world of big business, delighted in gala dinners, gave formal +evening parties, spoke of copyrights, sales, and long run plays, and +made great display of wealth. + +The second consisted of café loafers, "bohemians." Rolling on the +benches, gorged with beer they feigned an exaggerated modesty and at the +same time cried their wares, aired their genius, and abused their +betters. + +There was now no place where one could meet a few artists and privately, +intimately, discuss ideas at ease. One was at the mercy of the café +crowd or the drawing-room company. One's interlocutor was listening +avidly to steal one's ideas, and behind one's back one was being +vituperated. And the women were always intruding. + +In this indiscriminate world there was no illuminating criticism, +nothing but small talk, elegant or inelegant. + +Then Durtal learned, also by experience, that one cannot associate with +thieves without becoming either a thief or a dupe, and finally he broke +off relations with his confrères. + +He not only had no sympathy but no common topic of conversation with +them. Formerly when he accepted naturalism--airtight and unsatisfactory +as it was--he had been able to argue esthetics with them, but now! + +"The point is," Des Hermies was always telling him, "that there is a +basic difference between you and the other realists, and no patched-up +alliance could possibly be of long duration. You execrate the age and +they worship it. There is the whole matter. You were fated some day to +get away from this Americanized art and attempt to create something less +vulgar, less miserably commonplace, and infuse a little spirituality +into it. + +"In all your books you have fallen on our _fin de siècle_--our _queue du +siècle_--tooth and nail. But, Lord! a man soon gets tired of whacking +something that doesn't fight back but merely goes its own way repeating +its offences. You needed to escape into another epoch and get your +bearings while waiting for a congenial subject to present itself. That +explains your spiritual disarray of the last few months and your +immediate recovery as soon as you stumbled onto Giles de Rais." + +Des Hermies had diagnosed him accurately. The day on which Durtal had +plunged into the frightful and delightful latter mediæval age had been +the dawn of a new existence. The flouting of his actual surroundings +brought peace to Durtal's soul, and he had completely reorganized his +life, mentally cloistering himself, far from the furore of contemporary +letters, in the château de Tiffauges with the monster Bluebeard, with +whom he lived in perfect accord, even in mischievous amity. + +Thus history had for Durtal supplanted the novel, whose forced banality, +conventionality, and tidy structure of plot simply griped him. Yet +history, too, was only a peg for a man of talent to hang style and +ideas on, for events could not fail to be coloured by the temperament +and distorted by the bias of the historian. + +As for the documents and sources! Well attested as they might be, they +were all subject to revision, even to contradiction by others exhumed +later which were no less authentic than the first and which also but +waited their turn to be refuted by newer discoveries. + +In the present rage for grubbing around in dusty archives writing of +history served as an outlet for the pedantry of the moles who reworked +their mouldy findings and were duly rewarded by the Institute with +medals and diplomas. + +For Durtal history was, then, the most pretentious as it was the most +infantile of deceptions. Old Clio ought to be represented with a +sphinx's head, mutton-chop whiskers, and one of those padded bonnets +which babies wore to keep them from bashing their little brains out when +they took a tumble. + +Of course exactitude was impossible. Why should he dream of getting at +the whole truth about the Middle Ages when nobody had been able to give +a full account of the Revolution, of the Commune for that matter? The +best he could do was to imagine himself in the midst of creatures of +that other epoch, wearing their antique garb, thinking their thoughts, +and then, having saturated himself with their spirit, to convey his +illusion by means of adroitly selected details. + +That is practically what Michelet did, and though the garrulous old +gossip drivelled endlessly about matters of supreme unimportance and +ecstasized in his mild way over trivial anecdotes which he expanded +beyond all proportion, and though his sentimentality and chauvinism +sometimes discredited his quite plausible conjectures, he was +nevertheless the only French historian who had overcome the limitation +of time and made another age live anew before our eyes. + +Hysterical, garrulous, manneristic as he was, there was yet a truly epic +sweep in certain passages of his History of France. The personages were +raised from the oblivion into which the dry-as-dust professors had sunk +them, and became live human beings. What matter, then, if Michelet was +the least trustworthy of historians since he was the most personal and +the most evocative? + +As for the others, they simply ferreted around among the old state +papers, clipped them, and, following M. Taine's example, arranged, +ticketed, and mounted their sensational gleanings in logical sequence, +rejecting, of course, everything that did not advance the case they were +trying to make. They denied themselves imagination and enthusiasm and +claimed that they did not invent. True enough, but they did none the +less distort history by the selection they employed. And how simply and +summarily they disposed of things! It was discovered that such and such +an event occurred in France in several communities, and straightway it +was decided that the whole country lived, acted, and thought in a +certain manner at a certain hour, on a certain day, in a certain year. + +No less than Michelet they were doughty falsifiers, but they lacked his +vision. They dealt in knickknacks, and their trivialities were as far +from creating a unified impression as were the pointillistic puzzles of +modern painters and the word hashes cooked up by the decadent poets. + +And worst of all, thought Durtal, the biographers. The depilators! +taking all the hair off a real man's chest. They wrote ponderous tomes +to prove that Jan Steen was a teetotaler. Somebody had deloused Villon +and shown that the Grosse Margot of the ballade was not a woman but an +inn sign. Pretty soon they would be representing the poet as a +priggishly honest and judicious man. One would say that in writing their +monographs these historians feared to dishonour themselves by treating +of artists who had tasted somewhat fully and passionately of life. Hence +the expurgation of masterpieces that an artist might appear as +commonplace a bourgeois as his commentator. + +This rehabilitation school, today all-powerful, exasperated Durtal. In +writing his study of Gilles de Rais he was not going to fall into the +error of these bigoted sustainers of middle-class morality. With his +ideas of history he could not claim to give an exact likeness of +Bluebeard, but he was not going to concede to the public taste for +mediocrity in well-and evil-doing by whitewashing the man. + +Durtal's material for this study consisted of: a copy of the memorial +addressed by the heirs of Gilles de Rais to the king, notes taken from +the several true copies at Paris of the proceedings in the criminal +trial at Nantes, extracts from Vallet de Viriville's history of Charles +VII, finally the _Notice_ by Armand Guéraut and the biography of the +abbé Bossard. These sufficed to bring before Durtal's eyes the +formidable figure of that Satanic fifteenth century character who was +the most artistically, exquisitely cruel, and the most scoundrelly of +men. + +No one knew of the projected study but Des Hermies, whom Durtal saw +nearly every day. + +They had met in the strangest of homes, that of Chantelouve, the +Catholic historian, who boasted of receiving all classes of people. And +every week in the social season that drawing-room in the rue de Bagneux +was the scene of a heterogeneous gathering of under sacristans, café +poets, journalists, actresses, partisans of the cause of Naundorff,[1] +and dabblers in equivocal sciences. + +[Footnote 1: A watchmaker who at the time of the July monarchy attempted +to pass himself off for Louis XVII.] + +This salon was on the edge of the clerical world, and many religious +came here at the risk of their reputations. The dinners were +discriminately, if unconventionally, ordered. Chantelouve, rotund, +jovial, bade everyone make himself at home. Now and then through his +smoked spectacles there stole an ambiguous look which might have given +an analyst pause, but the man's bonhomie, quite ecclesiastical, was +instantly disarming. Madame was no beauty, but possessed a certain +bizarre charm and was always surrounded. She, however, remained silent +and did nothing to encourage her voluble admirers. As void of prudery as +her husband, she listened impassively, absently, with her thoughts +evidently afar, to the boldest of conversational imprudences. + +At one of these evening parties, while La Rousseil, recently converted, +howled a hymn, Durtal, sitting in a corner having a quiet smoke, had +been struck by the physiognomy and bearing of Des Hermies, who stood out +sharply from the motley throng of defrocked priests and grubby poets +packed into Chantelouve's library and drawing-room. + +Among these smirking and carefully composed faces, Des Hermies, +evidently a man of forceful individuality, seemed, and probably felt, +singularly out of place. He was tall, slender, somewhat pale. His eyes, +narrowed in a frown, had the cold blue gleam of sapphires. The nose was +short and sharp, the cheeks smooth shaven. With his flaxen hair and +Vandyke he might have been a Norwegian or an Englishman in not very good +health. His garments were of London make, and the long, tight, +wasp-waisted coat, buttoned clear up to the neck, seemed to enclose him +like a box. Very careful of his person, he had a manner all his own of +drawing off his gloves, rolling them up with an almost inaudible +crackling, then seating himself, crossing his long, thin legs, and +leaning over to the right, reaching into the patch pocket on his left +side and bringing forth the embossed Japanese pouch which contained his +tobacco and cigarette papers. + +He was methodic, guarded, and very cold in the presence of strangers. +His superior and somewhat bored attitude, not exactly relieved by his +curt, dry laugh, awakened, at a first meeting, a serious antipathy which +he sometimes justified by venomous words, by meaningless silences, by +unspoken innuendoes. He was respected and feared at Chantelouve's, but +when one came to know him one found, beneath his defensive shell, great +warmth of heart and a capacity for true friendship of the kind that is +not expansive but is capable of sacrifice and can always be relied upon. + +How did he live? Was he rich or just comfortable? No one knew, and he, +tight lipped, never spoke of his affairs. He was doctor of the Faculty +of Paris--Durtal had chanced to see his diploma--but he spoke of +medicine with great disdain. He said he had become convinced of the +futility of all he had been taught, and had thrown it over for +homeopathy, which in turn he had thrown over for a Bolognese system, and +this last he was now excoriating. + +There were times when Durtal could not doubt that his friend was an +author, for Des Hermies spoke understandingly of tricks of the trade +which one learns only after long experience, and his literary judgment +was not that of a layman. When, one day, Durtal reproached him for +concealing his productions, he replied with a certain melancholy, "No, I +caught myself in time to choke down a base instinct, the desire of +resaying what has been said. I could have plagiarized Flaubert as well +as, if not better than, the poll parrots who are doing it, but I decided +not to. I would rather phrase abstruse medicaments of rare application; +perhaps it is not very necessary, but at least it isn't cheap." + +What surprised Durtal was his friend's prodigious erudition. Des Hermies +had the run of the most out-of-the-way book shops, he was an authority +on antique customs and, at the same time, on the latest scientific +discoveries. He hobnobbed with all the freaks in Paris, and from them he +became deeply learned in the most diverse and hostile sciences. He, so +cold and correct, was almost never to be found save in the company of +astrologers, cabbalists, demonologists, alchemists, theologians, or +inventors. + +Weary of the advances and the facile intimacies of artists, Durtal had +been attracted by this man's fastidious reserve. It was perfectly +natural that Durtal, surfeited with skin-deep friendships, should feel +drawn to Des Hermies, but it was difficult to imagine why Des Hermies, +with his taste for strange associations, should take a liking to +Durtal, who was the soberest, steadiest, most normal of men. Perhaps Des +Hermies felt the need of talking with a sane human being now and then as +a relief. And, too, the literary discussions which he loved were out of +the question with these addlepates who monologued indefatigably on the +subject of their monomania and their ego. + +At odds, like Durtal, with his confrères, Des Hermies could expect +nothing from the physicians, whom he avoided, nor from the specialists +with whom he consorted. + +As a matter of fact there had been a juncture of two beings whose +situation was almost identical. At first restrained and on the +defensive, they had come finally to _tu-toi_ each other and establish a +relation which had been a great advantage to Durtal. His family were +dead, the friends of his youth married and scattered, and since his +withdrawal from the world of letters he had been reduced to complete +solitude. Des Hermies kept him from going stale and then, finding that +Durtal had not lost all interest in mankind, promised to introduce him +to a really lovable old character. Of this man Des Hermies spoke much, +and one day he said, "You really ought to know him. He likes the books +of yours which I have lent him, and he wants to meet you. You think I am +interested only in obscure and twisted natures. Well, you will find +Carhaix really unique. He is the one Catholic with intelligence and +without sanctimoniousness; the one poor man with envy and hatred for +none." + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +Durtal was in a situation familiar to all bachelors who have the +concierge do their cleaning. Only these know how a tiny lamp can fairly +drink up oil, and how the contents of a bottle of cognac can become +paler and weaker without ever diminishing. They know, too, how a once +comfortable bed can become forbidding, and how scrupulously a concierge +can respect its least fold or crease. They learn to be resigned and to +wash out a glass when they are thirsty and make their own fire when they +are cold. + +Durtal's concierge was an old man with drooping moustache and a powerful +breath of "three-six." Indolent and placid, he opposed an unbudgeable +inertia to Durtal's frantic and profanely expressed demand that the +sweeping be done at the same hour every morning. + +Threats, prayers, insults, the withholding of gratuities, were without +effect. Père Rateau took off his cap, scratched his head, promised, in +the tone of a man much moved, to mend his ways, and next day came later +than ever. + +"What a nuisance!" thought Durtal today, as he heard a key turning in +the lock, then he looked at his watch and observed that once again the +concierge was arriving after three o'clock in the afternoon. + +There was nothing for it but to submit with a sigh to the ensuing +hullabaloo. Rateau, somnolent and pacific in his lodge, became a demon +when he got a broom in his hand. In this sedentary being, who could +drowse all morning in the stale basement atmosphere heavy with the +cumulative aroma of many meat-stews, a martial ardour, a warlike +ferocity, then asserted themselves, and like a red revolutionary he +assaulted the bed, charged the chairs, manhandled the picture frames, +knocked the tables over, rattled the water pitcher, and whirled Durtal's +brogues about by the laces as when a pillaging conqueror hauls a +ravished victim along by the hair. So he stormed the apartment like a +barricade and triumphantly brandished his battle standard, the dust rag, +over the reeking carnage of the furniture. + +Durtal at such times sought refuge in the room which was not being +attacked. Today Rateau launched his offensive against the workroom, so +Durtal fled to the bedroom. From there, through the half open door, he +could see the enemy, with a feather duster like a Mohican war bonnet +over his head, doing a scalp dance around a table. + +"If I only knew at what time that pest would break in on me so I could +always arrange to be out!" groaned Durtal. Now he ground his teeth, as +Rateau, with a yell, grabbed up the mop and, skating around on one leg, +belaboured the floor lustily. + +The perspiring conqueror then appeared in the doorway and advanced to +reduce the chamber where Durtal was. The latter had to return to the +subjugated workroom, and the cat, shocked by the racket, arched its back +and, rubbing against its master's legs, followed him to a place of +safety. + +In the thick of the conflict Des Hermies rang the door bell. + +"I'll put on my shoes," cried Durtal, "and we'll get out of this. +Look--" he passed his hand over the table and brought back a coat of +grime that made him appear to be wearing a grey glove--"look. That brute +turns the house upside down and knocks everything to pieces, and here's +the result. He leaves more dust when he goes than he found when he came +in!" + +"Bah," said Des Hermies, "dust isn't a bad thing. Besides having the +taste of ancient biscuit and the smell of an old book, it is the +floating velvet which softens hard surfaces, the fine dry wash which +takes the garishness out of crude colour schemes. It is the caparison of +abandon, the veil of oblivion. Who, then, can despise it--aside from +certain persons whose lamentable lot must often have wrung a tear from +you? + +"Imagine living in one of these Paris _passages_. Think of a consumptive +spitting blood and suffocating in a room one flight up, behind the +'ass-back' gables of, say the passage des Panoramas, for instance. When +the window is open the dust comes in impregnated with snuff and +saturated with clammy exudations. The invalid, choking, begs for air, +and in order that he may breathe the window is _closed_. + +"Well, the dust that you complain of is rather milder than that. Anyway +I don't hear you coughing.... But if you're ready we'll be on our way." + +"Where shall we go?" asked Durtal. + +Des Hermies did not answer. They left the rue du Regard, in which Durtal +lived, and went down the rue du Cherche-Midi as far as the Croix-Rouge. + +"Let's go on to the place Saint-Sulpice," said Des Hermies, and after a +silence he continued, "Speaking of dust, 'out of which we came and to +which we shall return,' do you know that after we are dead our corpses +are devoured by different kinds of worms according as we are fat or +thin? In fat corpses one species of maggot is found, the rhizophagus, +while thin corpses are patronized only by the phora. The latter is +evidently the aristocrat, the fastidious gourmet which turns up its nose +at a heavy meal of copious breasts and juicy fat bellies. Just think, +there is no perfect equality, even in the manner in which we feed the +worms. + +"But this is where we stop." + +They had come to where the rue Férou opens into the place Saint-Sulpice. +Durtal looked up and on an unenclosed porch in the flank of the church +of Saint-Sulpice he read the placard, "Tower open to visitors." + +"Let's go up," said Des Hermies. + +"What for! In this weather?" and Durtal pointed at the yellow sky over +which black clouds, like factory smoke, were racing, so low that the tin +chimneys seemed to penetrate them and crenelate them with little spots +of clarity. "I am not enthusiastic about trying to climb a flight of +broken, irregular stairs. And anyway, what do you think you can see up +there? It's misty and getting dark. No, have a heart." + +"What difference is it to you where you take your airing? Come on. I +assure you you will see something unusual." + +"Oh! you brought me here on purpose?" + +"Yes." + +"Why didn't you say so?" + +He followed Des Hermies into the darkness under the porch. At the back +of the cellarway a little essence lamp, hanging from a nail, lighted a +door, the tower entrance. + +For a long time, in utter darkness, they climbed a winding stair. Durtal +was wondering where the keeper had gone, when, turning a corner, he saw +a shaft of light, then he stumbled against the rickety supports of a +"double-current" lamp in front of a door. Des Hermies pulled a bell cord +and the door swung back. + +Above them on a landing they could see feet, whether of a man or of a +woman they could not tell. + +"Ah! it's you, M. des Hermies," and a woman bent over, describing an +arc, so that her head was in a stream of light. "Louis will be very glad +to see you." + +"Is he in?" asked Des Hermies, reaching up and shaking hands with the +woman. + +"He is in the tower. Won't you stop and rest a minute?" + +"Why, when we come down, if you don't mind." + +"Then go up until you see a grated door--but what an old fool I am! You +know the way as well as I do." + +"To be sure, to be sure.... But, in passing, permit me to introduce my +friend Durtal." + +Durtal, somewhat flustered, made a bow in the darkness. + +"Ah, monsieur, how fortunate. Louis is so anxious to meet you." + +"Where is he taking me?" Durtal wondered as again he groped along behind +his friend, now and then, just as he felt completely lost, coming to the +narrow strip of light admitted by a barbican, and again proceeding in +inky darkness. The climb seemed endless. Finally they came to the barred +door, opened it, and found themselves on a frame balcony with the abyss +above and below. Des Hermies, who seemed perfectly at home, pointed +downward, then upward. They were halfway up a tower the face of which +was overlaid with enormous criss-crossing joists and beams riveted +together with bolt heads as big as a man's fist. Durtal could see no +one. He turned and, clinging to the hand rail, groped along the wall +toward the daylight which stole down between the inclined leaves of the +sounding-shutters. + +Leaning out over the precipice, he discerned beneath him a formidable +array of bells hanging from oak supports lined with iron. The sombre +bell metal was slick as if oiled and absorbed light without refracting +it. Bending backward, he looked into the upper abyss and perceived new +batteries of bells overhead. These bore the raised effigy of a bishop, +and a place in each, worn by the striking of the clapper, shone golden. + +All were in quiescence, but the wind rattled against the +sounding-shutters, stormed through the cage of timbers, howled along the +spiral stair, and was caught and held whining in the bell vases. +Suddenly a light breeze, like the stirring of confined air, fanned his +cheek. He looked up. The current had been set in motion by the swaying +of a great bell beginning to get under way. There was a crash of sound, +the bell gathered momentum, and now the clapper, like a gigantic pestle, +was grinding the great bronze mortar with a deafening clamour. The tower +trembled, the balcony on which Durtal was standing trepidated like the +floor of a railway coach, there was the continuous rolling of a mighty +reverberation, interrupted regularly by the jar of metal upon metal. + +In vain Durtal scanned the upper abyss. Finally he managed to catch +sight of a leg, swinging out into space and back again, in one of those +wooden stirrups, two of which, he had noticed, were fastened to the +bottom of every bell. Leaning out so that he was almost prone on one of +the timbers, he finally perceived the ringer, clinging with his hands to +two iron handles and balancing over the gulf with his eyes turned +heavenward. + +Durtal was shocked by the face. Never had he seen such disconcerting +pallor. It was not the waxen hue of the convalescent, not the lifeless +grey of the perfume-or snuff-maker, it was a prison pallor of a +bloodless lividness unknown today, the ghastly complexion of a wretch of +the Middle Ages shut up till death in a damp, airless, pitch-dark +_in-pace_. + +The eyes were blue, prominent, even bulging, and had the mystic's +readiness to tears, but their expression was singularly contradicted by +the truculent Kaiser Wilhelm moustache. The man seemed at once a dreamer +and a fighter, and it would have been difficult to tell which character +predominated. + +He gave the bell stirrup a last yank with his foot and with a heave of +his loins regained his equilibrium. He mopped his brow and smiled down +at Des Hermies. + +"Well! well!" he said, "you here." + +He descended, and when he learned Durtal's name his face brightened and +the two shook hands cordially. + +"We have been expecting you a long time, monsieur. Our friend here +speaks of you at great length, and we have been asking him why he didn't +bring you around to see us. But come," he said eagerly, "I must conduct +you on a tour of inspection about my little domain. I have read your +books and I know a man like you can't help falling in love with my +bells. But we must go higher if we are really to see them." + +And he bounded up a staircase, while Des Hermies pushed Durtal along in +front of him in a way that made retreat impossible. + +As he was once more groping along the winding stairs, Durtal asked, "Why +didn't you tell me your friend Carhaix--for of course that's who he +is--was a bell-ringer?" + +Des Hermies did not have time to answer, for at that moment, having +reached the door of the room beneath the tower roof, Carhaix was +standing aside to let them pass. They were in a rotunda pierced in the +centre by a great circular hole which had around it a corroded iron +balustrade orange with rust. By standing close to the railing, which was +like the well curb of the Pit, one could see down, down, to the +foundation. The "well" seemed to be undergoing repairs, and from the top +to the bottom of the tube the beams supporting the bells were +crisscrossed with timbers bracing the walls. + +"Don't be afraid to lean over," said Carhaix. "Now tell me, monsieur, +how do you like my foster children?" + +But Durtal was hardly heeding. He felt uneasy, here in space, and as if +drawn toward the gaping chasm, whence ascended, from time to time, the +desultory clanging of the bell, which was still swaying and would be +some time in returning to immobility. + +He recoiled. + +"Wouldn't you like to pay a visit to the top of the tower?" asked +Carhaix, pointing to an iron stair sealed into the wall. + +"No, another day." + +They descended and Carhaix, in silence, opened a door. They advanced +into an immense storeroom, containing colossal broken statues of saints, +scaly and dilapidated apostles, Saint Matthew legless and armless, Saint +Luke escorted by a fragmentary ox, Saint Mark lacking a shoulder and +part of his beard, Saint Peter holding up an arm from which the hand +holding the keys was broken off. + +"There used to be a swing in here," said Carhaix, "for the little girls +of the neighbourhood. But the privilege was abused, as privileges always +are. In the dusk all kinds of things were done for a few sous. The +curate finally had the swing taken down and the room closed up." + +"And what is that over there?" inquired Durtal, perceiving, in a corner, +an enormous fragment of rounded metal, like half a gigantic skull-cap. +On it the dust lay thick, and and in the hollow the meshes on meshes of +fine silken web, dotted with the black bodies of lurking spiders, were +like a fisherman's hand net weighted with little slugs of lead. + +"That? Ah, monsieur!" and there was fire in Carhaix's mild eyes, "that +is the skull of an old, old bell whose like is not cast these days. The +ring of that bell, monsieur, was like a voice from heaven." And suddenly +he exploded, "Bells have had their day!--As I suppose Des Hermies has +told you.--Bell ringing is a lost art. And why wouldn't it be? Look at +the men who are doing it nowadays. Charcoal burners, roofers, masons out +of a job, discharged firemen, ready to try their hand at anything for a +franc. There are curates who think nothing of saying, 'Need a man? Go +out in the street and pick up a soldier for ten sous. He'll do.' That's +why you read about accidents like the one that happened lately at Notre +Dame, I think. The fellow didn't withdraw in time and the bell came down +like the blade of a guillotine and whacked his leg right off. + +"People will spend thirty thousand francs on an altar baldachin, and +ruin themselves for music, and they have to have gas in their churches, +and Lord knows what all besides, but when you mention bells they shrug +their shoulders. Do you know, M. Durtal, there are only two men in Paris +who can ring chords? Myself and Père Michel, and he is not married and +his morals are so bad that he can't be regularly attached to a church. +He can ring music the like of which you never heard, but he, too, is +losing interest. He drinks, and, drunk or sober, goes to work, then he +bowls up again and goes to sleep. + +"Yes, the bell has had its day. Why, this very morning, Monsignor made +his pastoral visit to this church. At eight o'clock we sounded his +arrival. The six bells you see down here boomed out melodiously. But +there were sixteen up above, and it was a shame. Those extras jangled +away haphazard. It was a riot of discord." + +Carhaix ruminated in silence as they descended. Then, "Ah, monsieur," he +said, his watery eyes fairly bubbling, "the ring of bells, there's your +real sacred music." + +They were now above the main door of the building and they came out into +the great covered gallery on which the towers rest. Carhaix smiled and +pointed out a complete peal of miniature bells, installed between two +pillars on a plank. He pulled the cords, and, in ecstasies, his eyes +protruding, his moustache bristling, he listened to the frail tinkling +of his toy. + +And suddenly he relinquished the cords. + +"I once had a crazy idea," he said, "of forming a class here and +teaching all the intricacies of the craft, but no one cared to learn a +trade which was steadily going out of existence. Why, you know we don't +even sound for weddings any more, and nobody comes to look at the tower. + +"But I really can't complain. I hate the streets. When I try to cross +one I lose my head. So I stay in the tower all day, except once in the +early morning when I go to the other side of the square for a bucket of +water. Now my wife doesn't like it up here. You see, the snow does come +in through all the loopholes and it heaps up, and sometimes we are +snowbound with the wind blowing a gale." + +They had come to Carhaix's lodge. His wife was waiting for them on the +threshold. + +"Come in, gentlemen," she said. "You have certainly earned some +refreshment," and she pointed to four glasses which she had set out on +the table. + +The bell-ringer lighted a little briar pipe, while Des Hermies and +Durtal each rolled a cigarette. + +"Pretty comfortable place," remarked Durtal, just to be saying +something. It was a vast room, vaulted, with walls of rough stone, and +lighted by a semi-circular window just under the ceiling. The tiled +floor was badly covered by an infamous carpet, and the furniture, very +simple, consisted of a round dining-room table, some old _bergère_ +armchairs covered with slate-blue Utrecht velours, a little stained +walnut sideboard on which were several plates and pitchers of Breton +faience, and opposite the sideboard a little black bookcase, which might +contain fifty books. + +"Of course a literary man would be interested in the books," said +Carhaix, who had been watching Durtal. "You mustn't be too critical, +monsieur. I have only the tools of my trade." + +Durtal went over and took a look. The collection consisted largely of +works on bells. He read some of the titles: + +On the cover of a slim parchment volume he deciphered the faded legend, +hand-written, in rust-coloured ink, "_De tintinnabulis_ by Jerome +Magius, 1664"; then, pell-mell, there were: _A curious and edifying +miscellany concerning church bells_ by Dom Rémi Carré; another _Edifying +miscellany_, anonymous; a _Treatise of bells_ by Jean-Baptiste Thiers, +curate of Champrond and Vibraye; a ponderous tome by an architect named +Blavignac; a smaller work entitled _Essay on the symbolism of bells_ by +a parish priest of Poitiers; a _Notice_ by the abbé Baraud; then a whole +series of brochures, with covers of grey paper, bearing no titles. + +"It's no collection at all," said Carhaix with a sigh. "The best ones +are wanting, the _De campanis commentarius_ of Angelo Rocca and the _De +tintinnabulo_ of Percichellius, but they are so hard to find, and so +expensive when you do find them." + +A glance sufficed for the rest of the books, most of them being pious +works, Latin and French Bibles, an _Imitation of Christ_, Görres' +_Mystik_ in five volumes, the abbé Aubert's _History and theory of +religious symbolism_, Pluquet's _Dictionary of heresies_, and several +lives of saints. + +"Ah, monsieur, my own books are not much account, but Des Hermies lends +me what he knows will interest me." + +"Don't talk so much!" said his wife. "Give monsieur a chance to sit +down," and she handed Durtal a brimming glass aromatic with the +acidulous perfume of genuine cider. + +In response to his compliments she told him that the cider came from +Brittany and was made by relatives of hers at Landévennec, her and +Carhaix's native village. + +She was delighted when Durtal affirmed that long ago he had spent a day +in Landévennec. + +"Why, then we know each other already!" she said, shaking hands with him +again. + +The room was heated to suffocation by a stove whose pipe zigzagged over +to the window and out through a sheet-iron square nailed to the sash in +place of one of the panes. Carhaix and his good wife, with her honest, +weak face and frank, kind eyes, were the most restful of people. Durtal, +made drowsy by the warmth and the quiet domesticity, let his thoughts +wander. He said to himself, "If I had a place like this, above the roofs +of Paris, I would fix it up and make of it a real haven of refuge. Here, +in the clouds, alone and aloof, I would work away on my book and take my +time about it, years perhaps. What inconceivable happiness it would be +to escape from the age, and, while the waves of human folly were +breaking against the foot of the tower, to sit up here, out of it all, +and pore over antique tomes by the shaded light of the lamp." + +He smiled at the naïveté of his daydream. + +"I certainly do like your place," he said aloud, as if to sum up his +reflections. + +"Oh, you wouldn't if you had to live here," said the good wife. "We have +plenty of room, too much room, because there are a couple of bedchambers +as big as this, besides plenty of closet space, but it's so +inconvenient--and so cold! And no kitchen--" and she pointed to a +landing where, blocking the stairway, the cook stove had had to be +installed. "And there are so many, many steps to go up when you come +back from market. I am getting old, and I have a twinge of the +rheumatics whenever I think about making the climb." + +"You can't even drive a nail into this rock wall and have a peg to hang +things on," said Carhaix. "But I like this place. I was made for it. Now +my wife dreams constantly of spending her last days in Landévennec." + +Des Hermies rose. All shook hands, and monsieur and madame made Durtal +swear that he would come again. + +"What refreshing people!" exclaimed Durtal as he and Des Hermies crossed +the square. + +"And Carhaix is a mine of information." + +"But tell me, what the devil is an educated man, of no ordinary +intelligence, doing, working as a--as a day labourer?" + +"If Carhaix could hear you! But, my friend, in the Middle Ages +bell-ringers were high officials. True, the craft has declined +considerably in modern times. I couldn't tell you myself how Carhaix +became hipped on the subject of bells. All I know is that he studied at +a seminary in Brittany, that he had scruples of conscience and +considered himself unworthy to enter the priesthood, that he came to +Paris and apprenticed himself to a very intellectual master bell-ringer, +Père Gilbert, who had in his cell at Notre Dame some ancient and of +course unique plans of Paris that would make your mouth water. Gilbert +wasn't a 'labourer,' either. He was an enthusiastic collector of +documents relating to old Paris. From Notre Dame Carhaix came to Saint +Sulpice, fifteen years ago, and has been there ever since." + +"How did you happen to make his acquaintance?" + +"First he was my patient, then my friend. I've known him ten years." + +"Funny. He doesn't look like a seminary product. Most of them have the +shuffling gait and sheepish air of an old gardener." + +"Carhaix will be all right for a few more years," said Des Hermies, as +if to himself, "and then let us mercifully wish him a speedy death. The +Church, which has begun by sanctioning the introduction of gas into the +chapels, will end by installing mechanical chimes instead of bells. That +will be charming. The machinery will be run by electricity and we shall +have real up-to-date, timbreless, Protestant peals." + +"Then Carhaix's wife will have a chance to go back to Finistère." + +"No, they are too poor, and then too Carhaix would be broken-hearted if +he lost his bells. Curious, a man's affection for the object that he +manipulates. The mechanic's love for his machine. The thing that one +tends, and that obeys one, becomes personalized, and one ends by falling +in love with it. And the bell is an instrument in a class of its own. It +is baptized like a Christian, anointed with sacramental oil, and +according to the pontifical rubric it is also to be sanctified, in the +interior of its chalice, by a bishop, in seven cruciform unctions with +the oil of the infirm that it may send to the dying the message which +shall sustain them in their last agonies. + +"It is the herald of the Church, the voice from without as the priest is +the voice from within. So you see it isn't a mere piece of bronze, a +reversed mortar to be swung at a rope's end. Add that bells, like fine +wines, ripen with age, that their tone becomes more ample and mellow, +that they lose their sharp bouquet, their raw flavour. That will +explain--imperfectly--how one can become attached to them." + +"Why, you seem to be an enthusiast yourself." + +"Oh, I don't know anything about it. I am simply repeating what I have +heard Carhaix say. If the subject interests you, he will be only too +glad to teach you the symbolism of bells. He is inexhaustible. The man +is a monomaniac." + +"I can understand," said Durtal dreamily. "I live in a quarter where +there are a good many convents and at dawn the air is a-tingle with the +vibrance of the chimes. When I was ill I used to lie awake at night +awaiting the sound of the matin bells and welcoming them as a +deliverance. In the grey light I felt that I was being cuddled by a +distant and secret caress, that a lullaby was crooned over me, and a +cool hand applied to my burning forehead. I had the assurance that the +folk who were awake were praying for the others, and consequently for +me. I felt less lonely. I really believe the bells are sounded for the +special benefit of the sick who cannot sleep." + +"The bells ring for others, notably for the trouble-makers. The rather +common inscription for the side of a bell, '_Paco cruentos_,' 'I pacify +the bloody-minded,' is singularly apt, when you think it over." + +This conversation was still haunting Durtal when he went to bed. +Carhaix's phrase, "The ring of the bells is the real sacred music," took +hold of him like an obsession. And drifting back through the centuries +he saw in dream the slow processional of monks and the kneeling +congregations responding to the call of the angelus and drinking in the +balm of holy sound as if it were consecrated wine. + +All the details he had ever known of the liturgies of ages came crowding +into his mind. He could hear the sounding of matin invitatories; chimes +telling a rosary of harmony over tortuous labyrinths of narrow streets, +over cornet towers, over pepper-box pignons, over dentelated walls; the +chimes chanting the canonical hours, prime and tierce, sexte and none, +vespers and compline; celebrating the joy of a city with the tinkling +laughter of the little bells, tolling its sorrow with the ponderous +lamentation of the great ones. And there were master ringers in those +times, makers of chords, who could send into the air the expression of +the whole soul of a community. And the bells which they served as +submissive sons and faithful deacons were as humble and as truly of the +people as was the Church itself. As the priest at certain times put off +his chasuble, so the bell at times had put off its sacred character and +spoken to the baptized on fair day and market day, inviting them, in the +event of rain, to settle their affairs inside the nave of the church +and, that the sanctity of the place might not be violated by the +conflicts arising from sharp bargaining, imposing upon them a probity +unknown before or since. + +Today bells spoke an obsolete language, incomprehensible to man. Carhaix +was under no misapprehension. Living in an aërial tomb outside the human +scramble, he was faithful to his art, and in consequence no longer had +any reason for existing. He vegetated, superfluous and demoded, in a +society which insisted that for its amusement the holy place be turned +into a concert hall. He was like a creature reverted, a relic of a +bygone age, and he was supremely contemptuous of the miserable _fin de +siècle_ church showmen who to draw fashionable audiences did not fear to +offer the attraction of cavatinas and waltzes rendered on the cathedral +organ by manufacturers of profane music, by ballet mongers and comic +opera-wrights. + +"Poor Carhaix!" said Durtal, as he blew out the candle. "Another who +loves this epoch about as well as Des Hermies and I do. But he has the +tutelage of his bells, and certainly among his wards he has his +favourite. He is not to be pitied. He has his hobby, which renders life +possible for him, as hobbies do." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +"How is Gilles de Rais progressing?" + +"I have finished the first part of his life, making just the briefest +possible mention of his virtues and achievements." + +"Which are of no interest," remarked Des Hermies. + +"Evidently, since the name of Gilles de Rais would have perished four +centuries ago but for the enormities of vice which it symbolizes. I am +coming to the crimes now. The great difficulty, you see, is to explain +how this man, who was a brave captain and a good Christian, all of a +sudden became a sacrilegious sadist and a coward." + +"Metamorphosed over night, as it were." + +"Worse. As if at a touch of a fairy's wand or of a playwright's pen. +That is what mystifies his biographers. Of course untraceable influences +must have been at work a long time, and there must have been occasional +outcropping not mentioned in the chronicles. Here is a recapitulation of +our material. + +"Gilles de Rais was born about 1404 on the boundary between Brittany and +Anjou, in the château de Mâchecoul. We know nothing of his childhood. +His father died about the end of October, 1415, and his mother almost +immediately married a Sieur d'Estouville, abandoning her two sons, +Gilles and René. They became the wards of their grandfather, Jean de +Craon, 'a man old and ancient and of exceeding great age,' as the texts +say. He seems to have allowed his two charges to run wild, and then to +have got rid of Gilles by marrying him to Catherine de Thouars, November +30, 1420. + +"Gilles is known to have been at the court of the Dauphin five years +later. His contemporaries represent him as a robust, active man, of +striking beauty and rare elegance. We have no explicit statement as to +the rôle he played in this court, but one can easily imagine what sort +of treatment the richest baron in France received at the hands of an +impoverished king. + +"For at that moment Charles VII was in extremities. He was without +money, prestige, or real authority. Even the cities along the Loire +scarcely obeyed him. France, decimated a few years before, by the +plague, and further depopulated by massacres, was in a deplorable +situation. + +"England, rising from the sea like the fabled polyp the Kraken, had cast +her tentacles over Brittany, Normandy, l'Ile de France, part of Picardy, +the entire North, the Interior as far as Orléans, and crawling forward +left in her wake towns squeezed dry and country exhausted. + +"In vain Charles clamoured for subsidies, invented excuses for +exactions, and pressed the imposts. The paralyzed cities and fields +abandoned to the wolves could afford no succour. Remember his very claim +to the throne was disputed. He became like a blind man going the rounds +with a tin cup begging sous. His court at Chinon was a snarl of intrigue +complicated by an occasional murder. Weary of being hunted, more or less +out of harm's way behind the Loire, Charles and his partisans finally +consoled themselves by flaunting in the face of inevitable disaster the +devil-may-care debaucheries of the condemned making the most of the few +moments left them. Forays and loans furnished them with opulent cheer +and permitted them to carouse on a grand scale. The eternal _qui-vive_ +and the misfortunes of war were forgotten in the arms of courtesans. + +"What more could have been expected of a used-up sleepy-headed king, the +issue of an infamous mother and a mad father?" + +"Oh, whatever you say about Charles VII pales beside the testimony of +the portrait of him in the Louvre painted by Foucquet. That bestial +face, with the eyes of a small-town ursurer and the sly psalm-singing +mouth that butter wouldn't melt in, has often arrested me. Foucquet +depicts a debauched priest who has a bad cold and has been drinking sour +wine. Yet you can see that this monarch is of the very same type as the +more refined, less salacious, more prudently cruel, more obstinate and +cunning Louis XI, his son and successor. Well, Charles VII was the man +who had Jean Sans Peur assassinated, and who abandoned Jeanne d'Arc. +What more need be said?" + +"What indeed? Well, Gilles de Rais, who had raised an army at his own +expense, was certainly welcomed by this court with open arms. There is +no doubt that he footed the bills for tournaments and banquets, that he +was vigilantly 'tapped' by the courtiers, and that he lent the king +staggering sums. But in spite of his popularity he never seems to have +evaded responsibility and wallowed in debauchery, like the king. We find +Gilles shortly afterward defending Anjou and Maine against the English. +The chronicles say that he was 'a good and hardy captain,' but his +'goodness' and 'hardiness' did not prevent him from being borne back by +force of numbers. The English armies, uniting, inundated the country, +and, pushing on unchecked, invaded the interior. The king was ready to +flee to the Mediterranean provinces and let France go, when Jeanne d'Arc +appeared. + +"Gilles returned to court and was entrusted by Charles with the 'guard +and defence' of the Maid of Orleans. He followed her everywhere, fought +at her side, even under the walls of Paris, and was with her at Rheims +the day of the coronation, at which time, says Monstrelet, the king +rewarded his valour by naming him Marshal of France, at the age of +twenty-five." + +"Lord!" Des Hermies interrupted, "promotion came rapidly in those times. +But I suppose warriors then weren't the bemedalled, time-serving +incompetents they are now." + +"Oh, don't be misled. The title of Marshal of France didn't mean so +much in Gilles's time as it did afterward in the reign of Francis I, and +nothing like what it has come to mean since Napoleon. + +"What was the conduct of Gilles de Rais toward Jeanne d'Arc? We have no +certain knowledge. M. Vallet de Viriville, without proof, accuses him of +treachery. M. l'abbé Bossard, on the contrary, claims--and alleges +plausible reasons for entertaining the opinion--that he was loyal to her +and watched over her devotedly. + +"What is certain is that Gilles's soul became saturated with mystical +ideas. His whole history proves it. + +"He was constantly in association with this extraordinary maid whose +adventures seemed to attest the possibility of divine intervention in +earthly affairs. He witnessed the miracle of a peasant girl dominating a +court of ruffians and bandits and arousing a cowardly king who was on +the point of flight. He witnessed the incredible episode of a virgin +bringing back to the fold such black rams as La Hire, Xaintrailles, +Beaumanoir, Chabannes, Dunois, and Gaucourt, and washing their old +fleeces whiter than snow. Undoubtedly Gilles also, under her +shepherding, docilely cropped the white grass of the gospel, took +communion the morning of a battle, and revered Jeanne as a saint. + +"He saw the Maid fulfil all her promises. She raised the siege of +Orléans, had the king consecrated at Rheims, and then declared that her +mission was accomplished and asked as a boon that she be permitted to +return home. + +"Now I should say that as a result of such an association Gilles's +mysticism began to soar. Henceforth we have to deal with a man who is +half-freebooter, half-monk. Moreover--" + +"Pardon the interruption, but I am not so sure that Jeanne d'Arc's +intervention was a good thing for France." + +"Why not?" + +"I will explain. You know that the defenders of Charles were for the +most part Mediterranean cut-throats, ferocious pillagers, execrated by +the very people they came to protect. The Hundred Years' War, in effect, +was a war of the South against the North. England at that epoch had not +got over the Conquest and was Norman in blood, language, and tradition. +Suppose Jeanne d'Arc had stayed with her mother and stuck to her +knitting. Charles VII would have been dispossessed and the war would +have come to an end. The Plantagenets would have reigned over England +and France, which, in primeval times before the Channel existed, formed +one territory occupied by one race, as you know. Thus there would have +been a single united and powerful kingdom of the North, reaching as far +as the province of Languedoc and embracing peoples whose tastes, +instincts, and customs were alike. On the other hand, the coronation of +a Valois at Rheims created a heterogeneous and preposterous France, +separating homogeneous elements, uniting the most incompatible +nationalities, races the most hostile to each other, and identifying +us--inseparably, alas!--with those stained-skinned, varnished-eyed +munchers of chocolate and raveners of garlic, who are not Frenchmen at +all, but Spaniards and Italians. In a word, if it hadn't been for Jeanne +d'Arc, France would not now belong to that line of histrionic, forensic, +perfidious chatterboxes, the precious Latin race--Devil take it!" + +Durtal raised his eyebrows. + +"My, my," he said, laughing. "Your remarks prove to me that you are +interested in 'our own, our native land.' I should never have suspected +it of you." + +"Of course you wouldn't," said Des Hermies, relighting his cigarette. +"As has so often been said, 'My own, my native land is wherever I happen +to feel at home.' Now I don't feel at home except with the people of the +North. But I interrupted you. Let's get back to the subject. What were +you saying?" + +"I forget. Oh, yes. I was saying that the Maid had completed her task. +Now we are confronted by a question to which there is seemingly no +answer. What did Gilles do when she was captured, how did he feel about +her death? We cannot tell. We know that he was lurking in the vicinity +of Rouen at the time of the trial, but it is too much to conclude from +that, like certain of his biographies, that he was plotting her rescue. + +"At any rate, after losing track of him completely, we find that he has +shut himself in at his castle of Tiffauges. + +"He is no longer the rough soldier, the uncouth fighting-man. At the +time when the misdeeds are about to begin, the artist and man of letters +develop in Gilles and, taking complete possession of him, incite him, +under the impulsion of a perverted mysticism, to the most sophisticated +of cruelties, the most delicate of crimes. + +"For he was almost alone in his time, this baron de Rais. In an age when +his peers were simple brutes, he sought the delicate delirium of art, +dreamed of a literature soul-searching and profound; he even composed a +treatise on the art of evoking demons; he gloried in the music of the +Church, and would have nothing about his that was not rare and difficult +to obtain. + +"He was an erudite Latinist, a brilliant conversationalist, a sure and +generous friend. He possessed a library extraordinary for an epoch when +nothing was read but theology and lives of saints. We have the +description of several of his manuscripts; Suetonius, Valerius Maximus, +and an Ovid on parchment bound in red leather, with vermeil clasp and +key. + +"These books were his passion. He carried them with him when he +travelled. He had attached to his household a painter named Thomas who +illuminated them with ornate letters and miniatures, and Gilles himself +painted the enamels which a specialist--discovered after an assiduous +search--set in the gold-inwrought bindings. Gilles's taste in +furnishings was elevated and bizarre. He revelled in abbatial stuffs, +voluptuous silks, in the sombre gilding of old brocade. He liked +knowingly spiced foods, ardent wines heavy with aromatics; he dreamed of +unknown gems, weird stones, uncanny metals. He was the Des Esseintes of +the fifteenth century! + +"All this was very expensive, less so, perhaps, than the luxurious court +which made Tiffauges a place like none other. + +"He had a guard of two hundred men, knights, captains, squires, pages, +and all these people had personal attendants who were magnificently +equipped at Gilles's expense. The luxury of his chapel and collegium was +madly extravagant. There was in residence at Tiffauges a complete +metropolitan clergy, deans, vicars, treasurers, canons, clerks, deacons, +scholasters, and choir boys. There is an inventory extant of the +surplices, stoles, and amices, and the fur choir hats with crowns of +squirrel and linings of vair. There are countless sacerdotal ornaments. +We find vermilion altar cloths, curtains of emerald silk, a cope of +velvet, crimson and violet with orpheys of cloth of gold, another of +rose damask, satin dalmatics for the deacons, baldachins figured with +hawks and falcons of Cyprus gold. We find plate, hammered chalices and +ciboria crusted with uncut jewels. There are reliquaries, among them a +silver head of Saint Honoré. A mass of sparkling jewelleries which an +artist, installed in the château, cuts to order. + +"And anyone who came along was welcome. From all corners of France +caravans journeyed toward this château where the artist, the poet, the +scholar, found princely hospitality, cordial goodfellowship, gifts of +welcome and largesse at departure. + +"Already undermined by the demands which the war had made on it, his +fortune was giving way beneath these expenditures. Now he began to walk +the terrible ways of usury. He borrowed of the most unscrupulous +bourgeois, hypothecated his châteaux, alienated his lands. At times he +was reduced to asking advances on his religious ornaments, on his +jewels, on his books." + +"I am glad to see that the method of ruining oneself in the Middle Ages +did not differ sensibly from that of our days," said Des Hermies. +"However, our ancestors did not have Monte Carlo, the notaries, and the +Bourse." + +"And _did_ have sorcery and alchemy. A memorial addressed to the king by +the heirs of Gilles de Rais informs us that this immense fortune was +squandered in less than eight years. + +"Now it's the signories of Confolens, Chabanes, Châteaumorant, Lombert, +ceded to a captain for a ridiculous price; now it's the fief of Fontaine +Milon, of Angers, the fortress of Saint Etienne de Mer Morte acquired by +Guillaume Le Ferron for a song; again it's the châteaux of Blaison and +of Chemille forfeited to Guillaume de la Jumelière who never has to pay +a sou. But look, there's a long list of castellanies and forests, salt +mines and farm lands," said Durtal, spreading out a great sheet of paper +on which he had copied the account of the purchases and sales. + +"Frightened by his mad course, the family of the Marshal supplicated the +king to intervene, and Charles VII,'sure,' as he said, 'of the +malgovernance of the Sire de Rais,' forbade him, in grand council, by +letters dated 'Amboise, 1436,' to sell or make over any fortress, any +château, any land. + +"This order simply hastened the ruin of the interdicted. The grand +skinflint, the master usurer of the time, Jean V, duke of Brittany, +refused to publish the edict in his states, but, underhandedly, notified +all those of his subjects who dealt with Gilles. No one now dared to buy +the Marshal's domains for fear of incurring the wrath of the king, so +Jean V remained the sole purchaser and fixed the prices. You may judge +how liberal his prices were. + +"That explains Gilles's hatred of his family who had solicited these +letters patent of the king, and why, as long as he lived, he had nothing +to do with his wife, nor with his daughter whom he consigned to a +dungeon at Pouzauges. + +"Now to return to the question which I put a while ago, how and with +what motives Gilles quitted the court. I think the facts which I have +outlined will partially explain. + +"It is evident that for quite a while, long before the Marshal retired +to his estates, Charles had been assailed by the complaints of Gilles's +wife and other relatives. Moreover, the courtiers must have execrated +the young man on account of his riches and luxuries; and the king, the +same king who abandoned Jeanne d'Arc when he considered that she could +no longer be useful to him, found an occasion to avenge himself on +Gilles for the favours Gilles had done him. When the king needed money +to finance his debaucheries or to raise troops he had not considered the +Marshal lavish. Now that the Marshal was ruined the king censured him +for his prodigality, held him at arm's length, and spared him no +reproach and no menace. + +"We may be sure Gilles had no reason to regret leaving this court, and +another thing is to be taken into consideration. He was doubtless sick +and tired of the nomadic existence of a soldier. He was doubtless +impatient to get back to a pacific atmosphere among books. Moreover, he +seems to have been completely dominated by the passion for alchemy, for +which he was ready to abandon all else. For it is worth noting that this +science, which threw him into demonomania when he hoped to stave off +inevitable ruin with it, he had loved for its own sake when he was rich. +It was in fact toward the year 1426, when his coffers bulged with gold, +that he attempted the 'great work' for the first time. + +"We shall find him, then, bent over his retorts in the château de +Tiffauges. That is the point to which I have brought my history, and now +I am about to begin on the series of crimes of magic and sadism." + +"But all this," said Des Hermies, "does not explain how, from a man of +piety, he was suddenly changed into a Satanist, from a placid scholar +into a violator of little children, a 'ripper' of boys and girls." + +"I have already told you that there are no documents to bind together +the two parts of this life so strangely divided, but in what I have been +narrating you can pick out some of the threads of the duality. To be +precise, this man, as I have just had you observe, was a true mystic. He +witnessed the most extraordinary events which history has ever shown. +Association with Jeanne d'Arc certainly stimulated his desires for the +divine. Now from lofty Mysticism to base Satanism there is but one step. +In the Beyond all things touch. He carried his zeal for prayer into the +territory of blasphemy. He was guided and controlled by that troop of +sacrilegious priests, transmuters of metals, and evokers of demons, by +whom he was surrounded at Tiffauges." + +"You think, then, that the Maid of Orleans was really responsible for +his career of evil?" + +"To a certain point. Consider. She roused an impetuous soul, ready for +anything, as well for orgies of saintliness as for ecstasies of crime. + +"There was no transition between the two phases of his being. The moment +Jeanne was dead he fell into the hands of sorcerers who were the most +learned of scoundrels and the most unscrupulous of scholars. These men +who frequented the château de Tiffauges were fervent Latinists, +marvellous conversationalists, possessors of forgotten arcana, guardians +of world-old secrets. Gilles was evidently more fitted to live with them +than with men like Dunois and La Hire. These magicians, whom all the +biographers agree to represent--wrongly, I think--as vulgar parasites +and base knaves, were, as I view them, the patricians of intellect of +the fifteenth century. Not having found places in the Church, where they +would certainly have accepted no position beneath that of cardinal or +pope, they could, in those troubled times of ignorance, but take refuge +in the patronage of a great lord like Gilles. And Gilles was, indeed, +the only one at that epoch who was intelligent enough and educated +enough to understand them. + +"To sum up: natural mysticism on one hand, and, on the other, daily +association with savants obsessed by Satanism. The sword of Damocles +hanging over his head, to be conjured away by the will of the Devil, +perhaps. An ardent, a mad curiosity concerning the forbidden sciences. +All this explains why, little by little, as the bonds uniting him to the +world of alchemists and sorcerers grow stronger, he throws himself into +the occult and is swept on by it into the most unthinkable crimes. + +"Then as to being a 'ripper' of children--and he didn't immediately +become one, no, Gilles did not violate and trucidate little boys until +after he became convinced of the vanity of alchemy--why, he does not +differ greatly from the other barons of his times. + +"He exceeds them in the magnitude of his debauches, in opulence of +murders, and that's all. It's a fact. Read Michelet. You will see that +the princes of this epoch were redoubtable butchers. There was a sire de +Giac who poisoned his wife, put her astride of his horse and rode at +breakneck speed for five leagues, until she died. There was another, +whose name I have forgotten, who collared his father, dragged him +barefoot through the snow, and calmly thrust him into a subterranean +prison and left him there until he died. And how many others! I have +tried, without success, to find whether in battles and forays the +Marshal committed any serious misdeeds. I have discovered nothing, +except that he had a pronounced taste for the gibbet; for he liked to +string up all the renegade French whom he surprised in the ranks of the +English or in the cities which were not very much devoted to the king. + +"We shall find his taste for this kind of torture manifesting itself +later on in the château de Tiffauges. + +"Now, in conclusion, add to all these factors a formidable pride, a +pride which incites him to say, during his trial, 'So potent was the +star under which I was born that I have done what no one in the world +has done nor ever can do.' + +"And assuredly, the Marquis de Sade is only a timid bourgeois, a +mediocre fantasist, beside him!" + +"Since it is difficult to be a saint," said Des Hermies, "there is +nothing for it but to be a Satanist. One of the two extremes. +'Execration of impotence, hatred of the mediocre,' that, perhaps, is one +of the more indulgent definitions of Diabolism." + +"Perhaps. One can take pride in going as far in crime as a saint in +virtue. And that expresses Gilles de Rais exactly." + +"All the same, it's a mean subject to handle." + +"It certainly is, but happily the documents are abundant. Satan was +terrible to the Middle Ages--" + +"And to the modern." + +"What do you mean?" + +That Satanism has come down in a straight, unbroken line from that age +to this." + +"Oh, no; you don't believe that at this very hour the devil is being +evoked and the black mass celebrated?" + +"Yes." + +"You are sure?" + +"Perfectly." + +"You amaze me. But, man! do you know that to witness such things would +aid me signally in my work? No joking, you believe in a contemporary +Satanistic manifestation? You have proofs?" + +"Yes, and of them we shall speak later, for today I am very busy. +Tomorrow evening, when we dine with Carhaix. Don't forget. I'll come by +for you. Meanwhile think over the phrase which you applied a moment ago +to the magicians: 'If they had entered the Church they would not have +consented to be anything but cardinals and popes,' and then just think +what kind of a clergy we have nowadays. The explanation of Satanism is +there, in great part, anyway, for without sacrilegious priests there is +no mature Satanism." + +"But what do these priests want?" + +"Everything!" exclaimed Des Hermies. + +"Hmmm. Like Gilles de Rais, who asked the demon for 'knowledge, power, +riches,' all that humanity covets, to be deeded to him by a title signed +with his own blood." + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +"Come right in and get warm. Ah, messieurs, you must not do that any +more," said Mme. Carhaix, seeing Durtal draw from his pocket some +bottles wrapped in paper, while Des Hermies placed on the table some +little packages tied with twine. "You mustn't spend your money on us." + +"Oh, but you see we enjoy doing it, Mme. Carhaix. And your husband?" + +"He is in the tower. Since morning he has been going from one tantrum +into another." + +"My, the cold is terrible today," said Durtal, "and I should think it +would be no fun up there." + +"Oh, he isn't grumbling for himself but for his bells. Take off your +things." + +They took off their overcoats and came up close to the stove. + +"It isn't what you would call hot in here," said Mme. Carhaix, "but to +thaw this place you would have to keep a fire going night and day." + +"Why don't you get a portable stove?" + +"Oh, heavens! that would asphyxiate us." + +"It wouldn't be very comfortable at any rate," said Des Hermies, "for +there is no chimney. You might get some joints of pipe and run them out +of the window, the way you have fixed this tubing. But, speaking of that +kind of apparatus, Durtal, doesn't it seem to you that those hideous +galvanized iron contraptions perfectly typify our utilitarian epoch? + +"Just think, the engineer, offended by any object that hasn't a +sinister or ignoble form, reveals himself entire in this invention. He +tells us, 'You want heat. You shall have heat--and nothing else.' +Anything agreeable to the eye is out of the question. No more snapping, +crackling wood fire, no more gentle, pervasive warmth. The useful +without the fantastic. Ah, the beautiful jets of flame darting out from +a red cave of coals and spurting up over a roaring log." + +"But there are lots of stoves where you can see the fire," objected +madame. + +"Yes, and then it's worse yet. Fire behind a grated window of mica. +Flame in prison. Depressing! Ah, those fine fires of faggots and dry +vine stocks out in the country. They smell good and they cast a golden +glow over everything. Modern life has set that in order. The luxury of +the poorest of peasants is impossible in Paris except for people who +have copious incomes." + +The bell-ringer entered. Every hair of his bristling moustache was +beaded with a globule of snow. With his knitted bonnet, his sheepskin +coat, his fur mittens and goloshes, he resembled a Samoyed, fresh from +the pole. + +"I won't shake hands," he said, "for I am covered with grease and oil. +What weather! Just think, I've been scouring the bells ever since early +this morning. I'm worried about them." + +"Why?" + +"Why! You know very well that frost contracts the metal and sometimes +cracks or breaks it. Some of these bitterly cold winters we have lost a +good many, because bells suffer worse than we do in bad weather.--Wife, +is there any hot water in the other room, so I can wash up?" + +"Can't we help you set the table?" Des Hermies proposed. + +But the good woman refused. "No, no, sit down. Dinner is ready." + +"Mighty appetizing," said Durtal, inhaling the odour of a peppery +_pot-au-feu_, perfumed with a symphony of vegetables, of which the +keynote was celery. + +"Everybody sit down," said Carhaix, reappearing with a clean blouse on, +his face shining of soap and water. + +They sat down. The glowing stove purred. Durtal felt the sudden +relaxation of a chilly soul dipped into a warm bath: at Carhaix's one +was so far from Paris, so remote from the epoch.... + +The lodge was poor, but cosy, comfortable, cordial. The very table, set +country style, the polished glasses, the covered dish of sweet butter, +the cider pitcher, the somewhat battered lamp casting reflections of +tarnished silver on the great cloth, contributed to the atmosphere of +home. + +"Next time I come I must stop at the English store and buy a jar of that +reliable orange marmalade," said Durtal to himself, for by common +consent with Des Hermies he never dined with the bell-ringer without +furnishing a share of the provisions. Carhaix set out a _pot-au-feu_ and +a simple salad and poured his cider. Not to be an expense to him, Des +Hermies and Durtal brought wine, coffee, liquor, desserts, and managed +so that their contributions would pay for the soup and the beef which +would have lasted for several days if the Carhaixes had eaten alone. + +"This time I did it!" said Mme. Carhaix triumphantly, serving to each in +turn a mahogany-colour bouillon whose iridescent surface was looped with +rings of topaz. + +It was succulent and unctuous, robust and yet delicate, flavoured as it +was with the broth of a whole flock of boiled chickens. The diners were +silent now, their noses in their plates, their faces brightened by steam +from the savoury soup, soup, two selected dishes, a salad, and a +dessert. + +"Now is the time to repeat the chestnut dear to Flaubert, 'You can't +dine like this in a restaurant,'" said Durtal. + +"Let's not malign the restaurants," said Des Hermies. "They afford a +very special delight to the person who has the instinct of the +inspector. I had an opportunity to gratify this instinct just the other +night. I was returning from a call on a patient, and I dropped into one +of these establishments where for the sum of three francs you are +entitled to soup, two selected dishes, a salad, and a dessert. + +"The restaurant, where I go as often as once a month, has an unvarying +clientele, hostile highbrows, officers in mufti, members of Parliament, +bureaucrats. + +"While laboriously gnawing my way through a redoubtable sole with sauce +au gratin, I examined the habitués seated all around me and I found them +singularly altered since my last visit. They had become bony or bloated; +their eyes were either hollow, with violet rings around them, or puffy, +with crimson pouches beneath; the fat people had become yellow and the +thin ones were turning green. + +"More deadly than the forgotten venefices of the days of the Avignon +papacy, the terrible preparations served in this place were slowly +poisoning its customers. + +"It was interested, as you may believe. I made myself the subject of a +course of toxicological research, and, studying my food as it went down, +I identified the frightful ingredients masking the mixtures of tannin +and powdered carbon with which the fish was embalmed; and I penetrated +the disguise of the marinated meats, painted with sauces the colour of +sewage; and I diagnosed the wine as being coloured with fuscin, perfumed +with furfurol, and enforced with molasses and plaster. + +"I have promised myself to return every month to register the slow but +sure progress of these people toward the tomb." + +"Oh!" cried Mme. Carhaix. + +"And you will claim," said Durtal, "that you aren't Satanic?" + +"See, Carhaix, he's at it already. He won't even give us time to get our +breath, but must be dogging us about Satanism. It's true I promised him +I'd try and get you to tell us something about it tonight. Yes," +continued Des Hermies, in response to Carhaix's look of astonishment, +"yesterday, Durtal, who is engaged, as you know, in writing a history of +Gilles de Rais, declared that he possessed all the information there was +about Diabolism in the Middle Ages. I asked him if he had any material +on the Satanism of the present day. He asked me what I was talking +about, and wouldn't believe that these practices are being carried on +right now." + +"But they are," replied Carhaix, becoming grave. "It is only too true." + +"Before we go any further, there is one question I'd like to put to Des +Hermies," said Durtal. "Can you, honestly, without joking, without +letting that saturnine smile play around the corner of your mouth, tell +me, in perfectly good faith, whether you do or do not believe in +Catholicism?" + +"He!" exclaimed the bell-ringer. "Why, he's worse than an unbeliever, +he's a heresiarch." + +"The fast is, if I were certain of anything, I would be inclined toward +Manicheism," said Des Hermies. "It's one of the oldest and it is _the_ +simplest of religions, and it best explains the abominable mess +everything is in at the present time. + +"The Principle of Good and the Principle of Evil, the God of Light and +the God of Darkness, two rivals, are fighting for our souls. That's at +least clear. Right now it is evident that the Evil God has the upper +hand and is reigning over the world as master. Now--and on this point, +Carhaix, who is distressed by these theories, can't reprehend me--I am +for the under dog. That's a generous and perfectly proper idea." + +"But Manicheism is impossible!" cried the bell-ringer. "Two infinities +cannot exist together." + +"But nothing can exist if you get to reasoning. The moment you argue the +Catholic dogma everything goes to pieces. The proof that two infinities +can coexist is that this idea passes beyond reason and enters the +category of those things referred to in Ecclesiasticus: 'Inquire not +into things higher than thou, for many things have shown themselves to +be above the sense of men.' + +"Manicheism, you see, must have had some good in it, because it was +bathed in blood. At the end of the twelfth century thousands of +Albigenses were roasted for practising this doctrine. Of course, I +can't say that the Manicheans didn't abuse their cult, mostly made up of +devil worship, because we know very well they did. + +"On this point I am not with them," he went on slowly, after a silence. +He was waiting till Mme. Carhaix, who had got up to remove the plates, +should go out of the room to fetch the beef. + +"While we are alone," he said, seeing her disappear through the stairway +door, "I can tell you what they did. An excellent man named Psellus has +revealed to us, in a book entitled _De operatione Dæmonum_, the fact +that they tasted of the two excrements at the beginning of their +ceremonial, and that they mixed human semen with the host." + +"Horrible!" exclaimed Carhaix. + +"Oh, as they took both kinds of communion, they did better than that," +returned Des Hermies. "They cut children's throats and mixed the blood +with ashes, and this paste, dissolved in liquid, constituted the +Eucharistic wine." + +"You bring us right back to Satanism," said Durtal. + +"Why, yes, as you see, I haven't strayed off your subject." + +"I am sure Monsieur Des Hermies has been saying something awful," +murmured Mme. Carhaix as she came in, bearing a platter on which was a +piece of beef smothered in vegetables. + +"Oh, Madame," protested Des Hermies. + +They burst out laughing and Carhaix cut up the meat, while his wife +poured the cider and Durtal uncorked the bottle of anchovies. + +"I am afraid it's cooked too much," said the woman, who was a great deal +more interested in the beef than in other-world adventures, and she +added the famous maxim of housekeepers, "When the broth is good the beef +won't cut." + +The men protested that it wasn't stringy a bit, it was cooked just +right. + +"Have an anchovy and a little butter with your meat, Monsieur Durtal." + +"Wife, let's have some of the red cabbage that you preserved," said +Carhaix, whose pale face was lighted up while his great canine eyes were +becoming suspiciously moist. Visibly he was jubilant. He was at table +with friends, in his tower, safe from the cold. "But, empty your +glasses. You are not drinking," he said, holding up the cider pot. + +"Let's see, Des Hermies, you were claiming yesterday that Satanism has +pursued an uninterrupted course since the Middle Ages," said Durtal, +wishing to get back to the subject which haunted him. + +"Yes, and the documents are irrefutable. I'll put you into a position to +prove them whenever you wish. + +"At the end of the fifteenth century, that is to say at the time of +Gilles de Rais--to go no further back--Satanism had assumed the +proportions that you know. In the sixteenth it was worse yet. No need to +remind you, I think, of the demoniac pactions of Catherine de Medici and +of the Valois, of the trial of the monk Jean de Vaulx, of the +investigations of the Sprengers and the Lancres and those learned +inquisitors who had thousands of necromancers and sorcerers roasted +alive. All that is known, too well known. One case is not too well known +for me to cite here: that of the priest Benedictus who cohabited with +the she-devil Armellina and consecrated the hosts holding them upside +down. Here are the diabolical threads which bind that century to this. +In the seventeenth century, in which the sorcery trials continue, and in +which the 'possessed' of Loudun appear, the black religion nourishes, +but already it has been driven under cover. + +"I will cite you an example, one among many, if you like. + +"A certain abbé Guibourg made a specialty of these abominations. On a +table serving as tabernacle a woman lay down, naked or with her skirts +lifted up over her head, and with her arms outstretched. She held the +altar lights during the whole office. + +"Guibourg thus celebrated masses on the abdomen of Mme. de Montespan, of +Mme. d'Argenson, of Mme. de Saint-Pont. As a matter of fact these +masses were very frequent under the Grand Monarch. Numbers of women went +to them as in our times women flock to have their fortunes told with +cards. + +"The ritual of these ceremonies was sufficiently atrocious. Generally a +child was kidnapped and burnt in a furnace out in the country somewhere, +the ashes were saved and mixed with the blood of another child whose +throat had been cut, and of this mixture a paste was made resembling +that of the Manicheans of which I was speaking. Abbé Guibourg +officiated, consecrated the host, cut it into little pieces and mixed it +with this mixture of blood and ashes. That was the material of the +Sacrament." + +"What a horrible priest!" cried Mme. Carhaix, indignant. + +"Yes, he celebrated another kind of mass, too, that abbé did. It was +called--hang it--it's unpleasant to say--" + +"Say it, Monsieur des Hermies. When people have as great a hatred for +that sort of thing as we here, they need not blink any fact. It isn't +that kind of thing which is going to take me away from my prayers." + +"Nor me," added her husband. + +"Well, this sacrifice was called the Spermatic Mass." + +"Oh!" + +"Guibourg, wearing the alb, the stole, and the maniple, celebrated this +mass with the sole object of making pastes to conjure with. The archives +of the Bastille inform us that he acted thus at the request of a lady +named Des Oeillettes: + +"This woman, who was indisposed, gave some of her blood; the man who +accompanied her stood patiently beside the bed where the scene took +place, and Guibourg gathered up some of his semen into the chalice, then +added powdered blood and some flour, and after sacrilegious ceremonies +the Des Oeillettes woman departed bearing her paste." + +"My heavenly Saviour!" sighed the bell-ringer's wife, "what a lot of +filth." + +"But," said Durtal, "in the Middle Ages the mass was celebrated in a +different fashion. The altar then was the naked buttocks of a woman; in +the seventeenth century it was the abdomen, and now?" + +"Nowadays a woman is hardly ever used for an altar, but let us not +anticipate. In the eighteenth century we shall again find abbés--among +how many other monsters--who defile holy objects. One Canon Duer +occupied himself specially with black magic and the evocation of the +devil. He was finally executed as a sorcerer in the year of grace 1718. +There was another who believed in the Incarnation of the Holy Ghost as +the Paraclete, and who, in Lombary, which he stirred up to a feverish +pitch of excitement, ordained twelve apostles and twelve apostolines to +preach his gospel. This man, abbé Beccarelli, like all the other priests +of his ilk, abused both sexes, and he said mass without confessing +himself of his lecheries. As his cult grew he began to celebrate +travestied offices in which he distributed to his congregation +aphrodisiac pills presenting this peculiarity, that after having +swallowed them the men believed themselves changed into women and the +women into men. + +"The recipe for these hippomanes is lost," continued Des Hermies with +almost a sad smile. "To make a long story short, Beccarelli met with a +very miserable end. He was prosecuted for sacrilege and sentenced, in +1708, to row in the galleys for seven years." + +"These frightful stories seem to have taken away your appetite," said +Mme. Carhaix. "Come, Monsieur des Hermies, a little more salad?" + +"No, thanks. But now we've come to the cheese, I think it's time to open +the wine," and he uncapped one of the bottles which Durtal had brought. + +"It's a light Chinon wine, but not too weak. I discovered it in a little +shop down by the quay," said Durtal. + +"I see," he went on after a silence, "that the tradition of unspeakable +crimes has been maintained by worthy successors of Gilles de Rais. I see +that in all centuries there have been fallen priests who have dared +commit sins against the Holy Ghost. But at the present time it all seems +incredible. Surely nobody is cutting children's throats as in the days +of Bluebeard and of abbé Guibourg." + +"You mean that nobody is brought to justice for doing it. They don't +assassinate now, but they kill designated victims by methods unknown to +official science--ah, if the confessionals could speak!" cried the +bell-ringer. + +"But tell me, what class of people are these modern covenanters with the +Devil?" + +"Prelates, abbesses, mission superiors, confessors of communities; and +in Rome, the centre of present-day magic, they're the very highest +dignitaries," answered Des Hermies. "As for the laymen, they are +recruited from the wealthy class. That explains why these scandals are +hushed up if the police chance to discover them. + +"Then, let us assume that the sacrifices to the Devil are not preceded +by preliminary murders. Perhaps in some cases they aren't. The +worshippers probably content themselves with bleeding a foetus which had +been aborted as soon as it became matured to the point necessary. +Bloodletting is supererogatory anyway, and serves merely to whet the +appetite. The main business is to consecrate the host and put it to an +infamous use. The rest of the procedure varies. There is at present no +regular ritual for the black mass." + +"Well, then, is a priest absolutely essential to the celebration of +these offices?" + +"Certainly. Only a priest can operate the mystery of Transubstantiation. +I know there are certain occultists who claim to have been consecrated +by the Lord, as Saint Paul was, and who think they can consummate a +veritable sacrifice just like a real priest. Absurd! But even in default +of real masses with ordained celebrants, the people possessed by the +mania of sacrilege do none the less realize the sacred stupration of +which they dream. + +"Listen to this. In 1855 there existed at Paris an association composed +of women, for the most part. These women took communion several times a +day and retained the sacred wafer in their mouths to be spat out later +and trodden underfoot or soiled by disgusting contacts." + +"You are sure of it?" + +"Perfectly. These facts were revealed by a religious journal, _Les +annales de la sainteté_, and the archbishop of Paris could not deny +them. I add that in 1874 women were likewise enrolled at Paris to +practise this odious commerce. They were paid so much for every wafer +they brought in. That explains why they presented themselves at the +sacred table of different churches every day." + +"And that is not the half of it! Look," said Carhaix, in his turn, +rising and taking from his bookshelf a blue brochurette. "Here is a +review, _La voix de la septaine_, dated 1843. It informs us that for +twenty-five years, at Agen, a Satanistic association regularly +celebrated black masses, and committed murder, and polluted three +thousand three hundred and twenty hosts! And Monsignor the Bishop of +Agen, who was a good and ardent prelate, never dared deny the +monstrosities committed in his diocese!" + +"Yes, we can say it among ourselves," Des Hermies returned, "in the +nineteenth century the number of foul-minded abbés has been legion. +Unhappily, though the documents are certain, they are difficult to +verify, for no ecclesiastic boasts of such misdeeds. The celebrants of +Deicidal masses dissemble and declare themselves devoted to Christ. They +even affirm that they defend Him by exorcising the possessed. + +"That's a good one. The 'possessed' are made so or kept so by the +priests themselves, who are thus assured of subjects and accomplices, +especially in the convents. All kinds of murderous and sadistic follies +can be covered with the antique and pious mantle of exorcism." + +"Let us be just," said Carhaix. "The Satanist would not be complete if +he were not an abominable hypocrite." + +"Hypocrisy and pride are perhaps the most characteristic vices of the +perverse priest," suggested Durtal. + +"But in the long run," Des Hermies went on, "in spite of the most +adroit precautions, everything comes out. Up to now I have spoken only +of local Satanistic associations, but there are others, more extensive, +which ravage the old world and the new, for Diabolism is quite up to +date in one respect. It is highly centralized and very capably +administered. There are committees, subcommittees, a sort of curia, +which rules America and Europe, like the curia of a pope. + +"The biggest of these societies founded as long ago as 1855 is the +society of the Re-Theurgistes-Optimates. Beneath an apparent unity it is +divided into two camps, one aspiring to destroy the universe and reign +over the ruins, the other thinking simply of imposing upon the world a +demoniac cult of which it shall be high priest. + +"This society has its seat in America. It was formerly directed by one +Longfellow, an adventurer, born in Scotland, who entitled himself grand +priest of the New Evocative Magism. For a long time it has had branches +in France, Italy, Germany, Russia, Austria, even Turkey. + +"It is at the present moment moribund, or perhaps quite dead, but +another has just been created. The object of this one is to elect an +antipope who will be the exterminating Antichrist. And those are only +two of them. How many others are there, more or less important +numerically, more or less secret, which, by common accord, at ten +o'clock the morning of the Feast of the Holy Sacrament, celebrate black +masses at Paris, Rome, Bruges, Constantinople, Nantes, Lyons, and in +Scotland--where sorcerers swarm! + +"Then, outside of these universal associations and local assemblies, +isolated cases abound, on which little light can be shed, and that with +great difficulty. Some years ago there died, in a state of penitence, a +certain comte de Lautree, who presented several churches with statues +which he had bewitched so as to satanize the faithful. At Bruges a +priest of my acquaintance contaminates the holy ciboria and uses them to +prepare spells and conjurements. Finally one may, among all these, cite +a clear case of possession. It is the case of Cantianille, who in 1865 +turned not only the city of Auxerre, but the whole diocese of Sens, +upside down. + +"This Cantianille, placed in a convent of Mont-Saint-Sulpice, was +violated, when she was barely fifteen years old, by a priest who +dedicated her to the Devil. This priest himself had been corrupted, in +early childhood, by an ecclesiastic belonging to a sect of possessed +which was created the very day Louis XVI was guillotined. + +"What happened in this convent, where many nuns, evidently mad with +hysteria, were associated in erotic devilry and sacrilegious rages with +Cantianille, reads for all the world like the procedure in the trials of +wizards of long ago, the histories of Gaufrédy and Madeleine Palud, of +Urbain Grandier and Madeleine Bavent, or the Jesuit Girard and La +Cadière, histories, by the way, in which much might be said about +hystero-epilepsy on one hand and about Diabolism on the other. At any +rate, Cantianille, after being sent away from the convent, was exorcised +by a certain priest of the diocese, abbé Thorey, who seems to have been +contaminated by his patient. Soon at Auxerre there were such scandalous +scenes, such frenzied outbursts of Diabolism, that the bishop had to +intervene. Cantianille was driven out of the country, abbé Thorey was +disciplined, and the affair went to Rome. + +"The curious thing about it is that the bishop, terrified by what he had +seen, requested to be dismissed, and retired to Fontainebleau, where he +died, still in terror, two years later." + +"My friends," said Carhaix, consulting his watch, "it is a quarter to +eight. I must be going up into the tower to sound the angelus. Don't +wait for me. Have your coffee. I shall rejoin you in ten minutes." + +He put on his Greenland costume, lighted a lantern, and opened the door. +A stream of glacial air poured in. White molecules whirled in the +blackness. + +"The wind is driving the snow in through the loopholes along the stair," +said the woman. "I am always afraid that Louis will take cold in his +chest this kind of weather. Oh, well, Monsieur des Hermies, here is the +coffee. I appoint you to the task of serving it. At this hour of day my +poor old limbs won't hold me up any longer. I must go lie down." + +"The fact is," sighed Des Hermies, when they had wished her good night, +"the fact is that mama Carhaix is rapidly getting old. I have vainly +tried to brace her up with tonics. They do no good. She has worn herself +out. She has climbed too many stairs in her life, poor woman!" + +"All the same, it's very curious, what you have told me," said Durtal. +"To sum up, the most important thing about Satanism is the black mass." + +"That and the witchcraft and incubacy and succubacy which I will tell +you about; or rather, I will get another more expert than I in these +matters to tell you about them. Sacrilegious mass, spells, and +succubacy. There you have the real quintessence of Satanism." + +"And these hosts consecrated in blasphemous offices, what use is made of +them when they are not simply destroyed?" + +"But I already told you. They are used to consummate infamous acts. +Listen," and Des Hermies took from the bell-ringers bookshelf the fifth +volume of the _Mystik_ of Görres. "Here is the flower of them all: + + "'These priests, in their baseness, often go so far as to + celebrate the mass with great hosts which then they cut through + the middle and afterwards glue to a parchment, similarly cloven, + and use abominably to satisfy their passions.'" + +"Holy sodomy, in other words?" + +"Exactly." + +At this moment the bell, set in motion in the tower, boomed out. The +chamber in which Durtal and Des Hermies were sitting trembled and a +droning filled the air. It seemed that waves of sound came out of the +walls, unrolling in a spiral from the very rock, and that one was +transported, in a dream, into the inside of one of these shells which, +when held up to the ear, simulate the roar of rolling billows. Des +Hermies, accustomed to the mighty resonance of the bells at short range, +thought only of the coffee, which he had put on the stove to keep hot. + +Then the booming of the bell came more slowly. The humming departed from +the air. The window panes, the glass of the bookcase, the tumblers on +the table, ceased to rattle and gave off only a tenuous tinkling. + +A step was heard on the stair. Carhaix entered, covered with snow. + +"Cristi, boys, it blows!" He shook himself, threw his heavy outer +garments on a chair, and extinguished his lantern. "There were blinding +clouds of snow whirling in between the sounding-shutters. I can hardly +see. Dog's weather. The lady has gone to bed? Good. But you haven't +drunk your coffee?" he asked as he saw Durtal filling the glasses. + +Carhaix went up to the stove and poked the fire, then dried his eyes, +which the bitter cold had filled with tears, and drank a great draught +of coffee. + +"Now. That hits the spot. How far had you got with your lecture, Des +Hermies?" + +"I finished the rapid expose of Satanism, but I haven't yet spoken of +the genuine monster, the only real master that exists at the present +time, that defrocked abbé--" + +"Oh!" exclaimed Carhaix. "Take care. The mere name of that man brings +disaster." + +"Bah! Canon Docre--to utter his ineffable name--can do nothing to us. I +confess I cannot understand why he should inspire any terror. But never +mind. I should like for Durtal, before we hunt up the canon, to see your +friend Gévingey, who seems to be best and most intimately acquainted +with him. A conversation with Gévingey would considerably amplify my +contributions to the study of Satanism, especially as regards venefices +and succubacy. Let's see. Would you mind if we invited him here to +dine?" + +Carhaix scratched his head, then emptied the ashes of his pipe on his +thumbnail. + +"Well, you see, the fact is, we have had a slight disagreement." + +"What about?" + +"Oh, nothing very serious. I interrupted his experiments here one day. +But pour yourself some liqueur, Monsieur Durtal, and you, Des Hermies, +why, you aren't drinking at all," and while, lighting their cigarettes, +both sipped a few drops of almost proof cognac, Carhaix resumed, +"Gévingey, who, though an astrologer, is a good Christian and an honest +man--whom, indeed, I should be glad to see again--wished to consult my +bells. + +"That surprises you, but it's so. Bells formerly played quite an +important part in the forbidden science. The art of predicting the +future with their sounds is one of the least known and most disused +branches of the occult. Gévingey had dug up some documents, and wished +to verify them in the tower." + +"Why, what did he do?" + +"How do I know? He stood under the bell, at the risk of breaking his +bones--a man of his age on the scaffolding there! He was halfway into +the bell, the bell like a great hat, you see, coming clear down over his +hips. And he soliloquized aloud and listened to the repercussions of his +voice making the bronze vibrate. + +"He spoke to me also of the interpretation of dreams about bells. +According to him, whoever, in his sleep, sees bells swinging, is menaced +by an accident; if the bell chimes, it is presage of slander; if it +falls, ataxia is certain; if it breaks, it is assurance of afflictions +and miseries. Finally he added, I believe, that if the night birds fly +around a bell by moonlight one may be sure that sacrilegious robbery +will be committed in the church, or that the curate's life is in danger. + +"Be all that as it may, this business of touching the bells, getting up +into them--and you know they're consecrated--of attributing to them the +gift of prophecy, of involving them in the interpretation of dream--an +art formally forbidden in Leviticus--displeased me, and I demanded, +somewhat rudely, that he desist." + +"But you did not quarrel?" + +"No, and I confess I regret having been so hasty." + +"Well then, I will arrange it. I shall go see him--agreed?" said Des +Hermies. + +"By all means." + +"With that we must run along and give you a chance to get to bed, seeing +that you have to be up at dawn." + +"Oh, at half-past five for the six o'clock angelus, and then, if I want +to, I can go back to bed, for I don't have to ring again till a quarter +to eight, and then all I have to do is sound a couple of times for the +curate's mass. As you can see, I have a pretty easy thing of it." + +"Mmmm!" exclaimed Durtal, "if I had to get up so early!" + +"It's all a matter of habit. But before you go won't you have another +little drink? No? Really? Well, good night!" + +He lighted his lantern, and in single file, shivering, they descended +the glacial, pitch-dark, winding stair. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +Next morning Durtal woke later than usual. Before he opened his eyes +there was a sudden flash of light in his brain, and troops of demon +worshippers, like the societies of which Des Hermies had spoken, went +defiling past him, dancing a saraband. "A swarm of lady acrobats hanging +head downward from trapezes and praying with joined feet!" he said, +yawning. He looked at the window. The panes were flowered with crystal +fleurs de lys and frost ferns. Then he quickly drew his arms back under +the covers and snuggled up luxuriously. + +"A fine day to stay at home and work," he said. "I will get up and light +a fire. Come now, a little courage--" and--instead of tossing the covers +aside he drew them up around his chin. + +"Ah, I know that you are not pleased to see me taking a morning off," he +said, addressing his cat, which was hunched up on the counterpane at his +feet, gazing at him fixedly, its eyes very black. + +This beast, though affectionate and fond of being caressed, was crabbed +and set in its ways. It would tolerate no whims, no departures from the +regular course of things. It understood that there was a fixed hour for +rising and for going to bed, and when it was displeased it allowed a +shade of annoyance to pass into its eyes, the sense of which its master +could not mistake. + +If he returned before eleven at night, the cat was waiting for him in +the vestibule, scratching the wood of the door, miaouing, even before +Durtal was in the hall; then it rolled its languorous green-golden eyes +at him, rubbed against his trouser leg, stood up on its hind feet like +a tiny rearing horse and affectionately wagged its head at him as he +approached. If eleven o'clock had passed it did not run along in front +of him, but would only, very grudgingly, rise when he came up, and then +it would arch its back and suffer no caresses. When he came later yet, +it would not budge, and would complain and groan if he took the liberty +of stroking its head or scratching its throat. + +This morning it had no patience with Durtal's laziness. It squatted on +its hunkers, and swelled up, then it approached stealthily and sat down +two steps away from its master's face, staring at him with an +atrociously false eye, signifying that the time had come for him to +abdicate and leave the warm place for a cold cat. + +Amused by its manoeuvres, Durtal did not move, but returned its stare. +The cat was enormous, common, and yet bizarre with its rusty coat +yellowish like old coke ashes and grey as the fuzz on a new broom, with +little white tufts like the fleece which flies up from the burnt-out +faggot. It was a genuine gutter cat, long-legged, with a wild-beast +head. It was regularly striped with waving lines of ebony, its paws were +encircled by black bracelets and its eyes lengthened by two great +zigzags of ink. + +"In spite of your kill-joy character and your single track mind you +testy, old bachelor, you are a very nice cat," said Durtal, in an +insinuating, wheedling tone. "Then too, for many years now, I have told +you what one tells no man. You are the drain pipe of my soul, you +inattentive and indulgent confessor. Never shocked, you vaguely approve +the mental misdeeds which I confess to you. You let me relieve myself +and you don't charge me anything for the service. Frankly, that is what +you are here for. I spoil you with care and attentions because you are +the spiritual vent of solitude and celibacy, but that doesn't prevent +you, with your spiteful way of looking at me, from being insufferable at +times, as you are today, for instance!" + +The cat continued to stare at him, its ears sticking straight up as if +they would catch the sense of his words from the inflections of his +voice. It understood, doubtless, that Durtal was not disposed to jump +out of bed, for it went back to its old place, but now turned its back +full on him. + +"Oh come," said Durtal, discouraged, looking at his watch, "I've simply +got to get up and go to work on Gilles de Rais," and with a bound he +sprang into his trousers. The cat, rising suddenly, galloped across the +counterpane and rolled itself up into the warm covers, without waiting +an instant longer. + +"How cold it is!" and Durtal slipped on a knit jacket and went into the +other room to start a fire. "I shall freeze!" he murmured. + +Fortunately his apartment was easy to heat. It consisted simply of a +hall, a tiny sitting-room, a minute bedroom, and a large enough +bathroom. It was on the fifth floor, facing a sufficiently airy court. +Rent, eight hundred francs. + +It was furnished without luxury. The little sitting-room Durtal had +converted into a study, hiding the walls behind black wood bookcases +crammed with books. In front of the window were a great table, a leather +armchair, and a few straight chairs. He had removed the glass from the +mantelpiece, and in the panel, just over the mantelshelf, which was +covered with an old fabric, he had nailed an antique painting on wood, +representing a hermit kneeling beside a cardinal's hat and purple cloak, +beneath a hut of boughs. The colours of the landscape background had +faded, the blues to grey, the whites to russet, the greens to black, and +time had darkened the shadows to a burnt-onion hue. Along the edges of +the picture, almost against the black oak frame, a continuous narrative +unfolded in unintelligible episodes, intruding one upon the other, +portraying Lilliputian figures, in houses of dwarfs. Here the Saint, +whose name Durtal had sought in vain, crossed a curly, wooden sea in a +sailboat; there he marched through a village as big as a fingernail; +then he disappeared into the shadows of the painting and was discovered +higher up in a grotto in the Orient, surrounded by dromedaries and +bales of merchandise; again he was lost from sight, and after another +game of hide-and-seek he emerged, smaller than ever, quite alone, with a +staff in his hand and a knapsack on his back, mounting toward a strange, +unfinished cathedral. + +It was a picture by an unknown painter, an old Dutchman, who had perhaps +visited certain of the Italian masters, for he had appropriated colours +and processes peculiar to them. + +The bedroom contained a big bed, a chest of drawers waist-high, and some +easy chairs. On the mantel were an antique clock and copper +candlesticks. On the wall there was a fine photograph of a Botticelli in +the Berlin museum, representing a plump and penitent Virgin who was like +a housewife in tears. She was surrounded by gentleman-, lady-, and +little-boy-angels. The languishing young men held spliced wax tapers +that were like bits of rope; the coquettish hoydens had flowers stuck in +their long hair; and the mischievous cherub-pages looked rapturously at +the infant Jesus, who stood beside the Virgin and held out his hands in +benediction. + +Then there was a print of Breughel, engraved by Cock, "The wise and the +foolish virgins": a little panel, cut in the middle by a corkscrew cloud +which was flanked at each side by angels with their sleeves rolled up +and their cheeks puffed out, sounding the trumpet, while in the middle +of the cloud another angel, bizarre and sacerdotal, with his navel +indicated beneath his languorously flowing robe, unrolled a banderole on +which was written the verse of the Gospel, "_Ecce sponsus venit, exite +obviam ei_." + +Beneath the cloud, at one side, sat the wise virgins, good Flemings, +with their lighted lamps, and sang canticles as they turned the spinning +wheel. At the other side were the foolish virgins with their empty +lamps. Four joyous gossips were holding hands and dancing in a ring on +the greensward, while the fifth played the bagpipe and beat time with +her foot. Above the cloud the five wise virgins, slender and ethereal +now, naked and charming, brandished flaming tapers and mounted toward a +Gothic church where Christ stood to welcome them; while on the other +side the foolish virgins, imperfectly draped, beat vainly on a closed +door with their dead torches. + +The blessed naïveté of the Primitives, the homely touches in the scenes +of earth and of heaven! Durtal loved this old engraving. He saw in it a +union of the art of an Ostade purified and that of a Thierry Bouts. + +Waiting for his grate, in which the charcoal was crackling and peeling +and running like frying grease, to become red, he sat down in front of +his desk and ran over his notes. + +"Let's see," he said to himself, rolling a cigarette, "we had come to +the time when that excellent Gilles de Rais begins the quest of the +'great work.' It is easy to figure what knowledge he possessed about the +method of transmuting metals into gold. + +"Alchemy was already highly developed a century before he was born. The +writings of Albertus Magnus, Arnaud de Villeneuve, and Raymond Lully +were in the hands of the hermetics. The manuscripts of Nicolas Flamel +circulated, and there is no doubt that Gilles had acquired them, for he +was an avid collector of the rare. Let us add that at that epoch the +edict of Charles interdicting spagyric labours under pain of prison and +hanging, and the bull, _Spondent pariter quas non exhibent_, which Pope +John XXII fulminated against the alchemists, were still in vigour. These +treatises were, then, forbidden, and in consequence desirable. It is +certain that Gilles had long studied them, but from that to +understanding them is a far cry. + +"For they were written in an impossible jargon of allegories, twisted +and obscure metaphors, incoherent symbols, ambiguous parables, enigmas, +and ciphers. And here is an example." He took from one of the shelves of +the library a manuscript which was none other than the Asch-Mezareph, +the book of the Jew Abraham and of Nicolas Flamel, restored, translated, +and annotated by Eliphas Levi. This manuscript had been lent him by Des +Hermies, who had discovered it one day among some old papers. + +"In this is what claims to be the recipe for the philosopher's stone, +for the grand quintessential and tinctural essence. The figures are not +precisely clear," he said to himself, as he ran his eye over the pen +drawings, retouched in colour, representing, under the title of "_The +chemical coitus_" various bottles and flasks each containing a liquid +and imprisoning an allegorical creature. A green lion, with a crescent +moon over him, hung head downward. Doves were trying to fly out through +the neck of the bottle or to peck a way through the bottom. The liquid +was black and undulated with waves of carmine and gold, or white and +granulated with dots of ink, which sometimes took the shape of a frog or +a star. Sometimes the liquid was milky and troubled, sometimes flames +rose from it as if there were a film of alcohol over the surface. + +Eliphas Levi explained the symbolism of these bottled volatiles as fully +as he cared to, but abstained from giving the famous recipe for the +grand magisterium. He was keeping up the pleasantry of his other books, +in which, beginning with an air of solemnity, he affirmed his intention +of unveiling the old arcana, and, when the time came to fulfil his +promise, begged the question, alleging the excuse that he would perish +if he betrayed such burning secrets. The same excuse, which had done +duty through the ages, served in masking the perfect ignorance of the +cheap occultists of the present day. + +"As a matter of fact, the 'great work' is simple," said Durtal to +himself, folding up the manuscript of Nicolas Flamel. "The hermetic +philosophers discovered--and modern science, after long evading the +issue, no longer denies--that the metals are compounds, and that their +components are identical. They vary from each other according to the +different proportions of their elements. With the aid of an agent which +will displace these proportions one may transmute mercury, for example, +into silver, and lead into gold. + +"And this agent is the philosopher's stone: mercury--not the vulgar +mercury, which to the alchemists was but an aborted metallic sperm--but +the philosophers' mercury, called also the green lion, the serpent, the +milk of the Virgin, the pontic water. + +"Only the recipe for this mercury, or stone of the sages, has ever been +revealed--and it is this that the philosophers of the Middle Ages, the +Renaissance, all centuries, including our own, have sought so +frantically. + +"And in what has it not been sought?" said Durtal, thumbing his notes. +"In arsenic, in ordinary mercury, tin, salts of vitriol, saltpetre and +nitre; in the juices of spurge, poppy, and purslane; in the bellies of +starved toads; in human urine, in the menstrual fluid and the milk of +women." + +Now Gilles de Rais must have been completely baffled. Alone at +Tiffauges, without the aid of initiates, he was incapable of making +fruitful experiments. At that time Paris was the centre of the hermetic +science in France. The alchemists gathered under the vaults of Notre +Dame and studied the hieroglyphics which Nicolas Flamel, before he died, +had written on the walls of the charnal Des Innocents and on the portal +of Saint Jacques de la Boucherie, describing cabalistically the +preparation of the famous stone. + +The Marshal could not go to Paris because the English soldiers barred +the roads. There was only one thing to do. He wrote to the most +celebrated of the southern transmuters, and had them brought to +Tiffauges at great expense. + +"From documents which we posses we can see his supervising the +construction of the athanor, or alchemists' furnace, buying pelicans, +crucibles, and retorts. He turned one of the wings of his château into a +laboratory and shut himself up in it with Antonio di Palermo, François +Lombard, and 'Jean Petit, goldsmith of Paris,' all of whom busied +themselves night and day with the concoction of the 'great work.'" + +They were completely unsuccessful. At the end of their resources, these +hermetists disappeared, and there ensued at Tiffauges an incredible +coming-and-going of adepts and their helpers. They arrived from all +parts of Brittany, Poitou, and Maine, alone or escorted by promoters and +sorcerers. Gilles de Sillé and Roger de Bricqueville, cousins and +friends of the Marshal, scurried about the country, beating up the game +and driving it in to Gilles de Rais, while a priest of his chapel, +Eustache Blanchet, went to Italy where workers in metals were legion. + +While waiting, Gilles de Rais, not to be discouraged, continued his +experiments, all of which missed fire. He finally came to believe that +the magicians were right after all, and that no discovery was possible +without the aid of Satan. + +And one night, with a sorcerer newly arrived from Poitiers, Jean de la +Rivière, he betakes himself to a forest in the vicinity of the château +de Tiffauges. With his servitors Henriet and Poitou, he remains on the +verge of the wood into which the sorcerer penetrates. The night is heavy +and there is no moon. Gilles becomes nervous, scrutinizing the shadows, +listening to the muted sounds of the nocturnal landscape; his +companions, terrified, huddle close together, trembling and whispering +at the slightest stirring of the air. Suddenly a cry of anguish is +raised. They hesitate, then they advance, groping in the darkness. In a +sudden flare of light they perceive de la Rivière trembling and deathly +pale, clutching the handle of his lantern convulsively. In a low voice +he recounts how the Devil has risen in the form of a leopard and rushed +past without looking at the evocator, without saying a word. + +The next day the sorcerer vanished, but another arrived. This was a +bungler named Du Mesnil. He required Gilles to sign with blood a deed +binding him to give the Devil all the Devil asked of him "except his +life and soul," but, although to aid the conjurements Gilles consented +to have the Office of the Damned sung in his chapel on All Saints' Day, +Satan did not appear. + +The Marshal was beginning to doubt the powers of his magicians, when +the outcome of a new endeavor convinced him that frequently the Devil +does appear. + +An evocator whose name has been lost held a séance with Gilles and de +Sillé in a chamber at Tiffauges. + +On the ground he traces a great circle and commands his two companions +to step inside it. Sillé refuses. Gripped by a terror which he cannot +explain, he begins to tremble all over. He goes to the window, opens it, +and stands ready for flight, murmuring exorcisms under his breath. +Gilles, bolder, stands in the middle of the circle, but at the first +conjurgations he too trembles and tries to make the sign of the cross. +The sorcerer orders him not to budge. At one moment he feels something +seize him by the neck. Panic-stricken, he vacillates, supplicating Our +Lady to save him. The evocator, furious, throws him out of the circle. +Gilles precipitates himself through the door, de Sillé jumps out of the +window, they meet below and stand aghast. Howls are heard in the chamber +where the magician is operating. There is "a sound as of sword strokes +raining on a wooden billet," then groans, cries of distress, the appeals +of a man being assassinated. + +They stand rooted to the spot. When the clamour ceases they venture to +open the door and find the sorcerer lying; in pools of blood, his +forehead caved in, his body horribly mangled. + +They carry him out. Gilles, smitten with remorse, gives the man his own +bed, bandages him, and has him confessed. For several days the sorcerer +hovers between life and death but finally recovers and flees from the +castle. + +Gilles was despairing of obtaining from the Devil the recipe for the +sovereign magisterium, when Eustache Blanchet's return from Italy was +announced. Eustache brought the master of Florentine magic, the +irresistible evoker of demons and larvæ, Francesco Prelati. + +This man struck awe into Gilles. Barely twenty-three years old, he was +one of the wittiest, the most erudite, and the most polished men of the +time. What had he done before he came to install himself at Tiffauges, +there to begin, with Gilles, the most frightful series of sins against +the Holy Ghost that has ever been known? His testimony in the criminal +trial of Gilles does not furnish us any very detailed information on his +own score. He was born in the diocese of Lucca, at Pistoia, and had been +ordained a priest by the Bishop of Arezzo. Some time after his entrance +into the priesthood, he had become the pupil of a thaumaturge of +Florence, Jean de Fontenelle, and had signed a pact with a demon named +Barron. From that moment onward, this insinuating and persuasive, +learned and charming abbé, must have given himself over to the most +abominable of sacrileges and the most murderous practices of black +magic. + +At any rate Gilles came completely under the influence of this man. The +extinguished furnaces were relighted, and that Stone of the Sages, which +Prelati had seen, flexible, frail, red and smelling of calcinated marine +salt, they sought together furiously, invoking Hell. + +Their incantations were all in vain. Gilles, disconsolate, redoubled +them, but they finally produced a dreadful result and Prelati narrowly +escaped with his life. + +One afternoon Eustache Blanchet, in a gallery of the château, perceives +the Marshal weeping bitterly. Plaints of supplication are heard through +the door of a chamber in which Prelati has been evoking the Devil. + +"The Demon is in there beating my poor Francis. I implore you, go in!" +cries Gilles, but Blanchet, frightened, refuses. Then Gilles makes up +his mind, in spite of his fear. He is advancing to force the door, when +it opens and Prelati staggers out and falls, bleeding, into his arms. +Prelati is able, with the support of his friends, to gain the chamber of +the Marshal, where he is put to bed, but he has sustained so merciless a +thrashing that he goes into delirium and his fever keeps mounting. +Gilles, in despair, stays beside him, cares for him, has him confessed, +and weeps for joy when Prelati is out of danger. + +"The fate of the unknown sorcerer and of Prelati, both getting +dangerously wounded in an empty room, under identical circumstances--I +tell you, it's a remarkable coincidence," said Durtal to himself. + +"And the documents which relate these facts are authentic. They are, +indeed, excerpts from the procedure in Gilles's trial. The confessions +of the accused and the depositions of the witnesses agree, and it is +impossible to think that Gilles and Prelati lied, for in confessing +these Satanic evocations they condemned themselves, by their own words, +to be burned alive. + +"If in addition they had declared that the Evil One had appeared to +them, that they had been visited by succubi; if they had affirmed that +they had heard voices, smelled odours, even touched a body; we might +conclude that they had had hallucinations similar to those of certain +Bicêtre subjects, but as it was there could have been no misfunctioning +of the senses, no morbid visions, because the wounds, the marks of the +blows, the material fact, visible and tangible, are present for +testimony. + +"Imagine how thoroughly convinced of the reality of the Devil a mystic +like Gilles de Rais must have been after witnessing such scenes! + +"In spite of his discomfitures, he could not doubt--and Prelati, +half-killed, must have doubted even less--that if Satan pleased, they +should finally find this powder which would load them with riches and +even render them almost immortal--for at that epoch the philosopher's +stone passed not only for an agent in the transmutation of base metals, +such as tin, lead, copper, into noble metals like silver and gold, but +also for a panacea curing all ailments and prolonging life, without +infirmities, beyond the limits formerly assigned to the patriarchs. + +"Singular science," ruminated Durtal, raising the fender of his +fireplace and warming his feet, "in spite of the railleries of this +time, which, in the matter of discoveries but exhumes lost things, the +hermetic philosophy was not wholly vain. + +"The master of contemporary science, Dumas, recognizes, under the name +of isomery, the theories of the alchemists, and Berthelot declares, 'No +one can affirm _a priori_ that the fabrication of bodies reputed to be +simple is impossible.' Then there have been verified and certified +achievements. Besides Nicolas Flamel, who really seems to have succeeded +in the 'great work,' the chemist Van Helmont, in the eighteenth century, +received from an unknown man a quarter of a grain of philosopher's stone +and with it transformed eight ounces of mercury into gold. + +"At the same epoch, Helvetius, who combated the dogma of the spagyrics, +received from another unknown a powder of projection with which he +converted an ingot of lead into gold. Helvetius was not precisely a +charlatan, neither was Spinoza, who verified the experiment, a credulous +simpleton. + +"And what is to be thought of that mysterious man Alexander Sethon who, +under the name of the Cosmopolite, went all over Europe, operating +before princes, in public, transforming all metals into gold? This +alchemist, who seems to have had a sincere disdain for riches, as he +never kept the gold which he created, but lived in poverty and prayer, +was imprisoned by Christian II, Elector of Saxony, and endured martyrdom +like a saint. He suffered himself to be beaten with rods and pierced +with pointed stakes, and he refused to give up a secret which he +claimed, like Nicolas Flamel, to have received from God. + +"And to think that these researches are being carried on at the present +time! Only, most of the hermetics now deny medical and divine virtues to +the famous stone. They think simply that the grand magisterium is a +ferment, which, thrown into metals in fusion, produces a molecular +transformation similar to that which organic matter undergoes when +fermented with the aid of a leaven. + +"Des Hermies, who is well acquainted with the underworld of science, +maintains that more than forty alchemic furnaces are now alight in +France, and that in Hanover and Bavaria the adepts are more numerous +yet. + +"Have they rediscovered the incomparable secret of antiquity? In spite +of certain affirmations, it is hardly probable. Nobody need manufacture +artificially a metal whose origins are so unaccountable that a deposit +is likely to be found anywhere. For instance, in a law suit which took +place at Paris in the month of November, 1886, between M. Popp, +constructor of pneumatic city clocks, and financiers who had been +backing him, certain engineers and chemists of the School of Mines +declared that gold could be extracted from common silex, so that the +very walls sheltering us might be placers, and the mansards might be +loaded with nuggets! + +"At any rate," he continued, smiling, "these sciences are not +propitious." + +He was thinking of an old man who had installed an alchemic laboratory +on the fifth floor of a house in the rue Saint Jacques. This man, named +Auguste Redoutez, went every afternoon to the Bibliothèque Nationale and +pored over the works of Nicolas Flamel. Morning and evening he pursued +the quest of the "great work" in front of his furnace. + +The 16th of March the year before, he came out of the Bibliothèque with +a man who had been sitting at the same table with him, and as they +walked along together Redoutez declared that he was finally in +possession of the famous secret. Arriving in his laboratory, he threw +pieces of iron into a retort, made a projection, and obtained crystals +the colour of blood. The other examined the salts and made a flippant +remark. The alchemist, furious, threw himself upon him, struck him with +a hammer, and had to be overpowered and carried in a strait-jacket to +Saint Anne, pending investigation. + +"In the sixteenth century, in Luxemburg, initiates were roasted in iron +cages. The following century, in Germany, they were clothed in rags and +hanged on gilded gibbets. Now that they are tolerated and left in peace +they go mad. Decidedly, fate is against them," Durtal concluded. + +He rose and went to answer a ring at the door. He came back with a +letter which the concierge had brought. He opened it. + +"Why, what is this?" he exclaimed. His astonishment grew as he read: + + "Monsieur, + + "I am neither an adventuress nor a seeker of adventures, nor am + I a society woman grown weary of drawing-room conversation. Even + less am I moved by the vulgar curiosity to find out whether an + author is the same in the flesh as he is in his books. Indeed I + am none of the things which you may think I am, from my writing + to you this way. The fact is that I have just finished reading + your last book," + +"She has taken her time," murmured Durtal, "it appeared a year ago." + + "melancholy as an imprisoned soul vainly beating its wings + against the bars of its cage." + +"Oh, hell! What a compliment. Anyway, it rings false, like all of them." + + "And now, Monsieur, though I am convinced that it is always + folly and madness to try to realize a desire, will you permit + that a sister in lassitude meet you some evening in a place + which you shall designate, after which we shall return, each of + us, into our own interior, the interior of persons destined to + fall because they are out of line with their 'fellows'? Adieu, + Monsieur, be assured that I consider you a somebody in a century + of nobodies. + + "Not knowing whether this note will elicit a reply, I abstain + from making myself known. This evening a maid will call upon + your concierge and ask him if there is a letter for Mme. + Maubel." + +"Hmm!" said Durtal, folding up the letter. "I know her. She must be one +of these withered dames who are always trying to cash outlawed +kiss-tickets and soul-warrants in the lottery of love. Forty-five years +old at least. Her _clientele_ is composed of boys, who are always +satisfied if they don't have to pay, and men of letters, who are yet +more easily satisfied--for the ugliness of authors' mistresses is +proverbial. Unless this is simply a practical joke. But who would be +playing one on me--I don't know anybody--and why?" + +In any case, he would simply not reply. + +But in spite of himself he reopened the letter. + +"Well now, what do I risk? If this woman wants to sell me an over-ripe +heart, there is nothing forcing me to purchase it. I don't commit myself +to anything by going to an assignation. But where shall I meet her? +Here? No! Once she gets into my apartment complications arise, for it is +much more difficult to throw a woman out of your house than simply to +walk off and leave her at a street corner. Suppose I designated the +corner of the rue de Sèvres and the rue de la Chaise, under the wall of +the Abbaye-au-Bois. It is solitary, and then, too, it is only a minute's +walk from here. Or no, I will begin vaguely, naming no meeting-place at +all. I shall solve that problem later, when I get her reply." + +He wrote a letter in which he spoke of his own spiritual lassitude and +declared that no good could come of an interview, for he no longer +sought happiness on earth. + +"I will add that I am in poor health. That is always a good one, and it +excuses a man from 'being a man' if necessary," he said to himself, +rolling a cigarette. + +"Well, that's done, and she won't get much encouragement out of it. Oh, +wait. I omitted something. To keep from giving her a hold on me I shall +do well to let her know that a serious and sustained liaison with me is +impossible 'for family reasons.' And that's enough for one time." + +He folded the letter and scrawled the address. + +Then he held the sealed envelope in his hand and reflected. + +"Of course I am a fool to answer her. Who knows what situations a thing +like this is going to lead to? I am well aware that whoever she be, a +woman is an incubator of sorrow and annoyance. If she is good she is +probably stupid, or perhaps she is an invalid, or perhaps she is so +disastrously fecund that she gets pregnant if you look at her. If she is +bad, one may expect to be dragged through every disgusting kind of +degradation. Oh, whatever you do, you're in for it." + +He regurgitated the memories of his youthful amours. Deception. +Disenchantment. How pitilessly base a woman is while she is young! + +" ... To be thinking of things like that now at my age! As if I had any +need of a woman now!" + +But in spite of all, his pseudonymous correspondent interested him. + +"Who knows? Perhaps she is good-looking, or at least not very +ill-looking. It doesn't cost me anything to find out." + +He re-read her letter. No misspelling. The handwriting not commercial. +Her ideas about his book were mediocre enough, but who would expect her +to be a critic? "Discreet scent of heliotrope," he added, sniffing the +envelope. + +"Oh, well, let's have our little fling." + +And as he went out to get some breakfast he left his reply with the +concierge. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +"If this continues I shall lose my mind," murmured Durtal as he sat in +front of his table reperusing the letters which he had been receiving +from that woman for the last week. She was an indefatigable +letter-writer, and since she had begun her advances he had not had time +to answer one letter before another arrived. + +"My!" he said, "let's try and see just where we do stand. After that +ungracious answer to her first note she immediately sends me this: + + "'Monsieur, + + "'This is a farewell. If I were weak enough to write you any + more letters they would become as tedious as the life I lead. + Anyway, have I not had the best part of you, in that hesitant + letter of yours which shook me out of my lethargy for an + instant? Like yourself, monsieur, I know, alas! that nothing + happens, and that our only certain joys are those we dream of. + So, in spite of my feverish desire to know you, I fear that you + were right in saying that a meeting would be for both of us the + source of regrets to which we ought not voluntarily expose + ourselves....' + +"Then what bears witness to the perfect futility of this exordium is the +way the missive ends: + + "'If you should take the fancy to write me, you can safely + address your letters "Mme. Maubel, rue Littré, general + delivery." I shall be passing the rue Littré post-office Monday. + If you wish to let matters remain just where they are--and thus + cause me a great deal of pain--will you not tell me so, + frankly?' + +"Whereupon I was simple-minded enough to compose an epistle as +ambiguous as the first, concealing my furtive advances under an apparent +reluctance, thus letting her know that I was securely hooked. As her +third note proves: + + "'Never accuse yourself, monsieur--I repress a tenderer name + which rises to my lips--of being unable to give me consolation. + Weary, disabused, as we are, and done with it all, let us + sometimes permit our souls to speak to each other--low, very + low--as I have spoken to you this night, for henceforth my + thought is going to follow you wherever you are.' + +"Four pages of the same tune," he said, turning the leaves, "but this is +better: + + "'Tonight, my unknown friend, one word only. I have passed a + horrible day, my nerves in revolt and crying out against the + petty sufferings they are subjected to every minute. A slamming + door, a harsh or squeaky voice floating up to me out of the + street.... Yet there are whole hours when I am so far from being + sensitive that if the house were burning I should not move. Am I + about to send you a page of comic lamentations? Ah, when one has + not the gift of rendering one's grief superbly and transforming + it into literary or musical passages which weep magnificently, + the best thing is to keep still about it. + + "'I bid you a silent goodnight. As on the first day, I am + harassed by the conflict of the desire to see you and the dread + of touching a dream lest it perish. Ah, yes, you spoke truly. + Miserable, miserable wretches that we are, our timorous souls + are so afraid of any reality that they dare not think a sympathy + which has taken possession of them capable of surviving an + interview with the person who gave it birth. Yet, in spite of + this fine casuistry, I simply must confess to you--no, no, + nothing. Guess if you can, and forgive me for this banal + letter. Or rather, read between the lines, and perhaps you will + find there a little bit of my heart and a great deal of what I + leave unsaid. + + "'A foolish letter with "I" written all over it. Who would + suspect that while I wrote it my sole thought was of You?'" + +"So far, so good. This woman at least piqued my curiosity. And what +peculiar ink," he thought. It was myrtle green, very thin, very pale. +With his finger-nail he detached some of the fine dust of rice powder, +perfumed with heliotrope, clinging to the seal of the letters. + +"She must be blonde," he went on, examining the tint of the powder, "for +it isn't the 'Rachel' shade that brunettes use. Now up to that point +everything had been going nicely, but then and there I spoiled it. Moved +by I know not what folly, I wrote her a yet more roundabout letter, +which, however, was very pressing. In attempting to fan her flame I +kindled myself--for a spectre--and at once I received this: + + "'What shall I do? I neither wish to see you, nor can I consent + to annihilate my overwhelming desire to meet you. Last night, in + spite of me, your name, which was burning me, sprang from my + lips. My husband, one of your admirers, it seems, appeared to be + somewhat humiliated by the preoccupation which, indeed, was + absorbing me and causing unbearable shivers to run all through + me. A common friend of yours and mine--for why should I not tell + you that you know me, if to have met socially is to "know" + anyone?--one of your friends, then, came up and said that + frankly he was very much taken with you. I was in a state of + such utter lack of self-control that I don't know what I should + have done had it not been for the unwitting assistance which + somebody gave me by pronouncing the name of a grotesque person + of whom I can never think without laughing. Adieu. You are + right. I tell myself that I will never write you again, and I go + and do it anyway. + + "'Your own--as I cannot be in reality without wounding us both.' + +"Then when I wrote a burning reply, this was brought by a maid on a dead +run: + + "'Ah, if I were not afraid, afraid!--and you know you are just + as much afraid as I am--how I should fly to you! No, you cannot + hear the thousand conversations with which my soul fatigues + yours.... Oh, in my miserable existence there are hours when + madness seizes me. Judge for yourself. The whole night I spent + appealing to you furiously. I wept with exasperation. This + morning my husband came into the room. My eyes were bloodshot. I + began to laugh crazily, and when I could speak I said to him, + "What would you think of a person who, questioned as to his + profession, replied, 'I am a chamber succubus'?" "Ah, my dear, + you are ill," said he. "Worse than you think," said I. + + "'But if I come to see you, what could we talk about, in the + state you yourself are in? Your letter has completely unbalanced + me. You arraign your malady with a certain brutality which makes + my body rejoice but alienates my soul a little. Ah, what if our + dreams could really come true! + + "'Ah, say a word, just one word, from out your own heart. Don't + be afraid that even one of your letters can possibly fall into + other hands than mine.' + +"So, so, so. This is getting to be no laughing matter," concluded +Durtal, folding up the letter. "The woman is married to a man who knows +me, it seems. What a situation! Let's see, now. Whom have I ever +visited?" He tried vainly to remember. No woman he had ever met at an +evening party would address such declarations to him. And that common +friend. "But I have no friends, except Des Hermies. I'd better try and +find out whom he has been seeing recently. But as a physician he meets +scores of people! And then, how can I explain to him? Tell him the +story? He will burst into a roar and disillusion me before I have got +halfway through the narrative." + +And Durtal became irritated, for within him a really incomprehensible +phenomenon was taking place. He was burning for this unknown woman. He +was positively obsessed by her. He who had renounced all carnal +relations years ago, who, when the barns of his senses were opened, +contented himself with driving the disgusting herd of sin to the +commercial shambles to be summarily knocked in the head by the butcher +girls of love, he, he! was getting himself to believe--in the teeth of +all experience, in the teeth of good judgment--that with a woman as +passionate as this one seemed to be, he would experience superhuman +sensations and novel abandon. + +And he imagined her as he would have her, blonde, firm of flesh, lithe, +feline, melancholy, capable of frenzies; and the picture of her brought +on such a tension of nerves that his teeth rattled. + +For a week, in the solitude in which he lived, he had dreamed of her and +had become thoroughly aroused and incapable of doing any work, even of +reading, for the image of this woman interposed itself between him and +the page. + +He tried suggesting to himself ignoble visions. He would imagine this +creature in moments of corporal distress and thus calm his desires with +unappetizing hallucinations; but the procedure which had formerly been +very effective when he desired a woman and could not have her now failed +utterly. He somehow could not imagine his unknown in quest of bismuth or +of linen. He could not see her otherwise than rebellious, melancholy, +dizzy with desire, kindling him with her eyes, inflaming him with her +pale hands. + +And his sensual resurrection was incredible--an aberrated Dog Star +flaming in a physical November, at a spiritual All Hallows. Tranquil, +dried up, safe from crises, without veritable desires, almost impotent, +or rather completely forgetful of sex for months at a time, he was +suddenly roused--and for an unreality!--by the mystery of mad letters. + +"Enough!" he cried, smiting the table a jarring blow. + +He clapped on his hat and went out, slamming the door behind him. + +"I know how to make my imagination behave!" and he rushed over to the +Latin Quarter to see a prostitute he knew. "I have been a good boy too +long," he murmured as he hurried down the street. "One can't stay on the +straight and narrow path for ever." + +He found the woman at home and had a miserable time. She was a buxom +brunette with festive eyes and the teeth of a wolf. An expert, she +could, in a few seconds, drain one's marrow, granulate the lungs, and +demolish the loins. + +She chid him for having been away so long, then cajoled him and kissed +him. He felt pathetic, listless, out of breath, out of place, for he had +no genuine desires. He finally flung himself on a couch and, enervated +to the point of crying, he went through the back-breaking motions +mechanically, like a dredge. + +Never had he so execrated the flesh, never had he felt such repugnance +and lassitude, as when he issued from that room. He strolled haphazard +down the rue Soufflot, and the image of the unknown obsessed him, more +irritating, more tenacious. + +"I begin to understand the superstition of the succubus. I must try some +bromo-exorcism. Tonight I will swallow a gram of bromide of potassium. +That will make my senses be good." + +But he realized that the trouble was not primarily physical, that really +it was only the consequence of an extraordinary state of mind. His love +for that which departed from the formula, for that projection _out of +the world_ which had recently cheered him in art, had deviated and +sought expression in a woman. She embodied his need to soar upward from +the terrestrial humdrum. + +"It is those precious unworldly studies, those cloister thoughts +picturing ecclesiastical and demoniac scenes, which have prepared me for +the present folly," he said to himself. His unsuspected, and hitherto +unexpressed, mysticism, which had determined his choice of subject for +his last work was now sending him out, in disorder, to seek new pains +and pleasures. + +As he walked along he recapitulated what he knew of the woman. She was +married, blonde, in easy circumstances because she had her own sleeping +quarters and a maid. She lived in the neighbourhood, because she went to +the rue Littré post-office for her mail. Her name, supposing she had +prefixed her own initial to the name of Maubel, was Henriette, Hortense, +Honorine, Hubertine, or Hélène. What else? She must frequent the society +of artists, because she had met him, and for years he had not been in a +bourgeois drawing-room. She was some kind of a morbid Catholic, because +that word succubus was unknown to the profane. That was all. Then there +was her husband, who, gullible as he might be, must nevertheless suspect +their liaison, since, by her own confession, she dissembled her +obsession very badly. + +"This is what I get for letting myself be carried away. For I, too, +wrote at first to amuse myself with aphrodisiac statements. Then I ended +by becoming completely hysterical. We have taken turns fanning +smouldering ashes which now are blazing. It is too bad that we have both +become inflamed at the same time--for her case must be the same as mine, +to judge from the passionate letters she writes. What shall I do? Keep +on tantalizing myself for a chimera? No! I'll bring matters to a head, +see her, and if she is good-looking, sleep with her. I shall have peace, +anyway." + +He looked about him. Without knowing how he had got there he found +himself in the Jardin des Plantes. He oriented himself, remembered that +there was a café on the side facing the quay, and went to find it. + +He tried to control himself and write a letter at once ardent and firm, +but the pen shook in his fingers. He wrote at a gallop, confessed that +he regretted not having consented, at the outset, to the meeting she +proposed, and, attempting to check himself, declared, "We must see each +other. Think of the harm we are doing ourselves, teasing each other at a +distance. Think of the remedy we have at hand, my poor darling, I +implore you." + +He must indicate a place of meeting. He hesitated. "Let me think," he +said to himself. "I don't want her to alight at my place. Too dangerous. +Then the best thing to do would be to offer her a glass of port and a +biscuit and conduct her to Lavenue's, which is a hotel as well as a +café. I will reserve a room. That will be less disgusting than an +assignation house. Very well, then, let us put in place of the rue de la +Chaise the waiting-room of the Gare Montparnasse. Sometimes it is quite +empty. Well, that's done." He gummed the envelope and felt a kind of +relief. "Ah! I was forgetting. Garçon! The Bottin de Paris." + +He searched for the name Maubel, thinking that by some chance it might +be her own. Of course it was hardly probable, but she seemed so +imprudent that with her anything was to be expected. He might very +easily have met a Mme. Maubel and forgotten her. He found a Maubé and a +Maubec, but no Maubel. "Of course, that proves nothing," he said, +closing the directory. He went out and threw his letter into the box. +"The joker in this is the husband. But hell, I am not likely to take his +wife away from him very long." + +He had an idea of going home, but he realized that he would do no work, +that alone he would relapse into daydream. "If I went up to Des +Hermies's place. Yes, today was his consultation day, it's an idea." + +He quickened his pace, came to the rue Madame, and rang at an entresol. +The housekeeper opened the door. + +"Ah, Monsieur Durtal, he is out, but he will be in soon. Will you wait?" + +"But you are sure he is coming back?" + +"Why, yes. He ought to be here now," she said, stirring the fire. + +As soon as she had retired Durtal sat down, then, becoming bored, he +went over and began browsing among the books which covered the wall as +in his own place. + +"Des Hermies certainly has some curious items," he murmured, opening a +very old book. Here's a treatise written centuries ago to suit my case +exactly. _Manuale exorcismorum_. Well, I'll be damned! It's a Plantin. +And what does this manual have to recommend in the treatment of the +possessed? + +"Hmmm. Contains some quaint counter-spells. Here are some for +energumens, for the bewitched; here are some against love-philtres and +against the plague; against spells cast on comestibles; some, even, to +keep butter and milk sweet. That isn't odd. The Devil entered into +everything in the good old days. And what can this be?" In his hand he +held two little volumes with crimson edges, bound in fawn-coloured calf. +He opened them and looked at the title, _The anatomy of the mass_, by +Pierre du Moulin, dated, Geneva, 1624. "Might prove interesting." He +went to warm his feet, and hastily skimmed through one of the volumes. +"Why!" he said, "it's mighty good." + +On the page which he was reading was a discussion of the priesthood. The +author affirmed that none might exercise the functions of the priesthood +if he was not sound in body, or if any of his members had been +amputated, and asking apropos of this, if a castrated man could be +ordained a priest, he answered his own question, "No, unless he carries +upon him, reduced to powder, the parts which are wanting." He added, +however, that Cardinal Tolet did not admit this interpretation, which +nevertheless had been universally adopted. + +Durtal, amused, read on. Now du Moulin was debating with himself the +point whether it was necessary to interdict abbés ravaged by lechery. +And in answer he cited himself the melancholy glose of Canon Maximianus, +who, in his Distinction 81, sighs, "It is commonly said that none ought +to be deposed from his charge for fornication, in view of the fact that +few can be found exempt from this vice." + +"Why! You here?" said Des Hermies, entering. "What are you reading? _The +anatomy of the mass?_ Oh, it's a poor thing, for Protestants. I am just +about distracted. Oh, my friend, what brutes those people are," and like +a man with a great weight on his chest he unburdened himself. + +"Yes, I have just come from a consultation with those whom the journals +characterize as 'princes of science.' For a quarter of an hour I have +had to listen to the most contradictory opinions. On one point, however, +all agreed: that my patient was a dead man. Finally they compromised and +decided that the poor wretch's torture should be needlessly prolonged by +a course of moxas. I timidly remarked that it would be simpler to send +for a confessor, and then assuage the sufferings of the dying man with +repeated injections of morphine. If you had seen their faces! They came +as near as anything to denouncing me as a tout for the priests. + +"And such is contemporary science. Everybody discovers a new or +forgotten disease, and trumpets a forgotten or a new remedy, and nobody +knows a thing! And then, too, what good does it do one not to be +hopelessly ignorant since there is so much sophistication going on in +pharmacy that no physician can be sure of having his prescriptions +filled to the letter? One example among many: at present, sirup of white +poppy, the diacodia of the old Codex, does not exist. It is manufactured +with laudanum and sirup of sugar, as if they were the same thing! + +"We have got so we no longer dose substances but prescribe ready-made +remedies and use those surprising specifics which fill up the fourth +pages of the journals. It's a compromise medicine, a democratic +medicine, one cure for all cases. It's scandalous, it's silly. + +"No, there is no use in talking. The old therapeutics based on +experience was better than this. At least it know that remedies ingested +in pill, powder, or bolus form were treacherous, so it prescribed them +only in the liquid state. Now, too, every physician specializes. The +oculists see only the eyes, and, to cure them, quite calmly poison the +body. With their pilocarpine they have ruined the health of how many +people for ever! Others treat cutaneous affections. They drive an eczema +inward on an old man who as soon as he is 'cured' becomes childish or +dangerous. There is no more solidarity. Allegiance to one party means +hostility to all others. Its a mess. Now my honourable confrères are +stumbling around, taking a fancy to medicaments which they don't even +know how to use. Take antipyrine, for example. It is one of the very few +really active products that the chemists have found in a long time. +Well, where is the doctor who knows that, applied in a compress with +iodide and cold Bondonneau spring water, antipyrine combats the +supposedly incurable ailment, cancer? And if that seems incredible, it +is true, nevertheless." + +"Honestly," said Durtal, "you believe that the old-time doctors came +nearer healing?" + +"Yes, because, miraculously, they know the effects of certain invariable +remedies prepared without fraud. Of course it is self-evident that when +old Paré eulogized 'sack medicine' and ordered his patients to carry +pulverized medicaments in a little sack whose form varied according to +the organ to be healed, assuming the form of a cap for the head, of a +bagpipe for the stomach, of an ox tongue for the spleen, he probably did +not obtain very signal results. His claim to have cured gastralgia by +appositions of powder of red rose, coral and mastic, wormwood and mint, +aniseed and nutmeg, is certainly not to be borne out, but he also had +other systems, and often he cured, because he possessed the science of +simples, which is now lost. + +"The present-day physicians shrug their shoulders when the name of +Ambrose Paré is mentioned. They used to pooh-pooh the idea of the +alchemists that gold had medicinal virtue. Their fine scorn does not now +prevent them from using alternate doses of the salts and of the filings +of this metal. They use concentrated arseniate of gold against anemia, +muriate against syphilis, cyanide against amenorrhea and scrofula, and +chloride of sodium and gold against old ulcers. No, I assure you, it is +disgusting to be a physician, for in spite of the fact that I am a +doctor of science and have extensive hospital experience I am quite +inferior to humble country herborists, solitaries, who know a great deal +more than I about what is useful to know--and I admit it." + +"And homeopathy?" + +"It has some good things about it and some bad ones. It also palliates +without curing. It sometimes represses maladies, but for grave and acute +cases it is impotent, just like this Mattei system, which, however, is +useful as an intermediary to stave off a crisis. With its blood-and +lymph-purifying products, its antiscrofoloso, its angiotico, its +anti-canceroso, it sometimes modifies morbid states in which other +methods are of no avail. For instance, it permits a patient whose +kidneys have been demoralized by iodide of potassium to gain time and +recuperate so that he can safely begin to drink iodide again! + +"I add that terrific shooting pains, which rebel even against chloroform +and morphine, often yield to an application of 'green electricity.' You +ask me, perhaps, of what ingredients this liquid electricity is made. I +answer that I know absolutely nothing about it. Mattei claims that he +has been able to fix in his globules and liquors the electrical +properties of certain plants, but he has never given out his recipe, +hence he can tell whatever stories suit him. What is curious, anyway, +is that this system, thought out by a Roman count, a Catholic, has its +most important following and propaganda among Protestant pastors, whose +original asininity becomes abysmal in the unbelievable homilies which +accompany their essays on healing. Indeed, considered seriously, these +systems are a lot of wind. The truth is that in the art of healing we +grope along at hazard. Nevertheless, with a little experience and a +great deal of nerve we can manage so as not too shockingly to depopulate +the cities. Enough of that, old man, and now where have you been keeping +yourself?" + +"Just what I was going to ask you. You haven't been to see me for over a +week." + +"Well, just now everybody in the world is ill and I am racing around all +the time. By the way, I've been attending Chantelouve, who has a pretty +serious attack of gout. He complains of your absence, and his wife, whom +I should not have taken for an admirer of your books, of your last novel +especially, speaks to me unceasingly of them and you. For a person +customarily so reserved, she seems to me to have become quite +enthusiastic about you, does Mme. Chantelouve. Why, what's the matter?" +he exclaimed, seeing how red Durtal had become. + +"Oh, nothing, but I've got to be going. Good night." + +"Why, aren't you feeling well?" + +"Oh, it's nothing, I assure you." + +"Oh, well," said Des Hermies, knowing better than to insist. "Look at +this," and took him into the kitchen and showed him a superb leg of +mutton hanging beside the window. "I hung it up in a draft so as to get +some of the crass freshness out of it. We'll eat it when we have the +astrologer Gévingey to dine with us at Carhaix's. As I am the only +person alive who knows how to boil a _gigot à l'Anglaise_, I am going to +be the cook, so I shan't come by for you. You will find me in the tower, +disguised as a scullery maid." + +Once outside, Durtal took a long breath. Well, well, his unknown was +Chantelouve's wife. Impossible! She had never paid the slightest +attention to him. She was silent and cold. Impossible! And yet, why had +she spoken that way to Des Hermies? But surely if she had wanted to see +him she would have come to his apartment, since they were acquaintances. +She would not have started this correspondence under a pseudonym-- + +"H. de Maubel!" he said suddenly, "why, Mme. Chantelouve's name is +Hyacinthe, a boy's name which suits her very well. She lives in the rue +Babneux not vary far from the rue Littré post-office. She is a blonde, +she has a maid, she is a fervent Catholic. She's the one." + +And he experienced, almost simultaneously, two absolutely distinct +sensations. + +Of disappointment, first, for his unknown pleased him better. Mme. +Chantelouve would never realize the ideal he had fashioned for himself, +the tantalizing features, the agile, wild animal body, the melancholy +and ardent bearing, which he had dreamed. Indeed, the mere fact of +knowing the unknown rendered her less desirable, more vulgar. +Accessibility killed the chimera. + +At the same time he experienced a lively relief. He might have been +dealing with a hideous old crone, and Hyacinthe, as he immediately began +to call her, was desirable. Thirty-three at most, not pretty, but +peculiar; blonde, slight and supple, with no hips, she seemed thin +because she was small-boned. The face, mediocre, spoiled by too big a +nose, but the lips incandescent, the teeth superb, her complexion ever +so faint a rose in the slightly bluish milk white of rice water a little +troubled. + +Then her real charm, the really deceptive enigma of her, was in her +eyes; ash-grey eyes which seemed uncertain, myopic, and which conveyed +an expression of resigned boredom. At certain moments the pupils glowed +like a gem of grey water and sparks of silver twinkled to the surface. +By turns they were dolent, forsaken, languorous, and haughty. He +remembered that those eyes had often brought his heart into his throat! + +In spite of circumstantial evidence, he reflected that those +impassioned letters did not correspond in any way to this woman in the +flesh. Never was woman more controlled, more adept in the lies of good +breeding. He remembered the Chantelouve at-homes. She seemed attentive, +made no contribution to the conversation, played the hostess smiling, +without animation. It was a kind of case of dual personality. In one +visible phase a society woman, prudent and reserved, in another +concealed phase a wild romantic, mad with passion, hysterical of body, +nymphomaniac of soul. It hardly seemed probable. + +"No," he said, "I am on the wrong track. It's merely by chance that Mme. +Chantelouve spoke of my books to Des Hermies, and I mustn't jump to the +conclusion that she is smitten with me and that she has been writing me +these hot letters. It isn't she, but who on earth is it?" + +He continued to revolve the question, without coming any nearer a +solution. Again he called before his eyes the image of this woman, and +admitted that she was really potently seductive, with a fresh, girlish +body, flexible, and without a lot of repugnant flesh--and mysterious, +with her concentrated air, her plaintive eyes, and even her coldness, +real or feigned. + +He summarized all that he really knew about her: simply that she was a +widow when she married Chantelouve, that she had no children, that her +first husband, a manufacturer of chasubles, had, for unknown reasons, +committed suicide. That was all. On the other hand, too, too much was +known about Chantelouve! + +Author of a history of Poland and the cabinets of the north; of a +history of Boniface VIII and his times; a life of the blessed Jeanne de +Valois, founder of the Annonciade; a biography of the Venerable Mother +Anne de Xaintonge, teacher of the Company of Saint Ursula; and other +books of the same kind, published by Lecoffre, Palmé, Poussielgue, in +the inevitable shagreen or sheep bindings stamped with dendriform +patterns: Chantelouve was preparing his candidacy for the Académie des +Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, and hoped for the support of the party +of the Ducs. That was why he received influential hypocrites, provincial +Tartufes, and priests every week. He doubtless had to drive himself to +do this, because in spite of his slinking slyness he was jovial and +enjoyed a joke. On the other hand, he aspired to figure in the +literature that counts at Paris, and he expended a good deal of +ingenuity inveigling men of letters to his house on another evening +every week, to make them his aides, or at least keep them from openly +attacking him, so soon as his candidacy--an entirely clerical +affair--should be announced. It was probably to attract and placate his +adversaries that he had contrived these baroque gatherings to which, out +of curiosity as a matter of fact, the most utterly different kinds of +people came. + +He had other motives. It was said that he had no scruples about +exploiting his social acquaintances. Durtal had even noticed that at +each of the dinners given by Chantelouve a well-dressed stranger was +present, and the rumour went about that this guest was a wealthy +provincial to whom men of letters were exhibited like a wax-work +collection, and from whom, before or afterward, important sums were +borrowed. + +"It is undeniable that the Chantelouves have no income and that they +live in style. Catholic publishing houses and magazines pay even worse +than the secular, so in spite of his established reputation in the +clerical world, Chantelouve cannot possibly maintain such a standard of +living on his royalties. + +"There simply is no telling what these people are up to. That this +woman's home life is unhappy, and that she does not love the sneaky +sacristan to whom she is married, is quite possible, but what is her +real rôle in that household? Is she accessory to Chantelouve's pecuniary +dodges? If that is the case I don't see why she should pick on me. If +she is in connivance with her husband, she certainly ought to have sense +enough to seek an influential or wealthy lover, and she is perfectly +aware that I fulfil neither the one nor the other condition. Chantelouve +knows very well that I am incapable of paying for her gowns and thus +contributing to the upkeep of their establishment. I make about three +thousand livres, and I can hardly contrive to keep myself going. + +"So that is not her game. I don't know that I want to have anything to +do with their kind of people," he concluded, somewhat chilled by these +reflections. "But I am a big fool. What I know about them proves that my +unknown beloved is not Chantelouve's wife, and, all things considered, I +am glad she isn't." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +Next day his ferment had subsided. The unknown never left him, but she +kept her distance. Her less certain features were effaced in mist, her +fascination became feebler, and she no longer was his sole +preoccupation. + +The idea, suddenly formed on a word of Des Hermies, that the unknown +must be Chantelouve's wife, had, in fashion, checked his fever. If it +was she--and his contrary conclusions of the evening before seemed +hardly valid when he took up one by one the arguments by which he had +arrived at them--then her reasons for wanting him were obscure, +dangerous, and he was on his guard, no longer letting himself go in +complete self-abandon. + +And yet, there was another phenomenon taking place within him. He had +never paid any especial attention to Hyacinthe Chantelouve, he had never +been in love with her. She interested him by the mystery of her person +and her life, but outside her drawing-room he had never given her a +thought. Now ruminating about her he began almost to desire her. + +Suddenly she benefited by the face of the unknown, for when Durtal +evoked her she came confused to his sight, her physiognomy mingled with +that which he had visualized when the first letters came. + +Though the sneaking scoundrelism of her husband displeased him, he did +not think her the less attractive, but his desires were no longer beyond +control. In spite of the distrust which she aroused, she might be an +interesting mistress, making up for her barefaced vices by her good +grace, but she was no longer the non-existent, the chimera raised in a +moment of uncertainty. + +On the other hand, if his conjectures were false, if it was not Mme. +Chantelouve who had written the letters, then the other, the unknown, +lost a little of her subtlety by the mere fact that she could be +incarnated in a creature whom he knew. Still remote, she became less so; +then her beauty deteriorated, because, in turn, she took on certain +features of Mme. Chantelouve, and if the latter had profited, the +former, on the contrary, lost by the confusion which Durtal had +established. + +In one as in the other case, whether she were Mme. Chantelouve or not, +he felt appeased, calmed. At heart he did not know, when he revolved the +adventure, whether he preferred his chimera, even diminished, or this +Hyacinthe, who at least, in her reality, was not a disenchanting frump, +wrinkled with age. He profited by the respite to get back to work, but +he had presumed too much upon his powers. When he tried to begin his +chapter on the crimes of Gilles de Rais he discovered that he was +incapable of sewing two sentences together. He wandered in pursuit of +the Marshal and caught up with him, but the prose in which he wished to +embody the man remained listless and lifeless, and he could think only +patchily. + +He threw down his pen and sank into an armchair. In revery he was +transported to Tiffauges, where Satan, who had refused so obstinately to +show himself, now became incarnate in the unwitting Marshal, to wallow +him, vociferating, in the joys of murder. + +"For this, basically, is what Satanism is," said Durtal to himself. "The +external semblance of the Demon is a minor matter. He has no need of +exhibiting himself in human or bestial form to attest his presence. For +him to prove himself, it is enough that he choose a domicile in souls +which he ulcerates and incites to inexplicable crimes. Then, he can hold +his victims by that hope which he breathes into them, that instead of +living in them as he does, and as they don't often know, he will obey +evocations, appear to them, and deal out, duly, legally, the advantages +he concedes in exchange for certain forfeits. Our very willingness to +make a pact with him must be able often to produce his infusion into us. + +"All the modern theories of the followers of Maudsley and Lombroso do +not, in fact, render the singular abuses of the Marshal comprehensible. +Nothing could be more just than to class him as a monomaniac, for he was +one, if by the word monomaniac we designate every man who is dominated +by a fixed idea. But so is every one of us, more or less, from the +business man, all whose thoughts converge on the one idea of gain, to +the artist absorbed in bringing his masterpiece into the world. But why +was the Marshal a monomaniac, how did he become one? That is what all +the Lombrosos in the world can't tell you. Encephalic lesions, adherence +of the _pia mater_ to the cerebrum, mean absolutely nothing in this +question. For they are simple resultants, effects derived from a cause +which ought to be explained, and which no materialist can explain. It is +easy to declare that a disturbance of the cerebral lobes produces +assassins and demonomaniacs. The famous alienists of our time claim that +analysis of the brain of an insane woman disclosed a lesion or a +deterioration of the grey matter. And suppose it did! It would still be +a question whether, in the case of a woman possessed with demonomania, +the lesion produced the demonomania, or the demonomania produced the +lesion.... Admitting that there was a lesion! The spiritual Comprachicos +have never resorted to cerebral surgery. They don't amputate the +lobes--supposed to be reliably identified--after carefully trepanning. +They simply act upon the pupil by inculcating ignoble ideas in him, +developing his bad instincts, pushing him little by little into the +paths of vice; and if this gymnastic of persuasion deteriorates the +cerebral tissues in the subject, that proves precisely that the lesion +is only the derivative and not the cause of the psychological state. + +"And then, and then, these doctrines which consist nowadays in +confounding the criminal with the insane, the demonomaniac with the mad, +have absolutely no foundation. Nine years ago a lad of fourteen, Felix +Lemaîre, assassinated a little boy whom he did not know. He just wanted +to see the child suffer, just wanted to hear him cry. Felix slashed the +little fellow's stomach with a knife, turned the blade round and round +in the warm flesh, then slowly sawed his victim's head off. Felix +manifested no remorse, and in the ensuing investigation proved himself +to be intelligent and atrocious. Dr. Legrand Du Saule and other +specialists kept him under vigilant surveillance for months, and could +not discover the slightest pathological symptom. And he had had fairly +good rearing and certainly had not been corrupted by others. + +"His behaviour was like that of the conscious or unconscious +demonomaniacs who do evil for evil's sake. They are no more mad than the +rapt monk in his cell, than the man who does good for good's sake. +Anybody but a medical theorist can see that the desire for good and the +desire for evil simply form the two opposing poles of the soul. In the +fifteenth century these extremes were represented by Jeanne d'Arc and +the Marshal de Rais. Now there is no more reason for attributing madness +to Gilles than there is for attributing it to Jeanne d'Arc, whose +admirable excesses certainly have no connection with vesania and +delirium. + +"All the same, some frightful nights must have been passed in that +fortress," said Durtal. He was thinking of the château de Tiffauges, +which he had visited a year ago, believing that it would aid him in his +work to live in the country where Gilles had lived and to dig among the +ruins. + +He had established himself in the little hamlet which stretches along +the base of the abandoned donjon. He learned what a living thing the +legend of Bluebeard was in this isolated part of La Vendée on the border +of Brittany. + +"He was a young man who came to a bad end," said the young women. More +fearful, their grandmothers crossed themselves as they went along the +foot of the wall in the evening. The memory of the disembowelled +children persisted. The Marshal, known only by his surname, still had +power to terrify. + +Durtal had gone every day from the inn where he lodged to the château, +towering over the valleys of the Crume and of the Sèvre, facing hills +excoriated with blocks of granite and overgrown with formidable oaks, +whose roots, protruding out of the ground, resembled monstrous nests of +frightened snakes. + +One might have believed oneself transported into the real Brittany. +There was the same melancholy, heavy sky, the same sun, which seemed +older than in other parts of the world and which but feebly gilded the +sorrowful, age-old forests and the mossy sandstone. There were the same +endless stretches of broken, rocky soil, pitted with ponds of rusty +water, dotted with scattered clumps of gorse and fruze copse, and +sprinkled with pink harebells and nameless yellow prairie flowers. + +One felt that this iron-grey sky; this starving soil, empurpled only +here and there by the bleeding flower of the buckwheat; that these +roads, bordered with stones placed one on top of the other, without +cement or plaster; that these paths, bordered with impenetrable hedges; +that these grudging plants; these inhospitable fields; these crippled +beggars, eaten with vermin, plastered with filth; that even the flocks, +undersized and wasted, the dumpy little cows, the black sheep whose blue +eyes had the cold, pale gleam that is in the eyes of the Slav or of the +tribade; had perpetuated their primordial state, preserving an identical +landscape through all the centuries. + +Except for an incongruous factory chimney further away on the bank of +the Sèvre, the countryside of Tiffauges remained in perfect harmony with +the immense château, erect among its ruins. Within the close, still to +be traced by the ruins of the towers, was a whole plain, now converted +into a miserable truck garden. Cabbages, in long bluish lines, +impoverished carrots, consumptive navews, spread over this enormous +circle where iron mail had clanked in the tournament and where +processionals had slowly devolved, in the smoke of incense, to the +chanting of psalms. + +A thatched hut had been built in a corner. The peasant inhabitants, +returned to a state of savagery, no longer understood the meaning of +words, and could be roused out of their apathy only by the display of a +silver coin. Seizing the coin, they would hand over the keys. + +For hours one could browse around at ease among the ruins, and smoke and +daydream. Unfortunately, certain parts were inaccessible. The donjon was +still shut off, on the Tiffauges side, by a vast moat, at the bottom of +which mighty trees were growing. One would have had to pass over the +tops of the trees, growing to the very verge of the wall, to gain a +porch on the other side, for there was now no drawbridge. + +But quite accessible was another part which overhung the Sèvre. There +the wings of the castle, overgrown with ivy and white-crested viburnum, +were intact. Spongy, dry as pumice stone, silvered with lichen and +gilded with moss, the towers rose entire, though from their crenelated +collarettes whole blocks were blown away on windy nights. + +Within, room succeeded glacial room, cut into the granite, surmounted +with vaulted roofs, and as close as the hold of a ship. Then by spiral +stairways one descended into similar chambers, joined by cellar +passageways into the walls of which were dug deep niches and lairs of +unknown utility. + +Beneath, those corridors, so narrow that two persons could not walk +along them abreast, descended at a gentle slope, and bifurcated so that +there was a labyrinth of lanes, leading to veritable cells, on the walls +of which the nitre scintillated in the light of the lantern like steel +mica or twinkling grains of sugar. In the cells above, in the dungeons +beneath, one stumbled over rifts of hard earth, in the centre or in a +corner of which yawned now the mouth of an unsealed oubliette, now a +well. + +Finally, at the summit of one of the towers, that at the left as one +entered, there was a roofed gallery running parallel to a circular +foothold cut from the rock. There, without doubt, the men-at-arms had +been stationed to fire on their assailants through wide loopholes +opening overhead and underfoot. In this gallery the voice, even the +lowest, followed the curving walls and could be heard all around the +circuit. + +Briefly, the exterior of the castle revealed a fortified place built to +stand long sieges, and the dismantled interior made one think of a +prison in which flesh, mildewed by the moisture, must rot in a few +months. Out in the open air again, one felt a sensation of well-being, +of relief, which one lost on traversing the ruins of the isolated chapel +and penetrating, by a cellar door, to the crypt below. + +This chapel, low, squat, its vaulted roof upheld by massive columns on +whose capitals lozenges and bishop's croziers were carved, dated from +the eleventh century. The altar stone survived intact. Brackish +daylight, which seemed to have been filtered through layers of horn, +came in at the openings, hardly lighting the shadowed, begrimed walls +and the earth floor, which too was pierced by the entrance to an +oubliette or by a well shaft. + +In the evening after dinner he had often climbed up on the embankment +and followed the cracked walls of the ruins. On bright nights one part +of the castle was thrown back into shadow, and the other, by contrast, +stood forth, washed in silver and blue, as if rubbed with mercurial +lusters, above the Sèvre, along whose surface streaks of moonlight +darted like the backs of fishes. The silence was overpowering. After +nine o'clock not a dog, not a soul. He would return to the poor chamber +of the inn, where an old woman, in black, wearing the cornet head-dress +her ancestors wore in the sixteenth century, waited with a candle to bar +the door as soon as he returned. + +"All this," said Durtal to himself, "is the skeleton of a dead keep. To +reanimate it we must revisualize the opulent flesh which once covered +these bones of sandstone. Documents give us every detail. This carcass +was magnificently clad, and if we are to see Gilles in his own +environment, we must remember all the sumptuosity of fifteenth century +furnishing. + +"We must reclothe these walls with wainscots of Irish wood or with high +warp tapestries of gold and thread of Arras, so much sought after in +that epoch. Then this hard, black soil must be repaved with green and +yellow bricks or black and white flagstones. The vault must be starred +with gold and sown with crossbows on a field _azur_, and the Marshal's +cross, _sable_ on shield _or_, must be set shining there." + +Of themselves the furnishings returned, each to its own place. Here and +there were high-backed signorial chairs, thrones, and stools. Against +the walls were sideboards on whose carved panels were bas-reliefs +representing the Annunciation and the Adoration of the Magi. On top of +the sideboards, beneath lace canopies, stood the painted and gilded +statues of Saint Anne, Saint Marguerite, and Saint Catherine, so often +reproduced by the wood-carvers of the Middle Ages. There were +linen-chests, bound in iron, studded with great nails, and covered with +sowskin leather. Then there were coffers fastened by great metal clasps +and overlaid with leather or fabric on which fair faced angels, cut from +illuminated missal-backgrounds, had been mounted. There were great beds +reached by carpeted steps. There were tasselled pillows and counterpanes +heavily perfumed, and canopies and curtains embroidered with armories or +sprinkled with stars. + +So one must reconstruct the decorations of the other rooms, in which +nothing was standing but the walls and the high, basket-funneled +fireplaces, whose spacious hearths, wanting andirons, were still charred +from the old fires. One could easily imagine the dining-rooms and those +terrible repasts which Gilles deplored in his trial at Nantes. Gilles +admitted with tears that he had ordered his diet so as to kindle the +fury of his senses, and these reprobate menus can be easily reproduced. +When he was at table with Eustache Blanchet, Prelati, Gilles de Sillé, +all his trusted companions, in the great room, the plates and the ewers +filled with water of medlar, rose, and melilote for washing the hands, +were placed on credences. Gilles ate beef-, salmon-, and bream-pies; +levert-and squab-tarts; roast heron, stork, crane, peacock, bustard, and +swan; venison in verjuice; Nantes lampreys; salads of briony, hops, +beard of judas, mallow; vehement dishes seasoned with marjoram and mace, +coriander and sage, peony and rosemary, basil and hyssop, grain of +paradise and ginger; perfumed, acidulous dishes, giving one a violent +thirst; heavy pastries; tarts of elder-flower and rape; rice with milk +of hazelnuts sprinkled with cinnamon; stuffy dishes necessitating +copious drafts of beer and fermented mulberry juice, of dry wine, or +wine aged to tannic bitterness, of heady hypocras charged with cinnamon, +with almonds, and with musk, of raging liquors clouded with golden +particles--mad drinks which spurred the guests in this womanless castle +to frenzies of lechery and made them, at the end of the meal, writhe in +monstrous dreams. + +"Remain the costumes to be restored," said Durtal to himself, and he +imagined Gilles and his friends, not in their damaskeened field harness, +but in their indoor costumes, their robes of peace. He visualized them +in harmony with the luxury of their surroundings. They wore glittering +vestments, pleated jackets, bellying out in a little flounced skirt at +the waist. The legs were encased in dark skin-tight hose. On their heads +were the artichoke chaperon hats like that of Charles VII in his +portrait in the Louvre. The torso was enveloped in silver-threaded +damask, which was crusted with jewelleries and bordered with marten. + +He thought of the costume of the women of the time, robes of precious +tentered stuffs, with tight sleeves, great collars thrown back over the +shoulders, cramping bodices, long trains lined with fur. And as he thus +dressed an imaginary manikin, hanging ropes of heavy stones, purplish +or milky crystals, cloudy uncut gems, over the slashed corsage, a woman +slipped in, filled the robe, swelled the bodice, and thrust her head +under the two-horned steeple-headdress. From behind the pendent lace +smiled the composite features of the unknown and of Mme. Chantelouve. +Delighted, he gazed at the apparition without ever perceiving whom he +had evoked, when his cat, jumping into his lap, distracted his thoughts +and brought him back to his room. + +"Well, well, she won't let me alone," and in spite of himself he began +to laugh at the thought of the unknown following him even to the château +de Tiffauges. "It's foolish to let my thoughts wander this way," he +said, drawing himself up, "but daydream is the only good thing in life. +Everything else is vulgar and empty. + +"No doubt about it, that was a singular epoch, the Middle Epoch of +ignorance and darkness, the history professors and Ages," he went on, +lighting a cigarette. "For some it's all white and for others utterly +black. No intermediate shade, atheists reiterate. Dolorous and exquisite +epoch, say the artists and the religious savants. + +"What is certain is that the immutable classes, the nobility, the +clergy, the bourgeoisie, the people, had loftier souls at that time. You +can prove it: society has done nothing but deteriorate in the four +centuries separating us from the Middle Ages. + +"True, a baron then was usually a formidable brute. He was a drunken and +lecherous bandit, a sanguinary and boisterous tyrant, but he was a child +in mind and spirit. The Church bullied him, and to deliver the Holy +Sepulchre he sacrificed his wealth, abandoned home, wife, and children, +and accepted unconscionable fatigues, extraordinary sufferings, +unheard-of dangers. + +"By pious heroism he redeemed the baseness of his morals. The race has +since become moderate. It has reduced, sometimes even done away with, +its instincts of carnage and rape, but it has replaced them by the +monomania of business, the passion for lucre. It has done worse. It has +sunk to such a state of abjectness as to be attracted by the doings of +the lowest of the low. The aristocracy disguises itself as a mountebank, +puts on tights and spangles, gives public trapeze performances, jumps +through hoops, and does weight-lifting stunts in the trampled tan-bark +ring! + +"The clergy, then a good example--if we except a few convents ravaged by +frenzied Satanism and lechery--launched itself into superhuman +transports and attained God. Saints swarmed, miracles multiplied, and +while still omnipotent the Church was gentle with the humble, it +consoled the afflicted, defended the little ones, and mourned or +rejoiced with the people of low estate. Today it hates the poor, and +mysticism dies in a clergy which checks ardent thoughts and preaches +sobriety of mind, continence of postulation, common sense in prayer, +bourgeoisie of the soul! Yet here and there, buried in cloisters far +from these lukewarm priests, there perhaps still are real saints who +weep, monks who pray, to the point of dying of sorrow and prayer, for +each of us. And they--with the demoniacs--are the sole connecting link +between that age and this. + +"The smug, sententious side of the bourgeoisie already existed in the +time of Charles VII. But cupidity was repressed by the confessor, and +the tradesman, just like the labourer, was maintained by the +corporations, which denounced overcharging and fraud, saw that decried +merchandise was destroyed, and fixed a fair price and a high standard of +excellence for commodities. Trades and professions were handed down from +father to son. The corporations assured work and pay. People were not, +as now, subject to the fluctuations of the market and the merciless +capitalistic exploitation. Great fortunes did not exist and everybody +had enough to live on. Sure of the future, unhurried, they created +marvels of art, whose secret remains for ever lost. + +"All the artisans who passed the three degrees of apprentice, +journeyman, and master, developed subtlety and became veritable artists. +They ennobled the simplest of iron work, the commonest faience, the most +ordinary chests and coffers. Those corporations, putting themselves +under the patronage of Saints--whose images, frequently besought, +figured on their banners--preserved through the centuries the honest +existence of the humble and notably raised the spiritual level of the +people whom they protected. + +"All that is decisively at an end. The bourgeoise has taken the place +forfeited by a wastrel nobility which now subsists only to set ignoble +fashions and whose sole contribution to our 'civilization' is the +establishment of gluttonous dining clubs, so-called gymnastic societies, +and pari-mutuel associations. Today the business man has but these aims, +to exploit the working man, manufacture shoddy, lie about the quality of +merchandise, and give short weight. + +"As for the people, they have been relieved of the indispensable fear of +hell, and notified, at the same time, that they are not to expect to be +recompensed, after death, for their sufferings here. So they scamp their +ill-paid work and take to drink. From time to time, when they have +ingurgitated too violent liquids, they revolt, and then they must be +slaughtered, for once let loose they would act as a crazed stampeded +herd. + +"Good God, what a mess! And to think that the nineteenth century takes +on airs and adulates itself. There is one word in the mouths of all. +Progress. Progress of whom? Progress of what? For this miserable century +hasn't invented anything great. + +"It has constructed nothing and destroyed everything. At the present +hour it glorifies itself in this electricity which it thinks it +discovered. But electricity was known and used in remotest antiquity, +and if the ancients could not explain its nature nor even its essence, +the moderns are just as incapable of identifying that force which +conveys the spark and carries the voice--acutely nasalized--along the +wire. This century thinks it discovered the terrible science of +hypnotism, which the priests and Brahmins in Egypt and India knew and +practised to the utmost. No, the only thing this century has invented +is the sophistication of products. Therein it is passed master. It has +even gone so far as to adulterate excrement. Yes, in 1888 the two houses +of parliament had to pass a law destined to suppress the falsification +of fertilizer. Now that's the limit." + +The doorbell rang. He opened the door and nearly fell over backward. + +Mme. Chantelouve was before him. + +Stupefied, he bowed, while Mme. Chantelouve, without a word, went +straight into the study. There she turned around, and Durtal, who had +followed, found himself face to face with her. + +"Won't you please sit down?" He advanced an armchair and hastened to +push back, with his foot, the edge of the carpet turned up by the cat. +He asked her to excuse the disorder. She made a vague gesture and +remained standing. + +In a calm but very low voice she said, "It is I who wrote you those mad +letters. I have come to drive away this bad fever and get it over with +in a quite frank way. As you yourself wrote, no liaison between us is +possible. Let us forget what has happened. And before I go, tell me that +you bear me no grudge." + +He cried out at this. He would not have it so. He had not been beside +himself when he wrote her those ardent pages, he was in perfectly good +faith, he loved her-- + +"You love me! Why, you didn't even know that those letters were from me. +You loved an unknown, a chimera. Well, admitting that you are telling +the truth, the chimera does not exist now, for here I am." + +"You are mistaken. I knew perfectly that it was Mme. Chantelouve hiding +behind the pseudonym of Mme. Maubel." And he half-explained to her, +without, of course, letting her know of his doubts, how he had lifted +her mask. + +"Ah!" She reflected, blinking her troubled eyes. "At any rate," she +said, again facing him squarely, "you could not have recognized me in +the first letters, to which you responded with cries of passion. Those +cries were not addressed to me." + +He contested this observation, and became entangled in the dates and +happenings and in the sequence of the notes. She at length lost the +thread of his remarks. The situation was so ridiculous that both were +silent. Then she sat down and burst out laughing. + +Her strident, shrill laugh, revealing magnificent, but short and pointed +teeth, in a mocking mouth, vexed him. + +"She has been playing with me," he said to himself, and dissatisfied +with the turn the conversation had taken, and furious at seeing this +woman so calm, so different from her burning letters, he asked, in a +tone of irritation, "Am I to know why you laugh?" + +"Pardon me. It's a trick my nerves play on me, sometimes in public +places. But never mind. Let us be reasonable and talk things over. You +tell me you love me--" + +"And I mean it." + +"Well, admitting that I too am not indifferent, where is this going to +lead us? Oh, you know so well, you poor dear, that you refused, right at +first, the meeting which I asked in a moment of madness--and you gave +well-thought-out reasons for refusing." + +"But I refused because I did not know then that you were the women in +the case! I have told you that it was several days later that Des +Hermies unwittingly revealed your identity to me. Did I hesitate as soon +as I knew? No! I immediately implored you to come." + +"That may be, but you admit that I'm right when I claim that you wrote +your first letters to another and not me." + +She was pensive for a moment. Durtal began to be prodigiously bored by +this discussion. He thought it more prudent not to answer, and was +seeking a change of subject that would put an end to the deadlock. + +She herself got him out of his difficulty. "Let us not discuss it any +more," she said, smiling, "we shall not get anywhere. You see, this is +the situation: I am married to a very nice man who loves me and whose +only crime is that he represents the rather insipid happiness which one +has right at hand. I started this correspondence with you, so I am to +blame, and believe me, on his account I suffer. You have work to do, +beautiful books to write. You don't need to have a crazy woman come +walking into your life. So, you see, the best thing is for us to remain +friends, but true friends, and go no further." + +"And it is the woman who wrote me such vivid letters, who now speaks to +me of reason, good sense, and God knows what!" + +"But be frank, now. You don't love me." + +"I don't?" + +He took her hands, gently. She made no resistance, but looking at him +squarely she said, "Listen. If you had loved me you would have come to +see me; and yet for months you haven't tried to find out whether I was +alive or dead." + +"But you understand that I could not hope to be welcomed by you on the +terms we now are on, and too, in your parlour there are guests, your +husband--I have never had you even a little bit to myself at your home." + +He pressed her hands more tightly and came closer to her. She regarded +him with her smoky eyes, in which he now saw that dolent, almost +dolorous expression which had captivated him. He completely lost control +of himself before this voluptuous and plaintive face, but with a firm +gesture she freed her hands. + +"Enough. Sit down, now, and let's talk of something else. Do you know +your apartment is charming? Which saint is that?" she asked, examining +the picture, over the mantel, of the monk on his knees beside a +cardinal's hat and cloak. + +"I do not know." + +"I will find out for you. I have the lives of all the saints at home. It +ought to be easy to find out about a cardinal who renounced the purple +to go live in a hut. Wait. I think Saint Peter Damian did, but I am not +sure. I have such a poor memory. Help me think." + +"But I don't know who he is!" + +She came closer to him and put her hand on his shoulder. + +"Are you angry at me?" + +"I should say I am! When I desire you frantically, when I've been +dreaming for a whole week about this meeting, you come here and tell me +that all is over between us, that you do not love me--" + +She became demure. "But if I did not love you, would I have come to you? +Understand, then, that reality kills a dream; that it is better for us +not to expose ourselves to fearful regrets. We are not children, you +see. No! Let me go. Do not squeeze me like that!" Very pale, she +struggled in his embrace. "I swear to you that I will go away and that +you shall never see me again if you do not let me loose." Her voice +became hard. She was almost hissing her words. He let go of her. "Sit +down there behind the table. Do that for me." And tapping the floor with +her heel, she said, in a tone of melancholy, "Then it is impossible to +be friends, only friends, with a man. But it would be very nice to come +and see you without having evil thoughts to fear, wouldn't it?" She was +silent. Then she added, "Yes, just to see each other--and if we did not +have any sublime things to say to each other, it is also very nice to +sit and say nothing!" + +Then she said, "My time is up. I must go home." + +"And leave me with no hope?" he exclaimed, kissing her gloved hands. + +She did not answer, but gently shook her head, then, as he looked +pleadingly at her, she said, "Listen. If you will promise to make no +demands on me and to be good, I will come here night after next at nine +o'clock." + +He promised whatever she wished. And as he raised his head from her +hands and as his lips brushed lightly over her breast, which seemed to +tighten, she disengaged her hands, caught his nervously, and, clenching +her teeth, offered her neck to his lips. Then she fled. + +"Oof!" he said, closing the door after her. He was at the same time +satisfied and vexed. + +Satisfied, because he found her enigmatic, changeful, charming. Now that +he was alone he recalled her to memory. He remembered her tight black +dress, her fur cloak, the warm collar of which had caressed him as he +was covering her neck with kisses. He remembered that she wore no +jewellery, except sparkling blue sapphire eardrops. He remembered the +wayward blonde hair escaping from under the dark green otter hat. +Holding his hands to his nostrils he sniffed again the sweet and distant +odour, cinnamon lost among stronger perfumes, which he had caught from +the contact of her long, fawn-coloured suède gloves, and he saw again +her moist, rodent teeth, her thin, bitten lips, and her troubled eyes, +of a grey and opaque lustre which could suddenly be transfigured with +radiance. "Oh, night after next it will be great to kiss all that!" + +Vexed also, both with himself and with her. He reproached himself with +having been brusque and reserved. He ought to have shown himself more +expansive and less restrained. But it was her fault, for she had abashed +him! The incongruity between the woman who cried with voluptuous +suffering in her letters and the woman he had seen, so thoroughly +mistress of herself in her coquetries, was truly too much! + +"However you look at them, these women are astonishing creatures," he +thought. "Here is one who accomplishes the most difficult thing you can +imagine: coming to a man's room after having written him excessive +letters. I, I act like a goose. I stand there ill at ease. She, in a +second, has the self-assurance of a person in her own home, or visiting +in a drawing-room. No awkwardness, pretty gestures, a few words, and +eyes which supply everything! She isn't very agreeable," he thought, +reminded of the curt tone she had used when disengaging herself, "and +yet she has her tender spots," he continued dreamily, remembering not +so much her words as certain inflections of her voice and a certain +bewildered look in her eyes. "I must go about it prudently that night," +he concluded, addressing his cat, which, never having seen a woman +before, had fled at the arrival of Mme. Chantelouve and taken refuge +under the bed, but had now advanced almost grovelling, to sniff the +chair where she had sat. + +"Come to think of it, she is an old hand, Mme. Hyacinthe! She would not +have a meeting in a café nor in the street. She scented from afar the +assignation house or the hotel. And though, from the mere fact of my not +inviting her here, she could not doubt that I did not want to introduce +her to my lodging, she came here deliberately. Then, this first denial, +come to think of it, is only a fine farce. If she were not seeking a +liaison she would not have visited me. No, she wanted me to beg her to +do what she wanted to do. Like all women, she wanted me to offer her +what she desired. I have been rolled. Her arrival has knocked the props +out from under my whole method. But what does it matter? She is no less +desirable," he concluded, happy to get rid of disagreeable reflections +and plunge back into the delirious vision which he retained of her. +"That night won't be exactly dreary," he thought, seeing again her eyes, +imagining them in surrender, deceptive and plaintive, as he would +disrobe her and make a body white and slender, warm and supple, emerge +from her tight skirt. "She has no children. That is an earnest promise +that her flesh is quite firm, even at thirty!" + +A whole draft of youth intoxicated him. Durtal, astonished, took a look +at himself in the mirror. His tired eyes brightened, his face seemed +more youthful, less worn. "Lucky I had just shaved," he said to himself. +But gradually, as he mused, he saw in this mirror, which he was so +little in the habit of consulting, his features droop and his eyes lose +their sparkle. His stature, which had seemed to increase in this +spiritual upheaval, diminished again. Sadness returned to his +thoughtful mien. "I haven't what you would call the physique of a lady's +man," he concluded. "What does she see in me? for she could very easily +find someone else with whom to be unfaithful to her husband. Enough of +these rambling thoughts. Let's cease to think them. To sum up the +situation: I love her with my head and not my heart. That's the +important thing. Under such conditions, whatever happens, a love affair +is brief, and I am almost certain to get out of it without committing +any follies." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +The next morning he woke, thinking of her, just as he had been doing +when he went to sleep. He tried to rationalize the episode and revolved +his conjectures over and over. Once again he put himself this question: +"Why, when I went to her house, did she not let me see that I pleased +her? Never a look, never a word to encourage me. Why this +correspondence, when it was so easy to insist on having me to dine, so +simple to prepare an occasion which would bring us together, either at +her home or elsewhere?" And he answered himself, "It would have been +usual and not at all diverting. She is perhaps skilled in these matters. +She knows that the unknown frightens a man's reason away, that the +unembodied puts the soul in ferment, and she wished to give me a fever +before trying an attack--to call her advances by their right name. + +"It must be admitted that if my conjectures are correct she is strangely +astute. At heart she is, perhaps, quite simply a crazy romantic or a +comedian. It amuses her to manufacture little adventures, to throw +tantalizing obstacles in the way of the realization of a vulgar desire. +And Chantelouve? He is probably aware of his wife's goings on, which +perhaps facilitate his career. Otherwise, how could she arrange to come +here at nine o'clock at night, instead of the morning or afternoon on +pretence of going shopping?" + +To this new question there could be no answer, and little by little he +ceased to interrogate himself on the point. He began to be obsessed by +the real woman as he had been by the imaginary creature. The latter had +completely vanished. He did not even remember her physiognomy now. Mme. +Chantelouve, just as she was in reality, without borrowing the other's +features, had complete possession of him and fired his brain and senses +to white heat. He began to desire her madly and to wish furiously for +tomorrow night. And if she did not come? He felt cold in the small of +his back at the idea that she might be unable to get away from home or +that she might wilfully stay away. + +"High time it was over and done with," he said, for this Saint Vitus' +dance went on not without certain diminution of force, which disturbed +him. In fact he feared, after the febrile agitation of his nights, to +reveal himself as a sorry paladin when the time came. "But why bother?" +he rejoined, as he started toward Carhaix's, where he was to dine with +the astrologer Gévingey and Des Hermies. + +"I shall be rid of my obsession awhile," he murmured, groping along in +the darkness of the tower. + +Des Hermies, hearing him come up the stair, opened the door, casting a +shaft of light into the spiral. Durtal, reaching the landing, saw his +friend in shirt sleeves and enveloped in an apron. + +"I am, as you see, in the heat of composition," and upon a stew-pan +boiling on the stove Des Hermies cast that brief and sure look which a +mechanic gives his machine, then he consulted, as if it were a +manometer, his watch, hanging to a nail. "Look," he said, raising the +pot lid. + +Durtal bent over and through a cloud of vapour he saw a coiled napkin +rising and falling with the little billows. "Where is the leg of +mutton?" + +"It, my friend, is sewn into that cloth so tightly that the air cannot +enter. It is cooking in this pretty, singing sauce, into which I have +thrown a handful of hay, some pods of garlic and slices of carrot and +onion, some grated nutmeg, and laurel and thyme. You will have many +compliments to make me if Gévingey doesn't keep us waiting too long, +because a _gigot à l'Anglaise_ won't stand being cooked to shreds." + +Carhaix's wife looked in. + +"Come in," she said. "My husband is here." + +Durtal found him dusting the books. They shook hands. Durtal, at random, +looked over some of the dusted books lying on the table. + +"Are these," he asked, "technical works about metals and bell-founding +or are they about the liturgy of bells?" + +"They are not about founding, though there is sometimes reference to the +founders, the 'sainterers' as they were called in the good old days. You +will discover here and there some details about alloys of red copper and +fine tin. You will even find, I believe, that the art of the 'sainterer' +has been in decline for three centuries, probably due to the fact that +the faithful no longer melt down their ornaments of precious metals, +thus modifying the alloy. Or is it because the founders no longer invoke +Saint Anthony the Eremite when the bronze is boiling in the furnace? I +do not know. It is true, at any rate, that bells are now made in carload +lots. Their voices are without personality. They are all the same. +They're like docile and indifferent hired girls when formerly they were +like those aged servants who became part of the family whose joys and +griefs they have shared. But what difference does that make to the +clergy and the congregation? At present these auxiliaries devoted to the +cult do not represent any symbol. And that explains the whole +difficulty. + +"You asked me, a few seconds ago, whether these books treated of bells +from the liturgical point of view. Yes, most of them give tabulated +explanations of the significance of the various component parts. The +interpretations are simple and offer little variety." + +"What are a few of them?" + +"I can sum them all up for you in a very few words. According to the +_Rational_ of Guillaume Durand, the hardness of the metal signifies the +force of the preacher. The percussion of the clapper on the sides +expresses the idea that the preacher must first scourge himself to +correct himself of his own vices before reproaching the vices of others. +The wooden frame represents the cross of Christ, and the cord, which +formerly served to set the bell swinging, allegorizes the science of the +Scriptures which flows from the mystery of the Cross itself. + +"The most ancient liturgists expound practically the same symbols. Jean +Beleth, who lived in 1200, declares also that the bell is the image of +the preacher, but adds that its motion to and fro, when it is set +swinging, teaches that the preacher must by turns elevate his language +and bring it down within reach of the crowd. For Hugo of Saint Victor +the clapper is the tongue of the officiating priest, which strikes the +two sides of the vase and announces thus, at the same time, the truth of +the two Testaments. Finally, if we consult Fortunatus Amalarius, perhaps +the most ancient of the liturgists, we find simply that the body of the +bell denotes the mouth of the preacher and the hammer his tongue." + +"But," said Durtal, somewhat disappointed, "it isn't--what shall I +say?--very profound." + +The door opened. + +"Why, how are you!" said Carhaix, shaking hands with Gévingey, and then +introducing him to Durtal. + +While the bell-ringer's wife finished setting the table, Durtal examined +the newcomer. He was a little man, wearing a soft black felt hat and +wrapped up like an omnibus conductor in a cape with a military collar of +blue cloth. + +His head was like an egg with the hollow downward. The skull, waxed as +if with siccatif, seemed to have grown up out of the hair, which was +hard and like filaments of dried coconut and hung down over his neck. +The nose was bony, and the nostrils opened like two hatchways, over a +toothless mouth which was hidden by a moustache grizzled like the goatee +springing from the short chin. At first glance one would have taken him +for an art-worker, a wood engraver or a glider of saints' images, but on +looking at him more closely, observing the eyes, round and grey, set +close to the nose, almost crossed, and studying his solemn voice and +obsequious manners, one asked oneself from what quite special kind of +sacristy the man had issued. + +He took off his things and appeared in a black frock coat of square, +boxlike cut. A fine gold chain, passed about his neck, lost itself in +the bulging pocket of an old vest. Durtal gasped when Gévingey, as soon +as he had seated himself, complacently put his hands on exhibition, +resting them on his knees. Enormous, freckled with blotches of orange, +and terminating in milk-white nails cut to the quick, the fingers were +covered with huge rings, the sets of which formed a phalanx. + +Seeing Durtal's gaze fixed on his fingers, he smiled. "You examine my +valuables, monsieur. They are of three metals, gold, platinum, and +silver. This ring bears a scorpion, the sign under which I was born. +That with its two accoupled triangles, one pointing downward and the +other upward, reproduces the image of the macrocosm, the seal of +Solomon, the grand pantacle. As for the little one you see here," he +went on, showing a lady's ring set with a tiny sapphire between two +roses, "that is a present from a person whose horoscope I was good +enough to cast." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, somewhat surprised at the man's self-satisfaction. + +"Dinner is ready," said the bell-ringer's wife. + +Des Hermies, doffing his apron, appeared in his tight cheviot garments. +He was not so pale as usual, his cheeks being red from the heat of the +stove. He set the chairs around. + +Carhaix served the broth, and everyone was silent, taking spoonfuls of +the cooler broth at the edge of the bowl. Then madame brought Des +Hermies the famous leg of mutton to cut. It was a magnificent red, and +large drops flowed beneath the knife. Everybody ecstasized when tasting +this robust meat, aromatic with a purée of turnips sweetened with caper +sauce. + +Des Hermies bowed under a storm of compliments. Carhaix filled the +glasses, and, somewhat confused in the presence of Gévingey, paid the +astrologer effusive attention to make him forget their former +ill-feeling. Des Hermies assisted in this good work, and wishing also to +be useful to Durtal, brought the conversation around to the subject of +horoscopes. + +Then Gévingey mounted the rostrum. In a tone of satisfaction he spoke of +his vast labours, of the six months a horoscope required, of the +surprise of laymen when he declared that such work was not paid for by +the price he asked, five hundred francs. + +"But you see I cannot give my science for nothing," he said. "And now +people doubt astrology, which was revered in antiquity. Also in the +Middle Ages, when it was almost sacred. For instance, messieurs, look at +the portal of Notre Dame. The three doors which archeologists--not +initiated into the symbolism of Christianity and the occult--designate +by the names of the door of Judgment, the door of the Virgin, and the +door of Saint Marcel or Saint Anne, really represent Mysticism, +Astrology, and Alchemy, the three great sciences of the Middle Ages. +Today you find people who say, 'Are you quite sure that the stars have +an influence on the destiny of man?' But, messieurs, without entering +here into details reserved for the adept, in what way is this spiritual +influence stranger than that corporal influence which certain planets, +the moon, for example, exercise on the organs of men and women? + +"You are a physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, and you are not unaware that +the doctors Gillespin, Jackson, and Balfour, of Jamaica, have +established the influence of the constellations on human health in the +West Indies. At every change of the moon the number of sick people +augments. The acute crises of fever coincide with the phases of our +satellite. Finally, there are _lunatics_. Go out in the country and +ascertain at what periods madness becomes epidemic. But does this serve +to convince the incredulous?" he asked sorrowfully, contemplating his +rings. + +"It seems to me, on the contrary, that astrology is picking up," said +Durtal. "There are now two astrologers casting horoscopes in the next +column to the secret remedies on the fourth page of the newspapers." + +"And it's a shame! Those people don't even know the first thing about +the science. They are simply tricksters who hope thus to pick up some +money. What's the use of speaking of them when they _don't even exist_! +Really it must be admitted that only in England and America is there +anybody who knows how to establish the genethliac theme and construct a +horoscope." + +"I am very much afraid," said Des Hermies, "that not only these +so-called astrologers, but also all the mages, theosophists, occultists, +and cabalists of the present day, know absolutely nothing--those with +whom I am acquainted are indubitably, incontestably, ignorant imbeciles. +And that is the pure truth, messieurs. These people are, for the most +part, down-and-out journalists or broken spendthrifts seeking to exploit +the taste of a public weary of positivism. They plagiarize Eliphas Levi, +steal from Fabre d'Olivet, and write treatises of which they themselves +are incapable of making head or tail. It's a real pity, when you come to +think of it." + +"The more so as they discredit sciences which certainly contain verities +omitted in their jumble," said Durtal. + +"Then another lamentable thing," said Des Hermies, "is that in addition +to the dupes and simpletons, these little sects harbour some frightful +charlatans and windbags." + +"Péladan, among others. Who does not know that shoddy mage, +commercialized to his fingertips?" cried Durtal. + +"Oh, yes, that fellow--" + +"Briefly, messieurs," resumed Gévingey, "all these people are incapable +of obtaining in practise any effect whatever. The only man in this +century who, without being either a saint or a diabolist, has penetrated +the mysteries, is William Crookes." And as Durtal, who appeared to doubt +the apparitions sworn to by this Englishman, declared that no theory +could explain them, Gévingey perorated, "Permit me, messieurs. We have +the choice between two diverse, and I venture to say, very clear-cut +doctrines. Either the apparition is formed by the fluid disengaged by +the medium in trance to combine with the fluid of the persons present; +or else there are in the air immaterial beings, elementals as they are +called, which manifest themselves under very nearly determinable +conditions; or else, and this is the theory of pure spiritism, the +phenomena are produced by souls evoked from the dead." + +"I know it," Durtal said, "and that horrifies me. I know also the Hindu +dogma of the migrations of souls after death. These disembodied souls +stray until they are reincarnated or until they attain, from avatar to +avatar, to complete purity. Well, I think it's quite enough to live +once. I'd prefer nothingness, a hole in the ground, to all those +metamorphoses. It's more consoling to me. As for the evocation of the +dead, the mere thought that the butcher on the corner can force the soul +of Hugo, Balzac, Baudelaire, to converse with him, would put me beside +myself, if I believed it. Ah, no. Materialism, abject as it is, is less +vile than that." + +"Spiritism," said Carhaix, "is only a new name for the ancient +necromancy condemned and cursed by the Church." + +Gévingey looked at his rings, then emptied his glass. + +"In any case," he returned, "you will admit that these theories can be +upheld, especially that of the elementals, which, setting Satanism +aside, seems the most veridic, and certainly is the most clear. Space is +peopled by microbes. Is it more surprising that space should also be +crammed with spirits and larvæ? Water and vinegar are alive with +animalcules. The microscope shows them to us. Now why should not the +air, inaccessible to the sight and to the instruments of man, swarm, +like the other elements, with beings more or less corporeal, embryos +more or less mature?" + +"That is probably why cats suddenly look upward and gaze curiously into +space at something that is passing and that we can't see," said the +bell-ringer's wife. + +"No, thanks," said Gévingey to Des Hermies, who was offering him another +helping of egg-and-dandelion salad. + +"My friends," said the bell-ringer, "you forget only one doctrine, that +of the Church, which attributes all these inexplicable phenomena to +Satan. Catholicism has known them for a long time. It did not need to +wait for the first manifestations of the spirits--which were produced, I +believe, in 1847, in the United States, through the Fox family--before +decreeing that spirit rapping came from the Devil. You will find in +Saint Augustine the proof, for he had to send a priest to put an end to +noises and overturning of objects and furniture, in the diocese of +Hippo, analogous to those which Spiritism points out. At the time of +Theodoric also, Saint Cæsaræus ridded a house of lemurs haunting it. You +see, there are only the City of God and the City of the Devil. Now, +since God is above these cheap manipulations, the occultists and +spiritists satanize more or less, whether they wish to or not." + +"Nevertheless, Spiritism has accomplished one important thing. It has +violated the threshold of the unknown, broken the doors of the +sanctuary. It has brought about in the extranatural a revolution similar +to that which was effected in the terrestrial order in France in 1789. +It has democratized evocation and opened a whole new vista. Only, it has +lacked initiates to lead it, and, proceeding at random without science, +it has agitated good and bad spirits together. In Spiritism you will +find a jumble of everything. It is the hash of mystery, if I may be +permitted the expression." + +"The saddest thing about it," said Des Hermies, laughing, "is that at a +séance one never sees a thing! I know that experiments have been +successful, but those which I have witnessed--well, the experimenters +seemed to take a long shot and miss." + +"That is not surprising," said the astrologer, spreading some firm +candied orange jelly on a piece of bread, "the first law to observe in +magism and Spiritism is to send away the unbelievers, because very often +their fluid is antagonistic to that of the clairvoyant or the medium." + +"Then how can there be any assurance of the reality of the phenomena?" +thought Durtal. + +Carhaix rose. "I shall be back in ten minutes." He put on his greatcoat, +and soon the sound of his steps was lost in the tower. + +"True," murmured Durtal, consulting his watch. "It's a quarter to +eight." + +There was a moment of silence in the room. As all refused to have any +more dessert, Mme. Carhaix took up the tablecloth and spread an oilcloth +in its place. + +The astrologer played with his rings, turning them about; Durtal was +rolling a pellet of crumbled bread between his fingers; Des Hermies, +leaning over to one side, pulled from his patch pocket his embossed +Japanese pouch and made a cigarette. + +Then when the bell-ringer's wife had bidden them good night and retired +to her room, Des Hermies got the kettle and the coffee pot. + +"Want any help?" Durtal proposed. + +"You can get the little glasses and uncork the liqueur bottles, if you +will." + +As he opened the cupboard, Durtal swayed, dizzy from the strokes of the +bells which shook the walls and filled the room with clamour. + +"If there are spirits in this room, they must be getting knocked to +pieces," he said, setting the liqueur glasses on the table. + +"Bells drive phantoms and spectres away," Gévingey answered, doctorally, +filling his pipe. + +"Here," said Des Hermies, "will you pour hot water slowly into the +filter? I've got to feed the stove. It's getting chilly here. My feet +are freezing." + +Carhaix returned, blowing out his lantern. "The bell was in good voice, +this clear, dry night," and he took off his mountaineer cap and his +overcoat. + +"What do you think of him?" Des Hermies asked Durtal in a very low +voice, and pointed at the astrologer, now lost in a cloud of pipe smoke. + +"In repose he looks like an old owl, and when he speaks he makes me +think of a melancholy and discursive schoolmaster." + +"Only one," said Des Hermies to Carhaix, who was holding a lump of sugar +over Des Hermies's coffee cup. + +"I hear, monsieur, that you are occupied with a history of Gilles de +Rais," said Gévingey to Durtal. + +"Yes, for the time being I am up to my eyes in Satanism with that man." + +"And," said Des Hermies, "we were just going to appeal to your extensive +knowledge. You only can enlighten my friend on one of the most obscure +questions of Diabolism." + +"Which one?" + +"That of incubacy and succubacy." + +Gévingey did not answer at once. "That is a much graver question than +Spiritism," he said at last, "and grave in a different way. But monsieur +already knows something about it?" + +"Only that opinions differ. Del Rio and Bodin, for instance, consider +the incubi as masculine demons which couple with women and the succubi +as demons who consummate the carnal act with men. + +"According to their theories the incubi take the semen lost by men in +dream and make use of it. So that two questions arise: first, can a +child be born of such a union? The possibility of this kind of +procreation has been upheld by the Church doctors, who affirm, even, +that children of such commerce are heavier than others and can drain +three nurses without taking on flesh. The second question is whether the +demon who copulates with the mother or the man whose semen has been +taken is the father of the child. To which Saint Thomas answers, with +more or less subtle arguments, that the real father is not the incubus +but the man." + +"For Sinistrari d'Ameno," observed Durtal, "the incubi and succubi are +not precisely demons, but animal spirits, intermediate between the demon +and the angel, a sort of satyr or faun, such as were revered in the time +of paganism, a sort of imp, such as were exorcised in the Middle Ages. +Sinistrari adds that they do not need to pollute a sleeping man, since +they possess genitals and are endowed with prolificacy." + +"Well, there is nothing further," said Gévingey. "Görres, so learned, so +precise, in his _Mystik_ passes rapidly over this question, even +neglects it, and the Church, you know, is completely silent, for the +Church does not like to treat this subject and views askance the priest +who does occupy himself with it." + +"I beg your pardon," said Carhaix, always ready to defend the Church. +"The Church has never hesitated to declare itself on this detestable +subject. The existence of succubi and incubi is certified by Saint +Augustine, Saint Thomas, Saint Bonaventure, Denys le Chartreux, Pope +Innocent VIII, and how many others! The question is resolutely settled +for every Catholic. It also figures in the lives of some of the saints, +if I am not mistaken. Yes, in the legend of Saint Hippolyte, Jacques de +Voragine tells how a priest, tempted by a naked succubus, cast his stole +at its head and it suddenly became the corpse of some dead woman whom +the Devil had animated to seduce him." + +"Yes," said Gévingey, whose eyes twinkled. "The Church recognizes +succubacy, I grant. But let me speak, and you will see that my +observations are not uncalled for. + +"You know very well, messieurs," addressing Des Hermies and Durtal, +"what the books teach, but within a hundred years everything has +changed, and if the facts I am are unknown to the many members of the +clergy, and you will not find them cited in any book whatever. + +"At present it is less frequently demons than bodies raised from the +dead which fill the indispensable rôle of incubus and succubus. In other +words, formerly the living being subject to succubacy was known to be +possessed. Now that vampirism, by the evocation of the dead, is joined +to demonism, the victim is worse than possessed. The Church did not know +what to do. Either it must keep silent or reveal the possibility of the +evocation of the dead, already forbidden by Moses, and this admission +was dangerous, for it popularized the knowledge of acts that are easier +to produce now than formerly, since without knowing it Spiritism has +traced the way. + +"So the Church has kept silent. And Rome is not unaware of the frightful +advance incubacy has made in the cloisters in our days." + +"That proves that continence is hard to bear in solitude," said Des +Hermies. + +"It merely proves that the soul is feeble and that people have forgotten +how to pray," said Carhaix. + +"However that may be, messieurs, to instruct you completely in this +matter, I must divide the creatures smitten with incubacy or succubacy +into two classes. The first is composed of persons who have directly and +voluntarily given themselves over to the demoniac action of the spirits. +These persons are quite rare and they all die by suicide or some other +form of violent death. The second is composed of persons on whom the +visitation of spirits has been imposed by a spell. These are very +numerous, especially in the convents dominated by the demoniac +societies. Ordinarily these victims end in madness. The psychopathic +hospitals are crowded with them. The doctors and the majority of the +priests do not know the cause of their madness, but the cases are +curable. A thaumaturge of my acquaintance has saved a good many of the +bewitched who without his aid would be howling under hydrotherapeutic +douches. There are certain fumigations, certain exsufflations, certain +commandments written on a sheet of virgin parchment thrice blessed and +worn like an amulet which almost always succeed in delivering the +patient." + +"I want to ask you," said Des Hermies, "does a woman receive the visit +of the incubus while she is asleep or while she is awake?" + +"A distinction must be made. If the woman is not the victim of a spell, +if she voluntarily consorts with the impure spirit, she is always awake +when the carnal act takes place. If, on the other hand, the woman is the +victim of sorcery, the sin is committed either while she is asleep or +while she is awake, but in the latter case she is in a cataleptic state +which prevents her from defending herself. The most powerful of +present-day exorcists, the man who has gone most thoroughly into this +matter, one Johannès, Doctor of Theology, told me that he had saved nuns +who had been ridden without respite for two, three, even four days by +incubi!" + +"I know that priest," remarked Des Hermies. + +"And the act is consummated in the same manner as the normal human act?" + +"Yes and no. Here the dirtiness of the details makes me hesitate," said +Gévingey, becoming slightly red. "What I can tell you is more than +strange. Know, then, that the organ of the incubus is bifurcated and at +the same time penetrates both vases. Formerly it extended, and while one +branch of the fork acted in the licit channels, the other at the same +time reached up to the lower part of the face. You may imagine, +gentlemen, how life must be shortened by operations which are multiplied +through all the senses." + +"And you are sure that these are facts?" + +"Absolutely." + +"But come now, you have proofs?" + +Gévingey was silent, then, "The subject is so grave and I have gone so +far that I had better go the rest of the way. I am not mad nor the +victim of hallucination. Well, messieurs, I slept one time in the room +of the most redoubtable master Satanism now can claim." + +"Canon Docre," Des Hermies interposed. + +"Yes, and my sleep was fitful. It was broad daylight. I swear to you +that the succubus came, irritant and palpable and most tenacious. +Happily, I remembered the formula of deliverance, which kept me-- + +"So I ran that very day to Doctor Johannès, of whom I have spoken. He +immediately and forever, I hope, liberated me from the spell." + +"If I did not fear to be indiscreet, I would ask you what kind of thing +this succubus was, whose attack you repulsed." + +"Why, it was like any naked woman," said the astrologer hesitantly. + +"Curious, now, if it had demanded its little gifts, its little gloves--" +said Durtal, biting his lips. + +"And do you know what has become of the terrible Docre?" Des Hermies +inquired. + +"No, thank God. They say he is in the south, somewhere around Nîmes, +where he formerly resided." + +"But what does this abbé do?" inquired Durtal. + +"What does he do? He evokes the Devil, and he feeds white mice on the +hosts which he consecrates. His frenzy for sacrilege is such that he had +the image of Christ tattooed on his heels so that he could always step +on the Saviour!" + +"Well," murmured Carhaix, whose militant moustache bristled while his +great eyes flamed, "if that abominable priest were here, I swear to you +that I would respect his feet, but that I would throw him downstairs +head first." + +"And the black mass?" inquired Des Hermies. + +"He celebrates it with foul men and women. He is openly accused of +having influenced people to make wills in his favor and of causing +inexplicable death. Unfortunately, there are no laws to repress +sacrilege, and how can you prosecute a man who sends maladies from a +distance and kills slowly in such a way that at the autopsy no traces of +poison appear?" + +"The modern Gilles de Rais!" exclaimed Durtal. + +"Yes, less savage, less frank, more hypocritically cruel. He does not +cut throats. He probably limits himself to 'sendings' or to causing +suicide by suggestion," said Des Hermies, "for he is, I believe, a +master hypnotist." + +"Could he insinuate into a victim the idea to drink, regularly, in +graduated doses, a toxin which he would designate, and which would +simulate the phases of a malady?" asked Durtal. + +"Nothing simpler. 'Open window burglars' that the physicians of the +present day are, they recognize perfectly the ability of a more skilful +man to pull off such jobs. The experiments of Beaunis, Liégois, Liébaut, +and Bernheim are conclusive: you can even get a person assassinated by +another to whom you suggest, without his knowledge, the will to the +crime." + +"I was thinking of something, myself," said Carhaix, who had been +reflecting and not listening to this discussion of hypnotism. "Of the +Inquisition. It certainly had its reason for being. It is the only agent +that could deal with this fallen priest whom the Church has swept out." + +"And remember," said Des Hermies, with his crooked smile playing around +the corner of his mouth, "that the ferocity of the Inquisition has been +greatly exaggerated. No doubt the benevolent Bodin speaks of driving +long needles between the nails and the flesh of the sorcerers' fingers. +'An excellent gehenna,' says he. He eulogizes equally the torture by +fire, which he characterizes as 'an exquisite death.' But he wishes only +to turn the magicians away from their detestable practises and save +their souls. Then Del Rio declares that 'the question' must not be +applied to demoniacs after they have eaten, for fear they will vomit. He +worried about their stomachs, this worthy man. Wasn't it also he who +decreed that the torture must not be repeated twice in the same day, so +as to give fear and pain a chance to calm down? Admit that the good +Jesuit was not devoid of delicacy!" + +"Docre," Gévingey went on, not paying any attention to the words of Des +Hermies, "is the only individual who has rediscovered the ancient +secrets and who obtains results in practise. He is rather more powerful, +I would have you believe, than all those fools and quacks of whom we +have been speaking. And they know the terrible canon, for he has sent +many of them serious attacks of ophthalmia which the oculists cannot +cure. So they tremble when the name Docre is pronounced in their +presence." + +"But how did a priest fall so low?" + +"I can't say. If you wish ampler information about him," said Gévingey, +addressing Des Hermies, "question your friend Chantelouve." + +"Chantelouve!" cried Durtal. + +"Yes, he and his wife used to be quite intimate with Canon Docre, but I +hope for their sakes that they have long since ceased to have dealings +with the monster." + +Durtal listened no more. Mme. Chantelouve knew Canon Docre! Ah, was she +Satanic, too? No, she certainly did not act like a possessed. "Surely +this astrologer is cracked," he thought. She! And he called her image +before him, and thought that tomorrow night she would probably give +herself to him. Ah, those strange eyes of hers, those dark clouds +suddenly cloven by radiant light! + +She came now and took complete possession of him, as before he had +ascended to the tower. "But if I didn't love you would I have come to +you?" That sentence which she had spoken, with a caressing inflection of +the voice, he heard again, and again he saw her mocking and tender face. + +"Ah, you are dreaming," said Des Hermies, tapping him on the shoulder. +"We have to go. It's striking ten." + +When they were in the street they said good night to Gévingey, who lived +on the other side of the river. Then they walked along a little way. + +"Well," said Des Hermies, "are you interested in my astrologer?" + +"He is slightly mad, isn't he?" + +"Slightly? Humph." + +"Well, his stories are incredible." + +"Everything is incredible," said Des Hermies placidly, turning up the +collar of his overcoat. "However, I will admit that Gévingey astounds me +when he asserts that he was visited by a succubus. His good faith is not +to be doubted, for I know him to be a man who means what he says, though +he is vain and doctorial. I know, too, that at La Salpêtrière such +occurrences are not rare. Women smitten with hystero-epilepsy see +phantoms beside them in broad daylight and mate with them in a +cataleptic state, and every night couch with visions that must be +exactly like the fluid creatures of incubacy. But these women are +hystero-epileptics, and Gévingey isn't, for I am his physician. Then, +what can be believed and what can be proved? The materialists have taken +the trouble to revise the accounts of the sorcery trials of old. They +have found in the possession-cases of the Ursulines of Loudun and the +nuns of Poitiers, in the history, even, of the convulsionists of Saint +Médard, the symptoms of major hysteria, the same contractions of the +whole system, the same muscular dissolutions, the same lethargies, even, +finally, the famous arc of the circle. And what does this demonstrate, +that these demonomaniacs were hystero-epileptics? Certainly. The +observations of Dr. Richet, expert in such matters, are conclusive, but +wherein do they invalidate possession? From the fact that the patients +of La Salpêtrière are not possessed, though they are hysterical, does it +follow that others, smitten with the same malady as they, are not +possessed? It would have to be demonstrated also that all demonopathics +are hysterical, and that is false, for there are women of sound mind and +perfectly good sense who are demonopathic without knowing it. And +admitting that the last point is controvertible, there remains this +unanswerable question: is a woman possessed because she is hysterical, +or is she hysterical because she is possessed? Only the Church can +answer. Science cannot. + +"No, come to think it over, the effrontery of the positivists is +appalling. They decree that Satanism does not exist. They lay everything +at the account of major hysteria, and they don't even know what this +frightful malady is and what are its causes. No doubt Charcot determines +very well the phases of the attack, notes the nonsensical and passional +attitudes, the contortionistic movements; he discovers hysterogenic +zones and can, by skilfully manipulating the ovaries, arrest or +accelerate the crises, but as for foreseeing them and learning the +sources and the motives and curing them, that's another thing. Science +goes all to pieces on the question of this inexplicable, stupefying +malady, which, consequently, is subject to the most diversified +interpretations, not one of which can be declared exact. For the soul +enters into this, the soul in conflict with the body, the soul +overthrown in the demoralization of the nerves. You see, old man, all +this is as dark as a bottle of ink. Mystery is everywhere and reason +cannot see its way." + +"Mmmm," said Durtal, who was now in front of his door. "Since anything +can be maintained and nothing is certain, succubacy has it. Basically it +is more literary--and cleaner--than positivism." + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +The day was long and hard to kill. Waking at dawn, full of thoughts of +Mme. Chantelouve, he could not stay in one place, and kept inventing +excuses for going out. He had no cakes, bonbons, and exotic liqueurs, +and one must not be without all the little essentials when expecting a +visit from a woman. He went by the longest route to the avenue de +l'Opéra to buy fine essences of cedar and of that alkermes which makes +the person tasting it think he is in an Oriental pharmaceutic +laboratory. "The idea is," he said, "not so much to treat Hyacinthe as +to astound her by giving her a sip of an unknown elixir." + +He came back laden with packages, then went out again, and in the street +was assailed by an immense ennui. After an interminable tour of the +quays he finally tumbled into a beer hall. He fell on a bench and opened +a newspaper. + +What was he thinking as he sat, not reading but just looking at the +police news? Nothing, not even of her. From having revolved the same +matter over and over again and again his mind had reached a deadlock and +refused to function. Durtal merely found himself very tired, very +drowsy, as one in a warm bath after a night of travel. + +"I must go home pretty soon," he said when he could collect himself a +little, "for Père Rateau certainly has not cleaned house in the thorough +fashion which I commanded, and of course I don't want the furniture to +be covered with dust. Six o'clock. Suppose I dine, after a fashion, in +some not too unreliable place." + +He remembered a nearby restaurant where he had eaten before without a +great deal of dread. He chewed his way laboriously through an extremely +dead fish, then through a piece of meat, flabby and cold; then he found +a very few lentils, stiff with insecticide, beneath a great deal of +sauce; finally he savoured some ancient prunes, whose juice smelt of +mould and was at the same time aquatic and sepulchral. + +Back in his apartment, he lighted fires in his bedroom and in his study, +then he inspected everything. He was not mistaken. The concierge had +upset the place with the same brutality, the same haste, as customarily. +However, he must have tried to wash the windows, because the glass was +streaked with finger marks. + +Durtal effaced the imprints with a damp cloth, smoothed out the folds in +the carpet, drew the curtains, and put the bookcases in order after +dusting them with a napkin. Everywhere he found grains of tobacco, +trodden cigarette ashes, pencil sharpenings, pen points eaten with rust. +He also found cocoons of cat fur and crumpled bits of rough draft +manuscript which had been whirled into all corners by the furious +sweeping. + +He finally could not help asking himself why he had so long tolerated +the fuzzy filth which obscured and incrusted his household. While he +dusted, his indignation against Rateau increased mightily. "Look at +that," he said, perceiving his wax candles grown as yellow as tallow +ones. He changed them. "That's better." He arranged his desk into +studied disarray. Notebooks, and books with paper-cutters in them for +book-marks, he laid in careful disorder. "Symbol of work," he said, +smiling, as he placed an old folio, open, on a chair. Then he passed +into his bedroom. With a wet sponge he freshened up the marble of the +dresser, then he smoothed the bed cover, straightened his photographs +and engravings, and went into the bathroom. Here he paused, +disheartened. In a bamboo rack over the wash-bowl there was a chaos of +phials. Resolutely he grabbed the perfume bottles, scoured the bottoms +and necks with emery, rubbed the labels with gum elastic and bread +crumbs, then he soaped the tub, dipped the combs and brushes in an +ammoniac solution, got his vapourizer to working and sprayed the room +with Persian lilac, washed the linoleum, and scoured the seat and the +pipes. Seized with a mania for cleanliness, he polished, scrubbed, +scraped, moistened, and dried, with great sweeping strokes of the arm. +He was no longer vexed at the concierge; he was even sorry the old +villain had not left him more to do. + +Then he shaved, touched up his moustache, and proceeded to make an +elaborate toilet, asking himself, as he dressed, whether he had better +wear button shoes or slippers. He decided that shoes were less familiar +and more dignified but resolved to wear a flowing tie and a blouse, +thinking that this artistic negligée would please a woman. + +"All ready," he said, after a last stroke of the brush. He made the turn +of the other rooms, poked the fires, and fed the cat, which was running +about in alarm, sniffing all the cleaned objects and doubtless thinking +that those he rubbed against every day without paying any attention to +them had been replaced by new ones. + +"Oh, the 'little essentials' I am forgetting!" Durtal put the teakettle +on the hob and placed cups, teapot, sugar bowl, cakes, bonbons, and tiny +liqueur glasses on an old lacquered "waiter" so as to have everything on +hand when it was time to serve. + +"Now I'm through. I've given the place a thorough cleaning. Let her +come," he said to himself, realigning some books whose backs stuck out +further than the others on the shelves. "Everything in good shape. +Except the chimney of the lamp. Where it bulges, there are caramel +specks and blobs of soot, but I can't get the thing out; I don't want to +burn my fingers; and anyway, with the shade lowered a bit she won't +notice. + +"Well, how shall I proceed when she does come?" he asked himself, +sinking into an armchair. "She enters. Good. I take her hands. I kiss +them. Then I bring her into this room. I have her sit down beside the +fire, in this chair. I station myself, facing her, on this stool. +Advancing a little, touching her knees, I can seize her. I make her bend +over. I am supporting her whole weight. I bring her lips to mine and I +am saved! + +"--Or rather lost. For then the bother begins. I can't bear to think of +getting her into the bedroom. Undressing and going to bed! That part is +appalling unless you know each other very well. And when you are just +becoming acquainted! The nice way is to have a cosy little supper for +two. The wine has an ungodly kick to it. She immediately passes out, and +when she comes to she is lying in bed under a shower of kisses. As we +can't do it that way we shall have to avoid mutual embarrassment by +making a show of passion. If I speed up the tempo and pretend to be in a +frenzy perhaps we shall not have time to think about the miserable +details. So I must possess her here, in this very spot, and she must +think I have lost my head when she succumbs. + +"It's hard to arrange in this room, because there isn't any divan. The +best way would be to throw her down on the carpet. She can put her hands +over her eyes, as they always do. I shall take good care to turn down +the lamp before she rises. + +"Well, I had better prepare a cushion for her head." He found one and +slid it under the chair. "And I had better not wear suspenders, for they +often cause ridiculous delays." He took them off and put on a belt. "But +then there is that damned question of the skirts! I admire the novelists +who can get a virgin unharnessed from her corsets and deflowered in the +winking of an eye--as if it were possible! How annoying to have to fight +one's way through all those starched entanglements! I do hope Mme. +Chantelouve will be considerate and avoid those ridiculous difficulties +as much as possible--for her own sake." + +He consulted his watch. "Half-past eight. I mustn't expect her for +nearly an hour, because, like all women, she will come late. What kind +of an excuse will she make to Chantelouve, to get away tonight? Well, +that is none of my business. Hmmm. This water heater beside the fire +looks like the invitation to the toilet, but no, the tea things handy +banish any gross idea." + +And if Hyacinthe did not come? + +"She will come," he said to himself, suddenly moved. "What motive would +she have for staying away? She knows that she cannot inflame me more +than I am inflamed." Then, jumping from phase to phase of the same old +question, "This will turn out badly, of course," he decided. "Once I am +satisfied, disenchantment is inevitable. Oh, well, so much the better, +for with this romance going on I cannot work." + +"Miserable me! relapsing--only in mind, alas!--to the age of twenty. I +am waiting for a woman. I who have scorned the doings of lovers for +years and years. I look at my watch every five minutes, and I listen, in +spite of myself, thinking it is her step I hear on the stair. + +"No, there is no getting around it. The little blue flower, the +perennial of the soul, is difficult to extirpate, and it keeps growing +up again. It does not show itself for twenty years, and then all of a +sudden, you know not why nor how, it sprouts, and then forth comes a +burst of blossoms. My God! I am getting foolish." + +He jumped from his chair. There was a gentle ring. "Not nine o'clock +yet. It isn't she," he murmured, opening the door. + +He squeezed her hands and thanked her for being so punctual. + +She said she was not feeling well. "I came only because I didn't want to +keep you waiting in vain." + +His heart sank. + +"I have a fearful headache," she said, passing her gloved hands over her +forehead. + +He took her furs and motioned her to the armchair. Prepared to follow +his plan of attack, he sat down on the stool, but she refused the +armchair and took a seat beside the table. Rising, he bent over her and +caught hold of her fingers. + +"Your hand is burning," she said. + +"Yes, a bit of fever, because I get so little sleep. If you knew how +much I have thought about you! Now I have you here, all to myself," and +he spoke of that persistent odour of cinnamon, faint, distant, expiring +amid the less definite odours which her gloves exhaled, "well," and he +sniffed her fingers, "you will leave some of yourself here when you go +away." + +She rose, sighing. "I see you have a cat. What is his name?" + +"Mouche." + +She called to the cat, which fled precipitately. + +"Mouche! Mouche!" Durtal called, but Mouche took refuge under the bed +and refused to come out. "You see he is rather bashful. He has never +seen a woman." + +"Oh, would you try to make me think you have never received a woman +here?" + +He swore that he never had, that she was the first.... + +"And you were not really anxious that this--first--should come?" + +He blushed. "Why do you say that?" + +She made a vague gesture. "I want to tease you," she said, sitting down +in the armchair. "To tell you the truth, I do not know why I like to ask +you such presumptuous questions." + +He had sat down in front of her. So now, at last, the scene was set as +he wished and he must begin the attack. His knee touched hers. + +"You know," he said, "that you cannot presume here. You have claims +on--" + +"No, I haven't and I want none." + +"Why?" + +"Because.... Listen," and her voice became grave and firm. "The more I +reflect, the more inclined I am to ask you, for heaven's sake, not to +destroy our dream. And then.... Do you want me to be frank, so frank +that I shall doubtless seem a monster of selfishness? Well, personally, +I do not wish to spoil the--the--what shall I say?--the extreme +happiness our relation gives me. I know I explain badly and confusedly, +but this is the way it is: I possess you when and how I please, just as, +for a long time, I have possessed Byron, Baudelaire, Gérard de Nerval, +those I love--" + +"You mean ...?" + +"That I have only to desire them, to desire you, before I go to +sleep...." + +"And?" + +"And you would be inferior to my chimera, to the Durtal I adore, whose +caresses make my nights delirious!" + +He looked at her in stupefaction. She had that dolent, troubled look in +her eyes. She even seemed not to see him, but to be looking into space. +He hesitated.... In a sudden flash of thought he saw the scenes of +incubacy of which Gévingey had spoken. "We shall untangle all this +later," he thought within himself, "meanwhile--" He took her gently by +the arms, drew her to him and abruptly kissed her mouth. + +She rebounded as if she had had an electric shock. She struggled to +rise. He strained her to him and embraced her furiously, then with a +strange gurgling cry she threw her head back and caught his leg between +both of hers. + +He emitted a howl of rage, for he felt her haunches move. He understood +now--or thought he understood! She wanted a miserly pleasure, a sort of +solitary vice.... + +He pushed her away. She remained there, quite pale, choking, her eyes +closed, her hands outstretched like those of a frightened child. Then +Durtal's wrath vanished. With a little cry he came up to her and caught +her again, but she struggled, crying, "No! I beseech you, let me go." + +He held her crushed against his body and attempted to make her yield. + +"I implore you, let me go." + +Her accent was so despairing that he relinquished her. Then he debated +with himself whether to throw her brutally on the floor and violate her. +But her bewildered eyes frightened him. + +She was panting and her arms hung limp at her sides as she leaned, very +pale, against the bookcase. + +"Ah!" he said, marching up and down, knocking into the furniture, "I +must really love you, if in spite of your supplications and refusals--" + +She joined her hands to keep him away. + +"Good God!" he said, exasperated, "what are you made of?" + +She came to herself, and, offended, she said to him, "Monsieur, I too +suffer. Spare me," and pell-mell she spoke of her husband, of her +confessor, and became so incoherent that Durtal was frightened. She was +silent, then in a singing voice she said, "Tell me, you will come to my +house tomorrow night, won't you?" + +"But I suffer too!" + +She seemed not to hear him. In her smoky eyes, far, far back, there +seemed to be a twinkle of feeble light. She murmured, in the cadence of +a canticle, "Tell me, dear, you will come tomorrow night, won't you?" + +"Yes," he said at last. + +Then she readjusted herself and without saying a word quitted the room. +In silence he accompanied her to the entrance. She opened the door, +turned around, took his hand and very lightly brushed it with her lips. + +He stood there stupidly, not knowing what to make of her behaviour. + +"What does she mean?" he exclaimed, returning to the room, putting the +furniture back in place and smoothing the disordered carpet. "Heavens, I +wish I could as easily restore order to my brain. Let me think, if I +can. What is she after? Because, of course, she has something in view. +She does not want our relation to culminate in the act itself. Does she +really fear disillusion, as she claims? Is she really thinking how +grotesque the amorous somersaults are? Or is she, as I believe, a +melancholy and terrible player-around-the-edges, thinking only of +herself? Well, her obscene selfishness is one of those complicated sins +that have to be shriven by the very highest confessor. She's a plain +teaser! + +"I don't know. Incubacy enters into this. She admits--so placidly!--that +in dream she cohabits at will with dead or living beings. Is she +Satanizing, and is this some of the work of Canon Docre? He's a friend +of hers. + +"So many riddles impossible to solve. What is the meaning of this +unexpected invitation for tomorrow night? Does she wish to yield nowhere +except in her own home? Does she feel more at ease there, or does she +think the propinquity of her husband will render the sin more piquant? +Does she loathe Chantelouve, and is this a meditated vengeance, or does +she count on the fear of danger to spur our senses? + +"After all, I think it is probably a final coquetry, an appetizer before +the repast. And women are so funny anyway! She probably thinks these +delays and subterfuges are necessary to differentiate her from a +cocotte. Or perhaps there is a physical necessity for stalling me off +another day." + +He sought other reasons but could find none. + +"Deep down in my heart," he said, vexed in spite of himself by this +rebuff, "I know I have been an imbecile. I ought to have acted the cave +man and paid no attention to her supplications and lies. I ought to have +taken violent possession of her lips and breast. Then it would be +finished, whereas now I must begin at the beginning again, and God damn +her! I have other things to do. + +"Who knows whether she isn't laughing at me this very moment? Perhaps +she wanted me to be more violent and bold--but no, her soul-sick voice +was not feigned, her poor eyes did not simulate bewilderment, and then +what would she have meant by that _respectful_ kiss--for there was an +impalpable shade of respect and gratitude in that kiss which she planted +on my hand!" + +She was too much for him. "Meanwhile, in this hurly-burly I have +forgotten my refreshments. Suppose I take off my shoes, now that I am +alone, for my feet are swollen from parading up and down the room. +Suppose I do better yet and go to bed, for I am incapable of working or +reading," and he drew back the covers. + +"Decidedly, nothing happens the way one foresees it, yet my plan of +attack wasn't badly thought out," he said, crawling in. With a sigh he +blew out the lamp, and the cat, reassured, passed over him, lighter than +a breath, and curled up without a sound. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +Contrary to his expectations, he slept all night, with clenched fists, +and woke next morning quite calm, even gay. The scene of the night +before, which ought to have exacerbated his senses, produced exactly the +opposite effect. The truth is that Durtal was not of those who are +attracted by difficulties. He always made one hardy effort to surmount +them, then when that failed he would withdraw, with no desire to renew +the combat. If Mme. Chantelouve thought to entice him by delays, she had +miscalculated. This morning, already, he was weary of the comedy. + +His reflections began to be slightly tinged with bitterness. He was +angry at the woman for having wished to keep him in suspense, and he was +angry at himself for having permitted her to make a fool of him. Then +certain expressions, the impertinence of which had not struck him at +first, chilled him now. "Her nervous trick of laughing, which sometimes +caught her in public places," then her declaration that she did not need +his permission, nor even his person, in order to possess him, seemed to +him unbecoming, to say the least, and uncalled for, as he had not run +after her nor indeed made any advances to her at all. + +"I will fix you," he said, "when I get some hold over you." + +But in the calm awakening of this morning the spell of the woman had +relaxed. Resolutely he thought, "Keep two dates with her. This one +tonight at her house. It won't count, because nothing can be done. For I +intend neither to allow myself to be assaulted nor to attempt an +assault. I certainly have no desire to be caught by Chantelouve _in +flagrante delicto_, and probably get into a shooting scrape and be haled +into police court. Have her here once. If she does not yield then, why, +the matter is closed. She can go and tickle somebody else." + +And he made a hearty breakfast, and sat down to his writing table and +ran over the scattered notes for his book. + +"I had got," he said, glancing at his last chapter, "to where the +alchemic experiments and diabolic evocations have proved unavailing. +Prelati, Blanchet, all the sorcerers and sorcerers' helpers whom the +Marshal has about him, admit that to bring Satan to him Gilles must make +over his soul and body to the Devil or commit crimes. + +"Gilles refuses to alienate his existence and sell his soul, but he +contemplates murder without any horror. This man, so brave on the +battlefield, so courageous when he accompanied Jeanne d'Arc, trembles +before the Devil and is afraid when he thinks of eternity and of Christ. +The same is true of his accomplices. He has made them swear on the +Testament to keep the secret of the confounding turpitudes which the +château conceals, and he can be sure that not one will violate the oath, +for, in the Middle Ages, the most reckless of freebooters would not +commit the inexpiable sin of deceiving God. + +"At the same time that his alchemists abandon their unfruitful furnaces, +Gilles begins a course of systematic gluttony, and his flesh, set on +fire by the essences of inordinate potations and spiced dishes, seethes +in tumultuous eruption. + +"Now, there are no women in the château. Gilles appears to have despised +the sex ever since leaving the court. After experience of the ribalds of +the camps and frequentation, with Xaintrailles and La Hire, of the +prostitutes of Charles VII, it seems that a dislike for the feminine +form came over him. Like others whose ideal of concupiscence is +deteriorated and deviated, he certainly comes to be disgusted by the +delicacy of the grain of the skin of women and by that odour of +femininity which all sodomists abhor. + +"He depraves the choir boys who are under his authority. He chose them +in the first place, these little psaltry ministrants, for their beauty, +and 'beautiful as angels' they are. They are the only ones he loves, the +only ones he spares in his murderous transports. + +"But soon infantile pollution seems to him an insipid delicacy. The law +of Satanism which demands that the elect of Evil, once started, must go +the whole way, is once more fulfilled. Gilles's soul must become +thoroughly cankered, a red tabernacle, that in it the Very Low may dwell +at ease. + +"The litanies of lust arise in an atmosphere that is like the wind over +a slaughter house. The first victim is a very small boy whose name we do +not know. Gilles disembowels him, and, cutting off the hands and tearing +out the eyes and heart, carries these members into Prelati's chamber. +The two men offer them, with passionate objurgations, to the Devil, who +holds his peace. Gilles, confounded, flees. Prelati rolls up the poor +remains in linen and, trembling, goes out at night to bury them in +consecrated ground beside a chapel dedicated to Saint Vincent. + +"Gilles preserves the blood of this child to write formulas of evocation +and conjurements. It manures a horrible crop. Not long afterward the +Marshal reaps the most abundant harvest of crimes that has ever been +sown. + +"From 1432 to 1440, that is to say during the eight years between the +Marshal's retreat and his death, the inhabitants of Anjou, Poitou, and +Brittany walk the highways wringing their hands. All the children +disappear. Shepherd boys are abducted from the fields. Little girls +coming out of school, little boys who have gone to play ball in the +lanes or at the edge of the wood, return no more. + +"In the course of an investigation ordered by the duke of Brittany, the +scribes of Jean Touscheronde, duke's commissioner in these matters, +compile interminable lists of lost children. + +"Lost, at la Rochebernart, the child of the woman Péronne, 'a child who +did go to school and who did apply himself to his book with exceeding +diligence.' + +"Lost, at Saint Etienne de Montluc, the son of Guillaume Brice, 'and +this was a poor man and sought alms.' + +"Lost, at Mâchecoul, the son of Georget le Barbier, 'who was seen, a +certain day, knocking apples from a tree behind the hôtel Rondeau, and +who since hath not been seen.' + +"Lost, at Thonaye, the child of Mathelin Thouars, 'and he had been heard +to cry and lament and the said child was about twelve years of age.' + +"At Mâchecoul, again, the day of Pentecost, mother and father Sergent +leave their eight-year-old boy at home, and when they return from the +fields 'they did not find the said child of eight years of age, +wherefore they marvelled and were exceeding grieved.' + +"At Chantelou, it is Pierre Badieu, mercer of the parish, who says that +a year or thereabouts ago, he saw, in the domain de Rais, 'two little +children of the age of nine who were brothers and the children of Robin +Pavot of the aforesaid place, and since that time neither have they been +seen neither doth any know what hath become of them.' + +"At Nantes, it is Jeanne Darel who deposes that 'on the day of the feast +of the Holy Father, her true child named Olivier did stray from her, +being of the age of seven and eight years, and since the day of the +feast of the Holy Father neither did she see him nor hear tidings.' + +"And the account of the investigation goes on, revealing hundreds of +names, describing the grief of the mothers who interrogate passersby on +the highway, and telling of the keening of the families from whose very +homes children have been spirited away when the elders went to the +fields to hoe or to sow the hemp. These phrases, like a desolate +refrain, recur again and again, at the end of every deposition: 'They +were seen complaining dolorously,' 'Exceedingly they did lament.' +Wherever the bloodthirsty Gilles dwells the women weep. + +"At first the frantic people tell themselves that evil fairies and +malicious genii are dispersing the generation, but little by little +terrible suspicions are aroused. As soon as the Marshal quits a place, +as he goes from the château de Tiffauges to the château de Champtocé, +and from there to the castle of La Suze or to Nantes, he leaves behind +him a wake of tears. He traverses a countryside and in the morning +children are missing. Trembling, the peasant realizes also that wherever +Prelati, Roger de Bricqueville, Gilles de Sillé, any of the Marshal's +intimates, have shown themselves, little boys have disappeared. Finally, +the peasant learns to look with horror upon an old woman, Perrine +Martin, who wanders around, clad in grey, her face covered--as is that +of Gilles de Sillé--with a black stamin. She accosts children, and her +speech is so seductive, her face, when she raises her veil, so benign, +that all follow her to the edge of a wood, where men carry them off, +gagged, in sacks. And the frightened people call this purveyor of flesh, +this ogress, 'La Mefrraye,' from the name of a bird of prey. + +"These emissaries spread out, covering all the villages and hamlets, +tracking the children down at the orders of the Chief Huntsman, the sire +de Bricqueville. Not content with these beaters, Gilles takes to +standing at a window of the château, and when young mendicants, +attracted by the renown of his bounty, ask an alms, he runs an +appraising eye over them, has any who excite his lust brought in and +thrown into an underground prison and kept there until, being in +appetite, he is pleased to order a carnal supper. + +"How many children did he disembowel after deflowering them? He himself +did not know, so many were the rapes he had consummated and the murders +he had committed. The texts of the times enumerate between, seven and +eight hundred, but the estimate is inaccurate and seems +overconservative. Entire regions were devastated. The hamlet of +Tiffauges had no more young men. La Suze was without male posterity. At +Champtocé the whole foundation room of a tower was filled with corpses. +A witness cited in the inquest, Guillaume Hylairet, declared also, "that +one hight Du Jardin hath heard say that there was found in the said +castle a wine pipe full of dead little children.' + +"Even today traces of these assassinations linger. Two years ago at +Tiffauges a physician discovered an oubliette and brought forth piles of +skulls and bones. + +"Gilles confessed to frightful holocausts, and his friends confirmed the +atrocious details. + +"At dusk, when their senses are phosphorescent, enkindled by +inflammatory spiced beverages and by 'high' venison, Gilles and his +friends retire to a distant chamber of the château. The little boys are +brought from their cellar prisons to this room. They are disrobed and +gagged. The Marshal fondles them and forces them. Then he hacks them to +pieces with a dagger, taking great pleasure in slowly dismembering them. +At other times he slashes the boy's chest and drinks the breath from the +lungs; sometimes he opens the stomach also, smells it, enlarges the +incision with his hands, and seats himself in it. Then while he +macerates the warm entrails in mud, he turns half around and looks over +his shoulder to contemplate the supreme convulsions, the last spasms. He +himself says afterwards, 'I was happier in the enjoyment of tortures, +tears, fright, and blood, than in any other pleasure.' + +"Then he becomes weary of these fecal joys. An unpublished passage in +his trial proceedings informs us that 'The said sire heated himself with +little boys, sometimes also with little girls, with whom he had congress +in the belly, saying that he had more pleasure and less pain than acting +in nature.' After which, he slowly saws their throats, cuts them to +pieces, and the corpses, the linen and the clothing, are put in the +fireplace, where a smudge fire of logs and leaves is burning, and the +ashes are thrown into the latrine, or scattered to the winds from the +top of a tower, or buried in the moats and mounds. + +"Soon his furies become aggravated. Until now he has appeased the rage +of his senses with living or moribund beings. He wearies of stuprating +palpitant flesh and becomes a lover of the dead. A passionate artist, he +kisses, with cries of enthusiasm, the well-made limbs of his victims. He +establishes sepulchral beauty contests, and whichever of the truncated +heads receives the prize he raises by the hair and passionately kisses +the cold lips. + +"Vampirism satisfies him for months. He pollutes dead children, +appeasing the fever of his desires in the blood smeared chill of the +tomb. He even goes so far--one day when his supply of children is +exhausted--as to disembowel a pregnant woman and sport with the foetus. +After these excesses he falls into horrible states of coma, similar to +those heavy lethargies which overpowered Sergeant Bertrand after his +violations of the grave. But if that leaden sleep is one of the known +phases of ordinary vampirism, if Gilles de Rais was merely a sexual +pervert, we must admit that he distinguished himself from the most +delirious sadists, the most exquisite virtuosi in pain and murder, by a +detail which seems extrahuman, it is so horrible. + +"As these terrifying atrocities, these monstrous outrages, no longer +suffice him, he corrodes them with the essence of a rare sin. It is no +longer the resolute, sagacious cruelty of the wild beast playing with +the body of a victim. His ferocity does not remain merely carnal; it +becomes spiritual. He wishes to make the child suffer both in body and +soul. By a thoroughly Satanic cheat he deceives gratitude, dupes +affection, and desecrates love. At a leap he passes the bounds of human +infamy and lands plump in the darkest depth of Evil. + +"He contrives this: One of the unfortunate children is brought into his +chamber, and hanged, by Bricqueville, Prelati, and de Sillé, to a hook +fixed into the wall. Just at the moment when the child is suffocating, +Gilles orders him to be taken down and the rope untied. With some +precaution, he takes the child on his knees, revives him, caresses him, +rocks him, dries his tears, and pointing to the accomplices, says, +'These men are bad, but you see they obey me. Do not be afraid. I will +save your life and take you back to your mother,' and while the little +one, wild with joy, kisses him and at that moment loves him, Gilles +gently makes an incision in the back of the neck, rendering the child +'languishing,' to follow Gilles's own expression, and when the head, not +quite detached, bows, Gilles kneads the body, turns it about, and +violates it, bellowing. + +"After these abominable pastimes he may well believe that the art of the +charnalist has beneath his fingers expressed its last drop of pus, and +in a vaunting cry he says to his troop of parasites, "There is no man on +earth who dare do as I have done.' + +"But if in Love and Well-doing the infinite is approachable for certain +souls, the out-of-the-world possibilities of Evil are limited. In his +excesses of stupration and murder the Marshal cannot go beyond a fixed +point. In vain he may dream of unique violations, of more ingenious slow +tortures, but human imagination has a limit and he has already reached +it--even passed it, with diabolic aid. Insatiable he seethes--there is +nothing material in which to express his ideal. He can verify that axiom +of demonographers, that the Evil One dupes all persons who give +themselves, or are willing to give themselves, to him. + +"As he can descend no further, he tries returning on the way by which he +has come, but now remorse overtakes him, overwhelms him, and wrenches +him without respite. His nights are nights of expiation. Besieged by +phantoms, he howls like a wounded beast. He is found rushing along the +solitary corridors of the château. He weeps, throws himself on his +knees, swears to God that he will do penance. He promises to found pious +institutions. He does establish, at Mâchecoul, a boys' academy in honour +of the Holy Innocents. He speaks of shutting himself up in a cloister, +of going to Jerusalem, begging his bread on the way. + +"But in this fickle and aberrated mind ideas superpose themselves on +each other, then pass away, and those which disappear leave their shadow +on those which follow. Abruptly, even while weeping with distress, he +precipitates himself into new debauches and, raving with delirium, hurls +himself upon the child brought to him, gouges out the eyes, runs his +finger around the bloody, milky socket, then he seizes a spiked club and +crushes the skull. And while the gurgling blood runs over him, he +stands, smeared with spattered brains, and grinds his teeth and laughs. +Like a hunted beast he flees into the wood, while his henchmen remove +the crimson stains from the ground and dispose prudently of the corpse +and the reeking garments. + +"He wanders in the forests surrounding Tiffauges, dark, impenetrable +forests like those which Brittany still can show at Carnoet. He sobs as +he walks along. He attempts to thrust aside the phantoms which accost +him. Then he looks about him and beholds obscenity in the shapes of the +aged trees. It seems that nature perverts itself before him, that his +very presence depraves it. For the first time he understands the +motionless lubricity of trees. He discovers priapi in the branches. + +"Here a tree appears to him as a living being, standing on its +root-tressed head, its limbs waving in the air and spread wide apart, +subdivided and re-subdivided into haunches, which again are divided and +re-subdivided. Here between two limbs another branch is jammed, in a +stationary fornication which is reproduced in diminished scale from +bough to twig to the top of the tree. There it seems the trunk is a +phallus which mounts and disappears into a skirt of leaves or which, on +the contrary, issues from a green clout and plunges into the glossy +belly of the earth. + +"Frightful images rise before him. He sees the skin of little boys, the +lucid white skin, vellum-like, in the pale, smooth bark of the slender +beeches. He recognizes the pachydermatous skin of the beggar boys in the +dark and wrinkled envelope of the old oaks. Beside the bifurcations of +the branches there are yawning holes, puckered orifices in the bark, +simulating emunctoria, or the protruding anus of a beast. In the joints +of the branches there are other visions, elbows, armpits furred with +grey lichens. Even in the trunks there are incisions which spread out +into great lips beneath tufts of brown, velvety moss. + +"Everywhere obscene forms rise from the ground and spring, disordered, +into a firmament which satanizes. The clouds swell into breasts, divide +into buttocks, bulge as if with fecundity, scattering a train of spawn +through space. They accord with the sombre bulging of the foliage, in +which now there are only images of giant or dwarf hips, feminine +triangles, great V's, mouths of Sodom, glowing cicatrices, humid vents. +This landscape of abomination changes. Gilles now sees on the trunks +frightful cancers and horrible wens. He observes exostoses and ulcers, +membranous sores, tubercular chancres, atrocious caries. It is an +arboreal lazaret, a venereal clinic. + +"And there, at a detour of the forest aisle, stands a mottled red beech. + +"Amid the sanguinary falling leaves he feels that he has been spattered +by a shower of blood. He goes into a rage. He conceives the delusion +that beneath the bark lives a wood nymph, and he would feel with his +hands the palpitant flesh of the goddess, he would trucidate the Dryad, +violate her in a place unknown to the follies of men. + +"He is jealous of the woodman who can murder, can massacre, the trees, +and he raves. Tensely he listens and hears in the soughing wind a +response to his cries of desire. Overwhelmed, he resumes his walk, +weeping, until he arrives at the château and sinks to his bed exhausted, +an inert mass. + +"The phantoms take more definite shape, now that he sleeps. The lubric +enlacements of the branches, dilated crevices and cleft mosses, the +coupling of the diverse beings of the wood, disappear; the tears of the +leaves whipped by the wind are dried; the white abscesses of the clouds +are resorbed into the grey of the sky; and--in an awful silence--the +incubi and succubi pass. + +"The corpses of his victims, reduced to ashes and scattered, return to +the larva state and attack his lower parts. He writhes, with the blood +bursting his veins. He rebounds in a somersault, then he crawls to the +crucifix, like a wolf, on all fours, and howling, strains his lips to +the feet of the Christ. + +"A sudden reaction overwhelms him. He trembles before the image whose +convulsed face looks down on him. He adjures Christ to have pity, +supplicates Him to spare a sinner, and sobs and weeps, and when, +incapable of further effort, he whimpers, he hears, terrified, in his +own voice, the lamentations of the children crying for their mothers and +pleading for mercy." + + * * * * * + +And Durtal, coming slowly out of the vision he had conjured up, closed +his notebook and remarked, "Rather petty, my own spiritual conflict +regarding a woman whose sin--like my own, to be sure--is commonplace and +bourgeois." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +"Easy to find an excuse for this visit, though it will seem strange to +Chantelouve, whom I have neglected for months," said Durtal on his way +toward the rue Bagneux. "Supposing he is home this evening--and he +probably isn't, because surely Hyacinthe will have seen to that--I can +tell him that I have learned of his illness through Des Hermies and that +I have come to see how he is getting along." + +He paused on the stoop of the building in which Chantelouve lived. At +each side and over the door were these antique lamps with reflectors, +surmounted by a sort of casque of sheet iron painted green. There was an +old iron balustrade, very wide, and the steps, with wooden sides, were +paved with red tile. About this house there was a sepulchral and also +clerical odour, yet there was also something homelike--though a little +too imposing--about it such as is not to be found in the cardboard +houses they build nowadays. You could see at a glance that it did not +harbour the apartment house promiscuities: decent, respectable couples +with kept women for neighbours. The house pleased him, and he considered +Hyacinthe the more desirable for her substantial environment. + +He rang at a first-floor apartment. A maid led him through a long hall +into a sitting-room. He noticed, at a glance, that nothing had changed +since his last visit. It was the same vast, high-ceilinged room with +windows reaching to heaven. There was the huge fireplace; on the +mantelpiece the same reproduction, reduced, in bronze, of Fremiet's +Jeanne d'Arc, between the two globe lamps of Japanese porcelain. He +recognized the grand piano, the table loaded with albums, the divan, the +chairs in the style of Louis XV with tapestried covers. In front of +every window there were imitation Chinese vases, mounted on tripods of +imitation ebony and containing sickly palms. On the walls were religious +pictures, without expression, and a portrait of Chantelouve in his +youth, three-quarter length, his hand resting on a pile of his works. An +ancient Russian icon in nielloed silver and one of these Christs in +carved wood, executed in the seventeenth century by Bogard de Nancy, in +an antique frame of gilded wood backed with velvet, were the only things +that slightly relieved the banality of the decoration. The rest of the +furniture looked like that of a bourgeois household fixed up for Lent, +or for a charity dance or for a visit from the priest. A great fire +blazed on the hearth. The room was lighted by a very high lamp with a +wide shade of pink lace-- + +"Stinks of the sacristy!" Durtal was saying to himself at the moment the +door opened. + +Mme. Chantelouve entered, the lines of her figure advantageously +displayed by a wrapper of white swanskin, which gave off a fragrance of +frangipane. She pressed Durtal's hand and sat down facing him, and he +perceived under the wrap her indigo silk stockings in little patent +leather bootines with straps across the insteps. + +They talked about the weather. She complained of the way the winter hung +on, and declared that although the furnace seemed to be working all +right she was always shivering, was always frozen to death. She told him +to feel her hands, which indeed were cold, then she seemed worried about +his health. + +"You look pale," she said. + +"You might at least say that I _am_ pale," he replied. + +She did not answer immediately, then, "Yesterday I saw how much you +desire me," she said. "But why, why, want to go so far?" + +He made a gesture, indicating vague annoyance. + +"How funny you are!" she went on. "I was re-reading one of your books +today, and I noticed this phrase, 'The only women you can continue to +love are those you lose.' Now admit that you were right when you wrote +that." + +"It all depends. I wasn't in love then." + +She shrugged her shoulders. "Well," she said, "I must tell my husband +you are here." + +Durtal remained silent, wondering what rôle Chantelouve actually played +in this triangle. + +Chantelouve returned with his wife. He was in his dressing-gown and had +a pen in his mouth. He took it out and put it on the table, and after +assuring Durtal that his health was completely restored, he complained +of overwhelming labours. "I have had to quit giving dinners and +receptions," he said, "I can't even go visiting. I am in harness every +day at my desk." + +And when Durtal asked him the nature of these labours, he confessed to a +whole series of unsigned volumes on the lives of the saints, to be +turned out by the gross by a Tours firm for exportation. + +"Yes," said his wife, laughing, "and these are _sadly neglected_ saints +whose biographies he is preparing." + +And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, Chantelouve, also laughing, +said, "It was their persons that were _sadly neglected_. The subjects +are chosen for me, and it does seem as if the publisher enjoyed making +me eulogize frowziness. I have to describe Blessed Saints most of whom +were deplorably unkempt: Labre, who was so lousy and ill-smelling as to +disgust the beasts in the stables; Saint Cunegonde who 'through +humility' neglected her body; Saint Oportune who never used water and +who washed her bed only with her tears; Saint Silvia who never removed +the grime from her face; Saint Radegonde who never changed her hair +shirt and who slept on a cinder pile; and how many others, around whose +heads I must draw a golden halo!" + +"There are worse than those," said Durtal. "Read the life of Marie +Alacoque. You will see that she, to mortify herself, licked up with her +tongue the dejections of one sick person and sucked an abscess from the +toe of another." + +"I know, but I must admit that I am less touched than revolted by these +tales." + +"I prefer Saint Lucius the martyr," said Mme. Chantelouve. "His body was +so transparent that he could see through his chest the vileness of his +heart. His kind of 'vileness' at least we can stand. But I must admit +that this utter disregard of cleanliness makes me suspicious of the +monasteries and renders your beloved Middle Ages odious to me." + +"Pardon me, my dear," said her husband, "you are greatly mistaken. The +Middle Ages were not, as you believe, an epoch of uncleanliness. People +frequented the baths assiduously. At Paris, for example, where these +establishments were numerous, the 'stove-keepers' went about the city +announcing that the water was hot. It is not until the Renaissance that +uncleanliness becomes rife in France. When you think that that delicious +Reine Margot kept her body macerated with perfumes but as grimy as the +inside of a stovepipe! and that Henri Quatre plumed himself on having +'reeking feet and a fine armpit.'" + +"My dear, for heaven's sake," said madame, "spare us the details." + +While Chantelouve was speaking, Durtal was watching him. He was small +and rotund, with a bay window which his arms would not have gone around. +He had rubicund cheeks, long hair very much pomaded, trailing in the +back and drawn up in crescents along his temples. He had pink cotton in +his ears. He was smooth shaven and looked like a pious but convivial +notary. But his quick, calculating eye belied his jovial and sugary +mien. One divined in his look the cool, unscrupulous man of affairs, +capable, for all his honeyed ways, of doing one a bad turn. + +"He must be aching to throw me into the street," said Durtal to +himself, "because he certainly knows all about his wife's goings-on." + +But if Chantelouve wished to be rid of his guest he did not show it. +With his legs crossed and his hands folded one over the other, in the +attitude of a priest, he appeared to be mightily interested in Durtal's +work. Inclining a little, listening as if in a theatre, he said, "Yes, I +know the material on the subject. I read a book some time ago about +Gilles de Rais which seemed to me well handled. It was by abbé Bossard." + +"It is the most complete and reliable of the biographies of the +Marshal." + +"But," Chantelouve went on, "there is one point which I never have been +able to understand. I have never been able to explain to myself why the +name Bluebeard should have been attached to the Marshal, whose history +certainly has no relation to the tale of the good Perrault." + +"As a matter of fact the real Bluebeard was not Gilles de Rais, but +probably a Breton king, Comor, a fragment of whose castle, dating from +the sixth century, is still standing, on the confines of the forest of +Carnoet. The legend is simple. The king asked Guerock, count of Vannes, +for the hand of his daughter, Triphine. Guerock refused, because he had +heard that the king maintained himself in a constant state of +widowerhood by cutting his wives' throats. Finally Saint Gildas promised +Guerock to return his daughter to him safe and sound when he should +reclaim her, and the union was celebrated. + +"Some months later Triphine learned that Comor did indeed kill his +consorts as soon as they became pregnant. She was big with child, so she +fled, but her husband pursued her and cut her throat. The weeping father +commanded Saint Gildas to keep his promise, and the Saint resuscitated +Triphine. + +"As you see, this legend comes much nearer than the history of our +Bluebeard to the told tale arranged by the ingenious Perrault. Now, why +and how the name Bluebeard passed from King Comor to the Marshal de +Rais, I cannot tell. You know what pranks oral tradition can play." + +"But with your Gilles de Rais you must have to plunge into Satanism +right up to the hilt," said Chantelouve after a silence. + +"Yes, and it would really be more interesting if these scenes were not +so remote. What would have a timely appeal would be a study of the +Diabolism of the present day." + +"No doubt," said Chantelouve, pleasantly. + +"For," Durtal went on, looking at him intently, "unheard-of things are +going on right now. I have heard tell of sacrilegious priests, of a +certain canon who has revived the sabbats of the Middle Ages." + +Chantelouve did not betray himself by so much as a flicker of the +eyelids. Calmly he uncrossed his legs and looking up at the ceiling he +said, "Alas, certain scabby wethers succeed in stealing into the fold, +but they are so rare as hardly to be worth thinking about." And he +deftly changed the subject by speaking of a book he had just read about +the Fronde. + +Durtal, somewhat embarrassed, said nothing. He understood that +Chantelouve refused to speak of his relations with Canon Docre. + +"My dear," said Mme. Chantelouve, addressing her husband, "you have +forgotten to turn up your lamp wick. It is smoking. I can smell it from +here, even through the closed door." + +She was most evidently conveying him a dismissal. Chantelouve rose and, +with a vaguely malicious smile, excused himself as being obliged to +continue his work. He shook hands with Durtal, begged him not to stay +away so long in future, and gathering up the skirts of his dressing-gown +he left the room. + +She followed him with her eyes, then rose, in her turn, ran to the +door, assured herself with a glance that it was closed, then returned to +Durtal, who was leaning against the mantel. Without a word she took his +head between her hands, pressed her lips to his mouth and opened it. + +He grunted furiously. + +She looked at him with indolent and filmy eyes, and he saw sparks of +silver dart to their surface. He held her in his arms. She was swooning +but vigilantly listening. Gently she disengaged herself, sighing, while +he, embarrassed, sat down at a little distance from her, clenching and +unclenching his hands. + +They spoke of banal things: she boasting of her maid, who would go +through fire for her, he responding only by gestures of approbation and +surprise. + +Then suddenly she passed her hands over her forehead. "Ah!" she said, "I +suffer cruelly when I think that he is there working. No, it would cost +me too much remorse. What I say is foolish, but if he were a different +man, a man who went out more and made conquests, it would not be so +bad." + +He was irritated by the inconsequentiality of her plaints. Finally, +feeling completely safe, he came closer to her and said, "You spoke of +remorse, but whether we embark or whether we stand on the bank, isn't +our guilt exactly the same?" + +"Yes, I know. My confessor talks to me like that--only more +severely--but I think you are both wrong." + +He could not help laughing, and he said to himself, "Remorse is perhaps +the condiment which keeps passion from being too unappetizing to the +blasé." Then aloud he jestingly, "Speaking of confessors, if I were a +casuist it seems to me I would try to invent new sins. I am not a +casuist, and yet, having looked about a bit, I believe I _have_ found a +new sin." + +"You?" she said, laughing in turn. "Can I commit it?" + +He scrutinized her features. She had the expression of a greedy child. + +"You alone can answer that. Now I must admit that the sin is not +absolutely new, for it fits into the known category of lust. But it has +been neglected since pagan days, and was never well defined in any +case." + +"Do not keep me in suspense. What is this sin?" + +"It isn't easy to explain. Nevertheless I will try. Lust, I believe, can +be classified into: ordinary sin, sin against nature, bestiality, and +let us add _demoniality_ and sacrilege. Well, there is, in addition to +these, what I shall call Pygmalionism, which embraces at the same time +cerebral onanism and incest. + +"Imagine an artist falling in love with his child, his creation: with an +Hérodiade, a Judith, a Helen, a Jeanne d'Arc, whom he has either +described or painted, and evoking her, and finally possessing her in +dream. + +"Well, this love is worse than normal incest. In the latter sin the +guilty one commits only a half-offence, because his daughter is not born +solely of his substance, but also of the flesh of another. Thus, +logically, in incest there is a quasi-natural side, almost licit, +because part of another person has entered into the engendering of the +_corpus delicti_; while in Pygmalionism the father violates the child of +his soul, of that which alone is purely and really his, which alone he +can impregnate without the aid of another. The offence is, then, entire +and complete. Now, is there not also disdain of nature, of the work of +God, since the subject of the sin is no longer--as even in bestiality--a +palpable and living creature, but an unreal being created by a +projection of the desecrated talent, a being almost celestial, since, by +genius, by artistry, it often becomes immortal? + +"Let us go further, if you wish. Suppose that an artist depicts a saint +and becomes enamoured of her. Thus we have complications of crime +against nature and of sacrilege. An enormity!" + +"Which, perhaps, is exquisite!" + +He was taken aback by the word she had used. She rose, opened the door, +and called her husband. "Dear," she said, "Durtal has discovered a new +sin!" + +"Surely not," said Chantelouve, his figure framed in the doorway. "The +book of sins is an edition _ne varietur_. New sins cannot be invented, +but old ones may be kept from falling into oblivion. Well, what is this +sin of his?" + +Durtal explained the theory. + +"But it is simply a refined expression of succubacy. The consort is not +one's work become animate, but a succubus which by night takes that +form." + +"Admit, at any rate, that this cerebral hermaphrodism, self-fecundation, +is a distinguished vice at least--being the privilege of the artist--a +vice reserved for the elect, inaccessible to the mob." + +"If you like exclusive obscenity--" laughed Chantelouve. "But I must get +back to the lives of the saints; the atmosphere is fresher and more +benign. So excuse me, Durtal. I leave it to my wife to continue this +Marivaux conversation about Satanism with you." + +He said it in the simplest, most debonair fashion to be imagined, but +with just the slightest trace of irony. + +Which Durtal perceived. "It must be quite late," he thought, when the +door closed after Chantelouve. He consulted his watch. Nearly eleven. He +rose to take leave. + +"When shall I see you?" he murmured, very low. + +"Your apartment tomorrow night at nine." + +He looked at her with beseeching eyes. She understood, but wished to +tease him. She kissed him maternally on the forehead, then consulted his +eyes again. The expression of supplication must have remained unchanged, +for she responded to their imploration by a long kiss which closed them, +then came down to his lips, drinking their dolorous emotion. + +Then she rang and told her maid to light Durtal through the hall. He +descended, satisfied that she had engaged herself to yield tomorrow +night. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +He began again, as on the other evening, to clean house and establish a +methodical disorder. He slipped a cushion under the false disarray of +the armchair, then he made roaring fires to have the rooms good and warm +when she came. + +But he was without impatience. That silent promise which he had +obtained, that Mme. Chantelouve would not leave him panting this night, +moderated him. Now that his uncertainty was at an end, he no longer +vibrated with the almost painful acuity which hitherto her malignant +delays had provoked. He soothed himself by poking the fire. His mind was +still full of her, but plethoric, content. When his thoughts stirred at +all it was, at the very most, to revolve the question, "How shall I go +about it, when the time comes, so as not to be ridiculous?" This +question, which had so harassed him the other night, left him troubled +but inert. He did not try to solve it, but decided to leave everything +to chance, since the best planned strategy was almost always abortive. + +Then he revolted against himself, accused himself of stagnation, and +walked up and down to shake himself out of a torpor which might have +been attributed to the hot fire. Well, well, was it because he had had +to wait so long that his desires had left him, or at least quit +bothering him--no, they had not, why, he was yearning now for the moment +when he might crush that woman! He thought he had the explanation of his +lack of enthusiasm in the stage fright inseparable from any beginning. +"It will not be really exquisite tonight until after the newness wears +off and the grotesque with it. After I know her I shall be able to +consort with her again without feeling solicitous about her and +conscious of myself. I wish we were on that happy basis now." + +The cat, sitting on the table, cocked up its ears, gazed at the door +with its black eyes, and fled. The bell rang and Durtal went to let her +in. + +Her costume pleased him. He took off her furs. Her skirt was of a plum +colour so dark that it was almost black, the material thick and supple, +outlining her figure, squeezing her arms, making an hourglass of her +waist, accentuating the curve of her hips and the bulge of her corset. + +"You are charming," he said, kissing her wrists, and he was pleased to +find that his lips had accelerated her pulse. She did not speak, could +hardly breathe. She was agitated and very pale. + +He sat down facing her. She looked at him with her mysterious, half +sleepy eyes. He felt that he was falling in love all over again. He +forgot his reasonings and his fears, and took acute pleasure in +penetrating the mystery of these eyes and studying the vague smile of +this dolorous mouth. + +He enlaced her fingers in his, and for the first time, in a low voice, +he called her Hyacinthe. + +She listened, her breast heaving, her hands in a fever. Then in a +supplicating voice, "I implore you," she said, "let us have none of +that. Only desire is good. Oh, I am rational, I mean what I say. I +thought it all out on the way here. I left him very sad tonight. If you +knew how I feel--I went to church today and was afraid and hid myself +when I saw my confessor--" + +These plaints he had heard before, and he said to himself, "You may sing +whatever tune you want to, but you shall dance tonight." Aloud he +answered in monosyllables as he continued to take possession of her. + +He rose, thinking she would do the same, or that if she remained seated +he could better reach her lips by bending over her. + +"Your lips, your lips--the kiss you gave me last night--" he murmured, +as his face came close to hers. She put up her lips and stood, and they +embraced, but as his hands went seeking she recoiled. + +"Think how ridiculous it all is," she said in a low voice, "to undress, +put on night clothes--and that silly scene, getting into bed!" + +He avoided declaring, but attempted, by an embrace which bent her over +backward, to make her understand that she could spare herself those +embarrassments. Tacitly, in his own turn, feeling her body stiffen under +his fingers, he understood that she absolutely would not give herself in +the room here, in front of the fire. + +"Oh well," she said, disengaging herself, "if you will have it!" + +He made way to allow her to go into the other room, and seeing that she +desired to be alone he drew the portière. + +Sitting before the fire he reflected. Perhaps he ought to have pulled +down the bed covers, and not left her the task, but without doubt the +action would have been too direct, too obvious a hint. Ah! and that +water heater! He took it and, keeping away from the bedroom door, went +to the bathroom, placed the heater on the toilet table, and then, +swiftly, he set out the rice powder box, the perfumes, the combs, and, +returning into his study, he listened. + +She was making as little noise as possible, walking on tiptoe as if in +the presence of the dead. She blew out the candles, doubtless wishing no +more light than the rosy glow of the hearth. + +He felt positively annihilated. The irritating impression of the lips +and eyes of Hyacinthe was far from him now. She was nothing but a woman, +like any other, undressing in a man's room. Memories of similar scenes +overwhelmed him. He remembered girls who like her had crept about on the +carpet so as not to be heard, and who had stopped short, ashamed, for a +whole second, if they bumped against the water pitcher. And then, what +good was this going to do him? Now that she was yielding he no longer +desired her! Disillusion had come even before possession, not waiting, +as usual, till afterward. He was distressed to the point of tears. + +The frightened cat glided under the curtain, ran from one room to the +other, and finally came back to his master and jumped onto his knees. +Caressing him, Durtal said to himself, "Decidedly, she was right when +she refused. It will be grotesque, atrocious. I was wrong to insist, but +no, it's her fault, too. She must have wanted to do this or she wouldn't +have come. What a fool to think she could aggravate passion by delay. +She is fearfully clumsy. A moment ago when I was embracing her and +really was aroused, it would perhaps have been delicious, but now! And +what do I look like? A young bridegroom waiting--or a green country boy. +Oh God, how stupid! Well," he said, straining his ears and hearing no +sound from the other room, "she's in bed. I must go in. + +"I suppose it took her all this time to unharness herself from her +corset. She was a fool to wear one," he concluded, when, drawing the +curtain, he stepped into the other room. + +Mme. Chantelouve was buried under the thick coverlet, her mouth +half-open and her eyes closed; but he saw that she was peering at him +through the fringe of her blonde eyelashes. He sat down on the edge of +the bed. She huddled up, drawing the cover over her chin. + +"Cold, dear?" + +"No," and she opened wide her eyes, which flashed sparks. + +He undressed, casting a rapid glance at Hyacinthe's face. It was hidden +in the darkness, but was sometimes revealed by a flare of the red hot +fire, as a stick, half consumed and smouldering, would suddenly burst +into flame. Swiftly he slipped between the covers. He clasped a corpse; +a body so cold that it froze him, but the woman's lips were burning as +she silently gnawed his features. He lay stupified in the grip of this +body wound around his own, supple as the ... and hard! He could not +move; he could not speak for the shower of kisses traveling over his +face. Finally, he succeeded in disengaging himself, and, with his free +arm he sought her; then suddenly, while she devoured his lips he felt a +nervous inhibition, and, naturally, without profit, he withdrew. + +"I detest you!" she exclaimed. + +"Why?" + +"I detest you!" + +He wanted to cry out, "And I you!" He was exasperated, and would have +given all he owned to get her to dress and go home. + +The fire was burning low, unflickering. Appeased, now, he sat up and +looked into the darkness. He would have liked to get up and find another +nightshirt, because the one he had on was tearing and getting in his +way. But Hyacinthe was lying on top of it--then he reflected that the +bed was deranged and the thought affected him, because he liked to be +snug in winter, and knowing himself incapable of respreading the covers, +he foresaw a cold night. + +Once more, he was enlaced; the gripe of the woman's on his own was +renewed; rational, this time, he attended to her and crushed her with +mighty caresses. In a changed voice, lower, more guttural, she uttered +ignoble things and silly cries which gave him pain--"My dear!--oh, +hon!--oh I can't stand it!"--aroused nevertheless, he took this body +which creaked as it writhed, and he experienced the extraordinary +sensation of a spasmodic burning within a swaddle of ice-packs. + +He finally jumped over her, out of bed, and lighted the candles. On the +dresser the cat sat motionless, considering Durtal and Mme. Chantelouve +alternately. Durtal saw an inexpressible mockery in those black eyes +and, irritated, chased the beast away. + +He put some more wood on the fire, dressed, and started to leave the +room. Hyacinthe called him gently, in her usual voice. He approached the +bed. She threw her arms around his neck and hung there, kissing him +hungrily. Then sinking back and putting her arms under the cover, she +said, "The deed is done. Now will you love me any better?" + +He did not have the heart to answer. Ah yes, his disillusion was +complete. The satiety following justified his lack of appetite +preceding. She revolted him, horrified him. Was it possible to have so +desired a woman, only to come to--that? He had idealized her in his +transports, he had dreamed in her eyes--he knew not what! He had wished +to exalt himself with her, to rise higher than the delirious ravenings +of the senses, to soar out of the world into joys supernal and +unexplored. And his dream had been shattered. He remained fettered to +earth. Was there no means of escaping out of one's self, out of earthly +limitations, and attaining an upper ether where the soul, ravished, +would glory in its giddy flight? + +Ah, the lesson was hard and decisive. For having one time hoped so much, +what regrets, what a tumble! Decidedly, Reality does not pardon him who +despises her; she avenges herself by shattering the dream and trampling +it and casting the fragments into a cesspool. + +"Don't be vexed, dear, because it is taking me so long," said Mme. +Chantelouve behind the curtain. + +He thought crudely, "I wish you would get to hell out of here," and +aloud he asked politely if she had need of his services. + +"She was so mysterious, so enticing," he resumed to himself. "Her eyes, +remote, deep as space, and reflecting cemeteries and festivals at the +same time. And she has shown herself up for all she is, within an hour. +I have seen a new Hyacinthe, talking like a silly little milliner in +heat. All the nastinesses of women unite in her to exasperate me." + +After a thoughtful silence he concluded, "I must be young indeed to have +lost my head the way I did." + +As if echoing his thought, Mme. Chantelouve, coming out through the +portière, laughed nervously and said, "A woman of my age doing a mad +thing like that!" She looked at him, and though he forced a smile she +understood. + +"You will sleep tonight," she said, sadly, alluding to Durtal's former +complaints of sleeplessness on her account. + +He begged her to sit down and warm herself, but she said she was not +cold. + +"Why, in spite of the warmth of the room you were cold as ice!" + +"Oh, I am always that way. Winter and summer my flesh is chilly." + +He thought that in August this frigid body might be agreeable, but now! + +He offered her some bonbons, which she refused, then she said she would +take a sip of the alkermes, which he poured into a tiny silver goblet. +She took just a drop, and amicably they discussed the taste of this +preparation, in which she recognized an aroma of clove, tempered by +flower of cinnamon moistened with distillate of rose water. + +Then he became silent. + +"My poor dear," she said, "how I should love him if he were more +confiding and not always on his guard." + +He asked her to explain herself. + +"Why, I mean that you can't forget yourself and simply let yourself be +loved. Alas, you were reasoning all the time--" + +"I was not!" + +She kissed him tenderly. "You see I love you, anyway." And he was +surprised to see how sad and moved she looked, and he observed a sort of +frightened gratitude in her eyes. + +"She is easily satisfied," he said to himself. + +"What are you thinking about?" + +"You!" + +She sighed. Then, "What time is it?" + +"Half past ten." + +"I must go. He is waiting for me. No, don't say anything--" + +She passed her hands over her cheeks. He seized her gently by the waist +and kissed her, holding her thus enlaced until they were at the door. + +"You will come again soon, won't you?" + +"Yes.... Yes." + +He returned to the fireside. + +"Oof! it's done," he thought, in a whirl of confused emotions. His +vanity was satisfied, his selfesteem was no longer bleeding, he had +attained his ends and possessed this woman. Moreover, her spell over him +had lost its force. He was regaining his entire liberty of mind, but who +could tell what trouble this liaison had yet in store for him? Then, in +spite of everything, he softened. + +After all, what could he reproach her with? She loved as well as she +could. She was, indeed, ardent and plaintive. Even this dualism of a +mistress who was a low cocotte in bed and a fine lady when dressed--or +no, too intelligent to be called a fine lady--was a delectable pimento. +Her carnal appetites were excessive and bizarre. What, then, was the +matter with him? + +And at last he quite justly accused himself. It was his own fault if +everything was spoiled. He lacked appetite. He was not really tormented +except by a cerebral erethism. He was used up in body, filed away in +soul, inept at love, weary of tendernesses even before he received them +and disgusted when he had. His heart was dead and could not be revived. +And his mania for thinking, thinking! previsualizing an incident so +vividly that actual enactment was an anticlimax--but probably would not +be if his mind would leave him alone and not be always jeering at his +efforts. For a man in his state of spiritual impoverishment all, save +art, was but a recreation more or less boring, a diversion more or less +vain. "Ah, poor woman, I am afraid she is going to get pretty sick of +me. If only she would consent to come no more! But no, she doesn't +deserve to be treated in that fashion," and, seized by pity, he swore to +himself that the next time she visited him he would caress her and try +to persuade her that the disillusion which he had so ill concealed did +not exist. + +He tried to spread up the bed, get the tousled blankets together, and +plump the pillows, then he lay down. + +He put out his lamp. In the darkness his distress increased. With death +in his heart he said to himself, "Yes, I was right in declaring that the +only women you can continue to love are those you lose. + +"To learn, three years later, when the woman is inaccessible, chaste and +married, dead, perhaps, or out of France--to learn that she loved you, +though you had not dared believe it while she was near you, ah, that's +the dream! These real and intangible loves, these loves made up of +melancholy and distant regrets, are the only ones that count. Because +there is no flesh in them, no earthly leaven. + +"To love at a distance and without hope; never to possess; to dream +chastely of pale charms and impossible kisses extinguished on the waxen +brow of death: ah, that is something like it. A delicious straying away +from the world, and never the return. As only the unreal is not ignoble +and empty, existence must be admitted to be abominable. Yes, imagination +is the only good thing which heaven vouchsafes to the skeptic and +pessimist, alarmed by the eternal abjectness of life." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +From this scene he had learned an alarming lesson: that the flesh +domineers the soul and refuses to admit any schism. The flesh decisively +does not intend that one shall get along without it and indulge in +out-of-the-world pleasures which it can partake only on condition that +it keep quiet. For the first time, reviewing these turpitudes, he really +understood the meaning of that now obsolete word _chastity_, and he +savoured it in all its pristine freshness. Just as a man who has drunk +too deeply the night before thinks, the morning after, of drinking +nothing but mineral water in future, so he dreamed, today, of pure +affection far from a bed. + +He was still ruminating these thoughts when Des Hermies entered. + +They spoke of amorous misadventures. Astonished at once by Durtal's +languor and the ascetic tone of his remarks, Des Hermies exclaimed, "Ah, +we had a gay old time last night?" + +With the most decisive bad grace Durtal shook his head. + +"Then," replied Des Hermies, "you are superior and inhuman. To love +without hope, immaculately, would be perfect if it did not induct such +brainstorms. There is no excuse for chastity, unless one has a pious end +in view, or unless the senses are failing, and if they are one had best +see a doctor, who will solve the question more or less unsatisfactorily. +To tell the truth, everything on earth culminates in the act you +reprove. The heart, which is supposed to be the noble part of man, has +the same form as the penis, which is the so-called ignoble part of man. +There's symbolism in that similarity, because every love which is of +the heart soon extends to the organ resembling it. The human +imagination, the moment it tries to create artificially animated beings, +involuntarily reproduces in them the movements of animals propagating. +Look at the machines, the action of the piston and the cylinder; Romeos +of steel and Juliets of cast iron. Nor do the loftier expressions of the +human intellect get away from the advance and withdrawal copied by the +machines. One must bow to nature's law if one is neither impotent nor a +saint. Now you are neither the one nor the other, I think, but if, from +inconceivable motives, you desire to live in temporary continence, +follow the prescription of an occultist of the sixteenth century, the +Neapolitan Piperno. He affirms that whoever eats vervain cannot approach +a woman for seven days. Buy a jar, and let's try it." + +Durtal laughed. "There is perhaps a middle course: never consummate the +carnal act with her you love, and, to keep yourself quiet, frequent +those you do not love. Thus, in a certain measure, you would conjure +away possible disgust." + +"No, one would never get it out of one's head that with the woman of +whom one was enamoured one would experience carnal delights absolutely +different from those which one feels with the others, so your method +also would end badly. And too, the women who would not be indifferent to +one, have not charity and discretion enough to admire the wisdom of this +selfishness, for of course that's what it is. But what say, now, to +putting on your shoes? It's almost six o'clock and Mama Carhaix's beef +can't wait." + +It had already been taken out of the pot and couched on a platter amid +vegetables when they arrived. Carhaix, sprawling in an armchair, was +reading his breviary. + +"What's going on in the world?" he asked, closing his book. + +"Nothing. Politics doesn't interest us, and General Boulanger's +American tricks of publicity weary you as much as they do us, I suppose. +The other newspaper stories are just a little more shocking or dull than +usual.--Look out, you'll burn your mouth," as Durtal was preparing to +take a spoonful of soup. + +"In fact," said Durtal, grimacing, "this marrowy soup, so artistically +golden, is like liquid fire. But speaking of the news, what do you mean +by saying there is nothing of pressing importance? And the trial of that +astonishing abbé Boudes going on before the Assizes of Aveyron! After +trying to poison his curate through the sacramental wine, and committing +such other crimes as abortion, rape, flagrant misconduct, forgery, +qualified theft and usury, he ended by appropriating the money put in +the coin boxes for the souls in purgatory, and pawning the ciborium, +chalice, all the holy vessels. That case is worth following." + +Carhaix raised his eyes to heaven. + +"If he is not sent to jail, there will be one more priest for Paris," +said Des Hermies. + +"How's that?" + +"Why, all the ecclesiastics who get in bad in the provinces, or who have +a serious falling out with the bishop, are sent here where they will be +less in view, lost in the crowd, as it were. They form a part of that +corporation known as 'scratch priests.'" + +"What are they?" + +"Priests loosely attached to a parish. You know that in addition to a +curate, ministrants, vicars, and regular clergy, there are in every +church adjunct priests, supply priests. Those are the ones I am talking +about. They do the heavy work, celebrate the morning masses when +everybody is asleep and the late masses when everybody is doing. It is +they who get up at night to take the sacrament to the poor, and who sit +up with the corpses of the devout rich and catch cold standing under the +dripping church porches at funerals, and get sunstroke or pneumonia in +the cemetery. They do all the dirty work. For a five or ten franc fee +they act as substitutes for colleagues who have good livings and are +tired of service. They are men under a cloud for the most part. Churches +take them on, ready to fire them at a moment's notice, and keep strict +watch over them while waiting for them to be interdicted or to have +their _celebret_ taken away. I simply mean that the provincial parishes +excavate on the city the priests who for one reason or another have +ceased to please." + +"But what do the curates and other titulary abbés _do_, if they unload +their duties onto the backs of others?" + +"They do the elegant, easy work, which requires no effort, no charity. +They shrive society women who come to confession in their most stunning +gowns; they teach proper little prigs the catechism, and preach, and +play the limelight rôles in the gala ceremonials which are got up to +pander to the tastes of the faithful. At Paris, not counting the scratch +priests, the clergy is divided thus: Man-of-the-world priests in easy +circumstances: these are placed at la Madeleine and Saint Roch where the +congregations are wealthy. They are wined and dined, they pass their +lives in drawing-rooms, and comfort only elegant souls. Other priests +who are good desk clerks, for the most part, but who have neither the +education nor the fortune necessary to participate in the +inconsequentialities of the idle rich. They live more in seclusion and +visit only among the middle class. They console themselves for their +unfashionableness by playing cards with each other and uttering crude +commonplaces at the table." + +"Now, Des Hermies," said Carhaix, "you are going too far. I claim to +know the clerical world myself, and there are, even in Paris, honest men +who do their duty. They are covered with opprobrium and spat on. Every +Tom, Dick, and Harry accuses them of the foulest vices. But after all, +it must be said that the abbé Boudes and the Canon Docres are +exceptions, thank God! and outside of Paris there are veritable saints, +especially among the country clergy." + +"It's a fact that Satanic priests are relatively rare, and the +lecheries of the clergy and the knaveries of the episcopate are +evidently exaggerated by an ignoble press. But that isn't what I have +against them. If only they were gamblers and libertines! But they're +lukewarm, mediocre, lazy, imbeciles. That is their sin against the Holy +Ghost, the only sin which the All Merciful does not pardon." + +"They are of their time," said Durtal. "You wouldn't expect to find the +soul of the Middle Ages inculcated by the milk-and-water seminaries." + +"Then," Carhaix observed, "our friend forgets that there are impeccable +monastic orders, the Carthusians, for instance." + +"Yes, and the Trappists and the Franciscans. But they are cloistered +orders which live in shelter from an infamous century. Take, on the +other hand, the order of Saint Dominic, which exists for the fashionable +world. That is the order which produces jewelled dudes like Monsabre and +Didon. Enough said." + +"They are the hussars of religion, the jaunty lancers, the spick and +span and primped-up Zouaves, while the good Capuchins are the humble +poilus of the soul," said Durtal. + +"If only they loved bells," sighed Carhaix, shaking his head. "Well, +pass the Coulommiers," he said to his wife, who was taking up the salad +bowl and the plates. + +In silence they ate this Brie-type cheese. Des Hermies filled the +glasses. + +"Tell me," Durtal asked Des Hermies, "do you know whether a woman who +receives visits from the incubi necessarily has a cold body? In other +words, is a cold body a presumable symptom of incubacy, as of old the +inability to shed tears served the Inquisition as proof positive to +convict witches?" + +"Yes, I can answer you. Formerly women smitten with incubacy had frigid +flesh even in the month of August. The books of the specialists bear +witness. But now the majority of the creatures who voluntarily or +involuntarily summon or receive the amorous larvæ have, on the contrary, +a skin that is burning and dry to the touch. This transformation is not +yet general, but tends to become so. I remember very well that Dr. +Johannès, he of whom Gévingey told you, was often obliged, at the moment +when he attempted to deliver the patient, to bring the body back to +normal temperature with lotions of dilute hydriodate of potassium." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, who was thinking of Mme. Chantelouve. + +"You don't know what has become of Dr. Johannès?" asked Carhaix. + +"He is living very much in retirement at Lyons. He continues, I believe, +to cure venefices, and he preaches the blessed coming of the Paraclete." + +"For heaven's sake, who is this doctor?" asked Durtal. + +"He is a very intelligent and learned priest. He was superior of a +community, and he directed, here in Paris, the only review which ever +was really mystical. He was a theologian much consulted, a recognized +master of divine jurisprudence; then he had distressing quarrels with +the papal Curia at Rome and with the Cardinal-Archbishop of Paris. His +exorcisms and his battles against the incubi, especially in the female +convents, ruined him. + +"Ah, I remember the last time I saw him, as if it were yesterday. I met +him in the rue Grenelle coming out of the Archbishop's house, the day he +quitted the Church, after a scene which he told me all about. Again I +can see that priest walking with me along the deserted boulevard des +Invalides. He was pale, and his defeated but impressive voice trembled. +He had been summoned and commanded to explain his actions in the case of +an epileptic woman whom he claimed to have cured with the aid of a +relic, the seamless robe of Christ preserved at Argenteuil. The +Cardinal, assisted by two grand vicars, listened to him, standing. + +"When he had likewise furnished the information which they demanded +about his cures of witch spells, Cardinal Guibert said, 'You had best go +to La Trappe.' + +"And I remember word for word his reply, 'If I have violated the laws +of the Church, I am ready to undergo the penalty of my fault. If you +think me culpable, pass a canonical judgment and I will execute it, I +swear on my sacerdotal honour; but I wish a formal sentence, for, in +law, nobody is bound to condemn himself: "_Nemo se tradere tenetur_," +says the Corpus Juris Canonici.' + +"There was a copy of his review on the table. The Cardinal pointed to a +page and asked, 'Did you write that?' + +"'Yes, Eminence.' + +"'Infamous doctrines!' and he went from his office into the next room, +crying, 'Out of my sight!' + +"Then Johannès advanced as far as the threshold of the other room, and +falling on his knees, he said, 'Eminence, I had no intention of +offending. If I have done so, I beg forgiveness.' + +"The Cardinal cried more loudly, 'Out of my sight before I call for +assistance!' + +"Johannès rose and left. + +"'All my old ties are broken,' he said, as he parted from me. He was so +sad that I had not the heart to question him further." + +There was a silence. Carhaix went up to his tower to ring a peal. His +wife removed the dessert dishes and the cloth. Des Hermies prepared the +coffee. Durtal, pensive, rolled his cigarette. + +Carhaix, when he returned, as if enveloped in a fog of sounds, +exclaimed, "A while ago, Des Hermies, you were speaking of the +Franciscans. Do you know that that order, to live up to its professions +of poverty, was supposed not to possess even a bell? True, this rule has +been relaxed somewhat. It was too severe! Now they have a bell, but only +one." + +"Just like most other abbeys, then." + +"No, because all communities have at least three, in honour of the holy +and triple Hypostasis." + +"Do you mean to say that the number of bells a monastery or church can +have is limited by rule?" + +"Formerly it was. There was a pious hierarchy of ringing: the bells of a +convent could not sound when the bells of a church pealed. They were the +vassals, and, respectful and submissive as became their rank, they were +silent when the Suzerain spoke to the multitudes. These principles of +procedure, consecrated, in 1590, by a canon of the Council of Toulouse +and confirmed by two decrees of the Congress of Rites, are no longer +followed. The rulings of San Carlo Borromeo, who decreed that a church +should have from five to seven bells, a boy's academy three, and a +parochial school two, are abolished. Today churches have more or fewer +bells as they are more or less rich.... Oh, well, why worry? Where are +the little glasses?" + +His wife brought them, shook hands with the guests, and retired. + +Then while Carhaix was pouring the cognac, Des Hermies said in a low +voice, "I did not want to speak before her, because these matters +distress and frighten her, but I received a singular visit this morning +from Gévingey, who is running over to Lyons to see Dr. Johannès. He +claims to have been bewitched by Canon Docre, who, it seems, is making a +flying visit to Paris. What have been their relations? I don't know. +Anyway, Gévingey is in a deplorable state." + +"Just what seems to be the matter with him?" asked Durtal. + +"I positively do not know. I made a careful auscultation and examined +him thoroughly. He complains of needles pricking him around the heart. I +observed nervous trouble and nothing else. What I am most worried about +is a state of enfeeblement inexplicable in a man who is neither +cancerous nor diabetical." + +"Ah," said Carhaix, "I suppose people are not betwitched now with wax +images and needles, with the 'Manei' or the 'Dagyde' as it was called in +the good old days." + +"No, those practises are now out of date and almost everywhere fallen +into disuse. Gévingey who took me completely into his confidence this +morning, told me what extraordinary recipes the frightful canon uses. +These are, it seems, the unrevealed secrets of modern magic." + +"Ah, that's what interests me," exclaimed Durtal. + +"Of course I limit myself to repeating what was told me," resumed Des +Hermies, lighting his cigarette. "Well, Docre keeps white mice in cages, +and he takes them along when he travels. He feeds them on consecrated +hosts and on pastes impregnated with poisons skilfully dosed. When these +unhappy beasts are saturated, he takes them, holds them over a chalice, +and with a very sharp instrument he pricks them here and there. The +blood flows into the vase and he uses it, in a way which I shall explain +in a moment, to strike his enemies with death. Formerly he operated on +chickens and guinea pigs, but he used the grease, not the blood, of +these animals, become thus execrated and venomous tabernacles. + +"Formerly he also used a recipe discovered by the Satanic society of the +Re-Theurgistes-Optimates, of which I have spoken before, and he prepared +a hash composed of flour, meat, Eucharist bread, mercury, animal semen, +human blood, acetate of morphine and aspic oil. + +"Latterly, and according to Gévingey this abomination is more perilous +yet, he stuffs fishes with communion bread and with toxins skilfully +graduated. These toxins are chosen from those which produce madness or +lockjaw when absorbed through the pores. Then, when these fishes are +thoroughly permeated with the substances sealed by sacrilege, Docre +takes them out of the water, lets them rot, distills them, and expresses +from them an essential oil one drop of which will produce madness. This +drop, it appears, is applied externally, by touching the hair, as in +Balzac's _Thirteen_." + +"Hmmm," said Durtal, "I am afraid that a drop of this oil long ago fell +on the scalp of poor old Gévingey." + +"What is interesting about this story is not the outlandishness of these +diabolical pharmacopoeia so much as the psychology of the persons who +invent and manipulate them. Think. This is happening at the present day, +and it is the priests who have invented philtres unknown to the +sorcerers of the Middle Ages." + +"The priests, no! A priest. And what a priest!" remarked Carhaix. + +"Gévingey is very precise. He affirms that others use them. Bewitchment +by veniniferous blood of mice took place in 1879 at Châlons-sur-Marne in +a demoniac circle--to which the canon belonged, it is true. In 1883, in +Savoy, the oil of which I have spoken was prepared in a group of +defrocked abbés. As you see, Docre is not the only one who practises +this abominable science. It is known in the convents; some laymen, even, +have an inkling of it." + +"But now, admitting that these preparations are real and that they are +active, you have not explained how one can poison a man with them either +from a distance or near at hand." + +"Yes, that's another matter. One has a choice of two methods to reach +the enemy one is aiming at. The first and least used is this: the +magician employs a voyant, a woman who is known in that world as 'a +flying spirit'; she is a somnambulist, who, put into a hypnotic state, +can betake herself, in spirit, wherever one wishes her to go. It is then +possible to have her transmit the magic poisons to a person whom one +designates, hundreds of leagues away. Those who are stricken in this +manner have seen no one, and they go mad or die without suspecting the +venefice. But these voyants are not only rare, they are also unreliable, +because other persons can likewise fix them in a cataleptic state and +extract confessions from them. So you see why persons like Docre have +recourse to the second method, which is surer. It consists in evoking, +just as in Spiritism, the soul of a dead person and sending it to strike +the victim with the prepared spell. The result is the same but the +vehicle is different. There," concluded Des Hermies, "reported with +painstaking exactness, are the confidences which our friend Gévingey +made me this morning." + +"And Dr. Johannès cures people poisoned in this manner?" asked Carhaix. + +"Yes, Dr. Johannès--to my knowledge--has made inexplicable cures." + +"But with what?" + +"Gévingey tells me, in this connection, that the doctor celebrates a +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek. I haven't the faintest idea what +this sacrifice is, but Gévingey will perhaps enlighten us if he returns +cured." + +"In spite of all, I should not be displeased, once in my life to get a +good look at Canon Docre," said Durtal. + +"Not I! He is the incarnation of the Accursed on earth!" cried Carhaix, +assisting his friends to put on their overcoats. + +He lighted his lantern, and while they were descending the stair, as +Durtal complained of the cold, Des Hermies burst into a laugh. + +"If your family had known the magical secrets of the plants, you would +not shiver this way," he said. "It was learned in the sixteenth century +that a child might be immune to heat or cold all his life if his hands +were rubbed with juice of absinth before the twelfth month of his life +had passed. That, you see, is a tempting prescription, less dangerous +than those which Canon Docre abuses." + +Once below, after Carhaix had closed the door of his tower, they +hastened their steps, for the north wind swept the square. + +"After all," said Des Hermies, "Satanism aside--and yet Satanism also is +a phase of religion--admit that, for two miscreants of our sort, we hold +singularly pious conversations. I hope they will be counted in our +favour up above." + +"No merit on our part," replied Durtal, "for what else is there to talk +about? Conversations which do not treat of religion or art are so base +and vain." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +The memory of these frightful magisteria kept racing through his head +next day, and, while smoking cigarettes beside the fire, Durtal thought +of Docre and Johannès fighting across Gévingey's back, smiting and +parrying with incantations and exorcisms. + +"In the Christian symbolism," he said to himself, "the fish is one of +the representations of Christ. Doubtless the Canon thinks to aggravate +his sacrileges by feeding fishes on genuine hosts. His is the reverse of +the system of the mediæval witches who chose a vile beast dedicated to +the Devil to submit the body of the Saviour to the processes of +digestion. How real is the pretended power which the deicide chemists +are alleged to wield? What faith can we put in the tales of evoked larvæ +killing a designated person to order with corrosive oil and blood virus? +None, unless one is extremely credulous, and even a bit mad. + +"And yet, come to think of it, we find today, unexplained and surviving +under other names, the mysteries which were so long reckoned the product +of mediæval imagination and superstition. At the charity hospital Dr. +Louis transfers maladies from one hypnotized person to another. Wherein +is that less miraculous than evocation of demons, than spells cast by +magicians or pastors? A larva, a flying spirit, is not, indeed, more +extraordinary than a microbe coming from afar and poisoning one without +one's knowledge, and the atmosphere can certainly convey spirits as well +as bacilli. Certainly the ether carries, untransformed, emanations, +effluences, electricity, for instance, or the fluids of a magnet which +sends to a distant subject an order to traverse all Paris to rejoin it. +Science has no call to contest these phenomena. On the other hand, Dr. +Brown-Sequard rejuvenates infirm old men and revitalizes the impotent +with distillations from the parts of rabbits and cavies. Were not the +elixirs of life and the love philtres which the witches sold to the +senile and impotent composed of similar or analogous substances? Human +semen entered almost always, in the Middle Ages, into the compounding of +these mixtures. Now, hasn't Dr. Brown-Sequard, after repeated +experiments, recently demonstrated the virtues of semen taken from one +man and instilled into another? + +"Finally, the apparitions, doppelgänger, bilocations--to speak thus of +the spirits--that terrified antiquity, have not ceased to manifest +themselves. It would be difficult to prove that the experiments carried +on for three years by Dr. Crookes in the presence of witnesses were +cheats. If he has been able to photograph visible and tangible spectres, +we must recognize the veracity of the mediæval thaumaturges. Incredible, +of course--and wasn't hypnotism, possession of one soul by another which +could dedicate it to crime--incredible only ten years ago? + +"We are groping in shadow, that is sure. But Des Hermies hit the +bull's-eye when he remarked, 'It is less important to know whether the +modern pharmaceutic sacrileges are potent, than to study the motives of +the Satanists and fallen priests who prepare them.' + +"Ah, if there were some way of getting acquainted with Canon Docre, of +insinuating oneself into his confidence, perhaps one would attain clear +insight into these questions. I learned long ago that there are no +people interesting to know except saints, scoundrels, and cranks. They +are the only persons whose conversation amounts to anything. Persons of +good sense are necessarily dull, because they revolve over and over +again the tedious topics of everyday life. They are the crowd, more or +less intelligent, but they are the crowd, and they give me a pain. Yes, +but who will put me in touch with this monstrous priest?" and, as he +poked the fire, Durtal said to himself, "Chantelouve, if he would, but +he won't. There remains his wife, who used to be well acquainted with +Docre. I must interrogate her and find out whether she still corresponds +with him and sees him." + +The entrance of Mme. Chantelouve into his reflections saddened him. He +took out his watch and murmured, "What a bore. She will come again, and +again I shall have to--if only there were any possibility of convincing +her of the futility of the carnal somersaults! In any case, she can't be +very well pleased, because, to her frantic letter soliciting a meeting, +I responded three days later by a brief, dry note, inviting her to come +here this evening. It certainly was lacking in lyricism, too much so, +perhaps." + +He rose and went into his bedroom to make sure that the fire was burning +brightly, then he returned and sat down, without even arranging his room +as he had the other times. Now that he no longer cared for this woman, +gallantry and self-consciousness had fled. He awaited her without +impatience, his slippers on his feet. + +"To tell the truth, I have had nothing pleasant from Hyacinthe except +that kiss we exchanged when her husband was only a few feet away. I +certainly shall not again find her lips a-flame and fragrant. Here her +kiss is insipid." + +Mme. Chantelouve rang earlier than usual. + +"Well," she said, sitting down. "You wrote me a nice letter." + +"How's that?" + +"Confess frankly that you are through with me." + +He denied this, but she shook her head. + +"Well," he said, "what have you to reproach me with? Having written you +only a short note? But there was someone here, I was busy and I didn't +have time to assemble pretty speeches. Not having set a date sooner? I +told you our relation necessitates precautions, and we can't see each +other very often. I think I gave you clearly to understand my +motives--" + +"I am so stupid that I probably did not understand them. You spoke to me +of 'family reasons,' I believe." + +"Yes." + +"Rather vague." + +"Well, I couldn't go into detail and tell you that--" + +He stopped, asking himself whether the time had come to break decisively +with her, but he remembered that he wanted her aid in getting +information about Docre. + +"That what? Tell me." + +He shook his head, hesitating, not to tell her a lie, but to insult and +humiliate her. + +"Well," he went on, "since you force me to do it, I will confess, at +whatever cost, that I have had a mistress for several years--I add that +our relations are now purely amical--" + +"Very well," she interrupted, "your family reasons are sufficient." + +"And then," he pursued, in a lower tone, "if you wish to know all, +well--I have a child by her." + +"A child! Oh, you poor dear." She rose. "Then there is nothing for me to +do but withdraw." + +But he seized her hands, and, at the same time satisfied with the +success of his deception and ashamed of his brutality, he begged her to +stay awhile. She refused. Then he drew her to him, kissed her hair, and +cajoled her. Her troubled eyes looked deep into his. + +"Ah, then!" she said. "No, let me undress." + +"Not for the world!" + +"Yes!" + +"Oh, the scene of the other night beginning all over again," he +murmured, sinking, overwhelmed, into a chair. He felt borne down, +burdened by an unspeakable weariness. + +He undressed beside the fire and warmed himself while waiting for her to +get to bed. When they were in bed she enveloped him with her supple, +cold limbs. + +"Now is it true that I am to come here no more?" + +He did not answer, but understood that she had no intention of going +away and that he had to do with a person of the staying kind. + +"Tell me." + +He buried his head in her breast to keep from having to answer. + +"Tell me in my lips." + +He beset her furiously, to make her keep silent, then he lay disabused, +weary, happy that it was over. When they lay down again she put her arm +about his neck and ran her tongue around in his mouth like an auger, but +he paid little heed to caresses and remained feeble and pathetic. Then +she bent over, reached him, and he groaned. + +"Ah!" she exclaimed suddenly, rising, "at last I have heard you cry!" + +He lay, broken in body and spirit, incapable of thinking two thoughts in +sequence. His brain seemed to whir, undone, in his skull. + +He collected himself, however, rose and went into the other room to +dress and let her do the same. + +Through the drawn portière separating the two rooms he saw a little +pinhole of light which came from the wax candle placed on the mantel +opposite the curtain. Hyacinthe, going back and forth, would momentarily +intercept this light, then it would flash out again. + +"Ah," she said, "my poor darling, you have a child." + +"The shot struck home," said he to himself, and aloud, "Yes, a little +girl." + +"How old?" + +"She will soon be six," and he described her as flaxen-haired, lively, +but in very frail health, requiring multiple precautions and constant +care. + +"You must have very sad evenings," said Mme. Chantelouve, in a voice of +emotion, from behind the curtain. + +"Oh yes! If I were to die tomorrow, what would become of those two +unfortunates?" + +His imagination took wing. He began himself to believe the mother and +her. His voice trembled. Tears very nearly came to his eyes. + +"He is unhappy, my darling is," she said, raising the curtain and +returning, clothed, into the room. "And that is why he looks so sad, +even when he smiles!" + +He looked at her. Surely at that moment her affection was not feigned. +She really clung to him. Why, oh, why, had she had to have those rages +of lust? If it had not been for those they could probably have been good +comrades, sin moderately together, and love each other better than if +they wallowed in the sty of the senses. But no, such a relation was +impossible with her, he concluded, seeing those sulphurous eyes, that +ravenous, despoiling mouth. + +She had sat down in front of his writing table and was playing with a +penholder. "Were you working when I came in? Where are you in your +history of Gilles de Rais?" + +"I am getting along, but I am hampered. To make a good study of the +Satanism of the Middle Ages one ought to get really into the +environment, or at least fabricate a similar environment, by becoming +acquainted with the practitioners of Satanism all about us--for the +psychology is the same, though the operations differ." And looking her +straight in the eye, thinking the story of the child had softened her, +he hazarded all on a cast, "Ah! if your husband would give me the +information he has about Canon Docre!" + +She stood motionless, but her eyes clouded over. She did not answer. + +"True," he said, "Chantelouve, suspecting our liaison--" + +She interrupted him. "My husband has no concern with the relations which +may exist between you and me. He evidently suffers when I go out, as +tonight, for he knows where I am going; but I admit no right of control +either on his part or mine. He is free, and I am free, to go wherever we +please. I must keep house for him, watch out for his interests, take +care of him, love him like a devoted companion, and that I do, with all +my heart. As to being responsible for my acts, they're none of his +business, no more his than anybody else's." + +She spoke in a crisp, incisive tone. + +"The devil;" said Durtal. "You certainly reduce the importance of the +rôle of husband." + +"I know that my ideas are not the ideas of the world I live in, and they +appear not to be yours. In my first marriage they were a source of +trouble and disaster--but I have an iron will and I bend the people who +love me. In addition, I despise deceit, so when a few years after +marriage I became smitten on a man I quite frankly told my husband and +confessed my fault." + +"Dare I ask you in what spirit he received this confidence?" + +"He was so grieved that in one night his hair turned white. He could not +bear what he called--wrongly, I think--my treason, and he killed +himself." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, dumbfounded by the placid and resolute air of this +woman, "but suppose he had strangled you first?" + +She shrugged her shoulders and picked a cat hair off her skirt. + +"The result," he resumed after a silence, "being that you are now almost +free, that your second husband tolerates--" + +"Let us not discuss my second husband. He is an excellent man who +deserves a better wife. I have absolutely no reason to speak of +Chantelouve otherwise than with praise, and then--oh, let's talk of +something else, for I have had sufficient botheration on this subject +from my confessor, who interdicts me from the Holy Table." + +He contemplated her, and saw yet another Hyacinthe, a hard, pertinacious +woman whom he had not known. Not a sign nor an accent of emotion, +nothing, while she was describing the suicide of her first husband--she +did not even seem to imagine that she had a crime on her conscience. She +remained pitiless, and yet, a moment ago, when she was commiserating him +because of his fictitious parenthood, he had thought she was trembling. +"After all, perhaps she is acting a part--like myself." + +He remained awed by the turn the conversation had taken. He sought, +mentally, a way of getting back to the subject from which Hyacinthe had +diverted him, of the Satanism of Canon Docre. + +"Well, let us think of that no more," she said, coming very near. She +smiled, and was once more the Hyacinthe he knew. + +"But if on my account you can no longer take communion--" + +She interrupted him. "Would you be sorry if I did not love you?" and she +kissed his eyes. He squeezed her politely in his arms, but he felt her +trembling, and from motives of prudence he got away. + +"Is he so inexorable, your confessor?" + +"He is an incorruptible man, of the old school. I chose him expressly." + +"If I were a woman it seems to me I should take, on the contrary, a +confessor who was pliable and caressible and who would not violently +pillory my dainty little sins. I would have him indulgent, oiling the +hinges of confession, enticing forth with beguiling gestures the +misdeeds that hung back. It is true there would be risk of seducing a +confessor who perhaps would be defenceless--" + +"And that would be incest, because the priest is a spiritual father, and +it would also be sacrilege, because the priest is consecrated.--Oh," +speaking to herself, "I was mad, mad--" suddenly carried away. + +He observed her; sparks glinted in the myopic eyes of this extraordinary +woman. Evidently he had just stumbled, unwittingly, onto a guilty secret +of hers. + +"Well," and he smiled, "do you still commit infidelities to me with a +false me?" + +"I do not understand." + +"Do you receive, at night, the visit of the incubus which resembles +me?" + +"No. Since I have been able to possess you in the flesh I have no need +to evoke your image." + +"What a downright Satanist you are!" + +"Maybe. I have been so constantly associated with priests." + +"You're a great one," he said, bowing. "Now listen to me, and do me a +great favour. You know Canon Docre?" + +"I should say!" + +"Well, what in the world is this man, about whom I hear so much?" + +"From whom?" + +"Gévingey and Des Hermies." + +"Ah, you consult the astrologer! Yes, he met the Canon in my own house, +but I didn't know that Docre was acquainted with Des Hermies, who didn't +attend our receptions in those days" + +"Des Hermies has never seen Docre. He knows him, as I do, only by +hearsay, from Gévingey. Now, briefly, how much truth is there in the +stories of the sacrileges of which this priest is accused?" + +"I don't know. Docre is a gentleman, learned and well bred. He was even +the confessor of royalty, and he would certainly have become a bishop if +he had not quitted the priesthood. I have heard a great deal of evil +spoken about him, but, especially in the clerical world, people are so +fond of saying all sorts of things." + +"But you knew him personally." + +"Yes, I even had him for a confessor." + +"Then it isn't possible that you don't know what to make of him?" + +"Very possible, indeed presumable. Look here, you have been beating +around the bush a long time. Exactly what do you want to know?" + +"Everything you care to tell me. Is he young or old, handsome or ugly, +rich or poor?" + +"He is forty years old, very fastidious of his person, and he spends a +lot of money." + +"Do you believe that he indulges in sorcery, that he celebrates the +black mass?" + +"It is quite possible." + +"Pardon me for dunning you, for extorting information from you as if +with forceps--suppose I were to ask you a really personal question--this +faculty of incubacy ...?" + +"Why, certainly I got it from him. I hope you are satisfied." + +"Yes and no. Thanks for your kindness in telling me--I know I am abusing +your good nature--but one more question. Do you know of any way whereby +I may see Canon Docre in person?" + +"He is at Nîmes." + +"Pardon me. For the moment, he is in Paris." + +"Ah, you know that! Well, if I knew of a way, I would not tell you, be +sure. It would not be good for you to get to seeing too much of this +priest." + +"You admit, then, that he is dangerous?" + +"I do not admit nor deny. I tell you simply that you have nothing to do +with him." + +"Yes I have. I want to get material for my book from him." + +"Get it from somebody else. Besides," she said, putting on her hat in +front of the glass, "my husband got a bad scare and broke with that man +and refuses to receive him." + +"That is no reason why--" + +"What do you mean?" + +"Oh, nothing." He repressed the remark: "Why you should not see him." + +She did not insist. She was poking her hair under her veil. "Heavens! +what a fright I look!" + +He took her hands and kissed them. "When shall I see you again?" + +"I thought I wasn't to come here any more." + +"Oh, now, you know I love you as a good friend. Tell me, when will you +come again?" + +"Tomorrow night, unless it is inconvenient for you." + +"Not at all." + +"Then, _au revoir_." + +Their lips met. + +"And above all, don't think about Canon Docre," she said, turning and +shaking her finger at him threateningly as she went out. + +"Devil take you and your reticence," he said to himself, closing the +door after her. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +"When I think," said Durtal to himself the next morning, "that in bed, +at the moment when the most pertinacious will succumbs, I held firm and +refused to yield to the instances of Hyacinthe wishing to establish a +footing here, and that after the carnal decline, at that instant when +annihilated man recovers--alas!--his reason, I supplicated her, myself, +to continue her visits, why, I simply cannot understand myself. Deep +down, I have not got over my firm resolution of breaking with her, but I +could not dismiss her like a cocotte. And," to justify his +inconsistency, "I hoped to get some information about the canon. Oh, on +that subject I am not through with her. She's got to make up her mind to +speak out and quit answering me by monosyllables and guarded phrases as +she did yesterday. + +"Indeed, what can she have been up to with that abbé who was her +confessor and who, by her own admission, launched her into incubacy? She +has been his mistress, that is certain. And how many other of these +priests she has gone around with have been her lovers also? For she +confessed, in a cry, that those are the men she loves. Ah, if one went +about much in the clerical world one would doubtless learn remarkable +things concerning her and her husband. It is strange, all the same that +Chantelouve, who plays a singular rôle in that household, has acquired a +deplorable reputation, and she hasn't. Never have I heard anybody speak +of her dodges--but, oh, what a fool I am! It isn't strange. Her husband +doesn't confine himself to religious and polite circles. He hobnobs with +men of letters, and in consequence exposes himself to every sort of +slander, while she, if she takes a lover, chooses him out of a pious +society in which not one of us would ever be received. And then, abbés +are discreet. But how explain her infatuation with me? By the simple +fact that she is surfeited of priests and a layman serves as a change of +diet. + +"Just the same, she is quite singular, and the more I see her the less I +understand her. There are in her three distinct beings. + +"First the woman seated or standing up, whom I knew in her drawing-room, +reserved, almost haughty, who becomes a good companion in private, +affectionate and even tender. + +"Then the woman in bed, completely changed in voice and bearing, a +harlot spitting mud, losing all shame. + +"Third and last, the pitiless vixen, the thorough Satanist, whom I +perceived yesterday. + +"What is the binding-alloy that amalgamates all these beings of hers? I +can't say. Hypocrisy, no doubt. No. I don't think so, for she is often +of a disconcerting frankness--in moments, it is true, of forgetfulness +and unguardedness. Seriously, what is the use of trying to understand +the character of this pious harlot? And to be candid with myself, what I +wish ideally will never be realized; she does not ask me to take her to +swell places, does not force me to dine with her, exacts no revenue: she +isn't trying to compromise and blackmail me. I shan't find a +better--but, oh, Lord! I now prefer to find no one at all. It suits me +perfectly to entrust my carnal business to mercenary agents. For my +twenty francs I shall receive more considerate treatment. There is no +getting around it, only professionals know how to cook up a delicious +sensual dish. + +"Odd," he said to himself after a reflective silence, "but, all +proportions duly observed, Gilles de Rais divides himself like her, into +three different persons. + +"First, the brave and honest fighting man. + +"Then the refined and artistic criminal. + +"Finally the repentant sinner, the mystic. + +"He is a mass of contradictions and excesses. Viewing his life as a +whole one finds each of his vices compensated by a contradictory virtue, +but there is no key characteristic which reconciles them. + +"He is of an overweening arrogance, but when contrition takes possession +of him, he falls on his knees in front of the people of low estate, and +has the tears, the humility of a saint. + +"His ferocity passes the limits of the human scale, and yet he is +generous and sincerely devoted to his friends, whom he cares for like a +brother when the Demon has mauled them. + +"Impetuous in his desires, and nevertheless patient; brave in battle, a +coward confronting eternity; he is despotic and violent, yet he is putty +in the hands of his flatterers. He is now in the clouds, now in the +abyss, never on the trodden plain, the lowlands of the soul. His +confessions do not throw any light on his invariable tendency to +extremes. When asked who suggested to him the idea of such crimes, he +answers, 'No one. The thought came to me only from myself, from my +reveries, my daily pleasures, my taste for debauchery.' And he arraigns +his indolence and constantly asserts that delicate repasts and strong +drink have helped uncage the wild animal in him. + +"Unresponsive to mediocre passions, he is carried away alternately by +good as well as evil, and he bounds from spiritual pole to spiritual +pole. He dies at the age of thirty-six, but he has completely exhausted +the possibilities of joy and grief. He has adored death, loved as a +vampire, kissed inimitable expressions of suffering and terror, and has, +himself, been racked by implacable remorse, insatiable fear. He has +nothing more to try, nothing more to learn, here below. + +"Let's see," said Durtal, running over his notes. "I left him at the +moment when the expiation begins. As I had written in one of my +preceding chapters, the inhabitants of the region dominated by the +châteaux of the Marshal know now who the inconceivable monster is who +carries children off and cuts their throats. But no one dare speak. +When, at a turn in the road, the tall figure of the butcher is seen +approaching, all flee, huddle behind the hedges, or shut themselves up +in the cottages. + +"And Gilles passes, haughty and sombre, in the solitude of villages +where no one dares venture abroad. Impunity seems assured him, for what +peasant would be mad enough to attack a master who could have him +gibbeted at a word? + +"Again, if the humble give up the idea of bringing Gilles de Rais to +justice, his peers have no intention of combating him for the benefit of +peasants whom they disdain, and his liege, the duke of Brittany, Jean V, +burdens him with favours and blandishments in order to extort his lands +from him at a low price. + +"A single power can rise and, above feudal complicities, above earthly +interest, avenge the oppressed and the weak. The Church. And it is the +Church in fact, in the person of Jean de Malestroit, which rises up +before the monster and fells him. + +"Jean de Malestroit, Bishop of Nantes, belongs to an illustrious line. +He is a near kinsman of Jean V, and his incomparable piety, his +infallible Christian wisdom, and his enthusiastic charity, make him +venerated, even by the duke. + +"The wailing of Gilles's decimated flock reaches his ears. In silence he +begins an investigation and, setting spies upon the Marshal, waits only +for an opportune moment to begin the combat. And Gilles suddenly commits +an inexplicable crime which permits the Bishop to march forthwith upon +him and smite him. + +"To recuperate his shattered fortune, Gilles has sold his signorie of +Saint Etienne de Mer Morte to a subject of Jean V, Guillaume le Ferron, +who delegates his brother, Jean le Ferron, to take possession of the +domain. + +"Some days later the Marshal gathers the two hundred men of his military +household and at their head marches on Saint Etienne. There, the day of +Pentecost, when the assembled people are hearing mass, he precipitates +himself, sword in hand, into the church, sweeps aside the faithful, +throwing them into tumult, and, before the dumbfounded priest, threatens +to cleave Jean le Ferron, who is praying. The ceremony is broken off, +the congregation take flight. Gilles drags le Ferron, pleading for +mercy, to the château, orders that the drawbridge be let down, and by +force occupies the place, while his prisoner is carried away to +Tiffauges and thrown into an underground dungeon. + +"Gilles has, at one and the same time, violated the unwritten law of +Brittany forbidding any baron to raise troops without the consent of the +duke, and committed double sacrilege in profaning a chapel and seizing +Jean le Ferron, who is a tonsured clerk of the Church. + +"The Bishop learns of this outrage and prevails upon the reluctant Jean +V to march against the rebel. Then, while one army advances on Saint +Etienne, which Gilles abandons to take refuge with his little band in +the fortified manor of Mâchecoul, another army lays siege to Tiffauges. + +"During this time the priest hastens his redoubled investigations. He +delegates commissioners and procurators in all the villages where +children have disappeared. He himself quits his palace at Nantes, +travels about the countryside, and takes the depositions of the bereft. +The people at last speak, and on their knees beseech the Bishop to +protect them. Enraged by the atrocities which they reveal, he swears +that justice shall be done. + +"It takes a month to hear all the reports. By letters-patent Jean de +Malestroit establishes publicly the '_infamatio_' of Gilles, then, when +all the forms of canonic procedure have been gone through with, he +launches the mandate of arrest. + +"In this writ of warrant, given at Nantes the 13th day of September in +the year of Our Lord 1440, the Bishop notes all the crimes imputed to +the Marshal, then, in an energetic style, he commands his diocese to +march against the assassin and dislodge him. 'Thus we do enjoin you, +each and all, individually, by these presents, that ye cite immediately +and peremptorily, without counting any man upon his neighbor, without +discharging the burden any man upon his neighbour, that ye cite before +us or before the Official of our cathedral church, for Monday of the +feast of Exaltation of the Holy Cross, the 19th of September, Gilles, +noble baron de Rais, subject to our puissance and to our jurisdiction; +and we do ourselves cite him by these presents to appear before our bar +to answer for the crimes which weigh upon him. Execute these orders, and +do each of you cause them to be executed.' + +"And the next day the captain-at-arms, Jean Labbé, acting in the name of +the duke, and Robin Guillaumet, notary, acting in the name of the +Bishop, present themselves, escorted by a small troop, before the +château of Mâchecoul. + +"What sudden change of heart does the Marshal now experience? Too feeble +to hold his own in the open field, he can nevertheless defend himself +behind the sheltering ramparts--yet he surrenders. + +"Roger de Bricqueville and Gilles de Sillé, his trusted councillors, +have taken flight. He remains alone with Prelati, who also attempts, in +vain, to escape. He, like Gilles, is loaded with chains. Robin +Guillaumet searches the fortress from top to bottom. He discovers bloody +clothes, imperfectly calcinated ashes which Prelati has not had time to +throw into the latrines. Amid universal maledictions and cries of horror +Gilles and his servitors are conducted to Nîmes and incarcerated in the +château de la Tour Neuve. + +"Now this part is not very clear," said Durtal to himself. "Remembering +what a daredevil the Marshal had been, how can we reconcile ourselves to +the idea that he could give himself up to certain death and torture +without striking a blow? + +"'Was he softened, weakened by his nights of debauchery, terrified by +the audacity of his own sacrileges, ravaged and torn by remorse? Was he +tired of living as he did, and did he give himself up, as so many +murderers do, because he was irresistibly attracted to punishment? +Nobody knows. Did he think himself above the law because of his lofty +rank? Or did he hope to disarm the duke by playing upon his venality, +offering him a ransom of manors and farm land? + +"One answer is as plausible as another. He may also have known how +hesitant Jean V had been, for fear of rousing the wrath of the nobility +of his duchy, about yielding to the objurgations of the Bishop and +raising troops for the pursuit and arrest. + +"Well, there is no document which answers these questions. An author can +take some liberties here and set down his own conjectures. But that +curious trial is going to give me some trouble. + +"As soon as Gilles and his accomplices are incarcerated, two tribunals +are organized, one ecclesiastical to judge the crimes coming under the +jurisdiction of the Church, the other civil to judge those on which the +state must pass. + +"To tell the truth, the civil tribunal, which is present at the +ecclesiastical hearings, effaces itself completely. As a matter of form +it makes a brief cross-examination--but it pronounces the sentence of +death, which the Church cannot permit itself to utter, according to the +old adage, '_Ecclesia abhorret a sanguine_.' + +"The ecclesiastical trial lasts five weeks, the civil, forty-eight +hours. It seems that, to hide behind the robes of the Bishop, the duke +of Brittany has voluntarily subordinated the rôle of civil justice, +which ordinarily stands up for its rights against the encroachments of +the ecclesiastical court. + +"Jean de Malestroit presides over the hearings. He chooses for +assistants the Bishops of Mans, of Saint Brieuc, and of Saint Lô, then +in addition he surrounds himself with a troop of jurists who work in +relays in the interminable sessions of the trial. Some of the more +important are Guillaume de Montigné, advocate of the secular court; +Jean Blanchet, bachelor of laws; Guillaume Groyguet and Robert de la +Rivière, licentiates _in utroque jure_, and Hervé Lévi, senescal of +Quimper. Pierre de l'Hospital, chancellor of Brittany, who is to preside +over the civil hearings after the canonic judgment, assists Jean de +Malestroit. + +"The public prosecutor is Guillaume Chapeiron, curate of Saint Nicolas, +an eloquent and subtile man. Adjunct to him, to relieve him of the +fatigue of the readings, are Geoffroy Pipraire, dean of Sainte Marie, +and Jacques de Pentcoetdic, Official of the Church of Nantes. + +"In connection with the episcopal jurisdiction, the Church has called in +the assistance of the extraordinary tribunal of the Inquisition, for the +repression of the crime of heresy, then comprehending perjury, +blasphemy, sacrilege, all the crimes of magic. + +"It sits at the side of Jean de Malestroit in the redoubtable and +learned person of Jean Blouyn of the order of Saint Dominic, delegated +by the Grand Inquisitor of France, Guillaume Merici, to the functions of +Vice Inquisitor of the city and diocese of Nantes. + +"The tribunal constituted, the trial opens the first thing in the +morning, because judges and witnesses, in accordance with the custom of +the times, must proceed fasting to the giving and hearing of evidence. +The testimony of the parents of the victims is heard, and Robin +Guillaumet, acting sergeant-at-arms, the man who arrested the Marshal at +Mâchecoul, reads the citation bidding Gilles de Rais appear. He is +brought in and declares disdainfully that he does not recognize the +competence of the Tribunal, but, as canonic procedure demands, the +Prosecutor at once 'in order that by this means the correction of +sorcery be not prevented,' petitions for and obtains from the tribunal a +ruling that this objection be quashed as being null in law and +'frivolous.' He begins to read to the accused the counts on which he is +to be tried. Gilles cries out that the Prosecutor is a liar and a +traitor. Then Guillaume Chapeiron extends his hand toward the crucifix, +swears that he is telling the truth, and challenges the Marshal to take +the same oath. But this man, who has recoiled from no sacrilege, is +troubled. He refuses to perjure himself before God, and the session ends +with Gilles still vociferating outrageous denunciations of the +Prosecutor. + +"The preliminaries completed, a few days later, the public hearings +begin. The act of indictment is read aloud to the accused, in front of +an audience who shudder when Chapeiron indefatigably enumerates the +crimes one by one, and formally accuses the Marshal of having practised +sorcery and magic, of having polluted and slain little children, of +having violated the immunities of Holy Church at Saint Etienne de Mer +Morte. + +"Then after a silence he resumes his discourse, and making no account of +the murders, but dwelling only on the crimes of which the punishment, +foreseen by canonic law, can be fixed by the Church, he demands that +Gilles be smitten with double excommunication, first as an evoker of +demons, a heretic, apostate and renegade, second as a sodomist and +perpetrator of sacrilege. + +"Gilles, who has listened to this incisive and scathing indictment, +completely loses control of himself. He insults the judges, calls them +simonists and ribalds, and refuses to answer the questions put to him. +The Prosecutor and advocates are unmoved; they invite him to present his +defence. + +"Again he denounces them, insults them, but when called upon to refute +them he remains silent. + +"The Bishop and Vice Inquisitor declare him in contempt and pronounce +against him the sentence of excommunication, which is soon made public. +They decide in addition that the hearing shall be continued next day--" + +A ring of the doorbell interrupted Durtal's perusal of his notes. Des +Hermies entered. + +"I have just seen Carhaix. He is ill," he said. + +"That so? What seems to be the matter?" + +"Nothing very serious. A slight attack of bronchitis. He'll be up in a +few days if he will consent to keep quiet." + +"I must go see him tomorrow," said Durtal. + +"And what are you doing?" enquired Des Hermies. "Working hard?" + +"Why, yes. I am digging into the trial of the noble baron de Rais. It +will be as tedious to read as to write!" + +"And you don't know yet when you will finish your volume?" + +"No," answered Durtal, stretching. "As a matter of fact I wish it might +never be finished. What will become of me when it is? I'll have to look +around for another subject, and, when I find one, do all the drudgery of +planning and then getting the introductory chapter written--the mean +part of any literary work is getting started. I shall pass mortal hours +doing nothing. Really, when I think it over, literature has only one +excuse for existing; it saves the person who makes it from the +disgustingness of life." + +"And, charitably, it lessens the distress of us few who still love art." + +"Few indeed!" + +"And the number keeps diminishing. The new generation no longer +interests itself in anything except gambling and jockeys." + +"Yes, you're quite right. The men can't spare from gambling the time to +read, so it is only the society women who buy books and pass judgment on +them. It is to The Lady, as Schopenhauer called her, to the little +goose, as I should characterize her, that we are indebted for these +shoals of lukewarm and mucilaginous novels which nowadays get puffed." + +"You think, then, that we are in for a pretty literature. Naturally you +can't please women by enunciating vigorous ideas in a crisp style." + +"But," Durtal went on, after a silence, "it is perhaps best that the +case should be as it is. The rare artists who remain have no business to +be thinking about the public. The artist lives and works far from the +drawing-room, far from the clamour of the little fellows who fix up the +custom-made literature. The only legitimate source of vexation to an +author is to see his work, when printed, exposed to the contaminating +curiosity of the crowd." + +"That is," said Des Hermies, "a veritable prostitution. To advertise a +thing for sale is to accept the degrading familiarities of the first +comer." + +"But our impenitent pride--and also our need of the miserable sous--make +it impossible for us to keep our manuscripts sheltered from the asses. +Art ought to be--like one's beloved--out of reach, out of the world. Art +and prayer are the only decent ejaculations of the soul. So when one of +my books appears, I let go of it with horror. I get as far as possible +from the environment in which it may be supposed to circulate. I care +very little about a book of mine until years afterward, when it has +disappeared from all the shop windows and is out of print. Briefly, I am +in no hurry to finish the history of Gilles de Rais, which, +unfortunately, is getting finished in spite of me. I don't give a damn +how it is received." + +"Are you doing anything this evening?" + +"No. Why?" + +"Shall we dine together?" + +"Certainly." + +And while Durtal was putting on his shoes, Des Hermies remarked, "To me +the striking thing about the so-called literary world of this epoch is +its cheap hypocrisy. What a lot of laziness, for instance, that word +dilettante has served to cover." + +"Yes, it's a great old alibi. But it is confounding to see that the +critic who today decrees himself the title of dilettante accepts it as a +term of praise and does not even suspect that he is slapping himself. +The whole thing can be resolved into syllogism: + +"The dilettante has no personal temperament, since he objects to nothing +and likes everything. + +"Whoever has no personal temperament has no talent." + +"Then," rejoined Des Hermies, putting on his hat, "an author who boasts +of being a dilettante, confesses by that very thing that he is no +author?" + +"Exactly." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +Toward the end of the afternoon Durtal quit work and went up to the +towers of Saint Sulpice. + +He found Carhaix in bed in a chamber connecting with the one in which +they were in the habit of dining. These rooms were very similar, with +their walls or unpapered stone, and with their vaulted ceilings, only, +the bedroom was darker. The window opened its half-wheel not on the +place Saint Sulpice but on the rear of the church, whose roof prevented +any light from getting in. This cell was furnished with an iron bed, +whose springs shrieked, with two cane chairs, and with a table that had +a shabby covering of green baize. On the bare wall was a crucifix of no +value, with a dry palm over it. That was all. Carhaix was sitting up in +bed reading, with books and papers piled all around him. His eyes were +more watery and his face paler than usual. His beard, which had not been +shaved for several days, grew in grey clumps on his hollow cheeks, but +his poor features were radiant with an affectionate, affable smile. + +To Durtal's questions he replied, "It is nothing. Des Hermies gives me +permission to get up tomorrow. But what a frightful medicine!" and he +showed Durtal a potion of which he had to take a teaspoonful every hour. + +"What is it he's making you take?" + +But the bell-ringer did not know. Doubtless to spare him the expense, +Des Hermies himself always brought the bottle. + +"Isn't it tiresome lying in bed?" + +"I should say! I am obliged to entrust my bells to an assistant who is +no good. Ah, if you heard him ring! It makes me shudder, it sets my +teeth on edge." + +"Now you mustn't work yourself up," said his wife. "In two days you will +be able to ring your bells yourself." + +But he went on complaining. "You two don't understand. My bells are used +to being well treated. They're like domestic animals, those instruments, +and they obey only their master. Now they won't harmonize, they jangle. +I can hardly recognize their voices." + +"What are you reading?" asked Durtal, wishing to change a subject which +he judged to be dangerous. + +"Books about bells! Ah, Monsieur Durtal, I have some inscriptions here +of truly rare beauty. Listen," and he opened a worm-bored book, "listen +to this motto printed in raised letters on the bronze robe of the great +bell of Schaffhausen, 'I call the living, I mourn the dead, I break the +thunder.' And this other which figured on an old bell in the belfry of +Ghent, 'My name is Roland. When I toll, there is a fire; when I peal, +there is a tempest in Flanders.'" + +"Yes," Durtal agreed, "there is a certain vigour about that one." + +"Ah," said Carhaix, seeming not to have heard the other's remark, "it's +ridiculous. Now the rich have their names and titles inscribed on the +bells which they give to the churches, but they have so many qualities +and titles that there is no room for a motto. Truly, humility is a +forgotten virtue in our day." + +"If that were the only forgotten virtue!" sighed Durtal. + +"Ah!" replied Carhaix, not to be turned from his favourite subject, "and +if this were the only abuse! But bells now rust from inactivity. The +metal is no longer hammer-hardened and is not vibrant. Formerly these +magnificent auxiliaries of the ritual sang without cease. The canonical +hours were sounded, Matins and Laudes before daybreak, Prime at dawn, +Tierce at nine o'clock, Sexte at noon, Nones at three, and then Vespers +and Compline. Now we announce the curate's mass, ring three angeluses, +morning, noon, and evening, occasionally a Salute, and on certain days +launch a few peals for prescribed ceremonies. And that's all. It's only +in the convents where the bells do not sleep, for these, at least, the +night offices are kept up." + +"You mustn't talk about that," said his wife, straightening the pillows +at his back. "If you keep working yourself up, you will never get well." + +"Quite right," he said, resigned, "but what would you have? I shall +still be a man with a grievance, whom nothing can pacify," and he smiled +at his wife who was bringing him a spoonful of the potion to swallow. + +The doorbell rang. Mme. Carhaix went to answer it and a hilarious and +red-faced priest entered, crying in a great voice, "It's Jacob's ladder, +that stairway! I climbed and climbed and climbed, and I'm all out of +breath," and he sank, puffing, into an armchair. + +"Well, my friend," he said at last, coming into the bedroom, "I learned +from the beadle that you were ill, and I came to see how you were +getting on." + +Durtal examined him. An irrepressible gaiety exuded from this sanguine, +smooth-shaven face, blue from the razor. Carhaix introduced them. They +exchanged a look, of distrust on the priest's side, of coldness on +Durtal's. + +Durtal felt embarrassed and in the way, while the honest pair were +effusively and with excessive humility thanking the abbé for coming up +to see them. It was evident that for this pair, who were not ignorant of +the sacrileges and scandalous self-indulgences of the clergy, an +ecclesiastic was a man elect, a man so superior that as soon as he +arrived nobody else counted. + +Durtal took his leave, and as he went downstairs he thought, "That +jubilant priest sickens me. Indeed, a gay priest, physician, or man of +letters must have an infamous soul, because they are the ones who see +clearly into human misery and console it, or heal it, or depict it. If +after that they can act the clown--they are unspeakable! Though I'll +admit that thoughtless persons deplore the sadness of the novel of +observation and its resemblance to the life it represents. These people +would have it jovial, smart, highly coloured, aiding them, in their base +selfishness, to forget the hag-ridden existences of their brothers. + +"Truly, Carhaix and his wife are peculiar. They bow under the paternal +despotism of the priests--and there are moments when that same despotism +must be no joke--and revere them and adore them. But then these two are +simple believers, with humble, unsmirched souls. I don't know the priest +who was there, but he is rotund and rubicund, he shakes in his fat and +seems bursting with joy. Despite the example of Saint Francis of Assisi, +who was gay--spoiling him for me--I have difficulty in persuading myself +that this abbé is an elevated being. It's all right to say that the best +thing for him is to be mediocre; to ask how, if he were otherwise, he +would make his flock understand him; and add that if he really had +superior gifts he would be hated by his colleagues and persecuted by his +bishop." + +While conversing thus disjointedly with himself Durtal had reached the +base of the tower. He stopped under the porch. "I intended to stay +longer up there," thought he. "It's only half-past five. I must kill at +least half an hour before dinner." + +The weather was almost mild. The clouds had been swept away. He lighted +a cigarette and strolled about the square, musing. Looking up he hunted +for the bell-ringer's window and recognized it. Of the windows which +opened over the portico it alone had a curtain. + +"What an abominable construction," he thought, contemplating the church. +"Think. That cube flanked by two towers presumes to invite comparison +with the façade of Notre Dame. What a jumble," he continued, examining +the details. "From the foundation to the first story are Ionic columns +with volutes, then from the base of the tower to the summit are +Corinthian columns with acanthus leaves. What significance can this +salmagundi of pagan orders have on a Christian church? And as a rebuke +to the over-ornamented bell tower there stands the other tower +unfinished, looking like an abandoned grain elevator, but the less +hideous of the two, at that. + +"And it took five or six architects to erect this indigent heap of +stones. Yet Servandoni and Oppenord and their ilk were the real major +prophets, the ... zekiels of building. Their work is the work of seers +looking beyond the eighteenth century to the day of transportation by +steam. For Saint Sulpice is not a church, it's a railway station! + +"And the interior of the edifice is not more religious nor artistic than +the exterior. The only thing in it that pleases me is good Carhaix's +aërial cave." Then he looked about him. "This square is very ugly, but +how provincial and homelike it is! Surely nothing could equal the +hideousness of that seminary, which exhales the rancid, frozen odour of +a hospital. The fountain with its polygonal basins, its saucepan urns, +its lion-headed spouts, its niches with prelates in them, is no +masterpiece. Neither is the city hall, whose administrative style is a +cinder in the eye. But on this square, as in the neighbouring streets, +Servandoni, Garancière, and Ferrou, one respires an atmosphere +compounded of benign silence and mild humidity. You think of a +clothes-press that hasn't been open for years, and, somehow, of incense. +This square is in perfect harmony with the houses in the decayed streets +around here, with the shops where religious paraphernalia are sold, the +image and ciborium factories, the Catholic bookstores with books whose +covers are the colour of apple seeds, macadam, nutmeg, bluing. + +"Yes, it's dilapidated and quiet." + +The square was then almost deserted. A few women were going up the +church steps, met by mendicants who murmured paternosters as they +rattled their tin cups. An ecclesiastic, carrying under his arm a book +bound in black cloth, saluted white-eyed women. A few dogs were running +about. Children were chasing each other or jumping rope. The enormous +chocolate-coloured la Villette omnibus and the little honey-yellow bus +of the Auteuil line went past, almost empty. Hackmen were standing +beside their hacks on the sidewalk, or in a group around a comfort +station, talking. There were no crowds, no noise, and the great trees +gave the square the appearance of the silent mall of a little town. + +"Well," said Durtal, considering the church again, "I really must go up +to the top of the tower some clear day." Then he shook his head. "What +for? A bird's-eye view of Paris would have been interesting in the +Middle Ages, but now! I should see, as from a hill top, other heights, a +network of grey streets, the whiter arteries of the boulevards, the +green plaques of gardens and squares, and, away in the distance, files +of houses like lines of dominoes stood up on end, the black dots being +windows. + +"And then the edifices emerging from this jumble of roofs, Notre Dame, +la Sainte Chapelle, Saint Severin, Saint Etienne du Mont, the Tour Saint +Jacques, are put out of countenance by the deplorable mass of newer +edifices. And I am not at all eager to contemplate that specimen of the +art of the maker of toilet articles which l'Opéra is, nor that bridge +arch, l'arc de la Triomphe, nor that hollow chandelier, the Tour Eiffel! +It's enough to see them separately, from the ground, as you turn a +street corner. Well, I must go and dine, for I have an engagement with +Hyacinthe and I must be back before eight." + +He went to a neighbouring wine shop where the dining-room, depopulated +at six o'clock, permitted one to ruminate in tranquillity, while eating +fairly sanitary food and drinking not too dangerously coloured wines. He +was thinking of Mme. Chantelouve, but more of Docre. The mystery of this +priest haunted him. What could be going on in the soul of a man who had +had the figure of Christ tattooed on his heels the better to trample +Him? + +What hate the act revealed! Did Docre hate God for not having given him +the blessed ecstasies of a saint, or more humanly for not having raised +him to the highest ecclesiastical dignities? Evidently the spite of this +priest was inordinate and his pride unlimited. He seemed not displeased +to be an object of terror and loathing, for thus he was somebody. Then, +for a thorough-paced scoundrel, as this man seemed to be, what delight +to make his enemies languish in slow torment by casting spells on them +with perfect impunity. + +"And sacrilege carries one out of oneself in furious transports, in +voluptuous delirium, which nothing can equal. Since the Middle Ages it +has been the coward's crime, for human justice does not prosecute it, +and one can commit it with impunity, but it is the most extreme of +excesses for a believer, and Docre believes in Christ, or he wouldn't +hate Him so. + +"A monster! And what ignoble relations he must have had with +Chantelouve's wife! Now, how shall I make her speak up? She gave me +quite clearly to understand, the other day, that she refused to explain +herself on this topic. Meanwhile, as I have not intention of submitting +to her young girl follies tonight, I will tell her that I am not feeling +well, and that absolute rest and quiet are necessary." + +He did so, an hour later when she came in. + +She proposed a cup of tea, and when he refused, she embraced him and +nursed him like a baby. Then withdrawing a little, "You work too hard. +You need some relaxation. Come now, to pass the time you might court me +a little, because up to now I have done it all. No? That idea does not +amuse him. Let us try something else. Shall we play hide-and-seek with +the cat? He shrugs his shoulders. Well, since there is nothing to change +your grouchy expression, let us talk. What has become of your friend Des +Hermies?" + +"Nothing in particular." + +"And his experiments with Mattei medicine?" + +"I don't know whether he continues to prosecute them or not." + +"Well, I see that the conversational possibilities of that topic are +exhausted. You know your replies are not very encouraging, dear." + +"But," he said, "everybody sometimes gets so he doesn't answer questions +at great length. I even know a young woman who becomes excessively +laconic when interrogated on a certain subject." + +"Of a canon, for instance." + +"Precisely." + +She crossed her legs, very coolly. "That young woman undoubtedly had +reasons for keeping still. But perhaps that young woman is really eager +to oblige the person who cross-examines her; perhaps, since she last saw +him, she has gone to a great deal of trouble to satisfy his curiosity." + +"Look here, Hyacinthe darling, explain yourself," he said, squeezing her +hands, an expression of joy on his face. + +"If I have made your mouth water so as not to have a grouchy face in +front of my eyes, I have succeeded remarkably." + +He kept still, wondering whether she was making fun of him or whether +she really was ready to tell him what he wanted to know. + +"Listen," she said. "I hold firmly by my decision of the other night. I +will not permit you to become acquainted with Canon Docre. But at a +settled time I can arrange, without your forming any relations with him, +to have you be present at the ceremony you most desire to know about." + +"The Black Mass?" + +"Yes. Within a week Docre will have left Paris. If once, in my company, +you see him, you will never see him afterward. Keep your evenings free +all this week. When the time comes I will notify you. But you may thank +me, dear, because to be useful to you I am disobeying the commands of my +confessor, whom I dare not see now, so I am damning myself." + +He kissed her, then, "Seriously, that man is really a monster?" + +"I fear so. In any case I would not wish anybody the misfortune of +having him for an enemy." + +"I should say not, if he poisons people by magic, as he seems to have +done Gévingey." + +"And he probably has. I should not like to be in the astrologer's +shoes." + +"You believe in Docre's potency, then. Tell me, how does he operate, +with the blood of mice, with broths, or with oil?" + +"So you know about that! He does employ these substances. In fact, he is +one of the very few persons who know how to manage them without +poisoning themselves. It's as dangerous as working with explosives. +Frequently, though, when attacking defenceless persons, he uses simpler +recipes. He distils extracts of poison and adds sulphuric acid to fester +the wound, then he dips in this compound the point of a lancet with +which he has his victim pricked by a flying spirit or a larva. It is +ordinary, well-known magic, that of Rosicrucians and tyros." + +Durtal burst out laughing. "But, my dear, to hear you, one would think +death could be sent to a distance like a letter." + +"Well, isn't cholera transmitted by letters? Ask the sanitary corps. +Don't they disinfect all mail in the time of epidemics?" + +"I don't contradict that, but the case is not the same." + +"It is too, because it is the question of transmission, invisibility, +distance, which astonishes you." + +"What astonishes me more than that is to hear of the Rosicrucians +actively satanizing. I confess that I had never considered them as +anything more than harmless suckers and funereal fakes." + +"But all societies are composed of suckers and the wily leaders who +exploit them. That's the case of the Rosicrucians. Yes, their leaders +privately attempt crime. One does not need to be erudite or intelligent +to practise the ritual of spells. At any rate, and I affirm this, there +is among them a former man of letters whom I know. He lives with a +married woman, and they pass the time, he and she, trying to kill the +husband by sorcery." + +"Well, it has its advantages over divorce, that system has." + +She pouted. "I shan't say another word. I think you are making fun of +me. You don't believe in anything--" + +"Indeed. I was not laughing at you. I haven't very precise ideas on this +subject. I admit that at first blush all this seems improbable, to say +the least. But when I think that all the efforts of modern science do +but confirm the discoveries of the magic of other days, I keep my mouth +shut. It is true," he went on after a silence,--"to cite only one +fact--that people can no longer laugh at the stories of women being +changed into cats in the Middle Ages. Recently there was brought to M. +Charcot a little girl who suddenly got down on her hands and knees and +ran and jumped around, scratching and spitting and arching her back. So +that metamorphosis is possible. No, one cannot too often repeat it, the +truth is that we know nothing and have no right to deny anything. But to +return to your Rosicrucians. Using purely chemical formulæ, they get +along without sacrilege?" + +"That is as much as to say that their venefices--supposing they know how +to prepare them well enough to accomplish their purpose, though I doubt +that--are easy to defeat. Yet I don't mean to say that this group, one +member of which is an ordained priest, does not make use of contaminated +Eucharists at need." + +"Another nice priest! But since you are so well informed, do you know +how spells are conjured away?" + +"Yes and no. I know that when the poisons are sealed by sacrilege, when +the operation is performed by a master, Docre or one of the princes of +magic at Rome, it is not at all easy--nor healthy--to attempt to apply +an antidote. Though I have heard of a certain abbé at Lyons who, +practically alone, is succeeding right now in these difficult cures." + +"Dr. Johannès!" + +"You know him!" + +"No. But Gévingey, who has gone to seek his medical aid, has told me of +him." + +"Well, I don't know how he goes about it, but I know that spells which +are not complicated with sacrilege are usually evaded by the law of +return. The blow is sent back to him who struck it. There are, at the +present time, two churches, one in Belgium, the other in France, where, +when one prays before a statue of the Virgin, the spell which has been +cast on one flies off and goes and strikes one's adversary." + +"Rats!" + +"One of these churches is at Tougres, eighteen kilometres from Liége, +and the name of it is Notre Dame de Retour. The other is the church of +l'Epine, 'the thorn,' a little village near Châlons. This church was +built long ago to conjure away the spells produced with the aid of the +thorns which grew in that country and served to pierce images cut in the +shape of hearts." + +"Near Châlons," said Durtal, digging in his memory, "it does seem to me +now that Des Hermies, speaking of bewitchment by the blood of white +mice, pointed out that village as the habitation of certain diabolic +circles." + +"Yes, that country in all times has been a hotbed of Satanism." + +"You are mighty well up on these matters. Is it Docre who transmitted +this knowledge to you?" + +"Yes, I owe him the little I am able to pass on to you. He took a fancy +to me and even wanted to make me his pupil. I refused, and am glad now I +did, for I am much more wary than I was then of being constantly in a +state of mortal sin." + +"Have you ever attended the Black Mass?" + +"Yes. And I warn you in advance that you will regret having seen such +terrible things. It is a memory that persists and horrifies, +even--especially--when one does not personally take part in the +offices." + +He looked at her. She was pale, and her filmed eyes blinked rapidly. + +"It's your own wish," she continued. "You will have no complaint if the +spectacle terrifies you or wrings your heart." + +He was almost dumbfounded to see how sad she was and with what +difficulty she spoke. + +"Really. This Docre, where did he come from, what did he do formerly, +how did he happen to become a master Satanist?" + +"I don't know very much about him. I know he was a supply priest in +Paris, then confessor of a queen in exile. There were terrible stories +about him, which, thanks to his influential patronage, were hushed up +under the Empire. He was interned at La Trappe, then driven out of the +priesthood, excommunicated by Rome. I learned in addition that he had +several times been accused of poisoning, but had always been acquitted +because the tribunals had never been able to get any evidence. Today he +lives I don't know how, but at ease, and he travels a good deal with a +woman who serves as voyant. To all the world he is a scoundrel, but he +is learned and perverse, and then he is so charming." + +"Oh," he said, "how changed your eyes and voice are! Admit that you are +in love with him." + +"No, not now. But why should I not tell you that we were mad about each +other at one time?" + +"And now?" + +"It is over. I swear it is. We have remained friends and nothing more." + +"But then you often went to see him. What kind of a place did he have? +At least it was curious and heterodoxically arranged?" + +"No, it was quite ordinary, but very comfortable and clean. He had a +chemical laboratory and an immense library. The only curious book he +showed me was an office of the Black Mass on parchment. There were +admirable illuminations, and the binding was made of the tanned skin of +a child who had died unbaptized. Stamped into the cover, in the shape of +a fleuron, was a great host consecrated in a Black Mass." + +"What did the manuscript say?" + +"I did not read it." + +They were silent. Then she took his hands. + +"Now you are yourself again. I knew I should cure you of your bad +humour. Admit that I am awfully good-natured not to have got angry at +you." + +"Got angry? What about?" + +"Because it is not very flattering to a woman to be able to entertain a +man only by telling him about another one." + +"Oh, no, it isn't that way at all," he said, kissing her eyes tenderly. + +"Let me go now," she said, very low, "this enervates me, and I must get +home. It's late." + +She sighed and fled, leaving him amazed and wondering in what weird +activities the life of that woman had been passed. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +The day after that on which he had spewed such furious vituperation over +the Tribunal, Gilles de Rais appeared again before his judges. He +presented himself with bowed head and clasped hands. He had once more +jumped from one extreme to the other. A few hours had sufficed to break +the spirit of the energumen, who now declared that he recognized the +authority of the magistrates and begged forgiveness for having insulted +them. + +They affirmed that for the love of Our Lord they forgot his +imprecations, and, at his prayer, the Bishop and the Inquisitor revoked +the sentence of excommunication which they had passed on him the day +before. + +This hearing was, in addition, taken up with the arraignment of Prelati +and his accomplices. Then, authorized by the ecclesiastical text which +says that a confession cannot be regarded as sufficient if it is "dubia, +vaga, generalis illativa, jocosa," the Prosecutor asserted that to +certify the sincerity of his confessions Gilles must be subjected to the +"canonic question," that is, to torture. + +The Marshal besought the Bishop to wait until the next day, and claiming +the right of confessing immediately to such judges as the Tribunal were +pleased to designate, he swore that he would thereafter repeat his +confession before the public and the court. + +Jean de Malestroit granted this request, and the Bishop of Saint Brieuc +and Pierre de l'Hospital were appointed to hear Gilles in his cell. When +he had finished the recital of his debauches and murders they ordered +Prelati to be brought to them. + +At sight of him Gilles burst into tears and when, after the +interrogatory, preparations were made to conduct the Italian back to his +dungeon, Gilles embraced him, saying, "Farewell, Francis my friend, we +shall never see each other again in this world. I pray God to give you +good patience and I hope in Him that we may meet again in great joy in +Paradise. Pray God for me and I shall pray for you." + +And Gilles was left alone to meditate on his crimes which he was to +confess publicly at the hearing next day. That day was the impressive +day of the trial. The room in which the Tribunal sat was crammed, and +there were multitudes sitting on the stairs, standing in the corridors, +filling the neighbouring courts, blocking the streets and lanes. From +twenty miles around the peasants were come to see the memorable beast +whose very name, before his capture, had served to close the doors those +evenings when in universal trembling the women dared not weep aloud. + +This meeting of the Tribunal was to be conducted with the most minute +observance of all the forms. All the assize judges, who in a long +hearing generally had their places filled by proxies, were present. + +The courtroom, massive, obscure, upheld by heavy Roman pillars, had been +rejuvenated. The wall, ogival, threw to cathedral height the arches of +its vaulted ceiling, which were joined together, like the sides of an +abbatial mitre, in a point. The room was lighted by sickly daylight +which was filtered through small panes between heavy leads. The azure of +the ceiling was darkened to navy blue, and the golden stars, at that +height, were as the heads of steel pins. In the shadows of the vaults +appeared the ermine of the ducal arms, dimly seen in escutcheons which +were like great dice with black dots. + +Suddenly the trumpets blared, the room was lighted up, and the Bishops +entered. Their mitres of cloth of gold flamed like the lightning. About +their necks were brilliant collars with orphreys crusted, as were the +robes, with carbuncles. In silent processional the Bishops advanced, +weighted down by their rigid copes, which fell in a flare from their +shoulders and were like golden bells split in the back. In their hands +they carried the crozier from which hung the maniple, a sort of green +veil. + +At each step they glowed like coals blown upon. Themselves were +sufficient to light the room, as they reanimated with their jewels the +pale sun of a rainy October day and scattered a new lustre to all parts +of the room, over the mute audience. + +Outshone by the shimmer of the orphreys and the stones, the costumes of +the other judges appeared darker and discordant. The black vestments of +secular justice, the white and black robe of Jean Blouyn, the silk +symars, the red woollen mantles, the scarlet chaperons lined with fur, +seemed faded and common. + +The Bishops seated themselves in the front row, surrounding Jean de +Malestroit, who from a raised seat dominated the court. + +Under the escort of the men-at-arms Gilles entered. He was broken and +haggard and had aged twenty years in one night. His eyes burned behind +seared lids. His cheeks shook. Upon injunction he began the recital of +his crimes. + +In a laboured voice, choked by tears, he recounted his abductions of +children, his hideous tactics, his infernal stimulations, his impetuous +murders, his implacable violations. Obsessed by the vision of his +victims, he described their agonies drawn out or hastened, their cries, +the rattle in their throats. He confessed to having wallowed in the +elastic warmth of their intestines. He confessed that he had ripped out +their hearts through wounds enlarged and opening like ripe fruit. And +with the eyes of a somnambulist he looked down at his fingers and shook +them as if blood were dripping from them. + +The thunder-struck audience kept a mournful silence which was lacerated +suddenly by a few short cries, and the attendants, at a run, carried +out fainting women, mad with horror. + +He seemed to see nothing, to hear nothing. He continued to tell off the +frightful rosary of his crimes. Then his voice became raucous. He was +coming to the sepulchral violations, and now to the torture of the +little children whom he had cajoled in order to cut their throats as he +kissed them. + +He divulged every detail. The account was so formidable, so atrocious, +that beneath their golden caps the bishops blanched. These priests, +tempered in the fires of confessional, these judges who in that time of +demonomania and murder had never heard more terrifying confessions, +these prelates whom no depravity had ever astonished, made the sign of +the Cross, and Jean de Malestroit rose and for very shame veiled the +face of the Christ. + +Then all lowered their heads, and without a word they listened. The +Marshal, bathed in sweat, his face downcast, looked now at the crucifix +whose invisible head and bristling crown of thorns gave their shapes to +the veil. + +He finished his narrative and broke down completely. Till now he had +stood erect, speaking as if in a daze, recounting to himself, aloud, the +memory of his ineradicable crimes. But at the end of the story his +forces abandoned him. He fell on his knees and, shaken by terrific sobs, +he cried, "O God, O my Redeemer, I beseech mercy and pardon!" Then the +ferocious and haughty baron, the first of his caste no doubt, humiliated +himself. He turned toward the people and said, weeping, "Ye, the parents +of those whom I have so cruelly put to death, give, ah give me, the +succour of your pious prayers!" + +Then in its white splendour the soul of the Middle Ages burst forth +radiant. + +Jean de Malestroit left his seat and raised the accused, who was beating +the flagstones with his despairing forehead. The judge in de Malestroit +disappeared, the priest alone remained. He embraced the sinner who was +repenting and lamenting his fault. + +A shudder overran the audience when Jean de Malestroit, with Gilles's +head on his breast, said to him, "Pray that the just and rightful wrath +of the Most High be averted, weep that your tears may wash out the blood +lust from your being!" + +And with one accord everybody in the room knelt down and prayed for the +assassin. When the orisons were hushed there was an instant of wild +terror and commotion. Driven beyond human limits of horror and pity, the +crowd tossed and surged. The judges of the Tribunal, silent, enervated, +reconquered themselves. + +With a gesture, brushing away his tears, the Prosecutor arrested the +proceedings. He said that the crimes were "clear and apparent," that the +proofs were manifest, that the court would now "in its conscience and +soul" chastise the culprit, and he demanded that the day of passing +judgment be fixed. The Tribunal designated the day after the next. + +And that day the Official of the church of Nantes, Jacques de +Pentcoetdic, read in succession the two sentences. The first, passed by +the Bishop and the Inquisitor for the acts coming under their common +jurisdiction, began thus: + +"The Holy Name of Christ invoked, we, Jean, Bishop of Nantes, and +Brother Jean Blouyn, bachelor in our Holy Scriptures, of the order of +the preaching friars of Nantes, and delegate of the Inquisitor of +heresies for the city and diocese of Nantes, in session of the Tribunal +and having before our eyes God alone--" + +And after enumerating the crimes it concluded: + +"We pronounce, decide, and declare, that thou, Gilles de Rais, cited +unto our Tribunal, art heinously guilty of heresy, apostasy, and +evocation of demons; that for these crimes thou hast incurred the +sentence of excommunication and all other penalties determined by the +law." + +The second judgment, rendered by the Bishop alone, on the crimes of +sodomy, sacrilege, and violation of the immunities of the Church, which +more particularly concerned his authority, ended in the same +conclusions and in the pronunciation, in almost identical form, of the +same penalty. + +Gilles listened with bowed head to the reading of these judgments. When +it was over the Bishop and the Inquisitor said to him, "Will you, now +that you detest your errors, your evocations, and your crimes, be +reincorporated into the Church our Mother?" + +And upon the ardent prayers of the Marshal they relieved him of all +excommunication and admitted him to participate in the sacraments. The +justice of God was satisfied, the crime was recognized, punished, but +effaced by contrition and penitence. Only human justice remained. + +The Bishop and the Inquisitor remanded the culprit to the secular court, +which, holding against him the abductions and the murders, pronounced +the penalty of death and attainder. Prelati and the other accomplices +were at the same time condemned to be hanged and burned alive. + +"Cry to God mercy," said Pierre de l'Hospital, who presided over the +civil hearings, "and dispose yourself to die in good state with a great +repentance for having committed such crimes." + +The recommendation was unnecessary. Gilles now faced death without fear. +He hoped, humbly, avidly, in the mercy of the Saviour. He cried out +fervently for the terrestrial expiation, the stake, to redeem him from +the eternal flames after his death. + +Far from his châteaux, in his dungeon, alone, he had opened himself and +viewed the cloaca which had so long been fed by the residual waters +escaped from the abattoirs of Tiffauges and Mâchecoul. He had sobbed in +despair of ever draining this stagnant pool. And thunder-smitten by +grace, in a cry of horror and joy, he had suddenly seen his soul +overflow and sweep away the dank fen before a torrential current of +prayer and ecstasy. The butcher of Sodom had destroyed himself, the +companion of Jeanne d'Arc had reappeared, the mystic whose soul poured +out to God, in bursts of adoration, in floods of tears. + +Then he thought of his friends and wished that they also might die in a +state of grace. He asked the Bishop of Nantes that they might be +executed not before nor after him, but at the same time. He carried his +point that he was the most guilty and that he must instruct them in +saving their souls and assist them at the moment when they should mount +the scaffold. Jean de Malestroit granted the supplication. + +"What is curious," said Durtal, interrupting his writing to light a +cigarette, "is that--" + +A gentle ring. Mme. Chantelouve entered. + +She declared that she could stay only two minutes. She had a carriage +waiting below. "Tonight," she said, "I will call for you at nine. First +write me a letter in practically these terms," and she handed him a +paper. He unfolded it and read this declaration: + + "I certify that all that I have said and written about the Black + Mass, about the priest who celebrated it, about the place where + I claimed to have witnessed it, about the persons alleged to + have been there, is pure invention. I affirm that I imagined all + these incidents, that, in consequence, all that I have narrated + is false." + +"Docre's?" he asked, studying the handwriting, minute, pointed, twisted, +aggressive. + +"Yes, and he wants this declaration, not dated, to be made in the form +of a letter from you to a person consulting you on the subject." + +"Your canon distrusts me." + +"Of course. You write books." + +"It doesn't please me infinitely to sign that," murmured Durtal. "What +if I refuse?" + +"You will not go to the Black Mass." + +His curiosity overcame his reluctance. He wrote and signed the letter +and Mme. Chantelouve put it in her card-case. + +"And in what street is the ceremony to take place?" + +"In the rue Olivier de Serres." + +"Where is that?" + +"Near the rue de Vaugirard, away up." + +"Is that where Docre lives?" + +"No, we are going to a private house which belongs to a lady he knows. +Now, if you'll be so good, put off your cross-examination to some other +time, because I am in an awful hurry. At nine o'clock. Don't forget. Be +all ready." + +He had hardly time to kiss her and she was gone. + +"Well," said he, "I already had data on incubacy and poisoning by +spells. There remained only the Black Mass, to make me thoroughly +acquainted with Satanism as it is practised in our day. And I am to see +it! I'll be damned if I thought there were such undercurrents in Paris. +And how circumstances hang together and lead to each other! I had to +occupy myself with Gilles de Rais and the diabolism of the Middle Ages +to get contemporary diabolism revealed to me." And he thought of Docre +again. "What a sharper that priest is! Among the occultists who maunder +today in the universal decomposition of ideas he is the only one who +interests me. + +"The others, the mages, the theosophists, the cabalists, the spiritists, +the hermetics, the Rosicrucians, remind me, when they are not mere +thieves, of children playing and scuffling in a cellar. And if one +descend lower yet, into the hole-in-the-wall places of the pythonesses, +clairvoyants, and mediums, what does one find except agencies of +prostitution and gambling? All these pretended peddlers of the future +are extremely nasty; that's the only thing in the occult of which one +can be sure." + +Des Hermies interrupted the course of these reflections by ringing and +walking in. He came to announce that Gévingey had returned and that they +were all to dine at Carhaix's the night after next. + +"Is Carhaix's bronchitis cured?" + +"Yes, completely." + +Preoccupied with the idea of the Black Mass, Durtal could not keep +silent. He let out the fact that he was to witness the ceremony--and, +confronted by Des Hermies's stare of stupefaction, he added that he had +promised secrecy and that he could not, for the present, tell him more. + +"You're the lucky one!" said Des Hermies. "Is it too much to ask you the +name of the abbé who is to officiate?" + +"Not at all. Canon Docre." + +"Ah!" and the other was silent. He was evidently trying to divine by +what manipulations his friend had been able to get in touch with the +renegade. + +"Some time ago you told me," Durtal said, "that in the Middle Ages the +Black Mass was said on the naked buttocks of a woman, that in the +seventeenth century it was celebrated on the abdomen, and now?" + +"I believe that it takes place before an altar as in church. Indeed it +was sometimes celebrated thus at the end of the fifteenth century in +Biscay. It is true that the Devil then officiated in person. Clothed in +rent and soiled episcopal habits, he gave communion with round pieces of +shoe leather for hosts, saying, 'This is my body.' And he gave these +disgusting wafers to the faithful to eat after they had kissed his left +hand and his breech. I hope that you will not be obliged to render such +base homage to your canon." + +Durtal laughed. "No, I don't think he requires a pretend like that. But +look here, aren't you of the decided opinion that the creatures who so +piously, infamously, follow these offices are a bit mad?" + +"Mad? Why? The cult of the Demon is no more insane than that of God. One +is rotten and the other resplendent, that is all. By your reckoning all +people who worship any god whatever would be demented. No. The +affiliates of Satanism are mystics of a vile order, but they are +mystics. Now, it is highly probable that their exaltations into the +extra-terrestrial of Evil coincide with the rages of their frenzied +senses, for lechery is the wet nurse of Demonism. Medicine classes, +rightly or wrongly, the hunger for ordure in the unknown categories of +neurosis, and well it may, for nobody knows anything about neuroses +except that everybody has them. It is quite certain that in this, more +than in any previous century, the nerves quiver at the least shock. For +instance, recall the newspaper accounts of executions of criminals. We +learn that the executioner goes about his work timidly, that he is on +the point of fainting, that he has nervous prostration when he +decapitates a man. Then compare this nervous wreck with the invincible +torturers of the olden time. They would thrust your arm into a sleeve of +moistened parchment which when set on fire would draw up and in a +leisurely fashion reduce your flesh to dust. Or they would drive wedges +into your thighs and split the bones. They would crush your thumbs in +the thumbscrew. Or they would singe all the hair off your epidermis with +a poker, or roll up the skin from your abdomen and leave you with a kind +of apron. They would drag you at the cart's tail, give you the +strappado, roast you, drench you with ignited alcohol, and through it +all preserve an impassive countenance and tranquil nerves not to be +shaken by any cry or plaint. Only, as these exercises were somewhat +fatiguing, the torturers, after the operation, were ravenously hungry +and required a deal of drink. They were sanguinaries of a mental +stability not to be shaken, while now! But to return to your companions +in sacrilege. This evening, if they are not maniacs, you will find +them--doubt it not--repulsive lechers. Observe them closely. I am sure +that to them the invocation of Beelzebub is a prelibation of carnality. +Don't be afraid, because, Lord! in this group there won't be any to make +you imitate the martyr of whom Jacques de Voragine speaks in his history +of Saint Paul the Eremite. You know that legend?" + +"No." + +"Well, to refresh your soul I will tell you. This martyr, who was very +young, was stretched out, his hands and feet bound, on a bed, then a +superb specimen of femininity was brought in, who tried to force him. As +he was burning and was about to sin, he bit off his tongue and spat it +in the face of the woman, "and thus pain drove out temptation," says the +good de Voragine." + +"My heroism would not carry me so far as that, I confess. But must you +go so soon?" + +"Yes, I have a pressing engagement." + +"What a queer age," said Durtal, conducting him to the door. "It is just +at the moment when positivism is at its zenith that mysticism rises +again and the follies of the occult begin." + +"Oh, but it's always been that way. The tail ends of all centuries are +alike. They're always periods of vacillation and uncertainty. When +materialism is rotten-ripe magic takes root. This phenomenon reappears +every hundred years. Not to go further back, look at the decline of the +last century. Alongside of the rationalists and atheists you find +Saint-Germain, Cagliostro, Saint-Martin, Gabalis, Cazotte, the +Rosicrucian societies, the infernal circles, as now. With that, good-bye +and good luck." + +"Yes," said Durtal, closing the door, "but Cagliostro and his ilk had a +certain audacity, and perhaps a little knowledge, while the mages of our +time--what inept fakes!" + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +In a fiacre they went up the rue de Vaugirard. Mme. Chantelouve was as +in a shell and spoke not a word. Durtal looked closely at her when, as +they passed a street lamp, a shaft of light played over her veil a +moment, then winked out. She seemed agitated and nervous beneath her +reserve. He took her hand. She did not withdraw it. He could feel the +chill of it through her glove, and her blonde hair tonight seemed +disordered, dry, and not so fine as usual. + +"Nearly there?" + +But in a low voice full of anguish she said, "Do not speak." + +Bored by this taciturn, almost hostile tête-à-tête, he began to examine +the route through the windows of the cab. The street stretched out +interminable, already deserted, so badly paved that at every step the +cab springs creaked. The lamp-posts were beginning to be further and +further apart. The cab was approaching the ramparts. + +"Singular itinerary," he murmured, troubled by the woman's cold, +inscrutable reserve. + +Abruptly the vehicle turned up a dark street, swung around, and stopped. + +Hyacinthe got out. Waiting for the cabman to give him his change, Durtal +inspected the lay of the land. They were in a sort of blind alley. Low +houses, in which there was not a sign of life, bordered a lane that had +no sidewalk. The pavement was like billows. Turning around, when the cab +drove away, he found himself confronted by a long high wall above which +dry leaves rustled in the shadows. A little door with a square grating +in it was cut into the thick unlighted wall, which was seamed with +fissures. Suddenly, further away, a ray of light shot out of a show +window, and, doubtless attracted by the sound of the cab wheels, a man +wearing the black apron of a wineshop keeper lounged through the shop +door and spat on the threshold. + +"This is the place," said Mme. Chantelouve. + +She rang. The grating opened. She raised her veil. A shaft of lantern +light struck her full in the face, the door opened noiselessly, and they +penetrated into a garden. + +"Good evening, madame." + +"Good evening, Marie. In the chapel?" + +"Yes. Does madame wish me to guide her?" + +"No, thanks." + +The woman with the lantern scrutinized Durtal. He perceived, beneath a +hood, wisps of grey hair falling in disorder over a wrinkled old face, +but she did not give him time to examine her and returned to a tent +beside the wall serving her as a lodge. + +He followed Hyacinthe, who traversed the dark lanes, between rows of +palms, to the entrance of a building. She opened the doors as if she +were quite at home, and her heels clicked resolutely on the flagstones. + +"Be careful," she said, going through a vestibule. "There are three +steps." + +They came out into a court and stopped before an old house. She rang. A +little man advanced, hiding his features, and greeted her in an +affected, sing-song voice. She passed, saluting him, and Durtal brushed +a fly-blown face, the eyes liquid, gummy, the cheeks plastered with +cosmetics, the lips painted. + +"I have stumbled into a lair of sodomists.--You didn't tell me that I +was to be thrown into such company," he said to Hyacinthe, overtaking +her at the turning of a corridor lighted by a lamp. + +"Did you expect to meet saints here?" + +She shrugged her shoulders and opened a door. They were in a chapel +with a low ceiling crossed by beams gaudily painted with coal-tar +pigment. The windows were hidden by great curtains. The walls were +cracked and dingy. Durtal recoiled after a few steps. Gusts of humid, +mouldy air and of that indescribable new-stove acridity poured out of +the registers to mingle with an irritating odour of alkali, resin, and +burnt herbs. He was choking, his temples throbbing. + +He advanced groping, attempting to accustom his eyes to the +half-darkness. The chapel was vaguely lighted by sanctuary lamps +suspended from chandeliers of gilded bronze with pink glass pendants. +Hyacinthe made him a sign to sit down, then she went over to a group of +people sitting on divans in a dark corner. Rather vexed at being left +here, away from the centre of activity, Durtal noticed that there were +many women and few men present, but his efforts to discover their +features were unavailing. As here and there a lamp swayed, he +occasionally caught sight of a Junonian brunette, then of a +smooth-shaven, melancholy man. He observed that the women were not +chattering to each other. Their conversation seemed awed and grave. Not +a laugh, not a raised voice, was heard, but an irresolute, furtive +whispering, unaccompanied by gesture. + +"Hmm," he said to himself. "It doesn't look as if Satan made his +faithful happy." + +A choir boy, clad in red, advanced to the end of the chapel and lighted +a stand of candles. Then the altar became visible. It was an ordinary +church altar on a tabernacle above which stood an infamous, derisive +Christ. The head had been raised and the neck lengthened, and wrinkles, +painted in the cheeks, transformed the grieving face to a bestial one +twisted into a mean laugh. He was naked, and where the loincloth should +have been, there was a virile member projecting from a bush of +horsehair. In front of the tabernacle the chalice, covered with a pall, +was placed. The choir boy folded the altar cloth, wiggled his haunches, +stood tiptoe on one foot and flipped his arms as if to fly away like a +cherub, on pretext of reaching up to light the black tapers whose odour +of coal tar and pitch was now added to the pestilential smell of the +stuffy room. + +Durtal recognized beneath the red robe the "fairy" who had guarded the +chapel entrance, and he understood the rôle reserved for this man, whose +sacrilegious nastiness was substituted for the purity of childhood +acceptable to the Church. + +Then another choir boy, more hideous yet, exhibited himself. Hollow +chested, racked by coughs, withered, made up with white grease paint and +vivid carmine, he hobbled about humming. He approached the tripods +flanking the altar, stirred the smouldering incense pots and threw in +leaves and chunks of resin. + +Durtal was beginning to feel uncomfortable when Hyacinthe rejoined him. +She excused herself for having left him by himself so long, invited him +to change his place, and conducted him to a seat far in the rear, behind +all the rows of chairs. + +"This is a real chapel, isn't it?" he asked. + +"Yes. This house, this church, the garden that we crossed, are the +remains of an old Ursuline convent. For a long time this chapel was used +to store hay. The house belonged to a livery-stable keeper, who sold it +to that woman," and she pointed out a stout brunette of whom Durtal +before had caught a fleeting glimpse. + +"Is she married?" + +"No. She is a former nun who was debauched long ago by Docre." + +"Ah. And those gentlemen who seem to be hiding in the darkest places?" + +"They are Satanists. There is one of them who was a professor in the +School of Medicine. In his home he has an oratorium where he prays to a +statue of Venus Astarte mounted on an altar." + +"No!" + +"I mean it. He is getting old, and his demoniac orisons increase tenfold +his forces, which he is using up with creatures of that sort," and with +a gesture she indicated the choir boys. + +"You guarantee the truth of this story?" + +"You will find it narrated at great length in a religious journal. _Les +annales de la sainteté_. And though his identity was made pretty patent +in the article, the man did not dare prosecute the editors.--What's the +matter with you?" she asked, looking at him closely. + +"I'm strangling. The odour from those incense burners is unbearable." + +"You will get used to it in a few seconds." + +"But what do they burn that smells like that?" + +"Asphalt from the street, leaves of henbane, datura, dried nightshade, +and myrrh. These are perfumes delightful to Satan, our master." She +spoke in that changed, guttural voice which had been hers at times when +in bed with him. He looked her squarely in the face. She was pale, the +lips pressed tight, the pluvious eyes blinking rapidly. + +"Here he comes!" she murmured suddenly, while women in front of them +scurried about or knelt in front of the chairs. + +Preceded by the two choir boys the canon entered, wearing a scarlet +bonnet from which two buffalo horns of red cloth protruded. Durtal +examined him as he marched toward the altar. He was tall, but not well +built, his bulging chest being out of proportion to the rest of his +body. His peeled forehead made one continuous line with his straight +nose. The lips and cheeks bristled with that kind of hard, clumpy beard +which old priests have who have always shaved themselves. The features +were round and insinuating, the eyes, like apple pips, close together, +phosphorescent. As a whole his face was evil and sly, but energetic, and +the hard, fixed eyes were not the furtive, shifty orbs that Durtal had +imagined. + +The canon solemnly knelt before the altar, then mounted the steps and +began to say mass. Durtal saw then that he had nothing on beneath his +sacrificial habit. His black socks and his flesh bulging over the +garters, attached high up on his legs, were plainly visible. The +chasuble had the shape of an ordinary chasuble but was of the dark red +colour of dried blood, and in the middle, in a triangle around which was +an embroidered border of colchicum, savin, sorrel, and spurge, was the +figure of a black billy-goat presenting his horns. + +Docre made the genuflexions, the full-or half-length inclinations +specified by the ritual. The kneeling choir boys sang the Latin +responses in a crystalline voice which trilled on the ultimate syllables +of the words. + +"But it's a simple low mass," said Durtal to Mme. Chantelouve. + +She shook her head. Indeed, at that moment the choir boys passed behind +the altar and one of them brought back copper chafing-dishes, the other, +censers, which they distributed to the congregation. All the women +enveloped themselves in the smoke. Some held their heads right over the +chafing-dishes and inhaled deeply, then, fainting, unlaced themselves, +heaving raucous sighs. + +The sacrifice ceased. The priest descended the steps backward, knelt on +the last one, and in a sharp, tripidant voice cried: + +"Master of Slanders, Dispenser of the benefits of crime, Administrator +of sumptuous sins and great vices, Satan, thee we adore, reasonable God, +just God! + +"Superadmirable legate of false trances, thou receivest our beseeching +tears; thou savest the honour of families by aborting wombs impregnated +in the forgetfulness of the good orgasm; thou dost suggest to the mother +the hastening of untimely birth, and thine obstetrics spares the +still-born children the anguish of maturity, the contamination of +original sin. + +"Mainstay of the despairing Poor, Cordial of the Vanquished, it is thou +who endowest them with hypocrisy, ingratitude, and stiff-neckedness, +that they may defend themselves against the children of God, the Rich. + +"Suzerain of Resentment, Accountant of Humiliations, Treasurer of old +Hatreds, thou alone dost fertilize the brain of man whom injustice has +crushed; thou breathest into him the idea of meditated vengeance, sure +misdeeds; thou incitest him to murder; thou givest him the abundant joy +of accomplished reprisals and permittest him to taste the intoxicating +draught of the tears of which he is the cause. + +"Hope of Virility, Anguish of the Empty Womb, thou dost not demand the +bootless offering of chaste loins, thou dost not sing the praises of +Lenten follies; thou alone receivest the carnal supplications and +petitions of poor and avaricious families. Thou determinest the mother +to sell her daughter, to give her son; thou aidest sterile and reprobate +loves; Guardian of strident Neuroses, Leaden Tower of Hysteria, bloody +Vase of Rape! + +"Master, thy faithful servants, on their knees, implore thee and +supplicate thee to satisfy them when they wish the torture of all those +who love them and aid them; they supplicate thee to assure them the joy +of delectable misdeeds unknown to justice, spells whose unknown origin +baffles the reason of man; they ask, finally, glory, riches, power, of +thee, King of the Disinherited, Son who art to overthrow the inexorable +Father!" + +Then Docre rose, and erect, with arms outstretched, vociferated in a +ringing voice of hate: + +"And thou, thou whom, in my quality of priest, I force, whether thou +wilt or no, to descend into this host, to incarnate thyself in this +bread, Jesus, Artisan of Hoaxes, Bandit of Homage, Robber of Affection, +hear! Since the day when thou didst issue from the complaisant bowels of +a Virgin, thou hast failed all thine engagements, belied all thy +promises. Centuries have wept, awaiting thee, fugitive God, mute God! +Thou wast to redeem man and thou hast not, thou wast to appear in thy +glory, and thou sleepest. Go, lie, say to the wretch who appeals to +thee, 'Hope, be patient, suffer; the hospital of souls will receive +thee; the angels will assist thee; Heaven opens to thee.' Impostor! thou +knowest well that the angels, disgusted at thine inertness, abandon +thee! Thou wast to be the Interpreter of our plaints, the Chamberlain of +our tears; thou wast to convey them to the Father and thou hast not done +so, for this intercession would disturb thine eternal sleep of happy +satiety. + +"Thou hast forgotten the poverty thou didst preach, enamoured vassal of +Banks! Thou hast seen the weak crushed beneath the press of profit; thou +hast heard the death rattle of the timid, paralyzed by famine, of women +disembowelled for a bit of bread, and thou hast caused the Chancery of +thy Simoniacs, thy commercial representatives, thy Popes, to answer by +dilatory excuses and evasive promises, sacristy Shyster, huckster God! + +"Master, whose inconceivable ferocity engenders life and inflicts it on +the innocent whom thou darest damn--in the name of what original +sin?--whom thou darest punish--by the virtue of what covenants?--we +would have thee confess thine impudent cheats, thine inexpiable crimes! +We would drive deeper the nails into thy hands, press down the crown of +thorns upon thy brow, bring blood and water from the dry wounds of thy +sides. + +"And that we can and will do by violating the quietude of thy body, +Profaner of ample vices, Abstractor of stupid purities, cursed Nazarene, +do-nothing King, coward God!" "Amen!" trilled the soprano voices of the +choir boys. + +Durtal listened in amazement to this torrent of blasphemies and insults. +The foulness of the priest stupefied him. A silence succeeded the +litany. The chapel was foggy with the smoke of the censers. The women, +hitherto taciturn, flustered now, as, remounting the altar, the canon +turned toward them and blessed them with his left hand in a sweeping +gesture. And suddenly the choir boys tinkled the prayer bells. + +It was a signal. The women fell to the carpet and writhed. One of them +seemed to be worked by a spring. She threw herself prone and waved her +legs in the air. Another, suddenly struck by a hideous strabism, +clucked, then becoming tongue-tied stood with her mouth open, the tongue +turned back, the tip cleaving to the palate. Another, inflated, livid, +her pupils dilated, lolled her head back over her shoulders, then jerked +it brusquely erect and belaboured herself, tearing her breast with her +nails. Another, sprawling on her back, undid her skirts, drew forth a +rag, enormous, meteorized; then her face twisted into a horrible +grimace, and her tongue, which she could not control, stuck out, bitten +at the edges, harrowed by red teeth, from a bloody mouth. + +Suddenly Durtal rose, and now he heard and saw Docre distinctly. + +Docre contemplated the Christ surmounting the tabernacle, and with arms +spread wide apart he spewed forth frightful insults, and, at the end of +his forces, muttered the billingsgate of a drunken cabman. One of the +choir boys knelt before him with his back toward the altar. A shudder +ran around the priest's spine. In a solemn but jerky voice he said, +"_Hoc est enim corpus meum_," then, instead of kneeling, after the +consecration, before the precious Body, he faced the congregation, and +appeared tumefied, haggard, dripping with sweat. He staggered between +the two choir boys, who, raising the chasuble, displayed his naked +belly. Docre made a few passes and the host sailed, tainted and soiled, +over the steps. + +Durtal felt himself shudder. A whirlwind of hysteria shook the room. +While the choir boys sprinkled holy water on the pontiff's nakedness, +women rushed upon the Eucharist and, grovelling in front of the altar, +clawed from the bread humid particles and drank and ate divine ordure. + +Another woman, curled up over a crucifix, emitted a rending laugh, then +cried to Docre, "Father, father!" A crone tore her hair, leapt, whirled +around and around as on a pivot and fell over beside a young girl who, +huddled to the wall, was writhing in convulsions, frothing at the mouth, +weeping, and spitting out frightful blasphemies. And Durtal, terrified, +saw through the fog the red horns of Docre, who, seated now, frothing +with rage, was chewing up sacramental wafers, taking them out of his +mouth, wiping himself with them, and distributing them to the women, who +ground them underfoot, howling, or fell over each other struggling to +get hold of them and violate them. + +The place was simply a madhouse, a monstrous pandemonium of prostitutes +and maniacs. Now, while the choir boys gave themselves to the men, and +while the woman who owned the chapel, mounted the altar caught hold of +the phallus of the Christ with one hand and with the other held a +chalice between "His" naked legs, a little girl, who hitherto had not +budged, suddenly bent over forward and howled, howled like a dog. +Overcome with disgust, nearly asphyxiated, Durtal wanted to flee. He +looked for Hyacinthe. She was no longer at his side. He finally caught +sight of her close to the canon and, stepping over the writhing bodies +on the floor, he went to her. With quivering nostrils she was inhaling +the effluvia of the perfumes and of the couples. + +"The sabbatic odour!" she said to him between clenched teeth, in a +strangled voice. + +"Here, let's get out of this!" + +She seemed to wake, hesitated a moment, then without answering she +followed him. He elbowed his way through the crowd, jostling women whose +protruding teeth were ready to bite. He pushed Mme. Chantelouve to the +door, crossed the court, traversed the vestibule, and, finding the +portress' lodge empty, he drew the cord and found himself in the street. + +There he stopped and drew the fresh air deep into his lungs. Hyacinthe, +motionless, dizzy, huddled to the wall away from him. + +He looked at her. "Confess that you would like to go in there again." + +"No," she said with an effort. "These scenes shatter me. I am in a daze. +I must have a glass of water." + +And she went up the street, leaning on him, straight to the wine shop, +which was open. It was an ignoble lair, a little room with tables and +wooden benches, a zinc counter, cheap bar fixtures, and blue-stained +wooden pitchers; in the ceiling a U-shaped gas bracket. Two +pick-and-shovel labourers were playing cards. They turned around and +laughed. The proprietor took the excessively short-stemmed pipe from his +mouth and spat into the sawdust. He seemed not at all surprised to see +this fashionably gowned woman in his dive. Durtal, who was watching him, +thought he surprised an understanding look exchanged by the proprietor +and the woman. + +The proprietor lighted a candle and mumbled into Durtal's ear, +"Monsieur, you can't drink here with these people watching. I'll take +you to a room where you can be alone." + +"Hmmm," said Durtal to Hyacinthe, who was penetrating the mysteries of a +spiral staircase, "A lot of fuss for a glass of water!" + +But she had already entered a musty room. The paper was peeling from the +walls, which were nearly covered with pictures torn out of illustrated +weeklies and tacked up with hairpins. The floor was all in pieces. There +were a wooden bed without any curtains, a chamber pot with a piece +broken out of the side, a wash bowl and two chairs. + +The man brought a decanter of gin, a large one of water, some sugar, and +glasses, then went downstairs. + +Her eyes were sombre, mad. She enlaced Durtal. + +"No!" he shouted, furious at having fallen into this trap. "I've had +enough of that. It's late. Your husband is waiting for you. It's time +for you to go back to him--" + +She did not even hear him. + +"I want you," she said, and she took him treacherously and obliged him +to desire her. She disrobed, threw her skirts on the floor, opened wide +the abominable couch, and raising her chemise in the back she rubbed +her spine up and down over the coarse grain of the sheets. A look of +swooning ecstasy was in her eyes and a smile of joy on her lips. + +She seized him, and, with ghoulish fury, dragged him into obscenities of +whose existence he had never dreamed. Suddenly, when he was able to +escape, he shuddered, for he perceived that the bed was strewn with +fragments of hosts. + +"Oh, you fill me with horror! Dress, and let's get out of here." + +While, with a faraway look in her eyes, she was silently putting on +her clothes, he sat down on a chair. The fetidness of the room +nauseated him. Then, too--he was not absolutely convinced of +Transubstantiation--he did not believe very firmly that the Saviour +resided in that soiled bread--but--In spite of himself, the sacrilege he +had involuntarily participated in saddened him. + +"Suppose it were true," he said to himself, "that the Presence were +real, as Hyacinthe and that miserable priest attest--No, decidedly, I +have had enough. I am through. The occasion is timely for me to break +with this creature whom from our very first interview I have only +tolerated, and I'm going to seize the opportunity." + +Below, in the dive, he had to face the knowing smiles of the labourers. +He paid, and without waiting for his change, he fled. They reached the +rue de Vaugirard and he hailed a cab. + +As they were whirled along they sat lost in their thoughts, not looking +at each other. + +"Soon?" asked Mme. Chantelouve, in an almost timid tone when he left her +at her door. + +"No," he answered. "We have nothing in common. You wish everything and I +wish nothing. Better break. We might drag out our relation, but it would +finally terminate in recrimination and bitterness. Oh, and then--after +what happened this evening, no! Understand me? No!" + +And he gave the cabman his address and huddled himself into the furthest +corner of the fiacre. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +"He doesn't lead a humdrum life, that canon!" said Des Hermies, when +Durtal had related to him the details of the Black Mass. "It's a +veritable seraglio of hystero-epileptics and erotomaniacs that he has +formed for himself. But his vices lack warmth. Certainly, in the matter +of contumelious blasphemies, of sacrilegious atrocities, and sensual +excitation, this priest may seem to have exceeded the limits, to be +almost unique. But the bloody and investuous side of the old sabbats is +wanting. Docre is, we must admit, greatly inferior to Gilles de Rais. +His works are incomplete, insipid; weak, if I may say so." + +"I like that. You know it isn't easy to procure children whom one may +disembowel with impunity. The parents would raise a row and the police +would interfere." + +"Yes, and it is to difficulties of this sort that we must evidently +attribute the bloodless celebration of the Black Mass. But I am thinking +just now of the women you described, the ones that put their heads over +the chafing-dishes to drink in the smoke of the burning resin. They +employ the procedure of the Aissaouas, who hold their heads over the +braseros whenever the catalepsy necessary to their orgies is slow in +coming. As for the other phenomena you cite, they are known in the +hospitals, and except as symptoms of the demoniac effluence they teach +us nothing new. Now another thing. Not a word of this to Carhaix, +because he would be quite capable of closing his door in your face if he +knew you had been present at an office in honour of Satan." + +They went downstairs from Durtal's apartment and walked along toward the +tower of Saint Sulpice. + +"I didn't bring anything to eat, because you said you would look after +that," said Durtal, "but this morning I sent Mme. Carhaix--in lieu of +desserts and wine--some real Dutch gingerbread, and a couple of rather +surprising liqueurs, an elixir of life which we shall take, by way of +appetizer, before the repast, and a flask of crême de céléri. I have +discovered an honest distiller." + +"Impossible!" + +"You shall see. This elixir of life is manufactured from Socotra aloes, +little cardamom, saffron, myrrh, and a heap of other aromatics. It's +inhumanly bitter, but it's exquisite." + +"I am anxious to taste it. The least we can do is fête Gévingey a little +on his deliverance." + +"Have you seen him?" + +"Yes. He's looking fine. We'll make him tell us about his cure." + +"I keep wondering what he lives on." + +"On what his astrological skill brings him." + +"Then there are rich people who have their horoscopes cast?" + +"We must hope so. To tell you the truth, I think Gévingey is not in very +easy circumstances. Under the Empire he was astrologer to the Empress, +who was very superstitious and had faith--as did Napoleon, for that +matter--in predictions and fortune telling, but since the fall of the +Empire I think Gévingey's situation has changed a good deal for the +worse. Nevertheless he passes for being the only man in France who has +preserved the secrets of Cornelius Agrippa, Cremona, Ruggieri, Gauric, +Sinibald the Swordsman, and Tritemius." + +While discoursing they had climbed the stair and arrived at the +bell-ringer's door. + +The astrologer was already there and the table was set. All grimaced a +bit as they tasted the black and active liqueur which Durtal poured. + +Joyous to have all her family about her, Mama Carhaix brought the rich +soup. She filled the plates. + +When a dish of vegetables was passed and Durtal chose a leek, Des +Hermies said, laughing, "Look out! Porta, a thaumaturge of the late +sixteenth century, informs us that this plant, long considered an emblem +of virility, perturbs the quietude of the most chaste." + +"Don't listen to him," said the bell-ringer's wife. "And you, Monsieur +Gévingey, some carrots?" + +Durtal looked at the astrologer. His head still looked like a +sugar-loaf, his hair was the same faded, dirty brown of hydroquinine or +ipecac powders, his bird eyes had the same startled look, his enormous +hands were covered with the same phalanx of rings, he had the same +obsequious and imposing manner, and sacerdotal tone, but he was +freshened up considerably, the wrinkles had gone out of his skin, and +his eyes were brighter, since his visit to Lyons. + +Durtal congratulated him on the happy result of the treatment. + +"It was high time, monsieur, I was putting myself under the care of Dr. +Johannès, for I was nearly gone. Not possessing a shred of the gift of +voyance and knowing no extralucid cataleptic who could inform me of the +clandestine preparations of Canon Docre, I could not possibly defend +myself by using the laws of countersign and of the shock in return." + +"But," said Des Hermies, "admitting that you could, through the +intermediation of a flying spirit, have been aware of the operations of +the priest, how could you have parried them?" + +"The law of countersigns consists, when you know in advance the day and +hour of the attack, in going away from home, thus throwing the spell off +the track and neutralizing it, or in saying an hour beforehand, 'Here I +am. Strike!' The last method is calculated to scatter the fluids to the +wind and paralyze the powers of the assailant. In magic, any act known +and made public is lost. As for the shock in return, one must also know +beforehand of the attempt if one is to cast back the spells on the +person sending them before one is struck by them. + +"I was certain to perish. A day had passed since I was bewitched. Two +days more and I should have been ready for the cemetery." + +"How's that?" + +"Every individual struck by magic has three days in which to take +measures. That time past, the ill is incurable. So when Docre announced +to me that he condemned me to death by his own authority and when, two +hours later, on returning home, I felt desperately ill, I lost no time +packing my grip and starting for Lyons." + +"And there?" asked Durtal. + +"There I saw Dr. Johannès. I told him of Docre's threat and of my +illness. He said to me simply. 'That priest can dress the most virulent +poisons in the most frightful sacrileges. The fight will be bitter, but +I shall conquer,' and he immediately called in a woman who lives in his +house, a voyant. + +"He hypnotized her and she, at his injunction, explained the nature of +the sorcery of which I was the victim. She reconstructed the scene. She +literally saw me being poisoned by food and drink mixed with menstrual +fluid that had been reinforced with macerated sacramental wafers and +drugs skilfully dosed. That sort of spell is so terrible that aside from +Dr. Johannès no thaumaturge in France dare try to cure it. + +"So the doctor finally said to me, 'Your cure can be obtained only +through an invincible power. We must lose no time. We must at once +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek.' + +"He raised an altar, composed of a table and a wooden tabernacle. It was +shaped like a little house surmounted by a cross and encircled, under +the pediment, by the dial-like figure of the tetragram. He brought the +silver chalice, the unleavened bread and the wine. He donned his +sacerdotal habits, put on his finger the ring which has received the +supreme benedictions, then he began to read from a special missal the +prayers of the sacrifice. + +"Almost at once the voyant cried, 'Here are the spirits evoked for the +spell. These are they which have carried the venefice, obedient to the +command of the master of black magic, Canon Docre!' + +"I was sitting beside the altar. Dr. Johannès placed his left hand on my +head and raising toward heaven his right he besought the Archangel +Michael to assist him, and adjured the glorious legions of the +invincible seraphim to dominate, to enchain, the spirits of Evil. + +"I was already feeling greatly relieved. The sensation of internal +gnawing which tortured me in Paris was diminishing. Dr. Johannès +continued to recite his orisons, then when the moment came for the +deprecatory prayer, he took my hand, laid it on the altar, and three +times chanted: + +"'May the projects and the designs of the worker of iniquity, who has +made enchantment against you, be brought to naught; may any influence +obtained by Satanic means, any attack directed against you, be null and +void of effect; may all the maledictions of your enemy be transformed +into benedictions from the highest summits of the eternal hills; may his +fluids of death be transmuted into ferments of life; finally, may the +Archangels of Judgment and Chastisement decide the fate of the miserable +priest who has put his trust in the works of Darkness and Evil.' + +"'You,' he said to me, 'are delivered. Heaven has cured you. May your +heart therefore repay the living God and Jesus Christ, through the +glorious Mary, with the most ardent devotion.' + +"He offered me unleavened bread and wine. I was saved. You who are a +physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, can bear witness that human science was +impotent to aid me--and now look at me!" + +"Yes," Des Hermies replied, "without discussing the means, I certify the +cure, and, I admit, it is not the first time that to my knowledge +similar results have been obtained.--No thanks," to Mme. Carhaix, who +was inviting him to take another helping from a plate of sausages with +horseradish in creamed peas. "But," said Durtal, "permit me to ask you +several questions. Certain details interest me. What were the sacerdotal +ornaments of Dr. Johannès?" + +"His costume was a long robe of vermilion cashmere caught up at the +waist by a red and white sash. Above this robe he had a white mantle of +the same stuff, cut, over the chest, in the form of a cross upside +down." + +"Cross upside down?" + +"Yes, this cross, reversed like the figure of the Hanged Man in the +old-fashioned Tarot card deck, signifies that the priest Melchisedek +must die in the Old Man--that is, man affected by original sin--and live +again the Christ, to be powerful with the power of the Incarnate Word +which died for us." + +Carhaix seemed ill at ease. His fanatical and suspicious Catholicism +refused to countenance any save the prescribed ceremonies. He made no +further contribution to the conversation, and in significant silence +filled the glasses, seasoned the salad, and passed the plates. + +"What sort of a ring was that you spoke of?" + +"It is a symbolic ring of pure gold. It has the image of a serpent, +whose head, in relief, set with a ruby, is connected by a fine chain +with a tiny circlet which fastens the jaws of the reptile." + +"What I should like awfully to know is the origin and the aim of this +sacrifice. What has Melchisedek to do with your affair?" + +"Ah," said the astrologer, "Melchisedek is one of the most mysterious of +all the figures in the Holy Bible. He was king of Salem, sacrificer to +the Most High God. He blessed Abraham and Abraham gave him tithes of the +spoil of the vanquished kings of Sodom and Gomorrah. That is the story +in Genesis 14:18-20. But Saint Paul cites him also, in Hebrews 7, and in +the third verse of that chapter says that Melchisedek, 'without father, +without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of day, nor +end of life, but made like unto the Son of God, abideth, a priest +continually.' In Hebrews 5:6 Paul, quoting Psalm 110:4, says Jesus is +called 'a priest forever after the order of Melchisedek.' + +"All this, you see, is obscure enough. Some exegetes recognize in him +the prophetic figure of the Saviour, others, that of Saint Joseph, and +all admit that the sacrifice of Melchisedek offering to Abraham the +blood and wine of which he had first made oblation to the Lord +prefigures, to follow the expression of Isidore of Damietta, the +archetype of the divine mysteries, otherwise known as the holy mass." + +"Very well," said Des Hermies, "but all that Scripture does not explain +the alexipharmacal virtues which Dr. Johannès attributes to the +sacrifice." + +"You are asking more than I can answer. Only Dr. Johannès could tell +you. This much I can say. Theology teaches us that the mass, as it is +celebrated, is the re-enaction of the Sacrifice of Calvary, but the +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek is not that. It is, in some sort, +the future mass, the glorious office which will be known during the +earthly reign of the divine Paraclete. This sacrifice is offered to God +by man regenerated, redeemed by the infusion of the Love of the Holy +Ghost. Now, the hominal being whose heart has thus been purified and +sanctified is invincible, and the enchantments of hell cannot prevail +against him if he makes use of this sacrifice to dissipate the Spirits +of Evil. That explains to you the potency of Dr. Johannès, whose heart +unites, in this ceremony, with the divine heart of Jesus." + +"Your exposition is not very clear," Carhaix mildly objected. + +"Then it must be supposed that Johannès is a man amended ahead of time, +an apostle animated by the Holy Ghost?" + +"And so he is," said the astrologer, firmly assured. + +"Will you please pass the gingerbread?" Carhaix requested. + +"Here's the way to fix it," said Durtal. "First cut a slice very thin, +then take a slice of ordinary bread, equally thin, butter them and put +them together. Now tell me if this sandwich hasn't the exquisite taste +of fresh walnuts." + +"Well," said Des Hermies, pursuing his cross-examination, "aside from +that, what has Dr. Johannès been doing in this long time since I last +saw him?" + +"He leads what ought to be a peaceful life. He lives with friends who +revere and adore him. With them he rests from the tribulations of all +sorts--save one--that he has been subjected to. He would be perfectly +happy if he did not have to repulse the attacks launched at him almost +daily by the tonsured magicians of Rome." + +"Why do they attack him?" + +"A thorough explanation would take a long time. Johannès is commissioned +by Heaven to break up the venomous practises of Satanism and to preach +the coming of the glorified Christ and the divine Paraclete. Now the +diabolical Curia which holds the Vatican in its clutches has every +reason of self-interest for putting out of the way a man whose prayers +fetter their conjurements and neutralize their spells." + +"Ah!" exclaimed Durtal, "and would it be too much to ask you how this +former priest foresees and checks these astonishing assaults?" + +"No indeed. The doctor can tell by the flight and cry of certain birds. +Falcons and male sparrow-hawks are his sentinels. If they fly toward him +or away from him, to East or West, whether they emit a single cry or +many; these are omens, letting him know the hour of the combat so that +he can be on guard. Thus he told me one day, the sparrow-hawks are +easily influenced by the spirits, and he uses them as the hypnotist +makes use of somnambulism, as the spiritist makes use of tables and +slates." + +"They are the telegraph wires for magic despatches." + +"Yes. And of course you know that the method is not new. Indeed, its +origin is lost in the darkness of the ages. Ornithomancy is world-old. +One finds traces of it in the Holy Bible, and the Zohar asserts that one +may receive numerous notifications if one knows how to observe the +flight and distinguish the cries of birds." + +"But," said Durtal, "why is the sparrow-hawk chosen in preference to +other birds?" + +"Well, it has always been, since remotest antiquity, the harbinger of +charms. In Egypt the god with the head of a hawk was the one who +possessed the science of the hieroglyphics. Formerly in that country the +hierogrammatists swallowed the heart and blood of the hawk to prepare +themselves for the magic rites. Even today African chiefs put a hawk +feather in their hair, and this bird is sacred in India." + +"How does your friend go about it," asked Mme. Carhaix, "raising and +housing birds of prey?--because that is what they are." + +"He does not raise them nor house them. They nest in the high bluffs +along the Saône, near Lyons. They come and see him in time of need." + +Durtal, looking around this cozy dining-room and recalling the +extraordinary conversations which had been held here, was thinking, "How +far we are from the language and the ideas of modern times.--All that +takes us back to the Middle Ages," he said, finishing his thought aloud. + +"Happily!" exclaimed Carhaix, who was rising to go and ring his bells. + +"Yes," said Des Hermies, "and what is mighty strange in this day of +crass materialism is the idea of battles fought in space, over the +cities, between a priest of Lyons and prelates of Rome." + +"And between this priest and the Rosicrusians and Canon Docre." + +Durtal remembered that Mme. Chantelouve had assured him that the chiefs +of the Rosicrucians were making frantic efforts to establish connections +with the devil and prepare spells. + +"You think that the Rosicrucians are satanizing?" + +"They would like to, but they don't know how. They are limited to +reproducing, mechanically, the few fluidic and veniniferous operations +revealed to them by the three brahmins who visited Paris a few years +ago." + +"I am thankful, myself," said Mme. Carhaix, as she took leave of the +company, "that I am not mixed up in any of this frightful business, and +that I can pray and live in peace." + +Then while Des Hermies, as usual, prepared the coffee and Durtal brought +the liqueur glasses, Gévingey filled his pipe, and when the sound of the +bells died away--dispersed and as if absorbed by the pores of the +wall--he blew out a great cloud of smoke and said, "I passed some +delightful days with the family with whom Dr. Johannès is living. After +the shocks which I had received, it was a privilege without equal to +complete my convalescence in that sweet atmosphere of Christian Love. +And, too, Johannès is of all men I have ever met the most learned in the +occult sciences. No one, except his antithesis, the abominable Docre, +has penetrated so far into the arcana of Satanism. One may even say that +in France these two are the only ones who have crossed the terrestrial +threshold and obtained, each in his field, sure results. But in addition +to the charm of his conversation and the scope of his knowledge--for +even on the subject in which I excel, that of astrology, he surprised +me--Johannès delighted me with the beauty of his vision of the future +transformation of peoples. He is really, I swear, the prophet whose +earthly mission of suffering and glory has been authorized by the Most +High." + +"I don't doubt it," said Durtal, smiling, "but his theory of the +Paraclete is, if I am not mistaken, the very ancient heresy of Montanus +which the Church has formally condemned." + +"All depends on the manner in which the coming of the Paraclete is +conceived," interjected the bell-ringer, returning at that moment. "It +is also the orthodox doctrine of Saint Irenæus, Saint Justin, Scotus +Erigena, Amaury of Chartres, Saint Doucine, and that admirable mystic, +Joachim of Floris. This was the belief throughout the Middle Ages, and I +admit that it obsesses me and fills me with joy, that it responds to the +most ardent of my yearnings. Indeed," he said, sitting down and crossing +his legs, "if the third kingdom is an illusion, what consolation is left +for Christians in face of the general disintegration of a world which +charity requires us not to hate?" + +"I am furthermore obliged to admit," said Des Hermies, "that in spite of +the blood shed on Golgotha, I personally feel as if my ransom had not +been quite effected." + +"There are three kingdoms," the astrologer resumed, pressing down the +ashes of his pipe with his finger. "Of the Old Testament, that of the +Father, the kingdom of fear. Of the New Testament, that of the Son, the +kingdom of expiation. Of the Johannite Gospel, that of the Holy Ghost, +the kingdom of redemption and love. They are the past, present and +future; winter, spring and summer. The first, says Joachim of Floris, +gives us the blade, the second, the leaf, and the third, the ear. Two of +the Persons of the Trinity have shown themselves. Logically the Third +must appear." + +"Yes, and the Biblical texts abound, conclusive, explicit, irrefutable," +said Carhaix. "All the prophets, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Zachariah, +Malachi, speak of it.' The Acts of the Apostles is very precise on this +point. In the first chapter you will read these lines, 'This same Jesus, +which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as +ye have seen him go into heaven.' Saint John also announces the tidings +in the Apocalypse, which is the gospel of the second coming of Christ, +'Christ shall come and reign a thousand years.' Saint Paul is +inexhaustible in revelations of this nature. In the epistle to Timothy +he invokes the Lord 'who shall judge the quick and the dead at his +appearance and his kingdom.' In the second epistle to the Thessalonians +he writes, 'And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall +consume with the Spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the +brightness of his coming.' Now, he declares that the Antichrist is not +yet, so the coming which he prophesies is not that already realized by +the birth of the Saviour at Bethlehem. In the Gospel according to Saint +Matthew, Jesus responds to Caiaphas, who asks Him if He is the Christ, +Son of God, 'Thou hast said, and nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter +shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power and +coming in the clouds of heaven.' And in another verse He says to His +apostles, 'Watch, therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth +come.' + +"And there are other texts I could put my finger on. No, there is no use +in talking, the partisans of the glorious kingdom are supported with +certitude by inspired passages, and can, under certain conditions and +without fear of heresy, uphold this doctrine, which, Saint Jerome +attests, was in the fourth century a dogma of faith recognized by all. +But what say we taste a bit of this crême de céléri which Monsieur +Durtal praises so highly?" + +It was a thick liqueur, sirupy like anisette, but even sweeter and more +feminine, only, when one had swallowed this inert semi-liquid, there +lingered in the roots of the papillæ a faint taste of celery. + +"It isn't bad," said the astrologer, "but there's no life to it," and he +poured into his glass a stiff tot of rum. + +"Come to think of it," said Durtal, "the third kingdom is also announced +in the words of the Paternoster, 'Thy kingdom come.'" + +"Certainly," said the bell-ringer. + +"But you see," interjected Gévingey, "heresy would gain the upper hand +and the whole belief would be turned into nonsense and absurdity if we +admitted, as certain Paracletists do, an authentic fleshly incarnation. +For instance, remember Fareinism, which has been rife, since the +eighteenth century, in Fareins, a village of the Doubs, where Jansenism +took refuge when driven out of Paris after the closing of the cemetery +of Saint Médard. There a priest, François Bonjour, reproduced the +'convulsionist' orgies which, under the Regency, desecrated the tomb of +Deacon Paris. Then Bonjour had an affair with a woman and she claimed to +be big with the prophet Elijah, who, according to the Apocalypse, is to +precede the last arrival of Christ. This child came into the world, then +there was a second who was none other than the Paraclete. The latter did +business as a woolen merchant in Paris, was a colonel in the National +Guard under Louis-Philippe, and died in easy circumstances in 1866. A +tradesman Paraclete, a Redeemer with epaulettes and gold braid! + +"In 1886 one Dame Brochard of Vouvray affirmed to whoever would listen +that Jesus was reincarnate in her. In 1889 a pious madman named David +published at Angers a brochure entitled _The Voice of God_, in which he +assumed the modest appellation of 'only Messiah of the Creator Holy +Ghost,' and informed the world that he was a sewer contractor and wore a +beard a yard and a half long. At the present moment his throne is not +empty for want of successors. An engineer named Pierre Jean rode all +over the Mediterranean provinces on horseback announcing that he was the +Holy Ghost. In Paris, Bérard, an omnibus conductor on the +Panthéon-Courcelles line, likewise asserts that he incorporates the +Paraclete, while a magazine article avers that the hope of Redemption +has dawned in the person of the poet Jhouney. Finally, in America, from +time to time, women claim to be Messiahs, and they recruit adherents +among persons worked up to fever pitch by Advent revivals." + +"They are no worse than the people who deny God and Creation," said +Carhaix. "God is immanent in His creatures. He is their Life principle, +the source of movement, the foundation of existence, says Saint Paul. He +has His personal existence, being the 'I AM,' as Moses says. + +"The Holy Ghost, through Christ in glory, will be immanent in all +beings. He will be the principle which transforms and regenerates them, +but there is no need for him to be incarnate. The Holy Ghost proceeds +from the Father through the Son. He is sent to act, not to materialize +himself. It is downright madness to maintain the contrary, thus falling +into the heresies of the Gnostics and the Fratricelli, into the errors +of Dulcin de Novare and his wife Marguerite, into the filth of abbé +Beccarelli, and the abominations of Segarelli of Parma, who, on pretext +of becoming a child the better to symbolize the simple, naïf love of the +Paraclete, had himself diapered and slept on the breast of a nurse." + +"But," said Durtal, "you haven't made yourself quite clear to me. If I +understand you, the Holy Ghost will act by an infusion into us. He will +transmute us, renovate our souls by a sort of 'passive purgation'--to +drop into the theological vernacular." + +"Yes, he will purify us soul and body." + +"How will he purify our bodies?" + +"The action of the Paraclete," the astrologer struck in, "will extend to +the principle of generation. The divine life will sanctify the organs +which henceforth can procreate only elect creatures, exempt from +original sin, creatures whom it will not be necessary to test in the +fires of humiliation, as the Holy Bible says. This was the doctrine of +the prophet Vintras, that extraordinary unlettered man who wrote such +impressive and ardent pages. The doctrine has been continued and +amplified, since Vintras's death, by his successor, Dr. Johannès." + +"Then there is to be Paradise on earth," said Des Hermies. + +"Yes, the kingdom of liberty, goodness, and love." + +"You've got me all mixed up," said Durtal. "Now you announce the +arrival of the Holy Ghost, now the glorious advent of Christ. Are these +kingdoms identical or is one to follow the other?" + +"There is a distinction," answered Gévingey, "between the coming of the +Paraclete and the victorious return of Christ. They occur in the order +named. First a society must be recreated, embraced by the third +Hypostasis, by Love, in order that Jesus may descend, as He has +promised, from the clouds and reign over the people formed in His +image." + +"What rôle is the Pope to play?" + +"Ah, that is one of the most curious points of the Johannite doctrine. +Time, since the first appearance of the Messiah, is divided, as you +know, into two periods, the period of the Victim, of the expiant +Saviour, the period in which we now are, and the other, that which we +await, the period of Christ bathed in the spittle of mockery but radiant +with the superadorable splendour of His person. Well, there is a +different pope for each of these eras. The Scriptures announce these two +sovereign pontificates--and so do my horoscopes, for that matter. + +"It is an axiom of theology that the spirit of Peter lives in his +successors. It will live in them, more or less hidden, until the +longed-for expansion of the Holy Ghost. Then John, who has been held in +reserve, as the Gospel says, will begin his ministry of love and will +live in the souls of the new popes." + +"I don't understand the utility of a pope when Jesus is to be visible," +said Des Hermies. + +"To tell the truth, there is no use in having one, and the papacy is to +exist only during the epoch reserved for the effluence of the divine +Paraclete. The day on which, in a shower of meteors, Jesus appears, the +pontificate of Rome ceases." + +"Without going more deeply into questions which we could discuss the +rest of our lives," said Durtal, "I marvel at the placidity of the +Utopian who imagines that man is perfectible. There is no denying that +the human creature is born selfish, abusive, vile. Just look around you +and see. Society cynical and ferocious, the humble heckled and pillaged +by the rich traffickers in necessities. Everywhere the triumph of the +mediocre and unscrupulous, everywhere the apotheosis of crooked politics +and finance. And you think you can make any progress against a stream +like that? No, man has never changed. His soul was corrupt in the days +of Genesis and is not less rotten at present. Only the form of his sins +varies. Progress is the hypocrisy which refines the vices." + +"All the more reason," Carhaix rejoined, "why society--if it is as you +have described it--should fall to pieces. I, too, think it is putrefied, +its bones ulcerated, its flesh dropping off. It can neither be poulticed +nor cured, it must be interred and a new one born. And who but God can +accomplish such a miracle?" + +"If we admit," said Des Hermies, "that the infamousness of the times is +transitory, it is self-evident that only the intervention of a God can +wash it away; for neither socialism nor any other chimera of the +ignorant and hate-filled workers will modify human nature and reform the +peoples. These tasks are above human forces." + +"And the time awaited by Johannès is at hand," Gévingey proclaimed. +"Here are some of the manifest proofs. Raymond Lully asserted that the +end of the old world would be announced by the diffusion of the +doctrines of Antichrist. He defined these doctrines. They are +materialism and the monstrous revival of magic. This prediction applies +to our age, I think. On the other hand, the good tidings was to be +realized, according to Our Lord, as reported by Saint Matthew, 'When ye +shall see the abomination of desolation ... stand in the holy place.' +And isn't it standing in the holy place now? Look at our timorous, +skeptical Pope, lukewarm and politic, our episcopate of simonists and +cowards, our flabby, indulgent clergy. See how they are ravaged by +Satanism, then tell me if the Church can fall any lower." + +"The promises are explicit and cannot fail," and with his elbows on the +table, his chin in his hands, and his eyes to heaven, the bell-ringer +murmured, "Our father--thy kingdom come!" + +"It's getting late," said Des Hermies, "time we were going." + +While they were putting on their coats, Carhaix questioned Durtal. "What +do you hope for if you have no faith in the coming of Christ?" + +"I hope for nothing at all." + +"I pity you. Really, you believe in no future amelioration?" + +"I believe, alas, that a dotard Heaven maunders over an exhausted +Earth." + +The bell-ringer raised his hands and sadly shook his head. + +When they had left Gévingey, Des Hermies, after walking in silence for +some time, said, "You are not astonished that all the events spoken of +tonight happened at Lyons." And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, he +continued, "You see I am well acquainted with Lyons. People's brains +there are as foggy as the streets when the morning mists roll up from +the Rhone. That city looks magnificent to travellers who like the long +avenues, wide boulevards, green grass, and penitentiary architecture of +modern cities. But Lyons is also the refuge of mysticism, the haven of +preternatural ideas and doubtful creeds. That's where Vintras died, the +one in whom, it seems, the soul of the prophet Elijah was incarnate. +That's where Naundorff found his last partisans. That is where +enchantment is rampant, because in the suburb of La Guillotière you can +have a person bewitched for a louis. Add that it is likewise, in spite +of its swarms of radicals and anarchists, an opulent market for a dour +Protestant Catholicism; a Jansenist factory, richly productive of +bourgeois bigotry. + +"Lyons is celebrated for delicatessen, silk, and churches. At the top of +every hill--and there's a hill every block--is a chapel or a convent, +and Notre Dame de Fourvière dominates them all. From a distance this +pile looks like an eighteenth century dresser turned upside down, but +the interior, which is in process of completion, is amazing. You ought +to go and take a look at it some day. You will see the most +extraordinary jumble of Assyrian, Roman, Gothic, and God knows what, +jacked together by Bossan, the only architect for a century who has +known how to create a cathedral interior. The nave glitters with inlays +and marble, with bronze and gold. Statues of angels diversify the rows +of columns and break up, with impressive grace, the known harmonies of +line. It's Asiatic and barbarous, and reminds one of the architecture +shown in Gustave Moreau's Hérodiade. + +"And there is an endless stream of pilgrims. They strike bargains with +Our Lady. They pray for an extension of markets, new outlets for +sausages and silks. They consult her on ways and means of getting rid of +spoiled vegetables and pushing off their shoddy. In the centre of the +city, in the church of Saint Boniface, I found a placard requesting the +faithful, out of respect for the holy place, not to give alms. It was +not seemly, you see, that the commercial orisons be disturbed by the +ridiculous plaints of the indigent." + +"Well," said Durtal, "it's a strange thing, but democracy is the most +implacable of the enemies of the poor. The Revolution, which, you would +think, ought to have protected them, proved for them the most cruel of +régimes. I will show you some day a decree of the Year II, pronouncing +penalties not only for those who begged but for those who gave." + +"And yet democracy is the panacea which is going to cure every ill," +said Des Hermies, laughing. And he pointed to enormous posters +everywhere in which General Boulanger peremptorily demanded that the +people of Paris vote for him in the coming election. + +Durtal shrugged his shoulders. "Quite true. The people are very sick. +Carhaix and Gévingey are perhaps right in maintaining that no human +agency is powerful enough to effect a cure." + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +Durtal had resolved not to answer Mme. Chantelouve's letters. Every day, +since their rupture, she had sent him an inflamed missive, but, as he +soon noticed, her Mænad cries were subsiding into plaints and +reproaches. She now accused him of ingratitude, and repented having +listened to him and having permitted him to participate in sacrileges +for which she would have to answer before the heavenly tribunal. She +pleaded to see him once more. Then she was silent for a while week. +Finally, tired, no doubt, of writing unanswered letters, she admitted, +in a last epistle, that all was over. + +After agreeing with him that their temperaments were incompatible, she +ended: + + "Thanks for the trig little love, ruled like music-paper, that + you gave me. My heart cannot be so straitly measured, it + requires more latitude--" + +"Her heart!" he laughed, then he continued to read: + + "I understand that it is not your earthly mission to satisfy my + heart but you might at least have conceded me a frank + comradeship which would have permitted me to leave my sex at + home and to come and spend an evening with you now and then. + This, seemingly, so simple, you have rendered impossible. + Farewell forever. I have only to renew my pact with Solitude, to + which I have tried to be unfaithful--" + +"With solitude! and that complaisant and paternal cuckold, her husband! +Well, he is the one most to be pitied now. Thanks to me, he had evenings +of quiet. I restored his wife, pliant and satisfied. He profited by my +fatigues, that sacristan. Ah, when I think of it, his sly, hypocritical +eyes, when he looked at me, told me a great deal. + +"Well, the little romance is over. It's a good thing to have your heart +on strike. In my brain I still have a house of ill fame, which sometimes +catches fire, but the hired myrmidons will stamp out the blaze in a +hurry. + +"When I was young and ardent the women laughed at me. Now that I am old +and stale I laugh at them. That's more in my character, old fellow," he +said to the cat, which, with ears pricked up, was listening to the +soliloquy. "Truly, Gilles de Rais is a great deal more interesting than +Mme. Chantelouve. Unfortunately, my relations with him are also drawing +to a close. Only a few more pages and the book is done. Oh, Lord! Here +comes Rateau to knock my house to pieces." + +Sure enough, the concierge entered, made an excuse for being late, took +off his vest, and cast a look of defiance at the furniture. Then he +hurled himself at the bed, grappled with the mattress, got a half-Nelson +on it, and balancing himself, turning half around, hurled it onto the +springs. + +Durtal, followed by his cat, went into the other room, but suddenly +Rateau ceased wrestling and came and stood before Durtal. + +"Monsieur, do you know what has happened?" he blubbered. + +"Why, no." + +"My wife has left me." + +"Left you! but she must be over sixty." + +Rateau raised his eyes to heaven. + +"And she ran off with another man?" + +Rateau, disconsolate, let the feather duster fall from his listless +hand. + +"The devil! Then, in spite of her age, your wife had needs which you +were unable to satisfy?" + +The concierge shook his head and finally succeeded in saying, "It was +the other way around." + +"Oh," said Durtal, considering the old caricature, shrivelled by bad air +and "three-six," "but if she is tired of that sort of thing, why did she +run off with a man?" + +Rateau made a grimace of pitying contempt, "Oh, he's impotent. Good for +nothing--" + +"Ah!" + +"It's my job I'm sore about. The landlord won't keep a concierge that +hasn't a wife." + +"Dear Lord," thought Durtal, "how hast thou answered my prayers!--Come +on, let's go over to your place," he said to Des Hermies, who, finding +Rateau's key in the door, had walked in. + +"Righto! since your housecleaning isn't done yet, descend like a god +from your clouds of dust, and come on over to the house." + +On the way Durtal recounted his concierge's conjugal misadventure. + +"Oh!" said Des Hermies, "many a woman would be happy to wreathe with +laurel the occiput of so combustible a sexagenarian.--Look at that! +Isn't it revolting?" pointing to the walls covered with posters. + +It was a veritable debauch of placards. Everywhere on lurid coloured +paper in box car letters were the names of Boulanger and Jacques. + +"Thank God, this will be over tomorrow." + +"There is one resource left," said Des Hermies. "To escape the horrors +of present day life never raise your eyes. Look down at the sidewalk +always, preserving the attitude of timid modesty. When you look only at +the pavement you see the reflections of the sky signs in all sorts of +fantastic shapes; alchemic symbols, talismanic characters, bizarre +pantacles with suns, hammers, and anchors, and you can imagine yourself +right in the midst of the Middle Ages." + +"Yes, but to keep from seeing the disenchanting crowd you would have to +wear a long-vizored cap like a jockey and blinkers like a horse." + +Des Hermies sighed. "Come in," he said, opening the door. They went in +and sitting down in easy chairs they lighted their cigarettes. + +"I haven't got over that conversation we had with Gévingey the other +night at Carhaix's," said Durtal. "Strange man, that Dr. Johannès. I +can't keep from thinking about him. Look here, do you sincerely believe +in his miraculous cures?" + +"I am obliged to. I didn't tell you all about him, for a physician can't +lightly make these dangerous admissions. But you may as well know that +this priest heals hopeless cases. + +"I got acquainted with him when he was still a member of the Parisian +clergy. It came about by one of those miracles of his which I don't +pretend to understand. + +"My mother's maid had a granddaughter who was paralyzed in her arms and +legs and suffered death and destruction in her chest and howled when you +touched her there. She had been in this condition two years. It had come +on in one night, how produced nobody knows. She was sent away from the +Lyons hospitals as incurable. She came to Paris, underwent treatment at +La Salpêtrière, and was discharged when nobody could find out what was +the matter with her nor what medication would give her any relief. One +day she spoke to me of this abbé Johannès, who, she said, had cured +persons in as bad shape as she. I did not believe a word, but hearing +that the priest refused to take any money for his services I did not +dissuade her from visiting him, and out of curiosity I went along. + +"They placed her in a chair. The ecclesiastic, little, active, +energetic, took her hand and applied to it, one after the other, three +precious stones. Then he said coolly, 'Mademoiselle, you are the victim +of consanguineal sorcery.' + +"I could hardly keep from laughing. + +"'Remember,' he said,'two years back, for that is when your paralytic +stroke came on. You must have had a quarrel with a kinsman or +kinswoman?' + +"It was true. Poor Marie had been unjustly accused of the theft of a +watch which was an heirloom belonging to an aunt of hers. The aunt had +sworn vengeance. + +"'Your aunt lives in Lyons?' + +"She nodded. + +"'Nothing astonishing about that,' continued the priest. 'In Lyons, +among the lower orders, there are witch doctors who know a little about +the witchcraft practised in the country. But be reassured. These people +are not powerful. They know little more than the A B C's of the art. +Then, mademoiselle, you wish to be cured?' + +"And after she replied that she did, he said gently, 'That is all. You +may go.' + +"He did not touch her, did not prescribe any remedy. I came away +persuaded that he was a mountebank. But when, three days later, the girl +was able to raise her arms, and all her pain had left her, and when, at +the end of a week, she could walk, I had to yield in face of the +evidence. I went back to see him, had occasion to do him a service; and +thus our relations began." + +"But what are his methods?" + +"He opens, like the curate of Ars, with prayer. Then he evokes the +militant archangels, then he breaks the magic circles and +chases--'classes,' as he says--the spirits of Evil. I know very well +that this is confounding. Whenever I speak of this man's potency to my +confrères they smile with a superior air or serve up to me the specious +arguments which they have fabricated to explain the cures wrought by +Christ and the Virgin. The method they have imagined consists in +striking the patient's imagination, suggesting to him the will to be +cured, persuading him that he is well, hypnotizing him in a waking +state--so to speak. This done--say they--the twisted legs straighten, +the sores disappear, the consumption-torn lungs are patched up, the +cancers become benign pimples, and the blind eyes see. This procedure +they attribute to miracle workers to explain away the supernatural--why +don't they use the method themselves if it is so simple?" + +"But haven't they tried?" + +"After a fashion. I was present myself at an experiment attempted by Dr. +Luys. Ah, it was inspiring! At the charity hospital there was a poor +girl paralyzed in both legs. She was put to sleep and commanded to rise. +She struggled in vain. Then two interns held her up in a standing +posture, but her lifeless legs bent useless under her weight. Need I +tell you that she could not walk, and that after they had held her up +and pushed her along a few steps, they put her to bed again, having +obtained no result whatever." + +"But Dr. Johannès does not cure all sufferers, without discrimination?" + +"No. He will not meddle with any ailments which are not the result of +spells. He says he can do nothing with natural ills, which are the +province of the physician. He is a specialist in Satanic affections. He +has most to do with the possessed whose neuroses have proved obdurate to +hydrotherapeutic treatment." + +"What does he do with the precious stones you mentioned?" + +"First, before answering your question, I must explain the significance +and virtue of these stones. I shall be telling you nothing new when I +say that Aristotle, Pliny, all the sages of antiquity, attributed +medical and divine virtues to them. According to the pagans, agate and +carnelian stimulate, topaz consoles, jasper cures languor, hyacinth +drives away insomnia, turquoise prevents falls or lightens the shock, +amethyst combats drunkenness. + +"Catholic symbolism, in its turn, takes over the precious stones and +sees in them emblems of the Christian virtues. Then, sapphire represents +the lofty aspirations of the soul, chalcedony charity, sard and onyx +candor, beryl allegorizes theological science, hyacinthe humility, while +the ruby appeases wrath, and emerald 'lapidifies' incorruptible faith. + +"Now in magic," Des Hermies rose and took from a shelf a very small +volume bound like a prayer book. He showed Durtal the title: _Natural +magic, or: The secrets and miracles of nature, in four volumes, by +Giambattista Porta of Naples. Paris. Nicolas Bonjour, rue Neuve Nostre +Dame at the sign Saint Nicolas_. 1584. + +"Natural magic," said Des Hermies, "which was merely the medicine of the +time, ascribes a new meaning to gems. Listen to this. After first +celebrating an unknown stone, the Alectorius, which renders its +possessor invincible if it has been taken out of the stomach of a cock +caponized four years before or if it has been ripped out of the +ventricle of a hen, Porta informs us that chalcedony wins law suits, +that carnelian stops bloody flux 'and is exceeding useful to women who +are sick of their flower,' that hyacinth protects against lightning and +keeps away pestilence and poison, that topaz quells 'lunatic' passions, +that turquoise is of advantage against melancholy, quartan fever, and +heart failure. He attests finally that sapphire preserves courage and +keeps the members vigorous, while emerald, hung about one's neck, keeps +away Saint John's evil and breaks when the wearer is unchaste. + +"You see, antique philosophy, mediæval Christianity, and sixteenth +century magic do not agree on the specific virtues of every stone. +Almost in every case the significations, more or less far-fetched, +differ. Dr. Johannès has revised these beliefs, adopted and rejected +great numbers of them, finally he has, on his own authority, admitted +new acceptations. According to him, amethyst does cure drunkenness; but +moral drunkenness, pride; ruby relieves sex pressure; beryl fortifies +the will; sapphire elevates the thoughts and turns them toward God. + +"In brief, he believes that every stone corresponds to a species of +malady, and also to a class of sins; and he affirms that when we have +chemically got possession of the active principle of gems we shall have +not only antidotes but preventatives. While waiting for this chimerical +dream to be realized and for our medicine to become the mock of lapidary +chemists, he uses precious stones to formulate diagnoses of illnesses +produced by sorcery." + +"How?" + +"He claims that when such or such a stone is placed in the hand or on +the affected part of the bewitched a fluid escapes from the stone into +his hands, and that by examining this fluid he can tell what is the +matter. In this connection he told me that a woman whom he did not know +came to him one day to consult him about a malady, pronounced incurable, +from which she had suffered since childhood. He could not get any +precise answers to his questions. He saw no signs of venefice. After +trying out his whole array of stones he placed in her hand lapis lazuli, +which, he says, corresponds to the sin of incest. He examined the stone. + +"'Your malady,' he said, 'is the consequence of an act of incest.' + +"'Well,' she said, 'I did not come here to confessional,' but she +finally admitted that her father had violated her before she attained +the age of puberty. + +"That, of course, is against reason and contrary to all accepted ideas, +but there is no getting around the fact that this priest cures patients +whom we physicians have given up for lost." + +"Such as the only astrologer Paris now can boast, the astounding +Gévingey, who would have been dead without his aid. I wonder how +Gévingey came to cast the Empress Eugenie's horoscope." + +"Oh, I told you. Under the Empire the Tuileries was a hotbed of magic. +Home, the American, was revered as the equal of a god. In addition to +spiritualistic séances he evoked demons at court. One evocation had +fatal consequences. A certain marquis, whose wife had died, implored +Home to let him see her again. Home took him to a room, put him in bed, +and left him. What ensued? What dreadful phantom rose from the tomb? Was +the story of Ligeia re-enacted? At any rate, the marquis was found dead +at the foot of the bed. This story has recently been reported by Le +Figaro from unimpeachable documents. + +"You see it won't do to play with the world spirits of Evil. I used to +know a rich bachelor who had a mania for the occult sciences. He was +president of a theosophic society and he even wrote a little book on the +esoteric doctrine, in the Isis series. Well, he could not, like the +Péladan and Papus tribe, be content with knowing nothing, so he went to +Scotland, where Diabolism is rampant. There he got in touch with the man +who, if you stake him, will initiate you into the Satanic arcana. My +friend made the experiment. Did he see him whom Bulwer Lytton in +_Zanoni_ calls 'the dweller of the threshold'? I don't know, but certain +it is that he fainted from horror and returned to France exhausted, half +dead." + +"Evidently all is not rosy in that line of work," said Durtal. "But it +is only spirits of Evil that can be evoked?" + +"Do you suppose that the Angels, who, of earth, obey only the saints, +would ever consent to take orders from the first comer?" + +"But there must be an intermediate order of angels, who are neither +celestial nor infernal, who, for instance, commit the well-known +asininities in the spiritist séances." + +"A priest told me one day that the neuter larvæ inhabit an invisible, +neutral territory, something like a little island, which is beseiged on +all sides by the good and evil spirits. The larvæ cannot long hold out +and are soon forced into one or the other camp. Now, because it is these +larvæ they evoke, the occultists, who cannot, of course, draw down the +angels, always get the ones who have joined the party of Evil, so +unconsciously and probably involuntarily the spiritist is always +diabolizing." + +"Yes, and if one admits the disgusting idea that an imbecile medium can +bring back the dead, one must, in reason, recognize the stamp of Satan +on these practises." + +"However viewed, Spiritism is an abomination." + +"So you don't believe in theurgy, white magic?" + +"It's a joke. Only a Rosicrucian who wants to hide his more repulsive +essays at black magic ever hints at such a thing. No one dare confess +that he satanizes. The Church, not duped by these hair-splitting +distinctions, condemns black and white magic indifferently." + +"Well," said Durtal, lighting a cigarette, after a silence, "this is a +better topic of conversation than politics or the races, but where does +it get us? Half of these doctrines are absurd, the other half so +mysterious as to produce only bewilderment. Shall we grant Satanism? +Well, gross as it is, it seems a sure thing. And if it is, and one is +consistent, one must also grant Catholicism--for Buddhism and the like +are not big enough to be substituted for the religion of Christ." + +"All right. Believe." + +"I can't. There are so many discouraging and revolting dogmas in +Christianity--" + +"I am uncertain about a good many things, myself," said Des Hermies, +"and yet there are moments when I feel that the obstacles are giving +way, that I almost believe. Of one thing I _am_ sure. The supernatural +does exist, Christian or not. To deny it is to deny evidence--and who +wants to be a materialist, one of these silly freethinkers?" + +"It is mighty tiresome to be vacillating forever. How I envy Carhaix his +robust faith!" + +"You don't want much!" said Des Hermies. "Faith is the breakwater of the +soul, affording the only haven in which dismasted man can glide along in +peace." + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +"You like that?" asked Mme. Carhaix. "For a change I served the broth +yesterday and kept the beef for tonight. So we'll have vermicelli soup, +a salad of cold meat with pickled herring and celery, some nice mashed +potatoes _au gratin_, and a dessert. And then you shall taste the new +cider we just got." + +"Oh!" and "Ah!" exclaimed Des Hermies and Durtal, who, while waiting for +dinner, were sipping the elixir of life. "Do you know, Mme. Carhaix, +your cooking tempts us to the sin of gluttony--If you keep on you will +make perfect pigs of us." + +"Oh, you are joking. I wonder what is keeping Louis." + +"Somebody is coming upstairs," said Durtal, hearing the creaking of +shoes in the tower. + +"No, it isn't his step," and she went and opened the door. "It's +Monsieur Gévingey." + +And indeed, clad in his blue cape, with his soft black hat on his head, +the astrologer entered, made a bow, like an actor taking a curtain call, +nibbed his great knuckles against his massive rings, and asked where the +bell-ringer was. + +"He is at the carpenter's. The oak beams holding up the big bell are +cracked and Louis is afraid they will break down." + +"Any news of the election?" and Gévingey took out his pipe and filled +it. + +"No. In this quarter we shan't know the results until nearly ten +o'clock. There's no doubt about the outcome, though, because Paris is +strong for this democratic stuff. General Boulanger will win hands +down." + +"This certainly is the age of universal imbecility." + +Carhaix entered and apologized for being so late. While his wife brought +in the soup he took off his goloshes and said, in answer to his friends' +questions, "Yes; the dampness had rusted the frets and warped the beams. +It was time for the carpenter to intervene. He finally promised that he +would be here tomorrow and bring his men without fail. Well, I am mighty +glad to get back. In the streets everything whirls in front of my eyes. +I am dizzy. I don't know what to do. The only places where I am at home +are the belfry and this room. Here, wife, let me do that," and he pushed +her aside and began to stir the salad. + +"How good it smells!" said Durtal, drinking in the incisive tang of the +herring. "Do you know what this perfume suggests? A basket funnelled +fireplace, twigs of juniper snapping in it, in a ground-floor room +opening on to a great harbour. It seems to me there is a sort of salt +water halo around these little rings of gold and rusted +iron.--Exquisite," he said as he tasted the salad. + +"We'll make it again for you, Monsieur Durtal," said Mme. Carhaix, "you +are not hard to please." + +"Alas!" said her husband, "his palate isn't, but his soul is. When I +think of his despairing aphorisms of the other night! However, we are +praying God to enlighten him. I'll tell you," he said to his wife, "we +will invoke Saint Nolasque and Saint Theodulus, who are always +represented with bells. They sort of belong to the family, and they will +certainly be glad to intercede for people who revere them and their +emblems." + +"It would take a stunning miracle to convince Durtal," said Des Hermies. + +"Bells have been known to perform them," said the astrologer. "I +remember to have read, though I forget where, that angels tolled the +knell when Saint Isidro of Madrid was dying." + +"And there are many other cases," said Carhaix. "Of their own accord +the bells chimed when Saint Sigisbert chanted the De Profundis over the +corpse of the martyr Placidus, and when the body of Saint Ennemond, +Bishop of Lyons, was thrown by his murderers into a boat without oars or +sails, the bells rang out, though nobody set them in motion, as the boat +passed down the Saône." + +"Do you know what I think?" asked Des Hermies, looking at Carhaix. "I +think you ought to prepare a compendium of hagiography or a really +informative work on heraldry." + +"What makes you think that?" + +"Well, you are, thank God, remote from this epoch and fond of things +which it knows nothing about or execrates, and a work of that kind would +take you still further away. My good friend, you are the man forever +unintelligible to the coming generations. To ring bells because you love +them, to give yourself over to the abandoned study of feudal art or +monasticism would make you complete--take you clear out of Paris, out of +the world, back into the Middle Ages." + +"Alas," said Carhaix, "I am only a poor ignorant man. But the type you +speak of does exist. In Switzerland, I believe, a bell-ringer has for +years been collecting material for a heraldic memorial. I should think," +he continued, laughing, "that his avocation would interfere with his +vocation." + +"And do you think," said Gévingey bitterly, "that the profession of +astrologer is less decried, less neglected?" + +"How do you like our cider?" asked the bell-ringer's wife. "Do you find +it a bit raw?" + +"No, it's tart if you sip it, but sweet if you take a good mouthful," +answered Durtal. + +"Wife, serve the potatoes. Don't wait for me. I delayed so long getting +my business done that it's time for the angelus. Don't bother about me. +Go on eating. I shall catch up with you when I get back." + +And as her husband lighted his lantern and left the room the woman +brought in on a plate what looked to be a cake covered with golden brown +caramel icing. + +"Mashed potatoes, I thought you said!" + +"_Au gratin_. Browned in the oven. Taste it. I put in everything that +ought to make it very good." + +All exclaimed over it. + +Then it became impossible to hear oneself. Tonight the bell boomed out +with unusual clarity and power. Durtal tried to analyze the sound which +seemed to rock the room. There was a sort of flux and reflux of sound. +First, the formidable shock of the clapper against the vase, then a sort +of crushing and scattering of the sounds as if ground fine with the +pestle, then a rounding of the reverberation; then the recoil of the +clapper, adding, in the bronze mortar, other sonorous vibrations which +it ground up and cast out and dispersed through the sounding shutters. + +Then the bell strokes came further apart. Now there was only the +whirring as of a spinning wheel; a few crumbs were slow about falling. +And now Carhaix returned. + +"It's a two-sided age," said Gévingey, pensive. "People believe nothing, +yet gobble everything. Every day a new science is invented. Nobody reads +that admirable Paracelsus who rediscovered all that had ever been found +and created everything that had not. Say now to your congress of +scientists that, according to this great master, life is a drop of the +essence of the stars, that each of our organs corresponds to a planet +and depends upon it; that we are, in consequence, a foreshortening of +the divine sphere. Tell them--and this, experience attests--that every +man born under the sign of Saturn is melancholy and pituitous, taciturn +and solitary, poor and vain; that that sluggish star predisposes to +superstition and fraud, directs epilepsies and varices, hemorrhoids and +leprosies; that it is, alas! the great purveyor to hospital and +prison--and the scientists will shrug their shoulders and laugh at you. +The glorified pedants and homiletic asses!" + +"Paracelsus," said Des Hermies, "was one of the most extraordinary +practitioners of occult medicine. He knew the now forgotten mysteries of +the blood, the still unknown medical effects of light. Professing--as +did also the cabalists, for that matter--that the human being is +composed of three parts, a material body, a soul, and a perispirit +called also an astral body, he attended this last especially and +produced reactions on the carnal envelope by procedures which are either +incomprehensible or fallen into disuse. He cared for wounds by treating +not the tissues, but the blood which came out of them. However, we are +assured that he healed certain ailments." + +"Thanks to his profound knowledge of astrology," said Gévingey. + +"But if the study of the sidereal influence is so important," said +Durtal, "why don't you take pupils?" + +"I can't get them. Where will you unearth people willing to study twenty +years without glory or profit? Because, to be able to establish a +horoscope one must be an astronomer of the first order, know mathematics +from top to bottom, and one must have put in long hours tussling with +the obscure Latin of the old masters. Besides, you must have the +vocation and the faith, and they are lost." + +"Just the way it is with bell ringing," said Carhaix. + +"No, you see, messieurs," Gévingey went on, "the day when the grand +sciences of the Middle Ages fell foul of the systematic and hostile +indifference of an impious people was the death-day of the soul in +France. All we can do now is fold our arms and listen to the wild +vagaries of society, which by turns shrieks with farcical joy and bitter +grief." + +"We must not despair. A better time is coming," said Mme. Carhaix in a +conciliating tone, and before she retired she shook hands with all her +guests. + +"The people," said Des Hermies, pouring the water into the coffee-pot, +"instead of being ameliorated with time, grow, from century to century, +more avaricious, abject, and stupid. Remember the Siege, the Commune; +the unreasonable infatuations, the tumultuous hatreds, all the dementia +of a deteriorated, malnourished people in arms. They certainly cannot +compare with the naïf and tender-hearted plebes of the Middle Ages. Tell +us, Durtal, how the people acted when Gilles de Rais was conducted to +the stake." + +"Yes, tell us," said Carhaix, his great eyes made watery by the smoke of +his pipe. + +"Well, you know, as a consequence of unheard-of crimes, the Marshal de +Rais was condemned to be hanged and burned alive. After the sentence was +passed, when he was brought back to his dungeon, he addressed a last +appeal to the Bishop, Jean de Malestroit, beseeching the Bishop to +intercede for him with the fathers and mothers of the children Gilles +had so ferociously violated and put to death, to be present when he +suffered. + +"The people whose hearts he had lacerated wept with pity. They now saw +in this demoniac noble only a poor man who lamented his crimes and was +about to confront the Divine Wrath. The day of execution, by nine +o'clock they were marching through the city in processional. They +chanted psalms in the streets and took vows in the churches to fast +three days in order to help assure the repose of the Marshal's soul." + +"Pretty far, as you see, from American lynch law," said Des Hermies. + +"Then," resumed Durtal, "at eleven they went to the prison to get Gilles +de Rais and accompanied him to the prairie of Las Biesse, where tall +stakes stood, surmounted by gibbets. + +"The Marshal supported his accomplices, embraced them, adjured them to +have 'great displeasure and contrition of their ill deeds' and, beating +his breast, he supplicated the Virgin to spare them, while the clergy, +the peasants, and the people joined in the psalmody, intoning the +sinister and imploring strophes of the chant for the departed: + + "'Nos timemus diem judicii + Quia mali et nobis conscii. + Sed tu, Mater summi concilii, + Para nobis locum refugii, + O Maria. + + "'Tunc iratus Judex--'" + +"Hurrah for Boulanger!" + +The noise as of a stormy sea mounted from the Place Saint Sulpice, and a +hubbub of cries floated up to the tower room. "Boulange--Lange--" Then +an enormous, raucous voice, the voice of an oyster woman, a push-cart +peddler, rose, dominating all others, howling, "Hurrah for Boulanger!" + +"The people are cheering the election returns in front of the city +hall," said Carhaix disdainfully. + +They looked at each other. + +"The people of today!" exclaimed Des Hermies. + +"Ah," grumbled Gévingey, "they wouldn't acclaim a sage, an artist, that +way, even--if such were conceivable now--a saint." + +"And they did in the Middle Ages." + +"Well, they were more naïf and not so stupid then," said Des Hermies. +"And as Gévingey says, where now are the saints who directed them? You +cannot too often repeat it, the spiritual councillors of today have +tainted hearts, dysenteric souls, and slovenly minds. Or they are worse. +They corrupt their flock. They are of the Docre order and Satanize." + +"To think that a century of positivism and atheism has been able to +overthrow everything but Satanism, and it cannot make Satanism yield an +inch." + +"Easily explained!" cried Carhaix. "Satan is forgotten by the great +majority. Now it was Father Ravignan, I believe, who proved that the +wiliest thing the Devil can do is to get people to deny his existence." + +"Oh, God!" murmured Durtal forlornly, "what whirlwinds of ordure I see +on the horizon!" + +"No," said Carhaix, "don't say that. On earth all is dead and +decomposed. But in heaven! Ah, I admit that the Paraclete is keeping us +waiting. But the texts announcing his coming are inspired. The future is +certain. There will be light," and with bowed head he prayed fervently. + +Des Hermies rose and paced the room. "All that is very well," he +groaned, "but this century laughs the glorified Christ to scorn. It +contaminates the supernatural and vomits on the Beyond. Well, how can we +hope that in the future the offspring of the fetid tradesmen of today +will be decent? Brought up as they are, what will they do in Life?" + +"They will do," replied Durtal, "as their fathers and mothers do now. +They will stuff their guts and crowd out their souls through their +alimentary canals." + + + + +FINIS + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Là-bas, by J. K. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + https://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/14323-8.zip b/14323-8.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..19b462a --- /dev/null +++ b/14323-8.zip diff --git a/14323-h.zip b/14323-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..6c4da40 --- /dev/null +++ b/14323-h.zip diff --git a/14323-h/14323-h.htm b/14323-h/14323-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..e92d3d4 --- /dev/null +++ b/14323-h/14323-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,10297 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html> +<html lang="en"> + +<head> + <meta charset="UTF-8"> + <title>Là-bas | Project Gutenberg</title> + <style> + p { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + h1,h2,h3,h4,h5,h6 { + text-align: center; + } + hr { width: 33%; + margin-top: 1em; + margin-bottom: 1em; + margin-left: auto; + margin-right: auto; + } + body{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + + .blockquot{font-family: serif; margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%;} + + .footnotes {border: dashed 1px;} + .footnote {margin-left: 5%; margin-right: 10%; font-size: 0.9em;} + + .poem {margin-left:10%; margin-right:10%; text-align: left;} + .poem br {display: none;} + .poem .stanza {margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em;} + .poem .line {display: block;} + .poem .line2 {display: block; margin-left: 2em;} + </style> +</head> +<body> +<div>*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14323 ***</div> +<h1>LÀ-BAS</h1> +<h2>(DOWN THERE)</h2> +<h4>by</h4> +<h2>J.K. HUYSMANS</h2> +<h5>Translated by</h5> +<h3>KEENE WALLACE</h3> +<h5>[Transcriber's note:<br> +Original published 1891,<br> +English translation privately published 1928.]<br></h5> + +<!-- Not in original - added for ease of navigation. --> +<h6> + <a href="#CHAPTER_I"><b>I</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_II"><b>II</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_III"><b>III</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_IV"><b>IV</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_V"><b>V</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_VI"><b>VI</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_VII"><b>VII</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_VIII"><b>VIII</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_IX"><b>IX</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_X"><b>X</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XI"><b>XI</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XII"><b>XII</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XIII"><b>XIII</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XIV"><b>XIV</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XV"><b>XV</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XVI"><b>XVI</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XVII"><b>XVII</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII"><b>XVIII</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XIX"><b>XIX</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XX"><b>XX</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XXI"><b>XXI</b></a> + <a href="#CHAPTER_XXII"><b>XXII</b></a> +</h6> + +<!-- Page 3 --> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_I"><!-- Page 4 -->CHAPTER I</a></h2> + + +<p>"You believe pretty thoroughly in these things, or you wouldn't abandon +the eternal triangle and the other stock subjects of the modern +novelists to write the story of Gilles de Rais," and after a silence Des +Hermies added, "I do not object to the latrine; hospital; and workshop +vocabulary of naturalism. For one thing, the subject matter requires +some such diction. Again, Zola, in <i>L'Assommoir</i>, has shown that a +heavy-handed artist can slap words together hit-or-miss and give an +effect of tremendous power. I do not really care how the naturalists +maltreat language, but I do strenuously object to the earthiness of +their ideas. They have made our literature the incarnation of +materialism—and they glorify the democracy of art!</p> + +<p>"Say what you will, their theory is pitiful, and their tight little +method squeezes all the life out of them. Filth and the flesh are their +all in all. They deny wonder and reject the extra-sensual. I don't +believe they would know what you meant if you told them that artistic +curiosity begins at the very point where the senses leave off.</p> + +<p>"You shrug your shoulders, but tell me, how much has naturalism done to +clear up life's really troublesome mysteries? When an ulcer of the +soul—or indeed the most benign little pimple—is to be probed, +naturalism can do nothing. 'Appetite and instinct' seem to be its sole +motivation and rut and brainstorm its chronic states. The field of +naturalism is the region below the umbilicus. Oh, it's a hernia clinic +and it offers the soul a truss!</p> + +<p>"I tell you, Durtal, it's superficial quackery, and that isn't <!-- Page 5 -->all. +This fetid naturalism eulogizes the atrocities of modern life and +flatters our positively American ways. It ecstasizes over brute force +and apotheosizes the cash register. With amazing humility it defers to +the nauseating taste of the mob. It repudiates style, it rejects every +ideal, every aspiration towards the supernatural and the beyond. It is +so perfectly representative of bourgeois thought that it might be sired +by Homais and dammed by Lisa, the butcher girl in <i>Ventre de Paris</i>."</p> + +<p>"Heavens, how you go after it!" said Durtal, somewhat piqued. He lighted +his cigarette and went on, "I am as much revolted by materialism as you +are, but that is no reason for denying the unforgettable services which +naturalism has rendered.</p> + +<p>"It has demolished the inhuman puppets of romanticism and rescued our +literature from the clutches of booby idealists and sex-starved old +maids. It has created visible and tangible human beings—after +Balzac—and put them in accord with their surroundings. It has carried +on the work, which romanticism began, of developing the language. Some +of the naturalists have had the veritable gift of laughter, a very few +have had the gift of tears, and, in spite of what you say, they have not +all been carried away by an obsession for baseness."</p> + +<p>"Yes, they have. They are in love with the age, and that shows them up +for what they are."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to tell me Flaubert and the De Goncourts were in love with +the age?"</p> + +<p>"Of course not. But those men were artists, honest, seditious, and +aloof, and I put them in a class by themselves. I will also grant that +Zola is a master of backgrounds and masses and that his tricky handling +of people is unequalled. Then, too, thank God, he has never followed +out, in his novels, the theories enunciated in his magazine articles, +adulating the intrusion of positivism upon art. But in the works of his +best pupil, Rosny, the only talented novelist who <!-- Page 6 -->is really imbued with +the ideas of the master, naturalism has become a sickening jargon of +chemist's slang serving to display a layman's erudition, which is about +as profound as the scientific knowledge of a shop foreman. No, there is +no getting around it. Everything this whole poverty-stricken school has +produced shows that our literature has fallen upon evil days. The +grovellers! They don't rise above the moral level of the tumblebug. Read +the latest book. What do you find? Simple anecdotes: murder, suicide, +and accident histories copied right out of the newspaper, tiresome +sketches and wormy tales, all written in a colorless style and +containing not the faintest hint of an outlook on life nor an +appreciation of human nature. When I have waded through one of these +books its insipid descriptions and interminable harangues go instantly +out of my mind, and the only impression that remains is one of surprise +that a man can write three or four hundred pages when he has absolutely +nothing to reveal to us—nothing to say!"</p> + +<p>"If it's all the same to you, Des Hermies, let's speak of something +else. We shall never agree on the subject of naturalism, as the very +mention of it makes you see red. What about this Mattei system of +medicine? Your globules and electric phials at least relieve a few +sufferers?"</p> + +<p>"Hmph. A little better than the panaceas of the Codex, though I can't +say the effects are either lasting or sure. But, it serves, like +anything else. And now I must run along. The clock is striking ten and +your concierge is coming to put out the hall light. See you again very +soon, I hope. Good night."</p> + +<p>When the door closed Durtal put some more coke in the grate and resumed +a comfortless train of thought aggravated by this too pertinent +discussion with his friend. For some months Durtal had been trying to +reassemble the fragments of a shattered literary theory which had once +seemed inexpugnable, and Des Hermies's opinions troubled him, in spite +of their exaggerated vehemence.</p> + +<p><!-- Page 7 -->Certainly if naturalism confined one to monotonous studies of mediocre +persons and to interminable inventories of the objects in a drawing-room +or a landscape, an honest and clear-sighted artist would soon cease to +produce, and a less conscientious workman would be under the necessity +of repeating himself over and over again to the point of nausea. +Nevertheless Durtal could see no possibilities for the novelist outside +of naturalism. Were we to go back to the pyrotechnics of romanticism, +rewrite the lanuginous works of the Cherbuliez and Feuillet tribe, or, +worse yet, imitate the lachrymose storiettes of Theuriet and George +Sand? Then what was to be done? And Durtal, with desperate +determination, set to work sorting out a tangle of confused theories and +inchoate postulations. He made no headway. He felt but could not define. +He was afraid to. Definition of his present tendencies would plump him +back into his old dilemma.</p> + +<p>"We must," he thought, "retain the documentary veracity, the precision +of detail, the compact and sinewy language of realism, but we must also +dig down into the soul and cease trying to explain mystery in terms of +our sick senses. If possible the novel ought to be compounded of two +elements, that of the soul and that of the body, and these ought to be +inextricably bound together as in life. Their interreactions, their +conflicts, their reconciliation, ought to furnish the dramatic interest. +In a word, we must follow the road laid out once and for all by Zola, +but at the same time we must trace a parallel route in the air by which +we may go above and beyond.... A spiritual naturalism! It must be +complete, powerful, daring in a different way from anything that is +being attempted at present. Perhaps as approaching my concept I may cite +Dostoyevsky. Yet that <i>exorable</i> Russian is less an elevated realist +than an evangelic socialist. In France right now the purely corporal +recipe has brought upon itself such discredit that two clans have +arisen: the liberal, which prunes naturalism of all its boldness of +subject <!-- Page 8 -->matter and diction in order to fit it for the drawing-room, and +the decadent, which gets completely off the ground and raves +incoherently in a telegraphic patois intended to represent the language +of the soul—intended rather to divert the reader's attention from the +author's utter lack of ideas. As for the right wing verists, I can only +laugh at the frantic puerilities of these would-be psychologists, who +have never explored an unknown district of the mind nor ever studied an +unhackneyed passion. They simply repeat the saccharine Feuillet and the +saline Stendhal. Their novels are dissertations in school-teacher style. +They don't seem to realize that there is more spiritual revelation in +that one reply of old Hulot, in Balzac's <i>Cousine Bette</i>, 'Can't I take +the little girl along?' than in all their doctoral theses. We must +expect of them no idealistic straining toward the infinite. For me, +then, the real psychologist of this century is not their Stendhal but +that astonishing Ernest Hello, whose unrelenting unsuccess is simply +miraculous!"</p> + +<p>He began to think that Des Hermies was right. In the present +disorganized state of letters there was but one tendency which seemed to +promise better things. The unsatisfied need for the supernatural was +driving people, in default of something loftier, to spiritism and the +occult.</p> + +<p>Now his thoughts carried him away from his dissatisfaction with +literature to the satisfaction he had found in another art, in painting. +His ideal was completely realized by the Primitives. These men, in +Italy, Germany, and especially in Flanders, had manifested the amplitude +and purity of vision which are the property of saintliness. In authentic +and patiently accurate settings they pictured beings whose postures were +caught from life itself, and the illusion was compelling and sure. From +these heads, common enough, many of them, and these physiognomies, often +ugly but powerfully evocative, emanated celestial joy or acute anguish, +spiritual calm or turmoil. The effect was of matter transformed, by +being distended or compressed, to afford an escape <!-- Page 9 -->from the senses into +remote infinity.</p> + +<p>Durtal's introduction to this naturalism had come as a revelation the +year before, although he had not then been so weary as now of <i>fin de +siècle</i> silliness. In Germany, before a Crucifixion by Matthæus +Grünewald, he had found what he was seeking.</p> + +<p>He shuddered in his armchair and closed his eyes as if in pain. With +extraordinary lucidity he revisualized the picture, and the cry of +admiration wrung from him when he had entered the little room of the +Cassel museum was reechoing in his mind as here, in his study, the +Christ rose before him, formidable, on a rude cross of barky wood, the +arm an untrimmed branch bending like a bow under the weight of the body.</p> + +<p>This branch seemed about to spring back and mercifully hurl afar from +our cruel, sinful world the suffering flesh held to earth by the +enormous spike piercing the feet. Dislocated, almost ripped out of their +sockets, the arms of the Christ seemed trammelled by the knotty cords of +the straining muscles. The laboured tendons of the armpits seemed ready +to snap. The fingers, wide apart, were contorted in an arrested gesture +in which were supplication and reproach but also benediction. The +trembling thighs were greasy with sweat. The ribs were like staves, or +like the bars of a cage, the flesh swollen, blue, mottled with +flea-bites, specked as with pin-pricks by spines broken off from the +rods of the scourging and now festering beneath the skin where they had +penetrated.</p> + +<p>Purulence was at hand. The fluvial wound in the side dripped thickly, +inundating the thigh with blood that was like congealing mulberry juice. +Milky pus, which yet was somewhat reddish, something like the colour of +grey Moselle, oozed from the chest and ran down over the abdomen and the +loin cloth. The knees had been forced together and the rotulæ touched, +but the lower legs were held wide apart, though the feet were placed one +on top of the other. These, <!-- Page 10 -->beginning to putrefy, were turning green +beneath a river of blood. Spongy and blistered, they were horrible, the +flesh tumefied, swollen over the head of the spike, and the gripping +toes, with the horny blue nails, contradicted the imploring gesture of +the hands, turning that benediction into a curse; and as the hands +pointed heavenward, so the feet seemed to cling to earth, to that ochre +ground, ferruginous like the purple soil of Thuringia.</p> + +<p>Above this eruptive cadaver, the head, tumultuous, enormous, encircled +by a disordered crown of thorns, hung down lifeless. One lacklustre eye +half opened as a shudder of terror or of sorrow traversed the expiring +figure. The face was furrowed, the brow seamed, the cheeks blanched; all +the drooping features wept, while the mouth, unnerved, its under jaw +racked by tetanic contractions, laughed atrociously.</p> + +<p>The torture had been terrific, and the agony had frightened the mocking +executioners into flight.</p> + +<p>Against a dark blue night-sky the cross seemed to bow down, almost to +touch the ground with its tip, while two figures, one on each side, kept +watch over the Christ. One was the Virgin, wearing a hood the colour of +mucous blood over a robe of wan blue. Her face was pale and swollen with +weeping, and she stood rigid, as one who buries his fingernails deep +into his palms and sobs. The other figure was that of Saint John, like a +gipsy or sunburnt Swabian peasant, very tall, his beard matted and +tangled, his robe of a scarlet stuff cut in wide strips like slabs of +bark. His mantle was a chamois yellow; the lining, caught up at the +sleeves, showed a feverish yellow as of unripe lemons. Spent with +weeping, but possessed of more endurance than Mary, who was yet erect +but broken and exhausted, he had joined his hands and in an access of +outraged loyalty had drawn himself up before the corpse, which he +contemplated with his red and smoky eyes while he choked back the cry +which threatened to rend his quivering throat.</p> + +<p>Ah, this coarse, tear-compelling Calvary was at the oppo<!-- Page 11 -->site pole from +those debonair Golgothas adopted by the Church ever since the +Renaissance. This lockjaw Christ was not the Christ of the rich, the +Adonis of Galilee, the exquisite dandy, the handsome youth with the +curly brown tresses, divided beard, and insipid doll-like features, whom +the faithful have adored for four centuries. This was the Christ of +Justin, Basil, Cyril, Tertullian, the Christ of the apostolic church, +the vulgar Christ, ugly with the assumption of the whole burden of our +sins and clothed, through humility, in the most abject of forms.</p> + +<p>It was the Christ of the poor, the Christ incarnate in the image of the +most miserable of us He came to save; the Christ of the afflicted, of +the beggar, of all those on whose indigence and helplessness the greed +of their brother battens; the human Christ, frail of flesh, abandoned by +the Father until such time as no further torture was possible; the +Christ with no recourse but His Mother, to Whom—then powerless to aid +Him—He had, like every man in torment, cried out with an infant's cry.</p> + +<p>In an unsparing humility, doubtless, He had willed to suffer the Passion +with all the suffering permitted to the human senses, and, obeying an +incomprehensible ordination, He, in the time of the scourging and of the +blows and of the insults spat in His face, had put off divinity, nor had +He resumed it when, after these preliminary mockeries, He entered upon +the unspeakable torment of the unceasing agony. Thus, dying like a +thief, like a dog, basely, vilely, physically, He had sunk himself to +the deepest depth of fallen humanity and had not spared Himself the last +ignominy of putrefaction.</p> + +<p>Never before had naturalism transfigured itself by such a conception and +execution. Never before had a painter so charnally envisaged divinity +nor so brutally dipped his brush into the wounds and running sores and +bleeding nail holes of the Saviour. Grünewald had passed all measure. He +was the most uncompromising of realists, but his morgue Redeemer, his +sewer Deity, let the observer know that realism <!-- Page 12 -->could be truly +transcendent. A divine light played about that ulcerated head, a +superhuman expression illuminated the fermenting skin of the epileptic +features. This crucified corpse was a very God, and, without aureole, +without nimbus, with none of the stock accoutrements except the +blood-sprinkled crown of thorns, Jesus appeared in His celestial +super-essence, between the stunned, grief-torn Virgin and a Saint John +whose calcined eyes were beyond the shedding of tears.</p> + +<p>These faces, by nature vulgar, were resplendent, transfigured with the +expression of the sublime grief of those souls whose plaint is not +heard. Thief, pauper, and peasant had vanished and given place to +supraterrestial creatures in the presence of their God.</p> + +<p>Grünewald was the most uncompromising of idealists. Never had artist +known such magnificent exaltation, none had ever so resolutely bounded +from the summit of spiritual altitude to the rapt orb of heaven. He had +gone to the two extremes. From the rankest weeds of the pit he had +extracted the finest essence of charity, the mordant liquor of tears. In +this canvas was revealed the masterpiece of an art obeying the +unopposable urge to render the tangible and the invisible, to make +manifest the crying impurity of the flesh and to make sublime the +infinite distress of the soul.</p> + +<p>It was without its equivalent in literature. A few pages of Anne +Emmerich upon the Passion, though comparatively attenuated, approached +this ideal of supernatural realism and of veridic and exsurrected life. +Perhaps, too, certain effusions of Ruysbroeck, seeming to spurt forth in +twin jets of black and white flame, were worthy of comparison with the +divine befoulment of Grünewald. Hardly, either. Grünewald's masterpiece +remained unique. It was at the same time infinite and of earth earthy.</p> + +<p>"But," said Durtal to himself, rousing out of his revery, "if I am +consistent I shall have to come around to the Catholicism of the Middle +Ages, to <i>mystic</i> naturalism. Ah, <!-- Page 13 -->no! I will not—and yet, perhaps I +may!"</p> + +<p>Here he was in the old dilemma. How often before now had he halted on +the threshold of Catholicism, sounding himself thoroughly and finding +always that he had no faith. Decidedly there had been no effort on the +part of God to reclaim him, and he himself had never possessed the kind +of will that permits one to let oneself go, trustingly, without reserve, +into the sheltering shadows of immutable dogma.</p> + +<p>Momentarily at times when, after reading certain books, his disgust for +everyday life was accentuated, he longed for lenitive hours in a +cloister, where the monotonous chant of prayers in an incense-laden +atmosphere would bring on a somnolence, a dreamy rapture of mystical +ideas. But only a simple soul, on which life's wear and tear had left no +mark, was capable of savouring the delights of such a self-abandon, and +his own soul was battered and torn with earthly conflict. He must admit +that the momentary desire to believe, to take refuge in the timeless, +proceeded from a multitude of ignoble motives: from lassitude with the +petty and repeated annoyances of existence, quarrels with the laundress, +with the waiter, with the landlord; the sordid scramble for money; in a +word, from the general spiritual failure of a man approaching forty. He +thought of escaping into a monastery somewhat as street girls think of +going into a house where they will be free from the dangers of the +chase, from worry about food and lodging, and where they will not have +to do their own washing and ironing.</p> + +<p>Unmarried, without settled income, the voice of carnality now +practically stilled in him, he sometimes cursed the existence he had +shaped for himself. At times, weary of attempting to coerce words to do +his bidding, he threw down his pen and looked into the future. He could +see nothing ahead of him but bitterness and cause for alarm, and, +seeking consolation, he was forced to admit that only religion could +heal, but religion demanded in return so arrant a desertion of common +sense, so pusillanimous a willingness to be aston<!-- Page 14 -->ished at nothing, that +he threw up his hands and begged off.</p> + +<p>Yet he was always playing with the thought, indeed he could not escape +it. For though religion was without foundation it was also without limit +and promised a complete escape from earth into dizzy, unexplored +altitudes. Then, too, Durtal was attracted to the Church by its intimate +and ecstatic art, the splendour of its legends, and the radiant naïveté +of the histories of its saints.</p> + +<p>He did not believe, and yet he admitted the supernatural. Right here on +earth how could any of us deny that we are hemmed in by mystery, in our +homes, in the street,—everywhere when we came to think of it? It was +really the part of shallowness to ignore those extrahuman relations and +account for the unforeseen by attributing to fate the more than +inexplicable. Did not a chance encounter often decide the entire life of +a man? What was love, what the other incomprehensible shaping +influences? And, knottiest enigma of all, what was money?</p> + +<p>There one found oneself confronted by primordial organic law, atrocious +edicts promulgated at the very beginning of the world and applied ever +since.</p> + +<p>The rules were precise and invariable. Money attracted money, +accumulating always in the same places, going by preference to the +scoundrelly and the mediocre. When, by an inscrutable exception, it +heaped up in the coffers of a rich man who was not a miser nor a +murderer, it stood idle, incapable of resolving itself into a force for +good, however charitable the hands which fain would administer it. One +would say it was angry at having got into the wrong box and avenged +itself by going into voluntary paralysis when possessed by one who was +neither a sharper nor an ass.</p> + +<p>It acted still more strangely when by some extraordinary chance it +strayed into the home of a poor man. Immediately it defiled the clean, +debauched the chaste, and, acting simultaneously on the body and the +soul, it insinuated into its possessor a base selfishness, an ignoble +pride; it suggested <!-- Page 15 -->that he spend for himself alone; it made the humble +man a boor, the generous man a skinflint. In one second it changed every +habit, revolutionized every idea, metamorphosed the most deeply rooted +passions.</p> + +<p>It was the instigator and vigilant accomplice of all the important sins. +If it permitted one of its detainers to forget himself and bestow a boon +it awakened hatred in the recipient, it replaced avarice with +ingratitude and re-established equilibrium so that the account might +balance and not one sin of commission be wanting.</p> + +<p>But it reached its real height of monstrosity when, concealing its +identity under an assumed name, it entitled itself capital. Then its +action was not limited to individual incitation to theft and murder but +extended to the entire human race. With one word capital decided +monopolies, erected banks, cornered necessities, and, if it wished, +caused thousands of human beings to starve to death.</p> + +<p>And it grew and begot itself while slumbering in a safe, and the Two +Worlds adored it on bended knee, dying of desire before it as before a +God.</p> + +<p>Well! money was the devil, otherwise its mastery of souls was +inexplicable. And how many other mysteries, equally unintelligible, how +many other phenomena were there to make a reflective man shudder!</p> + +<p>"But," thought Durtal, "seeing that there are so many more things +betwixt heaven and earth than are dreamed of in anybody's philosophy, +why not believe in the Trinity? Why reject the divinity of Christ? It is +no strain on one to admit the <i>Credo quia absurdum</i> of Saint Augustine +and Tertullian and say that if the supernatural were comprehensible it +would not be supernatural, and that precisely because it passes the +faculties of man it is divine.</p> + +<p>"And—oh, to hell with it! What's it all about, anyway?"</p> + +<p>And again, as so often when he had found himself before this +unbridgeable gulf between reason and belief, he recoiled <!-- Page 16 -->from the leap.</p> + +<p>Well, his thoughts had strayed far from the subject of that naturalism +so reviled by Des Hermies. He returned to Grünewald and said to himself +that the great Crucifixion was the masterpiece of an art driven out of +bounds. One need not go far in search of the extra-terrestrial as to +fall into perfervid Catholicism. Perhaps spiritualism would give one all +one required to formulate a supernaturalistic method.</p> + +<p>He rose and went into his tiny workroom. His pile of manuscript notes +about the Marshal de Rais, surnamed Bluebeard, looked at him derisively +from the table where they were piled.</p> + +<p>"All the same," he said, "it's good to be here, in out of the world and +above the limits of time. To live in another age, never read a +newspaper, not even know that the theatres exist—ah, what a dream! To +dwell with Bluebeard and forget the grocer on the corner and all the +other petty little criminals of an age perfectly typified by the café +waiter who ravishes the boss's daughter—the goose who lays the golden +egg, as he calls her—so that she will have to marry him!"</p> + +<p>Bed was a good place, he added, smiling, for he saw his cat, a creature +with a perfect time sense, regarding him uneasily as if to remind him of +their common convenience and to reproach him for not having prepared the +couch. Durtal arranged the pillows and pulled back the coverlet, and the +cat jumped to the foot of the bed but remained humped up, tail coiled +beneath him, waiting till his master was stretched out at length before +burrowing a little hollow to curl up in.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_II"><!-- Page 17 -->CHAPTER II</a></h2> + + +<p>Nearly two years ago Durtal had ceased to associate with men of letters. +They were represented in books and in the book-chat columns of magazines +as forming an aristocracy which had a monopoly on intelligence. Their +conversation, if one believed what one read, sparkled with effervescent +and stimulating wit. Durtal had difficulty accounting to himself for the +persistence of this illusion. His sad experience led him to believe that +every literary man belonged to one of two classes, the thoroughly +commercial or the utterly impossible.</p> + +<p>The first consisted of writers spoiled by the public, and drained dry in +consequence, but "successful." Ravenous for notice they aped the ways of +the world of big business, delighted in gala dinners, gave formal +evening parties, spoke of copyrights, sales, and long run plays, and +made great display of wealth.</p> + +<p>The second consisted of café loafers, "bohemians." Rolling on the +benches, gorged with beer they feigned an exaggerated modesty and at the +same time cried their wares, aired their genius, and abused their +betters.</p> + +<p>There was now no place where one could meet a few artists and privately, +intimately, discuss ideas at ease. One was at the mercy of the café +crowd or the drawing-room company. One's interlocutor was listening +avidly to steal one's ideas, and behind one's back one was being +vituperated. And the women were always intruding.</p> + +<p>In this indiscriminate world there was no illuminating criticism, +nothing but small talk, elegant or inelegant.<!-- Page 18 --></p> + +<p>Then Durtal learned, also by experience, that one cannot associate with +thieves without becoming either a thief or a dupe, and finally he broke +off relations with his confrères.</p> + +<p>He not only had no sympathy but no common topic of conversation with +them. Formerly when he accepted naturalism—airtight and unsatisfactory +as it was—he had been able to argue esthetics with them, but now!</p> + +<p>"The point is," Des Hermies was always telling him, "that there is a +basic difference between you and the other realists, and no patched-up +alliance could possibly be of long duration. You execrate the age and +they worship it. There is the whole matter. You were fated some day to +get away from this Americanized art and attempt to create something less +vulgar, less miserably commonplace, and infuse a little spirituality +into it.</p> + +<p>"In all your books you have fallen on our <i>fin de siècle</i>—our <i>queue du +siècle</i>—tooth and nail. But, Lord! a man soon gets tired of whacking +something that doesn't fight back but merely goes its own way repeating +its offences. You needed to escape into another epoch and get your +bearings while waiting for a congenial subject to present itself. That +explains your spiritual disarray of the last few months and your +immediate recovery as soon as you stumbled onto Giles de Rais."</p> + +<p>Des Hermies had diagnosed him accurately. The day on which Durtal had +plunged into the frightful and delightful latter mediæval age had been +the dawn of a new existence. The flouting of his actual surroundings +brought peace to Durtal's soul, and he had completely reorganized his +life, mentally cloistering himself, far from the furore of contemporary +letters, in the château de Tiffauges with the monster Bluebeard, with +whom he lived in perfect accord, even in mischievous amity.</p> + +<p>Thus history had for Durtal supplanted the novel, whose forced banality, +conventionality, and tidy structure of plot simply griped him. Yet +history, too, was only a peg for a <!-- Page 19 -->man of talent to hang style and +ideas on, for events could not fail to be coloured by the temperament +and distorted by the bias of the historian.</p> + +<p>As for the documents and sources! Well attested as they might be, they +were all subject to revision, even to contradiction by others exhumed +later which were no less authentic than the first and which also but +waited their turn to be refuted by newer discoveries.</p> + +<p>In the present rage for grubbing around in dusty archives writing of +history served as an outlet for the pedantry of the moles who reworked +their mouldy findings and were duly rewarded by the Institute with +medals and diplomas.</p> + +<p>For Durtal history was, then, the most pretentious as it was the most +infantile of deceptions. Old Clio ought to be represented with a +sphinx's head, mutton-chop whiskers, and one of those padded bonnets +which babies wore to keep them from bashing their little brains out when +they took a tumble.</p> + +<p>Of course exactitude was impossible. Why should he dream of getting at +the whole truth about the Middle Ages when nobody had been able to give +a full account of the Revolution, of the Commune for that matter? The +best he could do was to imagine himself in the midst of creatures of +that other epoch, wearing their antique garb, thinking their thoughts, +and then, having saturated himself with their spirit, to convey his +illusion by means of adroitly selected details.</p> + +<p>That is practically what Michelet did, and though the garrulous old +gossip drivelled endlessly about matters of supreme unimportance and +ecstasized in his mild way over trivial anecdotes which he expanded +beyond all proportion, and though his sentimentality and chauvinism +sometimes discredited his quite plausible conjectures, he was +nevertheless the only French historian who had overcome the limitation +of time and made another age live anew before our eyes.</p> + +<p>Hysterical, garrulous, manneristic as he was, there was yet a truly epic +sweep in certain passages of his History of<!-- Page 20 --> France. The personages were +raised from the oblivion into which the dry-as-dust professors had sunk +them, and became live human beings. What matter, then, if Michelet was +the least trustworthy of historians since he was the most personal and +the most evocative?</p> + +<p>As for the others, they simply ferreted around among the old state +papers, clipped them, and, following M. Taine's example, arranged, +ticketed, and mounted their sensational gleanings in logical sequence, +rejecting, of course, everything that did not advance the case they were +trying to make. They denied themselves imagination and enthusiasm and +claimed that they did not invent. True enough, but they did none the +less distort history by the selection they employed. And how simply and +summarily they disposed of things! It was discovered that such and such +an event occurred in France in several communities, and straightway it +was decided that the whole country lived, acted, and thought in a +certain manner at a certain hour, on a certain day, in a certain year.</p> + +<p>No less than Michelet they were doughty falsifiers, but they lacked his +vision. They dealt in knickknacks, and their trivialities were as far +from creating a unified impression as were the pointillistic puzzles of +modern painters and the word hashes cooked up by the decadent poets.</p> + +<p>And worst of all, thought Durtal, the biographers. The depilators! +taking all the hair off a real man's chest. They wrote ponderous tomes +to prove that Jan Steen was a teetotaler. Somebody had deloused Villon +and shown that the Grosse Margot of the ballade was not a woman but an +inn sign. Pretty soon they would be representing the poet as a +priggishly honest and judicious man. One would say that in writing their +monographs these historians feared to dishonour themselves by treating +of artists who had tasted somewhat fully and passionately of life. Hence +the expurgation of masterpieces that an artist might appear as +commonplace a bourgeois as his commentator.</p> + +<p><!-- Page 21 -->This rehabilitation school, today all-powerful, exasperated Durtal. In +writing his study of Gilles de Rais he was not going to fall into the +error of these bigoted sustainers of middle-class morality. With his +ideas of history he could not claim to give an exact likeness of +Bluebeard, but he was not going to concede to the public taste for +mediocrity in well- and evil-doing by whitewashing the man.</p> + +<p>Durtal's material for this study consisted of: a copy of the memorial +addressed by the heirs of Gilles de Rais to the king, notes taken from +the several true copies at Paris of the proceedings in the criminal +trial at Nantes, extracts from Vallet de Viriville's history of Charles +VII, finally the <i>Notice</i> by Armand Guéraut and the biography of the +abbé Bossard. These sufficed to bring before Durtal's eyes the +formidable figure of that Satanic fifteenth century character who was +the most artistically, exquisitely cruel, and the most scoundrelly of +men.</p> + +<p>No one knew of the projected study but Des Hermies, whom Durtal saw +nearly every day.</p> + +<p>They had met in the strangest of homes, that of Chantelouve, the +Catholic historian, who boasted of receiving all classes of people. And +every week in the social season that drawing-room in the rue de Bagneux +was the scene of a heterogeneous gathering of under sacristans, café +poets, journalists, actresses, partisans of the cause of Naundorff, +<a id="FNanchor_1_1" href="#Footnote_1_1"><sup>[1]</sup></a> and dabblers in equivocal sciences.</p> + +<p>This salon was on the edge of the clerical world, and many religious +came here at the risk of their reputations. The dinners were +discriminately, if unconventionally, ordered. Chantelouve, rotund, +jovial, bade everyone make himself at home. Now and then through his +smoked spectacles there stole an ambiguous look which might have given +an analyst pause, but the man's bonhomie, quite ecclesiastical, <!-- Page 22 -->was +instantly disarming. Madame was no beauty, but possessed a certain +bizarre charm and was always surrounded. She, however, remained silent +and did nothing to encourage her voluble admirers. As void of prudery as +her husband, she listened impassively, absently, with her thoughts +evidently afar, to the boldest of conversational imprudences.</p> + +<p>At one of these evening parties, while La Rousseil, recently converted, +howled a hymn, Durtal, sitting in a corner having a quiet smoke, had +been struck by the physiognomy and bearing of Des Hermies, who stood out +sharply from the motley throng of defrocked priests and grubby poets +packed into Chantelouve's library and drawing-room.</p> + +<p>Among these smirking and carefully composed faces, Des Hermies, +evidently a man of forceful individuality, seemed, and probably felt, +singularly out of place. He was tall, slender, somewhat pale. His eyes, +narrowed in a frown, had the cold blue gleam of sapphires. The nose was +short and sharp, the cheeks smooth shaven. With his flaxen hair and +Vandyke he might have been a Norwegian or an Englishman in not very good +health. His garments were of London make, and the long, tight, +wasp-waisted coat, buttoned clear up to the neck, seemed to enclose him +like a box. Very careful of his person, he had a manner all his own of +drawing off his gloves, rolling them up with an almost inaudible +crackling, then seating himself, crossing his long, thin legs, and +leaning over to the right, reaching into the patch pocket on his left +side and bringing forth the embossed Japanese pouch which contained his +tobacco and cigarette papers.</p> + +<p>He was methodic, guarded, and very cold in the presence of strangers. +His superior and somewhat bored attitude, not exactly relieved by his +curt, dry laugh, awakened, at a first meeting, a serious antipathy which +he sometimes justified by venomous words, by meaningless silences, by +unspoken innuendoes. He was respected and feared at Chantelouve's, but +when one came to know him one found, beneath his defensive shell, great +warmth of heart and a capacity for <!-- Page 23 -->true friendship of the kind that is +not expansive but is capable of sacrifice and can always be relied upon.</p> + +<p>How did he live? Was he rich or just comfortable? No one knew, and he, +tight lipped, never spoke of his affairs. He was doctor of the Faculty +of Paris—Durtal had chanced to see his diploma—but he spoke of +medicine with great disdain. He said he had become convinced of the +futility of all he had been taught, and had thrown it over for +homeopathy, which in turn he had thrown over for a Bolognese system, and +this last he was now excoriating.</p> + +<p>There were times when Durtal could not doubt that his friend was an +author, for Des Hermies spoke understandingly of tricks of the trade +which one learns only after long experience, and his literary judgment +was not that of a layman. When, one day, Durtal reproached him for +concealing his productions, he replied with a certain melancholy, "No, I +caught myself in time to choke down a base instinct, the desire of +resaying what has been said. I could have plagiarized Flaubert as well +as, if not better than, the poll parrots who are doing it, but I decided +not to. I would rather phrase abstruse medicaments of rare application; +perhaps it is not very necessary, but at least it isn't cheap."</p> + +<p>What surprised Durtal was his friend's prodigious erudition. Des Hermies +had the run of the most out-of-the-way book shops, he was an authority +on antique customs and, at the same time, on the latest scientific +discoveries. He hobnobbed with all the freaks in Paris, and from them he +became deeply learned in the most diverse and hostile sciences. He, so +cold and correct, was almost never to be found save in the company of +astrologers, cabbalists, demonologists, alchemists, theologians, or +inventors.</p> + +<p>Weary of the advances and the facile intimacies of artists, Durtal had +been attracted by this man's fastidious reserve. It was perfectly +natural that Durtal, surfeited with skin-deep friendships, should feel +drawn to Des Hermies, but it was difficult to imagine why Des Hermies, +with his taste for <!-- Page 24 -->strange associations, should take a liking to +Durtal, who was the soberest, steadiest, most normal of men. Perhaps Des +Hermies felt the need of talking with a sane human being now and then as +a relief. And, too, the literary discussions which he loved were out of +the question with these addlepates who monologued indefatigably on the +subject of their monomania and their ego.</p> + +<p>At odds, like Durtal, with his confrères, Des Hermies could expect +nothing from the physicians, whom he avoided, nor from the specialists +with whom he consorted.</p> + +<p>As a matter of fact there had been a juncture of two beings whose +situation was almost identical. At first restrained and on the +defensive, they had come finally to <i>tu-toi</i> each other and establish a +relation which had been a great advantage to Durtal. His family were +dead, the friends of his youth married and scattered, and since his +withdrawal from the world of letters he had been reduced to complete +solitude. Des Hermies kept him from going stale and then, finding that +Durtal had not lost all interest in mankind, promised to introduce him +to a really lovable old character. Of this man Des Hermies spoke much, +and one day he said, "You really ought to know him. He likes the books +of yours which I have lent him, and he wants to meet you. You think I am +interested only in obscure and twisted natures. Well, you will find +Carhaix really unique. He is the one Catholic with intelligence and +without sanctimoniousness; the one poor man with envy and hatred for +none."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_III"><!-- Page 25 -->CHAPTER III</a></h2> + + +<p>Durtal was in a situation familiar to all bachelors who have the +concierge do their cleaning. Only these know how a tiny lamp can fairly +drink up oil, and how the contents of a bottle of cognac can become +paler and weaker without ever diminishing. They know, too, how a once +comfortable bed can become forbidding, and how scrupulously a concierge +can respect its least fold or crease. They learn to be resigned and to +wash out a glass when they are thirsty and make their own fire when they +are cold.</p> + +<p>Durtal's concierge was an old man with drooping moustache and a powerful +breath of "three-six." Indolent and placid, he opposed an unbudgeable +inertia to Durtal's frantic and profanely expressed demand that the +sweeping be done at the same hour every morning.</p> + +<p>Threats, prayers, insults, the withholding of gratuities, were without +effect. Père Rateau took off his cap, scratched his head, promised, in +the tone of a man much moved, to mend his ways, and next day came later +than ever.</p> + +<p>"What a nuisance!" thought Durtal today, as he heard a key turning in +the lock, then he looked at his watch and observed that once again the +concierge was arriving after three o'clock in the afternoon.</p> + +<p>There was nothing for it but to submit with a sigh to the ensuing +hullabaloo. Rateau, somnolent and pacific in his lodge, became a demon +when he got a broom in his hand. In this sedentary being, who could +drowse all morning in the stale basement atmosphere heavy with the +cumulative aroma of many meat-stews, a martial ardour, a warlike +ferocity, <!-- Page 26 -->then asserted themselves, and like a red revolutionary he +assaulted the bed, charged the chairs, manhandled the picture frames, +knocked the tables over, rattled the water pitcher, and whirled Durtal's +brogues about by the laces as when a pillaging conqueror hauls a +ravished victim along by the hair. So he stormed the apartment like a +barricade and triumphantly brandished his battle standard, the dust rag, +over the reeking carnage of the furniture.</p> + +<p>Durtal at such times sought refuge in the room which was not being +attacked. Today Rateau launched his offensive against the workroom, so +Durtal fled to the bedroom. From there, through the half open door, he +could see the enemy, with a feather duster like a Mohican war bonnet +over his head, doing a scalp dance around a table.</p> + +<p>"If I only knew at what time that pest would break in on me so I could +always arrange to be out!" groaned Durtal. Now he ground his teeth, as +Rateau, with a yell, grabbed up the mop and, skating around on one leg, +belaboured the floor lustily.</p> + +<p>The perspiring conqueror then appeared in the doorway and advanced to +reduce the chamber where Durtal was. The latter had to return to the +subjugated workroom, and the cat, shocked by the racket, arched its back +and, rubbing against its master's legs, followed him to a place of +safety.</p> + +<p>In the thick of the conflict Des Hermies rang the door bell.</p> + +<p>"I'll put on my shoes," cried Durtal, "and we'll get out of this. +Look—" he passed his hand over the table and brought back a coat of +grime that made him appear to be wearing a grey glove—"look. That brute +turns the house upside down and knocks everything to pieces, and here's +the result. He leaves more dust when he goes than he found when he came +in!"</p> + +<p>"Bah," said Des Hermies, "dust isn't a bad thing. Besides having the +taste of ancient biscuit and the smell of an old book, it is the +floating velvet which softens hard surfaces, <!-- Page 27 -->the fine dry wash which +takes the garishness out of crude colour schemes. It is the caparison of +abandon, the veil of oblivion. Who, then, can despise it—aside from +certain persons whose lamentable lot must often have wrung a tear from +you?</p> + +<p>"Imagine living in one of these Paris <i>passages</i>. Think of a consumptive +spitting blood and suffocating in a room one flight up, behind the +'ass-back' gables of, say the passage des Panoramas, for instance. When +the window is open the dust comes in impregnated with snuff and +saturated with clammy exudations. The invalid, choking, begs for air, +and in order that he may breathe the window is <i>closed</i>.</p> + +<p>"Well, the dust that you complain of is rather milder than that. Anyway +I don't hear you coughing.... But if you're ready we'll be on our way."</p> + +<p>"Where shall we go?" asked Durtal.</p> + +<p>Des Hermies did not answer. They left the rue du Regard, in which Durtal +lived, and went down the rue du Cherche-Midi as far as the Croix-Rouge.</p> + +<p>"Let's go on to the place Saint-Sulpice," said Des Hermies, and after a +silence he continued, "Speaking of dust, 'out of which we came and to +which we shall return,' do you know that after we are dead our corpses +are devoured by different kinds of worms according as we are fat or +thin? In fat corpses one species of maggot is found, the rhizophagus, +while thin corpses are patronized only by the phora. The latter is +evidently the aristocrat, the fastidious gourmet which turns up its nose +at a heavy meal of copious breasts and juicy fat bellies. Just think, +there is no perfect equality, even in the manner in which we feed the +worms.</p> + +<p>"But this is where we stop."</p> + +<p>They had come to where the rue Férou opens into the place Saint-Sulpice. +Durtal looked up and on an unenclosed porch in the flank of the church +of Saint-Sulpice he read the placard, "Tower open to visitors."</p> + +<p>"Let's go up," said Des Hermies.<!-- Page 28 --></p> + +<p>"What for! In this weather?" and Durtal pointed at the yellow sky over +which black clouds, like factory smoke, were racing, so low that the tin +chimneys seemed to penetrate them and crenelate them with little spots +of clarity. "I am not enthusiastic about trying to climb a flight of +broken, irregular stairs. And anyway, what do you think you can see up +there? It's misty and getting dark. No, have a heart."</p> + +<p>"What difference is it to you where you take your airing? Come on. I +assure you you will see something unusual."</p> + +<p>"Oh! you brought me here on purpose?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Why didn't you say so?"</p> + +<p>He followed Des Hermies into the darkness under the porch. At the back +of the cellarway a little essence lamp, hanging from a nail, lighted a +door, the tower entrance.</p> + +<p>For a long time, in utter darkness, they climbed a winding stair. Durtal +was wondering where the keeper had gone, when, turning a corner, he saw +a shaft of light, then he stumbled against the rickety supports of a +"double-current" lamp in front of a door. Des Hermies pulled a bell cord +and the door swung back.</p> + +<p>Above them on a landing they could see feet, whether of a man or of a +woman they could not tell.</p> + +<p>"Ah! it's you, M. des Hermies," and a woman bent over, describing an +arc, so that her head was in a stream of light. "Louis will be very glad +to see you."</p> + +<p>"Is he in?" asked Des Hermies, reaching up and shaking hands with the +woman.</p> + +<p>"He is in the tower. Won't you stop and rest a minute?"</p> + +<p>"Why, when we come down, if you don't mind."</p> + +<p>"Then go up until you see a grated door—but what an old fool I am! You +know the way as well as I do."</p> + +<p>"To be sure, to be sure.... But, in passing, permit me to introduce my +friend Durtal."</p> + +<p>Durtal, somewhat flustered, made a bow in the darkness.<!-- Page 29 --></p> + +<p>"Ah, monsieur, how fortunate. Louis is so anxious to meet you."</p> + +<p>"Where is he taking me?" Durtal wondered as again he groped along behind +his friend, now and then, just as he felt completely lost, coming to the +narrow strip of light admitted by a barbican, and again proceeding in +inky darkness. The climb seemed endless. Finally they came to the barred +door, opened it, and found themselves on a frame balcony with the abyss +above and below. Des Hermies, who seemed perfectly at home, pointed +downward, then upward. They were halfway up a tower the face of which +was overlaid with enormous criss-crossing joists and beams riveted +together with bolt heads as big as a man's fist. Durtal could see no +one. He turned and, clinging to the hand rail, groped along the wall +toward the daylight which stole down between the inclined leaves of the +sounding-shutters.</p> + +<p>Leaning out over the precipice, he discerned beneath him a formidable +array of bells hanging from oak supports lined with iron. The sombre +bell metal was slick as if oiled and absorbed light without refracting +it. Bending backward, he looked into the upper abyss and perceived new +batteries of bells overhead. These bore the raised effigy of a bishop, +and a place in each, worn by the striking of the clapper, shone golden.</p> + +<p>All were in quiescence, but the wind rattled against the +sounding-shutters, stormed through the cage of timbers, howled along the +spiral stair, and was caught and held whining in the bell vases. +Suddenly a light breeze, like the stirring of confined air, fanned his +cheek. He looked up. The current had been set in motion by the swaying +of a great bell beginning to get under way. There was a crash of sound, +the bell gathered momentum, and now the clapper, like a gigantic pestle, +was grinding the great bronze mortar with a deafening clamour. The tower +trembled, the balcony on which Durtal was standing trepidated like the +floor of a railway coach, there was the continuous rolling of a mighty +<!-- Page 30 -->reverberation, interrupted regularly by the jar of metal upon metal.</p> + +<p>In vain Durtal scanned the upper abyss. Finally he managed to catch +sight of a leg, swinging out into space and back again, in one of those +wooden stirrups, two of which, he had noticed, were fastened to the +bottom of every bell. Leaning out so that he was almost prone on one of +the timbers, he finally perceived the ringer, clinging with his hands to +two iron handles and balancing over the gulf with his eyes turned +heavenward.</p> + +<p>Durtal was shocked by the face. Never had he seen such disconcerting +pallor. It was not the waxen hue of the convalescent, not the lifeless +grey of the perfume- or snuff-maker, it was a prison pallor of a +bloodless lividness unknown today, the ghastly complexion of a wretch of +the Middle Ages shut up till death in a damp, airless, pitch-dark +<i>in-pace</i>.</p> + +<p>The eyes were blue, prominent, even bulging, and had the mystic's +readiness to tears, but their expression was singularly contradicted by +the truculent Kaiser Wilhelm moustache. The man seemed at once a dreamer +and a fighter, and it would have been difficult to tell which character +predominated.</p> + +<p>He gave the bell stirrup a last yank with his foot and with a heave of +his loins regained his equilibrium. He mopped his brow and smiled down +at Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"Well! well!" he said, "you here."</p> + +<p>He descended, and when he learned Durtal's name his face brightened and +the two shook hands cordially.</p> + +<p>"We have been expecting you a long time, monsieur. Our friend here +speaks of you at great length, and we have been asking him why he didn't +bring you around to see us. But come," he said eagerly, "I must conduct +you on a tour of inspection about my little domain. I have read your +books and I know a man like you can't help falling in love with my +bells. But we must go higher if we are really to see them."<!-- Page 31 --></p> + +<p>And he bounded up a staircase, while Des Hermies pushed Durtal along in +front of him in a way that made retreat impossible.</p> + +<p>As he was once more groping along the winding stairs, Durtal asked, "Why +didn't you tell me your friend Carhaix—for of course that's who he +is—was a bell-ringer?"</p> + +<p>Des Hermies did not have time to answer, for at that moment, having +reached the door of the room beneath the tower roof, Carhaix was +standing aside to let them pass. They were in a rotunda pierced in the +centre by a great circular hole which had around it a corroded iron +balustrade orange with rust. By standing close to the railing, which was +like the well curb of the Pit, one could see down, down, to the +foundation. The "well" seemed to be undergoing repairs, and from the top +to the bottom of the tube the beams supporting the bells were +crisscrossed with timbers bracing the walls.</p> + +<p>"Don't be afraid to lean over," said Carhaix. "Now tell me, monsieur, +how do you like my foster children?"</p> + +<p>But Durtal was hardly heeding. He felt uneasy, here in space, and as if +drawn toward the gaping chasm, whence ascended, from time to time, the +desultory clanging of the bell, which was still swaying and would be +some time in returning to immobility.</p> + +<p>He recoiled.</p> + +<p>"Wouldn't you like to pay a visit to the top of the tower?" asked +Carhaix, pointing to an iron stair sealed into the wall.</p> + +<p>"No, another day."</p> + +<p>They descended and Carhaix, in silence, opened a door. They advanced +into an immense storeroom, containing colossal broken statues of saints, +scaly and dilapidated apostles, Saint Matthew legless and armless, Saint +Luke escorted by a fragmentary ox, Saint Mark lacking a shoulder and +part of his beard, Saint Peter holding up an arm from which the hand +holding the keys was broken off.</p> + +<p>"There used to be a swing in here," said Carhaix, "for <!-- Page 32 -->the little girls +of the neighbourhood. But the privilege was abused, as privileges always +are. In the dusk all kinds of things were done for a few sous. The +curate finally had the swing taken down and the room closed up."</p> + +<p>"And what is that over there?" inquired Durtal, perceiving, in a corner, +an enormous fragment of rounded metal, like half a gigantic skull-cap. +On it the dust lay thick, and in the hollow the meshes on meshes of +fine silken web, dotted with the black bodies of lurking spiders, were +like a fisherman's hand net weighted with little slugs of lead.</p> + +<p>"That? Ah, monsieur!" and there was fire in Carhaix's mild eyes, "that +is the skull of an old, old bell whose like is not cast these days. The +ring of that bell, monsieur, was like a voice from heaven." And suddenly +he exploded, "Bells have had their day!—As I suppose Des Hermies has +told you.—Bell ringing is a lost art. And why wouldn't it be? Look at +the men who are doing it nowadays. Charcoal burners, roofers, masons out +of a job, discharged firemen, ready to try their hand at anything for a +franc. There are curates who think nothing of saying, 'Need a man? Go +out in the street and pick up a soldier for ten sous. He'll do.' That's +why you read about accidents like the one that happened lately at Notre +Dame, I think. The fellow didn't withdraw in time and the bell came down +like the blade of a guillotine and whacked his leg right off.</p> + +<p>"People will spend thirty thousand francs on an altar baldachin, and +ruin themselves for music, and they have to have gas in their churches, +and Lord knows what all besides, but when you mention bells they shrug +their shoulders. Do you know, M. Durtal, there are only two men in Paris +who can ring chords? Myself and Père Michel, and he is not married and +his morals are so bad that he can't be regularly attached to a church. +He can ring music the like of which you never heard, but he, too, is +losing interest. He drinks, and, drunk or sober, goes to work, then he +bowls up again and goes to sleep.<!-- Page 33 --></p> + +<p>"Yes, the bell has had its day. Why, this very morning, Monsignor made +his pastoral visit to this church. At eight o'clock we sounded his +arrival. The six bells you see down here boomed out melodiously. But +there were sixteen up above, and it was a shame. Those extras jangled +away haphazard. It was a riot of discord."</p> + +<p>Carhaix ruminated in silence as they descended. Then, "Ah, monsieur," he +said, his watery eyes fairly bubbling, "the ring of bells, there's your +real sacred music."</p> + +<p>They were now above the main door of the building and they came out into +the great covered gallery on which the towers rest. Carhaix smiled and +pointed out a complete peal of miniature bells, installed between two +pillars on a plank. He pulled the cords, and, in ecstasies, his eyes +protruding, his moustache bristling, he listened to the frail tinkling +of his toy.</p> + +<p>And suddenly he relinquished the cords.</p> + +<p>"I once had a crazy idea," he said, "of forming a class here and +teaching all the intricacies of the craft, but no one cared to learn a +trade which was steadily going out of existence. Why, you know we don't +even sound for weddings any more, and nobody comes to look at the tower.</p> + +<p>"But I really can't complain. I hate the streets. When I try to cross +one I lose my head. So I stay in the tower all day, except once in the +early morning when I go to the other side of the square for a bucket of +water. Now my wife doesn't like it up here. You see, the snow does come +in through all the loopholes and it heaps up, and sometimes we are +snowbound with the wind blowing a gale."</p> + +<p>They had come to Carhaix's lodge. His wife was waiting for them on the +threshold.</p> + +<p>"Come in, gentlemen," she said. "You have certainly earned some +refreshment," and she pointed to four glasses which she had set out on +the table.</p> + +<p>The bell-ringer lighted a little briar pipe, while Des Hermies and +Durtal each rolled a cigarette.<!-- Page 34 --></p> + +<p>"Pretty comfortable place," remarked Durtal, just to be saying +something. It was a vast room, vaulted, with walls of rough stone, and +lighted by a semi-circular window just under the ceiling. The tiled +floor was badly covered by an infamous carpet, and the furniture, very +simple, consisted of a round dining-room table, some old <i>bergère</i> +armchairs covered with slate-blue Utrecht velours, a little stained +walnut sideboard on which were several plates and pitchers of Breton +faience, and opposite the sideboard a little black bookcase, which might +contain fifty books.</p> + +<p>"Of course a literary man would be interested in the books," said +Carhaix, who had been watching Durtal. "You mustn't be too critical, +monsieur. I have only the tools of my trade."</p> + +<p>Durtal went over and took a look. The collection consisted largely of +works on bells. He read some of the titles:</p> + +<p>On the cover of a slim parchment volume he deciphered the faded legend, +hand-written, in rust-coloured ink, "<i>De tintinnabulis</i> by Jerome +Magius, 1664"; then, pell-mell, there were: <i>A curious and edifying +miscellany concerning church bells</i> by Dom Rémi Carré; another <i>Edifying +miscellany</i>, anonymous; a <i>Treatise of bells</i> by Jean-Baptiste Thiers, +curate of Champrond and Vibraye; a ponderous tome by an architect named +Blavignac; a smaller work entitled <i>Essay on the symbolism of bells</i> by +a parish priest of Poitiers; a <i>Notice</i> by the abbé Baraud; then a whole +series of brochures, with covers of grey paper, bearing no titles.</p> + +<p>"It's no collection at all," said Carhaix with a sigh. "The best ones +are wanting, the <i>De campanis commentarius</i> of Angelo Rocca and the <i>De +tintinnabulo</i> of Percichellius, but they are so hard to find, and so +expensive when you do find them."</p> + +<p>A glance sufficed for the rest of the books, most of them being pious +works, Latin and French Bibles, an <i>Imitation of Christ</i>, Görres' +<i>Mystik</i> in five volumes, the abbé Aubert's <i>History and theory of +religious symbolism</i>, Pluquet's <i>Dic<!-- Page 35 -->tionary of heresies</i>, and several +lives of saints.</p> + +<p>"Ah, monsieur, my own books are not much account, but Des Hermies lends +me what he knows will interest me."</p> + +<p>"Don't talk so much!" said his wife. "Give monsieur a chance to sit +down," and she handed Durtal a brimming glass aromatic with the +acidulous perfume of genuine cider.</p> + +<p>In response to his compliments she told him that the cider came from +Brittany and was made by relatives of hers at Landévennec, her and +Carhaix's native village.</p> + +<p>She was delighted when Durtal affirmed that long ago he had spent a day +in Landévennec.</p> + +<p>"Why, then we know each other already!" she said, shaking hands with him +again.</p> + +<p>The room was heated to suffocation by a stove whose pipe zigzagged over +to the window and out through a sheet-iron square nailed to the sash in +place of one of the panes. Carhaix and his good wife, with her honest, +weak face and frank, kind eyes, were the most restful of people. Durtal, +made drowsy by the warmth and the quiet domesticity, let his thoughts +wander. He said to himself, "If I had a place like this, above the roofs +of Paris, I would fix it up and make of it a real haven of refuge. Here, +in the clouds, alone and aloof, I would work away on my book and take my +time about it, years perhaps. What inconceivable happiness it would be +to escape from the age, and, while the waves of human folly were +breaking against the foot of the tower, to sit up here, out of it all, +and pore over antique tomes by the shaded light of the lamp."</p> + +<p>He smiled at the naïveté of his daydream.</p> + +<p>"I certainly do like your place," he said aloud, as if to sum up his +reflections.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you wouldn't if you had to live here," said the good wife. "We have +plenty of room, too much room, because there are a couple of bedchambers +as big as this, besides plenty of closet space, but it's so +inconvenient—and so cold! And no kitchen—" and she pointed to a +landing where, <!-- Page 36 -->blocking the stairway, the cook stove had had to be +installed. "And there are so many, many steps to go up when you come +back from market. I am getting old, and I have a twinge of the +rheumatics whenever I think about making the climb."</p> + +<p>"You can't even drive a nail into this rock wall and have a peg to hang +things on," said Carhaix. "But I like this place. I was made for it. Now +my wife dreams constantly of spending her last days in Landévennec."</p> + +<p>Des Hermies rose. All shook hands, and monsieur and madame made Durtal +swear that he would come again.</p> + +<p>"What refreshing people!" exclaimed Durtal as he and Des Hermies crossed +the square.</p> + +<p>"And Carhaix is a mine of information."</p> + +<p>"But tell me, what the devil is an educated man, of no ordinary +intelligence, doing, working as a—as a day labourer?"</p> + +<p>"If Carhaix could hear you! But, my friend, in the Middle Ages +bell-ringers were high officials. True, the craft has declined +considerably in modern times. I couldn't tell you myself how Carhaix +became hipped on the subject of bells. All I know is that he studied at +a seminary in Brittany, that he had scruples of conscience and +considered himself unworthy to enter the priesthood, that he came to +Paris and apprenticed himself to a very intellectual master bell-ringer, +Père Gilbert, who had in his cell at Notre Dame some ancient and of +course unique plans of Paris that would make your mouth water. Gilbert +wasn't a 'labourer,' either. He was an enthusiastic collector of +documents relating to old Paris. From Notre Dame Carhaix came to Saint +Sulpice, fifteen years ago, and has been there ever since."</p> + +<p>"How did you happen to make his acquaintance?"</p> + +<p>"First he was my patient, then my friend. I've known him ten years."</p> + +<p>"Funny. He doesn't look like a seminary product. Most of them have the +shuffling gait and sheepish air of an old gardener."<!-- Page 37 --></p> + +<p>"Carhaix will be all right for a few more years," said Des Hermies, as +if to himself, "and then let us mercifully wish him a speedy death. The +Church, which has begun by sanctioning the introduction of gas into the +chapels, will end by installing mechanical chimes instead of bells. That +will be charming. The machinery will be run by electricity and we shall +have real up-to-date, timbreless, Protestant peals."</p> + +<p>"Then Carhaix's wife will have a chance to go back to Finistère."</p> + +<p>"No, they are too poor, and then too Carhaix would be broken-hearted if +he lost his bells. Curious, a man's affection for the object that he +manipulates. The mechanic's love for his machine. The thing that one +tends, and that obeys one, becomes personalized, and one ends by falling +in love with it. And the bell is an instrument in a class of its own. It +is baptized like a Christian, anointed with sacramental oil, and +according to the pontifical rubric it is also to be sanctified, in the +interior of its chalice, by a bishop, in seven cruciform unctions with +the oil of the infirm that it may send to the dying the message which +shall sustain them in their last agonies.</p> + +<p>"It is the herald of the Church, the voice from without as the priest is +the voice from within. So you see it isn't a mere piece of bronze, a +reversed mortar to be swung at a rope's end. Add that bells, like fine +wines, ripen with age, that their tone becomes more ample and mellow, +that they lose their sharp bouquet, their raw flavour. That will +explain—imperfectly—how one can become attached to them."</p> + +<p>"Why, you seem to be an enthusiast yourself."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't know anything about it. I am simply repeating what I have +heard Carhaix say. If the subject interests you, he will be only too +glad to teach you the symbolism of bells. He is inexhaustible. The man +is a monomaniac."<!-- Page 38 --></p> + +<p>"I can understand," said Durtal dreamily. "I live in a quarter where +there are a good many convents and at dawn the air is a-tingle with the +vibrance of the chimes. When I was ill I used to lie awake at night +awaiting the sound of the matin bells and welcoming them as a +deliverance. In the grey light I felt that I was being cuddled by a +distant and secret caress, that a lullaby was crooned over me, and a +cool hand applied to my burning forehead. I had the assurance that the +folk who were awake were praying for the others, and consequently for +me. I felt less lonely. I really believe the bells are sounded for the +special benefit of the sick who cannot sleep."</p> + +<p>"The bells ring for others, notably for the trouble-makers. The rather +common inscription for the side of a bell, '<i>Paco cruentos</i>,' 'I pacify +the bloody-minded,' is singularly apt, when you think it over."</p> + +<p>This conversation was still haunting Durtal when he went to bed. +Carhaix's phrase, "The ring of the bells is the real sacred music," took +hold of him like an obsession. And drifting back through the centuries +he saw in dream the slow processional of monks and the kneeling +congregations responding to the call of the angelus and drinking in the +balm of holy sound as if it were consecrated wine.</p> + +<p>All the details he had ever known of the liturgies of ages came crowding +into his mind. He could hear the sounding of matin invitatories; chimes +telling a rosary of harmony over tortuous labyrinths of narrow streets, +over cornet towers, over pepper-box pignons, over dentelated walls; the +chimes chanting the canonical hours, prime and tierce, sexte and none, +vespers and compline; celebrating the joy of a city with the tinkling +laughter of the little bells, tolling its sorrow with the ponderous +lamentation of the great ones. And there were master ringers in those +times, makers of chords, who could send into the air the expression of +the whole soul of a community. And the bells which they served as +submissive sons and faithful deacons were as humble and as <!-- Page 39 -->truly of the +people as was the Church itself. As the priest at certain times put off +his chasuble, so the bell at times had put off its sacred character and +spoken to the baptized on fair day and market day, inviting them, in the +event of rain, to settle their affairs inside the nave of the church +and, that the sanctity of the place might not be violated by the +conflicts arising from sharp bargaining, imposing upon them a probity +unknown before or since.</p> + +<p>Today bells spoke an obsolete language, incomprehensible to man. Carhaix +was under no misapprehension. Living in an aërial tomb outside the human +scramble, he was faithful to his art, and in consequence no longer had +any reason for existing. He vegetated, superfluous and demoded, in a +society which insisted that for its amusement the holy place be turned +into a concert hall. He was like a creature reverted, a relic of a +bygone age, and he was supremely contemptuous of the miserable <i>fin de +siècle</i> church showmen who to draw fashionable audiences did not fear to +offer the attraction of cavatinas and waltzes rendered on the cathedral +organ by manufacturers of profane music, by ballet mongers and comic +opera-wrights.</p> + +<p>"Poor Carhaix!" said Durtal, as he blew out the candle. "Another who +loves this epoch about as well as Des Hermies and I do. But he has the +tutelage of his bells, and certainly among his wards he has his +favourite. He is not to be pitied. He has his hobby, which renders life +possible for him, as hobbies do."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_IV"><!-- Page 40 -->CHAPTER IV</a></h2> + + +<p>"How is Gilles de Rais progressing?"</p> + +<p>"I have finished the first part of his life, making just the briefest +possible mention of his virtues and achievements."</p> + +<p>"Which are of no interest," remarked Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"Evidently, since the name of Gilles de Rais would have perished four +centuries ago but for the enormities of vice which it symbolizes. I am +coming to the crimes now. The great difficulty, you see, is to explain +how this man, who was a brave captain and a good Christian, all of a +sudden became a sacrilegious sadist and a coward."</p> + +<p>"Metamorphosed over night, as it were."</p> + +<p>"Worse. As if at a touch of a fairy's wand or of a playwright's pen. +That is what mystifies his biographers. Of course untraceable influences +must have been at work a long time, and there must have been occasional +outcropping not mentioned in the chronicles. Here is a recapitulation of +our material.</p> + +<p>"Gilles de Rais was born about 1404 on the boundary between Brittany and +Anjou, in the château de Mâchecoul. We know nothing of his childhood. +His father died about the end of October, 1415, and his mother almost +immediately married a Sieur d'Estouville, abandoning her two sons, +Gilles and René. They became the wards of their grandfather, Jean de +Craon, 'a man old and ancient and of exceeding great age,' as the texts +say. He seems to have allowed his two charges to run wild, and then to +have got rid of Gilles by marrying him to Catherine de Thouars, November +30, 1420.</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 41 -->Gilles is known to have been at the court of the Dauphin five years +later. His contemporaries represent him as a robust, active man, of +striking beauty and rare elegance. We have no explicit statement as to +the rôle he played in this court, but one can easily imagine what sort +of treatment the richest baron in France received at the hands of an +impoverished king.</p> + +<p>"For at that moment Charles VII was in extremities. He was without +money, prestige, or real authority. Even the cities along the Loire +scarcely obeyed him. France, decimated a few years before, by the +plague, and further depopulated by massacres, was in a deplorable +situation.</p> + +<p>"England, rising from the sea like the fabled polyp the Kraken, had cast +her tentacles over Brittany, Normandy, l'Ile de France, part of Picardy, +the entire North, the Interior as far as Orléans, and crawling forward +left in her wake towns squeezed dry and country exhausted.</p> + +<p>"In vain Charles clamoured for subsidies, invented excuses for +exactions, and pressed the imposts. The paralyzed cities and fields +abandoned to the wolves could afford no succour. Remember his very claim +to the throne was disputed. He became like a blind man going the rounds +with a tin cup begging sous. His court at Chinon was a snarl of intrigue +complicated by an occasional murder. Weary of being hunted, more or less +out of harm's way behind the Loire, Charles and his partisans finally +consoled themselves by flaunting in the face of inevitable disaster the +devil-may-care debaucheries of the condemned making the most of the few +moments left them. Forays and loans furnished them with opulent cheer +and permitted them to carouse on a grand scale. The eternal <i>qui-vive</i> +and the misfortunes of war were forgotten in the arms of courtesans.</p> + +<p>"What more could have been expected of a used-up sleepy-headed king, the +issue of an infamous mother and a mad father?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, whatever you say about Charles VII pales beside the <!-- Page 42 -->testimony of +the portrait of him in the Louvre painted by Foucquet. That bestial +face, with the eyes of a small-town ursurer and the sly psalm-singing +mouth that butter wouldn't melt in, has often arrested me. Foucquet +depicts a debauched priest who has a bad cold and has been drinking sour +wine. Yet you can see that this monarch is of the very same type as the +more refined, less salacious, more prudently cruel, more obstinate and +cunning Louis XI, his son and successor. Well, Charles VII was the man +who had Jean Sans Peur assassinated, and who abandoned Jeanne d'Arc. +What more need be said?"</p> + +<p>"What indeed? Well, Gilles de Rais, who had raised an army at his own +expense, was certainly welcomed by this court with open arms. There is +no doubt that he footed the bills for tournaments and banquets, that he +was vigilantly 'tapped' by the courtiers, and that he lent the king +staggering sums. But in spite of his popularity he never seems to have +evaded responsibility and wallowed in debauchery, like the king. We find +Gilles shortly afterward defending Anjou and Maine against the English. +The chronicles say that he was 'a good and hardy captain,' but his +'goodness' and 'hardiness' did not prevent him from being borne back by +force of numbers. The English armies, uniting, inundated the country, +and, pushing on unchecked, invaded the interior. The king was ready to +flee to the Mediterranean provinces and let France go, when Jeanne d'Arc +appeared.</p> + +<p>"Gilles returned to court and was entrusted by Charles with the 'guard +and defence' of the Maid of Orleans. He followed her everywhere, fought +at her side, even under the walls of Paris, and was with her at Rheims +the day of the coronation, at which time, says Monstrelet, the king +rewarded his valour by naming him Marshal of France, at the age of +twenty-five."</p> + +<p>"Lord!" Des Hermies interrupted, "promotion came rapidly in those times. +But I suppose warriors then weren't the bemedalled, time-serving +incompetents they are now."</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 43 -->Oh, don't be misled. The title of Marshal of France didn't mean so +much in Gilles's time as it did afterward in the reign of Francis I, and +nothing like what it has come to mean since Napoleon.</p> + +<p>"What was the conduct of Gilles de Rais toward Jeanne d'Arc? We have no +certain knowledge. M. Vallet de Viriville, without proof, accuses him of +treachery. M. l'abbé Bossard, on the contrary, claims—and alleges +plausible reasons for entertaining the opinion—that he was loyal to her +and watched over her devotedly.</p> + +<p>"What is certain is that Gilles's soul became saturated with mystical +ideas. His whole history proves it.</p> + +<p>"He was constantly in association with this extraordinary maid whose +adventures seemed to attest the possibility of divine intervention in +earthly affairs. He witnessed the miracle of a peasant girl dominating a +court of ruffians and bandits and arousing a cowardly king who was on +the point of flight. He witnessed the incredible episode of a virgin +bringing back to the fold such black rams as La Hire, Xaintrailles, +Beaumanoir, Chabannes, Dunois, and Gaucourt, and washing their old +fleeces whiter than snow. Undoubtedly Gilles also, under her +shepherding, docilely cropped the white grass of the gospel, took +communion the morning of a battle, and revered Jeanne as a saint.</p> + +<p>"He saw the Maid fulfil all her promises. She raised the siege of +Orléans, had the king consecrated at Rheims, and then declared that her +mission was accomplished and asked as a boon that she be permitted to +return home.</p> + +<p>"Now I should say that as a result of such an association Gilles's +mysticism began to soar. Henceforth we have to deal with a man who is +half-freebooter, half-monk. Moreover—"</p> + +<p>"Pardon the interruption, but I am not so sure that Jeanne d'Arc's +intervention was a good thing for France."</p> + +<p>"Why not?"</p> + +<p>"I will explain. You know that the defenders of Charles <!-- Page 44 -->were for the +most part Mediterranean cut-throats, ferocious pillagers, execrated by +the very people they came to protect. The Hundred Years' War, in effect, +was a war of the South against the North. England at that epoch had not +got over the Conquest and was Norman in blood, language, and tradition. +Suppose Jeanne d'Arc had stayed with her mother and stuck to her +knitting. Charles VII would have been dispossessed and the war would +have come to an end. The Plantagenets would have reigned over England +and France, which, in primeval times before the Channel existed, formed +one territory occupied by one race, as you know. Thus there would have +been a single united and powerful kingdom of the North, reaching as far +as the province of Languedoc and embracing peoples whose tastes, +instincts, and customs were alike. On the other hand, the coronation of +a Valois at Rheims created a heterogeneous and preposterous France, +separating homogeneous elements, uniting the most incompatible +nationalities, races the most hostile to each other, and identifying +us—inseparably, alas!—with those stained-skinned, varnished-eyed +munchers of chocolate and raveners of garlic, who are not Frenchmen at +all, but Spaniards and Italians. In a word, if it hadn't been for Jeanne +d'Arc, France would not now belong to that line of histrionic, forensic, +perfidious chatterboxes, the precious Latin race—Devil take it!"</p> + +<p>Durtal raised his eyebrows.</p> + +<p>"My, my," he said, laughing. "Your remarks prove to me that you are +interested in 'our own, our native land.' I should never have suspected +it of you."</p> + +<p>"Of course you wouldn't," said Des Hermies, relighting his cigarette. +"As has so often been said, 'My own, my native land is wherever I happen +to feel at home.' Now I don't feel at home except with the people of the +North. But I interrupted you. Let's get back to the subject. What were +you saying?"</p> + +<p>"I forget. Oh, yes. I was saying that the Maid had <!-- Page 45 -->completed her task. +Now we are confronted by a question to which there is seemingly no +answer. What did Gilles do when she was captured, how did he feel about +her death? We cannot tell. We know that he was lurking in the vicinity +of Rouen at the time of the trial, but it is too much to conclude from +that, like certain of his biographies, that he was plotting her rescue.</p> + +<p>"At any rate, after losing track of him completely, we find that he has +shut himself in at his castle of Tiffauges.</p> + +<p>"He is no longer the rough soldier, the uncouth fighting-man. At the +time when the misdeeds are about to begin, the artist and man of letters +develop in Gilles and, taking complete possession of him, incite him, +under the impulsion of a perverted mysticism, to the most sophisticated +of cruelties, the most delicate of crimes.</p> + +<p>"For he was almost alone in his time, this baron de Rais. In an age when +his peers were simple brutes, he sought the delicate delirium of art, +dreamed of a literature soul-searching and profound; he even composed a +treatise on the art of evoking demons; he gloried in the music of the +Church, and would have nothing about his that was not rare and difficult +to obtain.</p> + +<p>"He was an erudite Latinist, a brilliant conversationalist, a sure and +generous friend. He possessed a library extraordinary for an epoch when +nothing was read but theology and lives of saints. We have the +description of several of his manuscripts; Suetonius, Valerius Maximus, +and an Ovid on parchment bound in red leather, with vermeil clasp and +key.</p> + +<p>"These books were his passion. He carried them with him when he +travelled. He had attached to his household a painter named Thomas who +illuminated them with ornate letters and miniatures, and Gilles himself +painted the enamels which a specialist—discovered after an assiduous +search—set in the gold-inwrought bindings. Gilles's taste in +furnishings was elevated and bizarre. He revelled in abbatial stuffs, +<!-- Page 46 -->voluptuous silks, in the sombre gilding of old brocade. He liked +knowingly spiced foods, ardent wines heavy with aromatics; he dreamed of +unknown gems, weird stones, uncanny metals. He was the Des Esseintes of +the fifteenth century!</p> + +<p>"All this was very expensive, less so, perhaps, than the luxurious court +which made Tiffauges a place like none other.</p> + +<p>"He had a guard of two hundred men, knights, captains, squires, pages, +and all these people had personal attendants who were magnificently +equipped at Gilles's expense. The luxury of his chapel and collegium was +madly extravagant. There was in residence at Tiffauges a complete +metropolitan clergy, deans, vicars, treasurers, canons, clerks, deacons, +scholasters, and choir boys. There is an inventory extant of the +surplices, stoles, and amices, and the fur choir hats with crowns of +squirrel and linings of vair. There are countless sacerdotal ornaments. +We find vermilion altar cloths, curtains of emerald silk, a cope of +velvet, crimson and violet with orpheys of cloth of gold, another of +rose damask, satin dalmatics for the deacons, baldachins figured with +hawks and falcons of Cyprus gold. We find plate, hammered chalices and +ciboria crusted with uncut jewels. There are reliquaries, among them a +silver head of Saint Honoré. A mass of sparkling jewelleries which an +artist, installed in the château, cuts to order.</p> + +<p>"And anyone who came along was welcome. From all corners of France +caravans journeyed toward this château where the artist, the poet, the +scholar, found princely hospitality, cordial goodfellowship, gifts of +welcome and largesse at departure.</p> + +<p>"Already undermined by the demands which the war had made on it, his +fortune was giving way beneath these expenditures. Now he began to walk +the terrible ways of usury. He borrowed of the most unscrupulous +bourgeois, hypothecated his châteaux, alienated his lands. At times he +was reduced to asking advances on his religious ornaments, on his +jewels, on his books."<!-- Page 47 --></p> + +<p>"I am glad to see that the method of ruining oneself in the Middle Ages +did not differ sensibly from that of our days," said Des Hermies. +"However, our ancestors did not have Monte Carlo, the notaries, and the +Bourse."</p> + +<p>"And <i>did</i> have sorcery and alchemy. A memorial addressed to the king by +the heirs of Gilles de Rais informs us that this immense fortune was +squandered in less than eight years.</p> + +<p>"Now it's the signories of Confolens, Chabanes, Châteaumorant, Lombert, +ceded to a captain for a ridiculous price; now it's the fief of Fontaine +Milon, of Angers, the fortress of Saint Etienne de Mer Morte acquired by +Guillaume Le Ferron for a song; again it's the châteaux of Blaison and +of Chemille forfeited to Guillaume de la Jumelière who never has to pay +a sou. But look, there's a long list of castellanies and forests, salt +mines and farm lands," said Durtal, spreading out a great sheet of paper +on which he had copied the account of the purchases and sales.</p> + +<p>"Frightened by his mad course, the family of the Marshal supplicated the +king to intervene, and Charles VII, 'sure,' as he said, 'of the +malgovernance of the Sire de Rais,' forbade him, in grand council, by +letters dated 'Amboise, 1436,' to sell or make over any fortress, any +château, any land.</p> + +<p>"This order simply hastened the ruin of the interdicted. The grand +skinflint, the master usurer of the time, Jean V, duke of Brittany, +refused to publish the edict in his states, but, underhandedly, notified +all those of his subjects who dealt with Gilles. No one now dared to buy +the Marshal's domains for fear of incurring the wrath of the king, so +Jean V remained the sole purchaser and fixed the prices. You may judge +how liberal his prices were.</p> + +<p>"That explains Gilles's hatred of his family who had solicited these +letters patent of the king, and why, as long as he lived, he had nothing +to do with his wife, nor with his daughter whom he consigned to a +dungeon at Pouzauges.</p> + +<p>"Now to return to the question which I put a while ago, <!-- Page 48 -->how and with +what motives Gilles quitted the court. I think the facts which I have +outlined will partially explain.</p> + +<p>"It is evident that for quite a while, long before the Marshal retired +to his estates, Charles had been assailed by the complaints of Gilles's +wife and other relatives. Moreover, the courtiers must have execrated +the young man on account of his riches and luxuries; and the king, the +same king who abandoned Jeanne d'Arc when he considered that she could +no longer be useful to him, found an occasion to avenge himself on +Gilles for the favours Gilles had done him. When the king needed money +to finance his debaucheries or to raise troops he had not considered the +Marshal lavish. Now that the Marshal was ruined the king censured him +for his prodigality, held him at arm's length, and spared him no +reproach and no menace.</p> + +<p>"We may be sure Gilles had no reason to regret leaving this court, and +another thing is to be taken into consideration. He was doubtless sick +and tired of the nomadic existence of a soldier. He was doubtless +impatient to get back to a pacific atmosphere among books. Moreover, he +seems to have been completely dominated by the passion for alchemy, for +which he was ready to abandon all else. For it is worth noting that this +science, which threw him into demonomania when he hoped to stave off +inevitable ruin with it, he had loved for its own sake when he was rich. +It was in fact toward the year 1426, when his coffers bulged with gold, +that he attempted the 'great work' for the first time.</p> + +<p>"We shall find him, then, bent over his retorts in the château de +Tiffauges. That is the point to which I have brought my history, and now +I am about to begin on the series of crimes of magic and sadism."</p> + +<p>"But all this," said Des Hermies, "does not explain how, from a man of +piety, he was suddenly changed into a Satanist, from a placid scholar +into a violator of little children, a 'ripper' of boys and girls."</p> + +<p>"I have already told you that there are no documents <!-- Page 49 -->to bind together +the two parts of this life so strangely divided, but in what I have been +narrating you can pick out some of the threads of the duality. To be +precise, this man, as I have just had you observe, was a true mystic. He +witnessed the most extraordinary events which history has ever shown. +Association with Jeanne d'Arc certainly stimulated his desires for the +divine. Now from lofty Mysticism to base Satanism there is but one step. +In the Beyond all things touch. He carried his zeal for prayer into the +territory of blasphemy. He was guided and controlled by that troop of +sacrilegious priests, transmuters of metals, and evokers of demons, by +whom he was surrounded at Tiffauges."</p> + +<p>"You think, then, that the Maid of Orleans was really responsible for +his career of evil?"</p> + +<p>"To a certain point. Consider. She roused an impetuous soul, ready for +anything, as well for orgies of saintliness as for ecstasies of crime.</p> + +<p>"There was no transition between the two phases of his being. The moment +Jeanne was dead he fell into the hands of sorcerers who were the most +learned of scoundrels and the most unscrupulous of scholars. These men +who frequented the château de Tiffauges were fervent Latinists, +marvellous conversationalists, possessors of forgotten arcana, guardians +of world-old secrets. Gilles was evidently more fitted to live with them +than with men like Dunois and La Hire. These magicians, whom all the +biographers agree to represent—wrongly, I think—as vulgar parasites +and base knaves, were, as I view them, the patricians of intellect of +the fifteenth century. Not having found places in the Church, where they +would certainly have accepted no position beneath that of cardinal or +pope, they could, in those troubled times of ignorance, but take refuge +in the patronage of a great lord like Gilles. And Gilles was, indeed, +the only one at that epoch who was intelligent enough and educated +enough to understand them.</p> + +<p>"To sum up: natural mysticism on one hand, and, on the other, daily +association with savants obsessed by Satanism.<!-- Page 50 --> The sword of Damocles +hanging over his head, to be conjured away by the will of the Devil, +perhaps. An ardent, a mad curiosity concerning the forbidden sciences. +All this explains why, little by little, as the bonds uniting him to the +world of alchemists and sorcerers grow stronger, he throws himself into +the occult and is swept on by it into the most unthinkable crimes.</p> + +<p>"Then as to being a 'ripper' of children—and he didn't immediately +become one, no, Gilles did not violate and trucidate little boys until +after he became convinced of the vanity of alchemy—why, he does not +differ greatly from the other barons of his times.</p> + +<p>"He exceeds them in the magnitude of his debauches, in opulence of +murders, and that's all. It's a fact. Read Michelet. You will see that +the princes of this epoch were redoubtable butchers. There was a sire de +Giac who poisoned his wife, put her astride of his horse and rode at +breakneck speed for five leagues, until she died. There was another, +whose name I have forgotten, who collared his father, dragged him +barefoot through the snow, and calmly thrust him into a subterranean +prison and left him there until he died. And how many others! I have +tried, without success, to find whether in battles and forays the +Marshal committed any serious misdeeds. I have discovered nothing, +except that he had a pronounced taste for the gibbet; for he liked to +string up all the renegade French whom he surprised in the ranks of the +English or in the cities which were not very much devoted to the king.</p> + +<p>"We shall find his taste for this kind of torture manifesting itself +later on in the château de Tiffauges.</p> + +<p>"Now, in conclusion, add to all these factors a formidable pride, a +pride which incites him to say, during his trial, 'So potent was the +star under which I was born that I have done what no one in the world +has done nor ever can do.'</p> + +<p>"And assuredly, the Marquis de Sade is only a timid bourgeois, a +mediocre fantasist, beside him!"</p> + +<p>"Since it is difficult to be a saint," said Des Hermies,<!-- Page 51 --> "there is +nothing for it but to be a Satanist. One of the two extremes. +'Execration of impotence, hatred of the mediocre,' that, perhaps, is one +of the more indulgent definitions of Diabolism."</p> + +<p>"Perhaps. One can take pride in going as far in crime as a saint in +virtue. And that expresses Gilles de Rais exactly."</p> + +<p>"All the same, it's a mean subject to handle."</p> + +<p>"It certainly is, but happily the documents are abundant. Satan was +terrible to the Middle Ages—"</p> + +<p>"And to the modern."</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"That Satanism has come down in a straight, unbroken line from that age +to this."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no; you don't believe that at this very hour the devil is being +evoked and the black mass celebrated?"</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"You are sure?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly."</p> + +<p>"You amaze me. But, man! do you know that to witness such things would +aid me signally in my work? No joking, you believe in a contemporary +Satanistic manifestation? You have proofs?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, and of them we shall speak later, for today I am very busy. +Tomorrow evening, when we dine with Carhaix. Don't forget. I'll come by +for you. Meanwhile think over the phrase which you applied a moment ago +to the magicians: 'If they had entered the Church they would not have +consented to be anything but cardinals and popes,' and then just think +what kind of a clergy we have nowadays. The explanation of Satanism is +there, in great part, anyway, for without sacrilegious priests there is +no mature Satanism."</p> + +<p>"But what do these priests want?"</p> + +<p>"Everything!" exclaimed Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"Hmmm. Like Gilles de Rais, who asked the demon for 'knowledge, power, +riches,' all that humanity covets, to be deeded to him by a title signed +with his own blood."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_V"><!-- Page 52 -->CHAPTER V</a></h2> + + +<p>"Come right in and get warm. Ah, messieurs, you must not do that any +more," said Mme. Carhaix, seeing Durtal draw from his pocket some +bottles wrapped in paper, while Des Hermies placed on the table some +little packages tied with twine. "You mustn't spend your money on us."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but you see we enjoy doing it, Mme. Carhaix. And your husband?"</p> + +<p>"He is in the tower. Since morning he has been going from one tantrum +into another."</p> + +<p>"My, the cold is terrible today," said Durtal, "and I should think it +would be no fun up there."</p> + +<p>"Oh, he isn't grumbling for himself but for his bells. Take off your +things."</p> + +<p>They took off their overcoats and came up close to the stove.</p> + +<p>"It isn't what you would call hot in here," said Mme. Carhaix, "but to +thaw this place you would have to keep a fire going night and day."</p> + +<p>"Why don't you get a portable stove?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, heavens! that would asphyxiate us."</p> + +<p>"It wouldn't be very comfortable at any rate," said Des Hermies, "for +there is no chimney. You might get some joints of pipe and run them out +of the window, the way you have fixed this tubing. But, speaking of that +kind of apparatus, Durtal, doesn't it seem to you that those hideous +galvanized iron contraptions perfectly typify our utilitarian epoch?</p> + +<p>"Just think, the engineer, offended by any object that <!-- Page 53 -->hasn't a +sinister or ignoble form, reveals himself entire in this invention. He +tells us, 'You want heat. You shall have heat—and nothing else.' +Anything agreeable to the eye is out of the question. No more snapping, +crackling wood fire, no more gentle, pervasive warmth. The useful +without the fantastic. Ah, the beautiful jets of flame darting out from +a red cave of coals and spurting up over a roaring log."</p> + +<p>"But there are lots of stoves where you can see the fire," objected +madame.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and then it's worse yet. Fire behind a grated window of mica. +Flame in prison. Depressing! Ah, those fine fires of faggots and dry +vine stocks out in the country. They smell good and they cast a golden +glow over everything. Modern life has set that in order. The luxury of +the poorest of peasants is impossible in Paris except for people who +have copious incomes."</p> + +<p>The bell-ringer entered. Every hair of his bristling moustache was +beaded with a globule of snow. With his knitted bonnet, his sheepskin +coat, his fur mittens and goloshes, he resembled a Samoyed, fresh from +the pole.</p> + +<p>"I won't shake hands," he said, "for I am covered with grease and oil. +What weather! Just think, I've been scouring the bells ever since early +this morning. I'm worried about them."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"Why! You know very well that frost contracts the metal and sometimes +cracks or breaks it. Some of these bitterly cold winters we have lost a +good many, because bells suffer worse than we do in bad weather.—Wife, +is there any hot water in the other room, so I can wash up?"</p> + +<p>"Can't we help you set the table?" Des Hermies proposed.</p> + +<p>But the good woman refused. "No, no, sit down. Dinner is ready."</p> + +<p>"Mighty appetizing," said Durtal, inhaling the odour of a peppery +<i>pot-au-feu</i>, perfumed with a symphony of vegetables, of which the +keynote was celery.</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 54 -->Everybody sit down," said Carhaix, reappearing with a clean blouse on, +his face shining of soap and water.</p> + +<p>They sat down. The glowing stove purred. Durtal felt the sudden +relaxation of a chilly soul dipped into a warm bath: at Carhaix's one +was so far from Paris, so remote from the epoch....</p> + +<p>The lodge was poor, but cosy, comfortable, cordial. The very table, set +country style, the polished glasses, the covered dish of sweet butter, +the cider pitcher, the somewhat battered lamp casting reflections of +tarnished silver on the great cloth, contributed to the atmosphere of +home.</p> + +<p>"Next time I come I must stop at the English store and buy a jar of that +reliable orange marmalade," said Durtal to himself, for by common +consent with Des Hermies he never dined with the bell-ringer without +furnishing a share of the provisions. Carhaix set out a <i>pot-au-feu</i> and +a simple salad and poured his cider. Not to be an expense to him, Des +Hermies and Durtal brought wine, coffee, liquor, desserts, and managed +so that their contributions would pay for the soup and the beef which +would have lasted for several days if the Carhaixes had eaten alone.</p> + +<p>"This time I did it!" said Mme. Carhaix triumphantly, serving to each in +turn a mahogany-colour bouillon whose iridescent surface was looped with +rings of topaz.</p> + +<p>It was succulent and unctuous, robust and yet delicate, flavoured as it +was with the broth of a whole flock of boiled chickens. The diners were +silent now, their noses in their plates, their faces brightened by steam +from the savoury soup, two selected dishes, a salad, and a +dessert.</p> + +<p>"Now is the time to repeat the chestnut dear to Flaubert, 'You can't +dine like this in a restaurant,'" said Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Let's not malign the restaurants," said Des Hermies. "They afford a +very special delight to the person who has the instinct of the +inspector. I had an opportunity to gratify this instinct just the other +night. I was returning from a call on a patient, and I dropped into one +of these establishments where for the sum of three francs you are +entitled to soup, two selected dishes, a salad, and a dessert.<!-- Page 55 --></p> + +<p>"The restaurant, where I go as often as once a month, has an unvarying +clientele, hostile highbrows, officers in mufti, members of Parliament, +bureaucrats.</p> + +<p>"While laboriously gnawing my way through a redoubtable sole with sauce +au gratin, I examined the habitués seated all around me and I found them +singularly altered since my last visit. They had become bony or bloated; +their eyes were either hollow, with violet rings around them, or puffy, +with crimson pouches beneath; the fat people had become yellow and the +thin ones were turning green.</p> + +<p>"More deadly than the forgotten venefices of the days of the Avignon +papacy, the terrible preparations served in this place were slowly +poisoning its customers.</p> + +<p>"It was interested, as you may believe. I made myself the subject of a +course of toxicological research, and, studying my food as it went down, +I identified the frightful ingredients masking the mixtures of tannin +and powdered carbon with which the fish was embalmed; and I penetrated +the disguise of the marinated meats, painted with sauces the colour of +sewage; and I diagnosed the wine as being coloured with fuscin, perfumed +with furfurol, and enforced with molasses and plaster.</p> + +<p>"I have promised myself to return every month to register the slow but +sure progress of these people toward the tomb."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" cried Mme. Carhaix.</p> + +<p>"And you will claim," said Durtal, "that you aren't Satanic?"</p> + +<p>"See, Carhaix, he's at it already. He won't even give us time to get our +breath, but must be dogging us about Satanism. It's true I promised him +I'd try and get you to tell us something about it tonight. Yes," +continued Des Hermies, in response to Carhaix's look of astonishment, +"yesterday, Durtal, who is engaged, as you know, in writing a history of +Gilles de Rais, declared that he possessed all the information there was +about Diabolism in the Middle Ages. I asked him if he had any material +on the Satanism of the <!-- Page 56 -->present day. He asked me what I was talking +about, and wouldn't believe that these practices are being carried on +right now."</p> + +<p>"But they are," replied Carhaix, becoming grave. "It is only too true."</p> + +<p>"Before we go any further, there is one question I'd like to put to Des +Hermies," said Durtal. "Can you, honestly, without joking, without +letting that saturnine smile play around the corner of your mouth, tell +me, in perfectly good faith, whether you do or do not believe in +Catholicism?"</p> + +<p>"He!" exclaimed the bell-ringer. "Why, he's worse than an unbeliever, +he's a heresiarch."</p> + +<p>"The fast is, if I were certain of anything, I would be inclined toward +Manicheism," said Des Hermies. "It's one of the oldest and it is <i>the</i> +simplest of religions, and it best explains the abominable mess +everything is in at the present time.</p> + +<p>"The Principle of Good and the Principle of Evil, the God of Light and +the God of Darkness, two rivals, are fighting for our souls. That's at +least clear. Right now it is evident that the Evil God has the upper +hand and is reigning over the world as master. Now—and on this point, +Carhaix, who is distressed by these theories, can't reprehend me—I am +for the under dog. That's a generous and perfectly proper idea."</p> + +<p>"But Manicheism is impossible!" cried the bell-ringer. "Two infinities +cannot exist together."</p> + +<p>"But nothing can exist if you get to reasoning. The moment you argue the +Catholic dogma everything goes to pieces. The proof that two infinities +can coexist is that this idea passes beyond reason and enters the +category of those things referred to in Ecclesiasticus: 'Inquire not +into things higher than thou, for many things have shown themselves to +be above the sense of men.'</p> + +<p>"Manicheism, you see, must have had some good in it, because it was +bathed in blood. At the end of the twelfth century thousands of +Albigenses were roasted for practising <!-- Page 57 -->this doctrine. Of course, I +can't say that the Manicheans didn't abuse their cult, mostly made up of +devil worship, because we know very well they did.</p> + +<p>"On this point I am not with them," he went on slowly, after a silence. +He was waiting till Mme. Carhaix, who had got up to remove the plates, +should go out of the room to fetch the beef.</p> + +<p>"While we are alone," he said, seeing her disappear through the stairway +door, "I can tell you what they did. An excellent man named Psellus has +revealed to us, in a book entitled <i>De operatione Dæmonum</i>, the fact +that they tasted of the two excrements at the beginning of their +ceremonial, and that they mixed human semen with the host."</p> + +<p>"Horrible!" exclaimed Carhaix.</p> + +<p>"Oh, as they took both kinds of communion, they did better than that," +returned Des Hermies. "They cut children's throats and mixed the blood +with ashes, and this paste, dissolved in liquid, constituted the +Eucharistic wine."</p> + +<p>"You bring us right back to Satanism," said Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Why, yes, as you see, I haven't strayed off your subject."</p> + +<p>"I am sure Monsieur Des Hermies has been saying something awful," +murmured Mme. Carhaix as she came in, bearing a platter on which was a +piece of beef smothered in vegetables.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Madame," protested Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>They burst out laughing and Carhaix cut up the meat, while his wife +poured the cider and Durtal uncorked the bottle of anchovies.</p> + +<p>"I am afraid it's cooked too much," said the woman, who was a great deal +more interested in the beef than in other-world adventures, and she +added the famous maxim of housekeepers, "When the broth is good the beef +won't cut."</p> + +<p>The men protested that it wasn't stringy a bit, it was cooked just +right.</p> + +<p>"Have an anchovy and a little butter with your meat, Monsieur Durtal."<!-- Page 58 --></p> + +<p>"Wife, let's have some of the red cabbage that you preserved," said +Carhaix, whose pale face was lighted up while his great canine eyes were +becoming suspiciously moist. Visibly he was jubilant. He was at table +with friends, in his tower, safe from the cold. "But, empty your +glasses. You are not drinking," he said, holding up the cider pot.</p> + +<p>"Let's see, Des Hermies, you were claiming yesterday that Satanism has +pursued an uninterrupted course since the Middle Ages," said Durtal, +wishing to get back to the subject which haunted him.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and the documents are irrefutable. I'll put you into a position to +prove them whenever you wish.</p> + +<p>"At the end of the fifteenth century, that is to say at the time of +Gilles de Rais—to go no further back—Satanism had assumed the +proportions that you know. In the sixteenth it was worse yet. No need to +remind you, I think, of the demoniac pactions of Catherine de Medici and +of the Valois, of the trial of the monk Jean de Vaulx, of the +investigations of the Sprengers and the Lancres and those learned +inquisitors who had thousands of necromancers and sorcerers roasted +alive. All that is known, too well known. One case is not too well known +for me to cite here: that of the priest Benedictus who cohabited with +the she-devil Armellina and consecrated the hosts holding them upside +down. Here are the diabolical threads which bind that century to this. +In the seventeenth century, in which the sorcery trials continue, and in +which the 'possessed' of Loudun appear, the black religion nourishes, +but already it has been driven under cover.</p> + +<p>"I will cite you an example, one among many, if you like.</p> + +<p>"A certain abbé Guibourg made a specialty of these abominations. On a +table serving as tabernacle a woman lay down, naked or with her skirts +lifted up over her head, and with her arms outstretched. She held the +altar lights during the whole office.</p> + +<p>"Guibourg thus celebrated masses on the abdomen of Mme. de Montespan, of +Mme. d'Argenson, of Mme. de<!-- Page 59 --> Saint-Pont. As a matter of fact these +masses were very frequent under the Grand Monarch. Numbers of women went +to them as in our times women flock to have their fortunes told with +cards.</p> + +<p>"The ritual of these ceremonies was sufficiently atrocious. Generally a +child was kidnapped and burnt in a furnace out in the country somewhere, +the ashes were saved and mixed with the blood of another child whose +throat had been cut, and of this mixture a paste was made resembling +that of the Manicheans of which I was speaking. Abbé Guibourg +officiated, consecrated the host, cut it into little pieces and mixed it +with this mixture of blood and ashes. That was the material of the +Sacrament."</p> + +<p>"What a horrible priest!" cried Mme. Carhaix, indignant.</p> + +<p>"Yes, he celebrated another kind of mass, too, that abbé did. It was +called—hang it—it's unpleasant to say—"</p> + +<p>"Say it, Monsieur des Hermies. When people have as great a hatred for +that sort of thing as we here, they need not blink any fact. It isn't +that kind of thing which is going to take me away from my prayers."</p> + +<p>"Nor me," added her husband.</p> + +<p>"Well, this sacrifice was called the Spermatic Mass."</p> + +<p>"Oh!"</p> + +<p>"Guibourg, wearing the alb, the stole, and the maniple, celebrated this +mass with the sole object of making pastes to conjure with. The archives +of the Bastille inform us that he acted thus at the request of a lady +named Des Oeillettes:</p> + +<p>"This woman, who was indisposed, gave some of her blood; the man who +accompanied her stood patiently beside the bed where the scene took +place, and Guibourg gathered up some of his semen into the chalice, then +added powdered blood and some flour, and after sacrilegious ceremonies +the Des Oeillettes woman departed bearing her paste."</p> + +<p>"My heavenly Saviour!" sighed the bell-ringer's wife, "what a lot of +filth."</p> + +<p>"But," said Durtal, "in the Middle Ages the mass was celebrated in a +different fashion. The altar then was the <!-- Page 60 -->naked buttocks of a woman; in +the seventeenth century it was the abdomen, and now?"</p> + +<p>"Nowadays a woman is hardly ever used for an altar, but let us not +anticipate. In the eighteenth century we shall again find abbés—among +how many other monsters—who defile holy objects. One Canon Duer +occupied himself specially with black magic and the evocation of the +devil. He was finally executed as a sorcerer in the year of grace 1718. +There was another who believed in the Incarnation of the Holy Ghost as +the Paraclete, and who, in Lombary, which he stirred up to a feverish +pitch of excitement, ordained twelve apostles and twelve apostolines to +preach his gospel. This man, abbé Beccarelli, like all the other priests +of his ilk, abused both sexes, and he said mass without confessing +himself of his lecheries. As his cult grew he began to celebrate +travestied offices in which he distributed to his congregation +aphrodisiac pills presenting this peculiarity, that after having +swallowed them the men believed themselves changed into women and the +women into men.</p> + +<p>"The recipe for these hippomanes is lost," continued Des Hermies with +almost a sad smile. "To make a long story short, Beccarelli met with a +very miserable end. He was prosecuted for sacrilege and sentenced, in +1708, to row in the galleys for seven years."</p> + +<p>"These frightful stories seem to have taken away your appetite," said +Mme. Carhaix. "Come, Monsieur des Hermies, a little more salad?"</p> + +<p>"No, thanks. But now we've come to the cheese, I think it's time to open +the wine," and he uncapped one of the bottles which Durtal had brought.</p> + +<p>"It's a light Chinon wine, but not too weak. I discovered it in a little +shop down by the quay," said Durtal.</p> + +<p>"I see," he went on after a silence, "that the tradition of unspeakable +crimes has been maintained by worthy successors of Gilles de Rais. I see +that in all centuries there have been fallen priests who have dared +commit sins against the Holy Ghost. But at the present time it all seems +incredible.<!-- Page 61 --> Surely nobody is cutting children's throats as in the days +of Bluebeard and of abbé Guibourg."</p> + +<p>"You mean that nobody is brought to justice for doing it. They don't +assassinate now, but they kill designated victims by methods unknown to +official science—ah, if the confessionals could speak!" cried the +bell-ringer.</p> + +<p>"But tell me, what class of people are these modern covenanters with the +Devil?"</p> + +<p>"Prelates, abbesses, mission superiors, confessors of communities; and +in Rome, the centre of present-day magic, they're the very highest +dignitaries," answered Des Hermies. "As for the laymen, they are +recruited from the wealthy class. That explains why these scandals are +hushed up if the police chance to discover them.</p> + +<p>"Then, let us assume that the sacrifices to the Devil are not preceded +by preliminary murders. Perhaps in some cases they aren't. The +worshippers probably content themselves with bleeding a fœtus which had +been aborted as soon as it became matured to the point necessary. +Bloodletting is supererogatory anyway, and serves merely to whet the +appetite. The main business is to consecrate the host and put it to an +infamous use. The rest of the procedure varies. There is at present no +regular ritual for the black mass."</p> + +<p>"Well, then, is a priest absolutely essential to the celebration of +these offices?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly. Only a priest can operate the mystery of Transubstantiation. +I know there are certain occultists who claim to have been consecrated +by the Lord, as Saint Paul was, and who think they can consummate a +veritable sacrifice just like a real priest. Absurd! But even in default +of real masses with ordained celebrants, the people possessed by the +mania of sacrilege do none the less realize the sacred stupration of +which they dream.</p> + +<p>"Listen to this. In 1855 there existed at Paris an association composed +of women, for the most part. These women took communion several times a +day and retained the sacred <!-- Page 62 -->wafer in their mouths to be spat out later +and trodden underfoot or soiled by disgusting contacts."</p> + +<p>"You are sure of it?"</p> + +<p>"Perfectly. These facts were revealed by a religious journal, <i>Les +annales de la sainteté</i>, and the archbishop of Paris could not deny +them. I add that in 1874 women were likewise enrolled at Paris to +practise this odious commerce. They were paid so much for every wafer +they brought in. That explains why they presented themselves at the +sacred table of different churches every day."</p> + +<p>"And that is not the half of it! Look," said Carhaix, in his turn, +rising and taking from his bookshelf a blue brochurette. "Here is a +review, <i>La voix de la septaine</i>, dated 1843. It informs us that for +twenty-five years, at Agen, a Satanistic association regularly +celebrated black masses, and committed murder, and polluted three +thousand three hundred and twenty hosts! And Monsignor the Bishop of +Agen, who was a good and ardent prelate, never dared deny the +monstrosities committed in his diocese!"</p> + +<p>"Yes, we can say it among ourselves," Des Hermies returned, "in the +nineteenth century the number of foul-minded abbés has been legion. +Unhappily, though the documents are certain, they are difficult to +verify, for no ecclesiastic boasts of such misdeeds. The celebrants of +Deicidal masses dissemble and declare themselves devoted to Christ. They +even affirm that they defend Him by exorcising the possessed.</p> + +<p>"That's a good one. The 'possessed' are made so or kept so by the +priests themselves, who are thus assured of subjects and accomplices, +especially in the convents. All kinds of murderous and sadistic follies +can be covered with the antique and pious mantle of exorcism."</p> + +<p>"Let us be just," said Carhaix. "The Satanist would not be complete if +he were not an abominable hypocrite."</p> + +<p>"Hypocrisy and pride are perhaps the most characteristic vices of the +perverse priest," suggested Durtal.</p> + +<p>"But in the long run," Des Hermies went on, "in spite <!-- Page 63 -->of the most +adroit precautions, everything comes out. Up to now I have spoken only +of local Satanistic associations, but there are others, more extensive, +which ravage the old world and the new, for Diabolism is quite up to +date in one respect. It is highly centralized and very capably +administered. There are committees, subcommittees, a sort of curia, +which rules America and Europe, like the curia of a pope.</p> + +<p>"The biggest of these societies founded as long ago as 1855 is the +society of the Re-Theurgistes-Optimates. Beneath an apparent unity it is +divided into two camps, one aspiring to destroy the universe and reign +over the ruins, the other thinking simply of imposing upon the world a +demoniac cult of which it shall be high priest.</p> + +<p>"This society has its seat in America. It was formerly directed by one +Longfellow, an adventurer, born in Scotland, who entitled himself grand +priest of the New Evocative Magism. For a long time it has had branches +in France, Italy, Germany, Russia, Austria, even Turkey.</p> + +<p>"It is at the present moment moribund, or perhaps quite dead, but +another has just been created. The object of this one is to elect an +antipope who will be the exterminating Antichrist. And those are only +two of them. How many others are there, more or less important +numerically, more or less secret, which, by common accord, at ten +o'clock the morning of the Feast of the Holy Sacrament, celebrate black +masses at Paris, Rome, Bruges, Constantinople, Nantes, Lyons, and in +Scotland—where sorcerers swarm!</p> + +<p>"Then, outside of these universal associations and local assemblies, +isolated cases abound, on which little light can be shed, and that with +great difficulty. Some years ago there died, in a state of penitence, a +certain comte de Lautree, who presented several churches with statues +which he had bewitched so as to satanize the faithful. At Bruges a +priest of my acquaintance contaminates the holy ciboria and uses them to +prepare spells and conjurements. Finally one may, among all these, cite +a clear case of possession. It is the case of Cantianille, who in 1865 +turned not only the <!-- Page 64 -->city of Auxerre, but the whole diocese of Sens, +upside down.</p> + +<p>"This Cantianille, placed in a convent of Mont-Saint-Sulpice, was +violated, when she was barely fifteen years old, by a priest who +dedicated her to the Devil. This priest himself had been corrupted, in +early childhood, by an ecclesiastic belonging to a sect of possessed +which was created the very day Louis XVI was guillotined.</p> + +<p>"What happened in this convent, where many nuns, evidently mad with +hysteria, were associated in erotic devilry and sacrilegious rages with +Cantianille, reads for all the world like the procedure in the trials of +wizards of long ago, the histories of Gaufrédy and Madeleine Palud, of +Urbain Grandier and Madeleine Bavent, or the Jesuit Girard and La +Cadière, histories, by the way, in which much might be said about +hystero-epilepsy on one hand and about Diabolism on the other. At any +rate, Cantianille, after being sent away from the convent, was exorcised +by a certain priest of the diocese, abbé Thorey, who seems to have been +contaminated by his patient. Soon at Auxerre there were such scandalous +scenes, such frenzied outbursts of Diabolism, that the bishop had to +intervene. Cantianille was driven out of the country, abbé Thorey was +disciplined, and the affair went to Rome.</p> + +<p>"The curious thing about it is that the bishop, terrified by what he had +seen, requested to be dismissed, and retired to Fontainebleau, where he +died, still in terror, two years later."</p> + +<p>"My friends," said Carhaix, consulting his watch, "it is a quarter to +eight. I must be going up into the tower to sound the angelus. Don't +wait for me. Have your coffee. I shall rejoin you in ten minutes."</p> + +<p>He put on his Greenland costume, lighted a lantern, and opened the door. +A stream of glacial air poured in. White molecules whirled in the +blackness.</p> + +<p>"The wind is driving the snow in through the loopholes along the stair," +said the woman. "I am always afraid that Louis will take cold in his +chest this kind of weather. Oh, <!-- Page 65 -->well, Monsieur des Hermies, here is the +coffee. I appoint you to the task of serving it. At this hour of day my +poor old limbs won't hold me up any longer. I must go lie down."</p> + +<p>"The fact is," sighed Des Hermies, when they had wished her good night, +"the fact is that mama Carhaix is rapidly getting old. I have vainly +tried to brace her up with tonics. They do no good. She has worn herself +out. She has climbed too many stairs in her life, poor woman!"</p> + +<p>"All the same, it's very curious, what you have told me," said Durtal. +"To sum up, the most important thing about Satanism is the black mass."</p> + +<p>"That and the witchcraft and incubacy and succubacy which I will tell +you about; or rather, I will get another more expert than I in these +matters to tell you about them. Sacrilegious mass, spells, and +succubacy. There you have the real quintessence of Satanism."</p> + +<p>"And these hosts consecrated in blasphemous offices, what use is made of +them when they are not simply destroyed?"</p> + +<p>"But I already told you. They are used to consummate infamous acts. +Listen," and Des Hermies took from the bell-ringers bookshelf the fifth +volume of the <i>Mystik</i> of Görres. "Here is the flower of them all:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"'These priests, in their baseness, often go so far as to + celebrate the mass with great hosts which then they cut through + the middle and afterwards glue to a parchment, similarly cloven, + and use abominably to satisfy their passions.'" </p></div> + +<p>"Holy sodomy, in other words?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly."</p> + +<p>At this moment the bell, set in motion in the tower, boomed out. The +chamber in which Durtal and Des Hermies were sitting trembled and a +droning filled the air. It seemed that waves of sound came out of the +walls, unrolling in a spiral from the very rock, and that one was +transported, in a dream, into the inside of one of these shells which, +when held up to the ear, simulate the roar of rolling <!-- Page 66 -->billows. Des +Hermies, accustomed to the mighty resonance of the bells at short range, +thought only of the coffee, which he had put on the stove to keep hot.</p> + +<p>Then the booming of the bell came more slowly. The humming departed from +the air. The window panes, the glass of the bookcase, the tumblers on +the table, ceased to rattle and gave off only a tenuous tinkling.</p> + +<p>A step was heard on the stair. Carhaix entered, covered with snow.</p> + +<p>"Cristi, boys, it blows!" He shook himself, threw his heavy outer +garments on a chair, and extinguished his lantern. "There were blinding +clouds of snow whirling in between the sounding-shutters. I can hardly +see. Dog's weather. The lady has gone to bed? Good. But you haven't +drunk your coffee?" he asked as he saw Durtal filling the glasses.</p> + +<p>Carhaix went up to the stove and poked the fire, then dried his eyes, +which the bitter cold had filled with tears, and drank a great draught +of coffee.</p> + +<p>"Now. That hits the spot. How far had you got with your lecture, Des +Hermies?"</p> + +<p>"I finished the rapid expose of Satanism, but I haven't yet spoken of +the genuine monster, the only real master that exists at the present +time, that defrocked abbé—"</p> + +<p>"Oh!" exclaimed Carhaix. "Take care. The mere name of that man brings +disaster."</p> + +<p>"Bah! Canon Docre—to utter his ineffable name—can do nothing to us. I +confess I cannot understand why he should inspire any terror. But never +mind. I should like for Durtal, before we hunt up the canon, to see your +friend Gévingey, who seems to be best and most intimately acquainted +with him. A conversation with Gévingey would considerably amplify my +contributions to the study of Satanism, especially as regards venefices +and succubacy. Let's see. Would you mind if we invited him here to +dine?"</p> + +<p>Carhaix scratched his head, then emptied the ashes of his pipe on his +thumbnail.<!-- Page 67 --></p> + +<p>"Well, you see, the fact is, we have had a slight disagreement."</p> + +<p>"What about?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing very serious. I interrupted his experiments here one day. +But pour yourself some liqueur, Monsieur Durtal, and you, Des Hermies, +why, you aren't drinking at all," and while, lighting their cigarettes, +both sipped a few drops of almost proof cognac, Carhaix resumed, +"Gévingey, who, though an astrologer, is a good Christian and an honest +man—whom, indeed, I should be glad to see again—wished to consult my +bells.</p> + +<p>"That surprises you, but it's so. Bells formerly played quite an +important part in the forbidden science. The art of predicting the +future with their sounds is one of the least known and most disused +branches of the occult. Gévingey had dug up some documents, and wished +to verify them in the tower."</p> + +<p>"Why, what did he do?"</p> + +<p>"How do I know? He stood under the bell, at the risk of breaking his +bones—a man of his age on the scaffolding there! He was halfway into +the bell, the bell like a great hat, you see, coming clear down over his +hips. And he soliloquized aloud and listened to the repercussions of his +voice making the bronze vibrate.</p> + +<p>"He spoke to me also of the interpretation of dreams about bells. +According to him, whoever, in his sleep, sees bells swinging, is menaced +by an accident; if the bell chimes, it is presage of slander; if it +falls, ataxia is certain; if it breaks, it is assurance of afflictions +and miseries. Finally he added, I believe, that if the night birds fly +around a bell by moonlight one may be sure that sacrilegious robbery +will be committed in the church, or that the curate's life is in danger.</p> + +<p>"Be all that as it may, this business of touching the bells, getting up +into them—and you know they're consecrated—of attributing to them the +gift of prophecy, of involving them in the interpretation of dream—an +art formally for<!-- Page 68 -->bidden in Leviticus—displeased me, and I demanded, +somewhat rudely, that he desist."</p> + +<p>"But you did not quarrel?"</p> + +<p>"No, and I confess I regret having been so hasty."</p> + +<p>"Well then, I will arrange it. I shall go see him—agreed?" said Des +Hermies.</p> + +<p>"By all means."</p> + +<p>"With that we must run along and give you a chance to get to bed, seeing +that you have to be up at dawn."</p> + +<p>"Oh, at half-past five for the six o'clock angelus, and then, if I want +to, I can go back to bed, for I don't have to ring again till a quarter +to eight, and then all I have to do is sound a couple of times for the +curate's mass. As you can see, I have a pretty easy thing of it."</p> + +<p>"Mmmm!" exclaimed Durtal, "if I had to get up so early!"</p> + +<p>"It's all a matter of habit. But before you go won't you have another +little drink? No? Really? Well, good night!"</p> + +<p>He lighted his lantern, and in single file, shivering, they descended +the glacial, pitch-dark, winding stair.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_VI"><!-- Page 69 -->CHAPTER VI</a></h2> + + +<p>Next morning Durtal woke later than usual. Before he opened his eyes +there was a sudden flash of light in his brain, and troops of demon +worshippers, like the societies of which Des Hermies had spoken, went +defiling past him, dancing a saraband. "A swarm of lady acrobats hanging +head downward from trapezes and praying with joined feet!" he said, +yawning. He looked at the window. The panes were flowered with crystal +fleurs de lys and frost ferns. Then he quickly drew his arms back under +the covers and snuggled up luxuriously.</p> + +<p>"A fine day to stay at home and work," he said. "I will get up and light +a fire. Come now, a little courage—" and—instead of tossing the covers +aside he drew them up around his chin.</p> + +<p>"Ah, I know that you are not pleased to see me taking a morning off," he +said, addressing his cat, which was hunched up on the counterpane at his +feet, gazing at him fixedly, its eyes very black.</p> + +<p>This beast, though affectionate and fond of being caressed, was crabbed +and set in its ways. It would tolerate no whims, no departures from the +regular course of things. It understood that there was a fixed hour for +rising and for going to bed, and when it was displeased it allowed a +shade of annoyance to pass into its eyes, the sense of which its master +could not mistake.</p> + +<p>If he returned before eleven at night, the cat was waiting for him in +the vestibule, scratching the wood of the door, miaouing, even before +Durtal was in the hall; then it rolled its languorous green-golden eyes +at him, rubbed against his <!-- Page 70 -->trouser leg, stood up on its hind feet like +a tiny rearing horse and affectionately wagged its head at him as he +approached. If eleven o'clock had passed it did not run along in front +of him, but would only, very grudgingly, rise when he came up, and then +it would arch its back and suffer no caresses. When he came later yet, +it would not budge, and would complain and groan if he took the liberty +of stroking its head or scratching its throat.</p> + +<p>This morning it had no patience with Durtal's laziness. It squatted on +its hunkers, and swelled up, then it approached stealthily and sat down +two steps away from its master's face, staring at him with an +atrociously false eye, signifying that the time had come for him to +abdicate and leave the warm place for a cold cat.</p> + +<p>Amused by its manœuvres, Durtal did not move, but returned its stare. +The cat was enormous, common, and yet bizarre with its rusty coat +yellowish like old coke ashes and grey as the fuzz on a new broom, with +little white tufts like the fleece which flies up from the burnt-out +faggot. It was a genuine gutter cat, long-legged, with a wild-beast +head. It was regularly striped with waving lines of ebony, its paws were +encircled by black bracelets and its eyes lengthened by two great +zigzags of ink.</p> + +<p>"In spite of your kill-joy character and your single track mind you +testy, old bachelor, you are a very nice cat," said Durtal, in an +insinuating, wheedling tone. "Then too, for many years now, I have told +you what one tells no man. You are the drain pipe of my soul, you +inattentive and indulgent confessor. Never shocked, you vaguely approve +the mental misdeeds which I confess to you. You let me relieve myself +and you don't charge me anything for the service. Frankly, that is what +you are here for. I spoil you with care and attentions because you are +the spiritual vent of solitude and celibacy, but that doesn't prevent +you, with your spiteful way of looking at me, from being insufferable at +times, as you are today, for instance!"</p> + +<p>The cat continued to stare at him, its ears sticking straight <!-- Page 71 -->up as if +they would catch the sense of his words from the inflections of his +voice. It understood, doubtless, that Durtal was not disposed to jump +out of bed, for it went back to its old place, but now turned its back +full on him.</p> + +<p>"Oh come," said Durtal, discouraged, looking at his watch, "I've simply +got to get up and go to work on Gilles de Rais," and with a bound he +sprang into his trousers. The cat, rising suddenly, galloped across the +counterpane and rolled itself up into the warm covers, without waiting +an instant longer.</p> + +<p>"How cold it is!" and Durtal slipped on a knit jacket and went into the +other room to start a fire. "I shall freeze!" he murmured.</p> + +<p>Fortunately his apartment was easy to heat. It consisted simply of a +hall, a tiny sitting-room, a minute bedroom, and a large enough +bathroom. It was on the fifth floor, facing a sufficiently airy court. +Rent, eight hundred francs.</p> + +<p>It was furnished without luxury. The little sitting-room Durtal had +converted into a study, hiding the walls behind black wood bookcases +crammed with books. In front of the window were a great table, a leather +armchair, and a few straight chairs. He had removed the glass from the +mantelpiece, and in the panel, just over the mantelshelf, which was +covered with an old fabric, he had nailed an antique painting on wood, +representing a hermit kneeling beside a cardinal's hat and purple cloak, +beneath a hut of boughs. The colours of the landscape background had +faded, the blues to grey, the whites to russet, the greens to black, and +time had darkened the shadows to a burnt-onion hue. Along the edges of +the picture, almost against the black oak frame, a continuous narrative +unfolded in unintelligible episodes, intruding one upon the other, +portraying Lilliputian figures, in houses of dwarfs. Here the Saint, +whose name Durtal had sought in vain, crossed a curly, wooden sea in a +sailboat; there he marched through a village as big as a fingernail; +then he disappeared into the shadows of the painting and was discovered +higher up in a <!-- Page 72 -->grotto in the Orient, surrounded by dromedaries and +bales of merchandise; again he was lost from sight, and after another +game of hide-and-seek he emerged, smaller than ever, quite alone, with a +staff in his hand and a knapsack on his back, mounting toward a strange, +unfinished cathedral.</p> + +<p>It was a picture by an unknown painter, an old Dutchman, who had perhaps +visited certain of the Italian masters, for he had appropriated colours +and processes peculiar to them.</p> + +<p>The bedroom contained a big bed, a chest of drawers waist-high, and some +easy chairs. On the mantel were an antique clock and copper +candlesticks. On the wall there was a fine photograph of a Botticelli in +the Berlin museum, representing a plump and penitent Virgin who was like +a housewife in tears. She was surrounded by gentleman-, lady-, and +little-boy-angels. The languishing young men held spliced wax tapers +that were like bits of rope; the coquettish hoydens had flowers stuck in +their long hair; and the mischievous cherub-pages looked rapturously at +the infant Jesus, who stood beside the Virgin and held out his hands in +benediction.</p> + +<p>Then there was a print of Breughel, engraved by Cock, "The wise and the +foolish virgins": a little panel, cut in the middle by a corkscrew cloud +which was flanked at each side by angels with their sleeves rolled up +and their cheeks puffed out, sounding the trumpet, while in the middle +of the cloud another angel, bizarre and sacerdotal, with his navel +indicated beneath his languorously flowing robe, unrolled a banderole on +which was written the verse of the Gospel, "<i>Ecce sponsus venit, exite +obviam ei</i>."</p> + +<p>Beneath the cloud, at one side, sat the wise virgins, good Flemings, +with their lighted lamps, and sang canticles as they turned the spinning +wheel. At the other side were the foolish virgins with their empty +lamps. Four joyous gossips were holding hands and dancing in a ring on +the greensward, while the fifth played the bagpipe and beat time with +her foot. Above the cloud the five wise virgins, slender and <!-- Page 73 -->ethereal +now, naked and charming, brandished flaming tapers and mounted toward a +Gothic church where Christ stood to welcome them; while on the other +side the foolish virgins, imperfectly draped, beat vainly on a closed +door with their dead torches.</p> + +<p>The blessed naïveté of the Primitives, the homely touches in the scenes +of earth and of heaven! Durtal loved this old engraving. He saw in it a +union of the art of an Ostade purified and that of a Thierry Bouts.</p> + +<p>Waiting for his grate, in which the charcoal was crackling and peeling +and running like frying grease, to become red, he sat down in front of +his desk and ran over his notes.</p> + +<p>"Let's see," he said to himself, rolling a cigarette, "we had come to +the time when that excellent Gilles de Rais begins the quest of the +'great work.' It is easy to figure what knowledge he possessed about the +method of transmuting metals into gold.</p> + +<p>"Alchemy was already highly developed a century before he was born. The +writings of Albertus Magnus, Arnaud de Villeneuve, and Raymond Lully +were in the hands of the hermetics. The manuscripts of Nicolas Flamel +circulated, and there is no doubt that Gilles had acquired them, for he +was an avid collector of the rare. Let us add that at that epoch the +edict of Charles interdicting spagyric labours under pain of prison and +hanging, and the bull, <i>Spondent pariter quas non exhibent</i>, which Pope +John XXII fulminated against the alchemists, were still in vigour. These +treatises were, then, forbidden, and in consequence desirable. It is +certain that Gilles had long studied them, but from that to +understanding them is a far cry.</p> + +<p>"For they were written in an impossible jargon of allegories, twisted +and obscure metaphors, incoherent symbols, ambiguous parables, enigmas, +and ciphers. And here is an example." He took from one of the shelves of +the library a manuscript which was none other than the Asch-Mezareph, +the book of the Jew Abraham and of Nicolas Flamel, restored, translated, +and annotated by Eliphas Levi.<!-- Page 74 --> This manuscript had been lent him by Des +Hermies, who had discovered it one day among some old papers.</p> + +<p>"In this is what claims to be the recipe for the philosopher's stone, +for the grand quintessential and tinctural essence. The figures are not +precisely clear," he said to himself, as he ran his eye over the pen +drawings, retouched in colour, representing, under the title of "<i>The +chemical coitus</i>" various bottles and flasks each containing a liquid +and imprisoning an allegorical creature. A green lion, with a crescent +moon over him, hung head downward. Doves were trying to fly out through +the neck of the bottle or to peck a way through the bottom. The liquid +was black and undulated with waves of carmine and gold, or white and +granulated with dots of ink, which sometimes took the shape of a frog or +a star. Sometimes the liquid was milky and troubled, sometimes flames +rose from it as if there were a film of alcohol over the surface.</p> + +<p>Eliphas Levi explained the symbolism of these bottled volatiles as fully +as he cared to, but abstained from giving the famous recipe for the +grand magisterium. He was keeping up the pleasantry of his other books, +in which, beginning with an air of solemnity, he affirmed his intention +of unveiling the old arcana, and, when the time came to fulfil his +promise, begged the question, alleging the excuse that he would perish +if he betrayed such burning secrets. The same excuse, which had done +duty through the ages, served in masking the perfect ignorance of the +cheap occultists of the present day.</p> + +<p>"As a matter of fact, the 'great work' is simple," said Durtal to +himself, folding up the manuscript of Nicolas Flamel. "The hermetic +philosophers discovered—and modern science, after long evading the +issue, no longer denies—that the metals are compounds, and that their +components are identical. They vary from each other according to the +different proportions of their elements. With the aid of an agent which +will displace these proportions one may transmute mercury, for example, +into silver, and lead into gold.<!-- Page 75 --></p> + +<p>"And this agent is the philosopher's stone: mercury—not the vulgar +mercury, which to the alchemists was but an aborted metallic sperm—but +the philosophers' mercury, called also the green lion, the serpent, the +milk of the Virgin, the pontic water.</p> + +<p>"Only the recipe for this mercury, or stone of the sages, has ever been +revealed—and it is this that the philosophers of the Middle Ages, the +Renaissance, all centuries, including our own, have sought so +frantically.</p> + +<p>"And in what has it not been sought?" said Durtal, thumbing his notes. +"In arsenic, in ordinary mercury, tin, salts of vitriol, saltpetre and +nitre; in the juices of spurge, poppy, and purslane; in the bellies of +starved toads; in human urine, in the menstrual fluid and the milk of +women."</p> + +<p>Now Gilles de Rais must have been completely baffled. Alone at +Tiffauges, without the aid of initiates, he was incapable of making +fruitful experiments. At that time Paris was the centre of the hermetic +science in France. The alchemists gathered under the vaults of Notre +Dame and studied the hieroglyphics which Nicolas Flamel, before he died, +had written on the walls of the charnal Des Innocents and on the portal +of Saint Jacques de la Boucherie, describing cabalistically the +preparation of the famous stone.</p> + +<p>The Marshal could not go to Paris because the English soldiers barred +the roads. There was only one thing to do. He wrote to the most +celebrated of the southern transmuters, and had them brought to +Tiffauges at great expense.</p> + +<p>"From documents which we posses we can see his supervising the +construction of the athanor, or alchemists' furnace, buying pelicans, +crucibles, and retorts. He turned one of the wings of his château into a +laboratory and shut himself up in it with Antonio di Palermo, François +Lombard, and 'Jean Petit, goldsmith of Paris,' all of whom busied +themselves night and day with the concoction of the 'great work.'"</p> + +<p>They were completely unsuccessful. At the end of their resources, these +hermetists disappeared, and there ensued at<!-- Page 76 --> Tiffauges an incredible +coming-and-going of adepts and their helpers. They arrived from all +parts of Brittany, Poitou, and Maine, alone or escorted by promoters and +sorcerers. Gilles de Sillé and Roger de Bricqueville, cousins and +friends of the Marshal, scurried about the country, beating up the game +and driving it in to Gilles de Rais, while a priest of his chapel, +Eustache Blanchet, went to Italy where workers in metals were legion.</p> + +<p>While waiting, Gilles de Rais, not to be discouraged, continued his +experiments, all of which missed fire. He finally came to believe that +the magicians were right after all, and that no discovery was possible +without the aid of Satan.</p> + +<p>And one night, with a sorcerer newly arrived from Poitiers, Jean de la +Rivière, he betakes himself to a forest in the vicinity of the château +de Tiffauges. With his servitors Henriet and Poitou, he remains on the +verge of the wood into which the sorcerer penetrates. The night is heavy +and there is no moon. Gilles becomes nervous, scrutinizing the shadows, +listening to the muted sounds of the nocturnal landscape; his +companions, terrified, huddle close together, trembling and whispering +at the slightest stirring of the air. Suddenly a cry of anguish is +raised. They hesitate, then they advance, groping in the darkness. In a +sudden flare of light they perceive de la Rivière trembling and deathly +pale, clutching the handle of his lantern convulsively. In a low voice +he recounts how the Devil has risen in the form of a leopard and rushed +past without looking at the evocator, without saying a word.</p> + +<p>The next day the sorcerer vanished, but another arrived. This was a +bungler named Du Mesnil. He required Gilles to sign with blood a deed +binding him to give the Devil all the Devil asked of him "except his +life and soul," but, although to aid the conjurements Gilles consented +to have the Office of the Damned sung in his chapel on All Saints' Day, +Satan did not appear.</p> + +<p>The Marshal was beginning to doubt the powers of his <!-- Page 77 -->magicians, when +the outcome of a new endeavor convinced him that frequently the Devil +does appear.</p> + +<p>An evocator whose name has been lost held a séance with Gilles and de +Sillé in a chamber at Tiffauges.</p> + +<p>On the ground he traces a great circle and commands his two companions +to step inside it. Sillé refuses. Gripped by a terror which he cannot +explain, he begins to tremble all over. He goes to the window, opens it, +and stands ready for flight, murmuring exorcisms under his breath. +Gilles, bolder, stands in the middle of the circle, but at the first +conjurgations he too trembles and tries to make the sign of the cross. +The sorcerer orders him not to budge. At one moment he feels something +seize him by the neck. Panic-stricken, he vacillates, supplicating Our +Lady to save him. The evocator, furious, throws him out of the circle. +Gilles precipitates himself through the door, de Sillé jumps out of the +window, they meet below and stand aghast. Howls are heard in the chamber +where the magician is operating. There is "a sound as of sword strokes +raining on a wooden billet," then groans, cries of distress, the appeals +of a man being assassinated.</p> + +<p>They stand rooted to the spot. When the clamour ceases they venture to +open the door and find the sorcerer lying; in pools of blood, his +forehead caved in, his body horribly mangled.</p> + +<p>They carry him out. Gilles, smitten with remorse, gives the man his own +bed, bandages him, and has him confessed. For several days the sorcerer +hovers between life and death but finally recovers and flees from the +castle.</p> + +<p>Gilles was despairing of obtaining from the Devil the recipe for the +sovereign magisterium, when Eustache Blanchet's return from Italy was +announced. Eustache brought the master of Florentine magic, the +irresistible evoker of demons and larvæ, Francesco Prelati.</p> + +<p>This man struck awe into Gilles. Barely twenty-three years old, he was +one of the wittiest, the most erudite, and <!-- Page 78 -->the most polished men of the +time. What had he done before he came to install himself at Tiffauges, +there to begin, with Gilles, the most frightful series of sins against +the Holy Ghost that has ever been known? His testimony in the criminal +trial of Gilles does not furnish us any very detailed information on his +own score. He was born in the diocese of Lucca, at Pistoia, and had been +ordained a priest by the Bishop of Arezzo. Some time after his entrance +into the priesthood, he had become the pupil of a thaumaturge of +Florence, Jean de Fontenelle, and had signed a pact with a demon named +Barron. From that moment onward, this insinuating and persuasive, +learned and charming abbé, must have given himself over to the most +abominable of sacrileges and the most murderous practices of black +magic.</p> + +<p>At any rate Gilles came completely under the influence of this man. The +extinguished furnaces were relighted, and that Stone of the Sages, which +Prelati had seen, flexible, frail, red and smelling of calcinated marine +salt, they sought together furiously, invoking Hell.</p> + +<p>Their incantations were all in vain. Gilles, disconsolate, redoubled +them, but they finally produced a dreadful result and Prelati narrowly +escaped with his life.</p> + +<p>One afternoon Eustache Blanchet, in a gallery of the château, perceives +the Marshal weeping bitterly. Plaints of supplication are heard through +the door of a chamber in which Prelati has been evoking the Devil.</p> + +<p>"The Demon is in there beating my poor Francis. I implore you, go in!" +cries Gilles, but Blanchet, frightened, refuses. Then Gilles makes up +his mind, in spite of his fear. He is advancing to force the door, when +it opens and Prelati staggers out and falls, bleeding, into his arms. +Prelati is able, with the support of his friends, to gain the chamber of +the Marshal, where he is put to bed, but he has sustained so merciless a +thrashing that he goes into delirium and his fever keeps mounting. +Gilles, in despair, stays beside him, cares for him, has him confessed, +and weeps for joy when Prelati is out of danger.<!-- Page 79 --></p> + +<p>"The fate of the unknown sorcerer and of Prelati, both getting +dangerously wounded in an empty room, under identical circumstances—I +tell you, it's a remarkable coincidence," said Durtal to himself.</p> + +<p>"And the documents which relate these facts are authentic. They are, +indeed, excerpts from the procedure in Gilles's trial. The confessions +of the accused and the depositions of the witnesses agree, and it is +impossible to think that Gilles and Prelati lied, for in confessing +these Satanic evocations they condemned themselves, by their own words, +to be burned alive.</p> + +<p>"If in addition they had declared that the Evil One had appeared to +them, that they had been visited by succubi; if they had affirmed that +they had heard voices, smelled odours, even touched a body; we might +conclude that they had had hallucinations similar to those of certain +Bicêtre subjects, but as it was there could have been no misfunctioning +of the senses, no morbid visions, because the wounds, the marks of the +blows, the material fact, visible and tangible, are present for +testimony.</p> + +<p>"Imagine how thoroughly convinced of the reality of the Devil a mystic +like Gilles de Rais must have been after witnessing such scenes!</p> + +<p>"In spite of his discomfitures, he could not doubt—and Prelati, +half-killed, must have doubted even less—that if Satan pleased, they +should finally find this powder which would load them with riches and +even render them almost immortal—for at that epoch the philosopher's +stone passed not only for an agent in the transmutation of base metals, +such as tin, lead, copper, into noble metals like silver and gold, but +also for a panacea curing all ailments and prolonging life, without +infirmities, beyond the limits formerly assigned to the patriarchs.</p> + +<p>"Singular science," ruminated Durtal, raising the fender of his +fireplace and warming his feet, "in spite of the railleries of this +time, which, in the matter of discoveries but <!-- Page 80 -->exhumes lost things, the +hermetic philosophy was not wholly vain.</p> + +<p>"The master of contemporary science, Dumas, recognizes, under the name +of isomery, the theories of the alchemists, and Berthelot declares, 'No +one can affirm <i>a priori</i> that the fabrication of bodies reputed to be +simple is impossible.' Then there have been verified and certified +achievements. Besides Nicolas Flamel, who really seems to have succeeded +in the 'great work,' the chemist Van Helmont, in the eighteenth century, +received from an unknown man a quarter of a grain of philosopher's stone +and with it transformed eight ounces of mercury into gold.</p> + +<p>"At the same epoch, Helvetius, who combated the dogma of the spagyrics, +received from another unknown a powder of projection with which he +converted an ingot of lead into gold. Helvetius was not precisely a +charlatan, neither was Spinoza, who verified the experiment, a credulous +simpleton.</p> + +<p>"And what is to be thought of that mysterious man Alexander Sethon who, +under the name of the Cosmopolite, went all over Europe, operating +before princes, in public, transforming all metals into gold? This +alchemist, who seems to have had a sincere disdain for riches, as he +never kept the gold which he created, but lived in poverty and prayer, +was imprisoned by Christian II, Elector of Saxony, and endured martyrdom +like a saint. He suffered himself to be beaten with rods and pierced +with pointed stakes, and he refused to give up a secret which he +claimed, like Nicolas Flamel, to have received from God.</p> + +<p>"And to think that these researches are being carried on at the present +time! Only, most of the hermetics now deny medical and divine virtues to +the famous stone. They think simply that the grand magisterium is a +ferment, which, thrown into metals in fusion, produces a molecular +transformation similar to that which organic matter undergoes when +fermented with the aid of a leaven.</p> + +<p>"Des Hermies, who is well acquainted with the underworld of science, +maintains that more than forty alchemic <!-- Page 81 -->furnaces are now alight in +France, and that in Hanover and Bavaria the adepts are more numerous +yet.</p> + +<p>"Have they rediscovered the incomparable secret of antiquity? In spite +of certain affirmations, it is hardly probable. Nobody need manufacture +artificially a metal whose origins are so unaccountable that a deposit +is likely to be found anywhere. For instance, in a law suit which took +place at Paris in the month of November, 1886, between M. Popp, +constructor of pneumatic city clocks, and financiers who had been +backing him, certain engineers and chemists of the School of Mines +declared that gold could be extracted from common silex, so that the +very walls sheltering us might be placers, and the mansards might be +loaded with nuggets!</p> + +<p>"At any rate," he continued, smiling, "these sciences are not +propitious."</p> + +<p>He was thinking of an old man who had installed an alchemic laboratory +on the fifth floor of a house in the rue Saint Jacques. This man, named +Auguste Redoutez, went every afternoon to the Bibliothèque Nationale and +pored over the works of Nicolas Flamel. Morning and evening he pursued +the quest of the "great work" in front of his furnace.</p> + +<p>The 16th of March the year before, he came out of the Bibliothèque with +a man who had been sitting at the same table with him, and as they +walked along together Redoutez declared that he was finally in +possession of the famous secret. Arriving in his laboratory, he threw +pieces of iron into a retort, made a projection, and obtained crystals +the colour of blood. The other examined the salts and made a flippant +remark. The alchemist, furious, threw himself upon him, struck him with +a hammer, and had to be overpowered and carried in a strait-jacket to +Saint Anne, pending investigation.</p> + +<p>"In the sixteenth century, in Luxemburg, initiates were roasted in iron +cages. The following century, in Germany, they were clothed in rags and +hanged on gilded gibbets.<!-- Page 82 --> Now that they are tolerated and left in peace +they go mad. Decidedly, fate is against them," Durtal concluded.</p> + +<p>He rose and went to answer a ring at the door. He came back with a +letter which the concierge had brought. He opened it.</p> + +<p>"Why, what is this?" he exclaimed. His astonishment grew as he read:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Monsieur,</p> + +<p> "I am neither an adventuress nor a seeker of adventures, nor am + I a society woman grown weary of drawing-room conversation. Even + less am I moved by the vulgar curiosity to find out whether an + author is the same in the flesh as he is in his books. Indeed I + am none of the things which you may think I am, from my writing + to you this way. The fact is that I have just finished reading + your last book," </p></div> + +<p>"She has taken her time," murmured Durtal, "it appeared a year ago."</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"melancholy as an imprisoned soul vainly beating its wings + against the bars of its cage." </p></div> + +<p>"Oh, hell! What a compliment. Anyway, it rings false, like all of them."</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"And now, Monsieur, though I am convinced that it is always + folly and madness to try to realize a desire, will you permit + that a sister in lassitude meet you some evening in a place + which you shall designate, after which we shall return, each of + us, into our own interior, the interior of persons destined to + fall because they are out of line with their 'fellows'? Adieu, + Monsieur, be assured that I consider you a somebody in a century + of nobodies.</p> + +<p> "Not knowing whether this note will elicit a reply, I abstain + from making myself known. This evening a maid will call upon + your concierge and ask him if there is a letter for Mme. + Maubel." </p></div> + +<p>"Hmm!" said Durtal, folding up the letter. "I know her. She must be one +of these withered dames who are always <!-- Page 83 -->trying to cash outlawed +kiss-tickets and soul-warrants in the lottery of love. Forty-five years +old at least. Her <i>clientele</i> is composed of boys, who are always +satisfied if they don't have to pay, and men of letters, who are yet +more easily satisfied—for the ugliness of authors' mistresses is +proverbial. Unless this is simply a practical joke. But who would be +playing one on me—I don't know anybody—and why?"</p> + +<p>In any case, he would simply not reply.</p> + +<p>But in spite of himself he reopened the letter.</p> + +<p>"Well now, what do I risk? If this woman wants to sell me an over-ripe +heart, there is nothing forcing me to purchase it. I don't commit myself +to anything by going to an assignation. But where shall I meet her? +Here? No! Once she gets into my apartment complications arise, for it is +much more difficult to throw a woman out of your house than simply to +walk off and leave her at a street corner. Suppose I designated the +corner of the rue de Sèvres and the rue de la Chaise, under the wall of +the Abbaye-au-Bois. It is solitary, and then, too, it is only a minute's +walk from here. Or no, I will begin vaguely, naming no meeting-place at +all. I shall solve that problem later, when I get her reply."</p> + +<p>He wrote a letter in which he spoke of his own spiritual lassitude and +declared that no good could come of an interview, for he no longer +sought happiness on earth.</p> + +<p>"I will add that I am in poor health. That is always a good one, and it +excuses a man from 'being a man' if necessary," he said to himself, +rolling a cigarette.</p> + +<p>"Well, that's done, and she won't get much encouragement out of it. Oh, +wait. I omitted something. To keep from giving her a hold on me I shall +do well to let her know that a serious and sustained liaison with me is +impossible 'for family reasons.' And that's enough for one time."</p> + +<p>He folded the letter and scrawled the address.</p> + +<p>Then he held the sealed envelope in his hand and reflected.<!-- Page 84 --></p> + +<p>"Of course I am a fool to answer her. Who knows what situations a thing +like this is going to lead to? I am well aware that whoever she be, a +woman is an incubator of sorrow and annoyance. If she is good she is +probably stupid, or perhaps she is an invalid, or perhaps she is so +disastrously fecund that she gets pregnant if you look at her. If she is +bad, one may expect to be dragged through every disgusting kind of +degradation. Oh, whatever you do, you're in for it."</p> + +<p>He regurgitated the memories of his youthful amours. Deception. +Disenchantment. How pitilessly base a woman is while she is young!</p> + +<p>" ... To be thinking of things like that now at my age! As if I had any +need of a woman now!"</p> + +<p>But in spite of all, his pseudonymous correspondent interested him.</p> + +<p>"Who knows? Perhaps she is good-looking, or at least not very +ill-looking. It doesn't cost me anything to find out."</p> + +<p>He re-read her letter. No misspelling. The handwriting not commercial. +Her ideas about his book were mediocre enough, but who would expect her +to be a critic? "Discreet scent of heliotrope," he added, sniffing the +envelope.</p> + +<p>"Oh, well, let's have our little fling."</p> + +<p>And as he went out to get some breakfast he left his reply with the +concierge.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_VII"><!-- Page 85 -->CHAPTER VII</a></h2> + + +<p>"If this continues I shall lose my mind," murmured Durtal as he sat in +front of his table reperusing the letters which he had been receiving +from that woman for the last week. She was an indefatigable +letter-writer, and since she had begun her advances he had not had time +to answer one letter before another arrived.</p> + +<p>"My!" he said, "let's try and see just where we do stand. After that +ungracious answer to her first note she immediately sends me this:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"'Monsieur,</p> + +<p> "'This is a farewell. If I were weak enough to write you any + more letters they would become as tedious as the life I lead. + Anyway, have I not had the best part of you, in that hesitant + letter of yours which shook me out of my lethargy for an + instant? Like yourself, monsieur, I know, alas! that nothing + happens, and that our only certain joys are those we dream of. + So, in spite of my feverish desire to know you, I fear that you + were right in saying that a meeting would be for both of us the + source of regrets to which we ought not voluntarily expose + ourselves....' </p></div> + +<p>"Then what bears witness to the perfect futility of this exordium is the +way the missive ends:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"'If you should take the fancy to write me, you can safely + address your letters "Mme. Maubel, rue Littré, general + delivery." I shall be passing the rue Littré post-office Monday. + If you wish to let matters remain just where they are—and thus + cause me a great deal of pain—will you not tell me so, + frankly?' </p></div> + +<p>"<!-- Page 86 -->Whereupon I was simple-minded enough to compose an epistle as +ambiguous as the first, concealing my furtive advances under an apparent +reluctance, thus letting her know that I was securely hooked. As her +third note proves:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"'Never accuse yourself, monsieur—I repress a tenderer name + which rises to my lips—of being unable to give me consolation. + Weary, disabused, as we are, and done with it all, let us + sometimes permit our souls to speak to each other—low, very + low—as I have spoken to you this night, for henceforth my + thought is going to follow you wherever you are.' </p></div> + +<p>"Four pages of the same tune," he said, turning the leaves, "but this is +better:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"'Tonight, my unknown friend, one word only. I have passed a + horrible day, my nerves in revolt and crying out against the + petty sufferings they are subjected to every minute. A slamming + door, a harsh or squeaky voice floating up to me out of the + street.... Yet there are whole hours when I am so far from being + sensitive that if the house were burning I should not move. Am I + about to send you a page of comic lamentations? Ah, when one has + not the gift of rendering one's grief superbly and transforming + it into literary or musical passages which weep magnificently, + the best thing is to keep still about it.</p> + +<p> "'I bid you a silent goodnight. As on the first day, I am + harassed by the conflict of the desire to see you and the dread + of touching a dream lest it perish. Ah, yes, you spoke truly. + Miserable, miserable wretches that we are, our timorous souls + are so afraid of any reality that they dare not think a sympathy + which has taken possession of them capable of surviving an + interview with the person who gave it birth. Yet, in spite of + this fine casuistry, I simply must confess to you—no, no, + nothing. Guess if you <!-- Page 87 -->can, and forgive me for this banal + letter. Or rather, read between the lines, and perhaps you will + find there a little bit of my heart and a great deal of what I + leave unsaid.</p> + +<p> "'A foolish letter with "I" written all over it. Who would + suspect that while I wrote it my sole thought was of You?'" </p></div> + +<p>"So far, so good. This woman at least piqued my curiosity. And what +peculiar ink," he thought. It was myrtle green, very thin, very pale. +With his finger-nail he detached some of the fine dust of rice powder, +perfumed with heliotrope, clinging to the seal of the letters.</p> + +<p>"She must be blonde," he went on, examining the tint of the powder, "for +it isn't the 'Rachel' shade that brunettes use. Now up to that point +everything had been going nicely, but then and there I spoiled it. Moved +by I know not what folly, I wrote her a yet more roundabout letter, +which, however, was very pressing. In attempting to fan her flame I +kindled myself—for a spectre—and at once I received this:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"'What shall I do? I neither wish to see you, nor can I consent + to annihilate my overwhelming desire to meet you. Last night, in + spite of me, your name, which was burning me, sprang from my + lips. My husband, one of your admirers, it seems, appeared to be + somewhat humiliated by the preoccupation which, indeed, was + absorbing me and causing unbearable shivers to run all through + me. A common friend of yours and mine—for why should I not tell + you that you know me, if to have met socially is to "know" + anyone?—one of your friends, then, came up and said that + frankly he was very much taken with you. I was in a state of + such utter lack of self-control that I don't know what I should + have done had it not been for the unwitting assistance which + somebody gave me by pronouncing the name of a <!-- Page 88 -->grotesque person + of whom I can never think without laughing. Adieu. You are + right. I tell myself that I will never write you again, and I go + and do it anyway.</p> + +<p> "'Your own—as I cannot be in reality without wounding us both.' </p></div> + +<p>"Then when I wrote a burning reply, this was brought by a maid on a dead +run:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"'Ah, if I were not afraid, afraid!—and you know you are just + as much afraid as I am—how I should fly to you! No, you cannot + hear the thousand conversations with which my soul fatigues + yours.... Oh, in my miserable existence there are hours when + madness seizes me. Judge for yourself. The whole night I spent + appealing to you furiously. I wept with exasperation. This + morning my husband came into the room. My eyes were bloodshot. I + began to laugh crazily, and when I could speak I said to him, + "What would you think of a person who, questioned as to his + profession, replied, 'I am a chamber succubus'?" "Ah, my dear, + you are ill," said he. "Worse than you think," said I.</p> + +<p> "'But if I come to see you, what could we talk about, in the + state you yourself are in? Your letter has completely unbalanced + me. You arraign your malady with a certain brutality which makes + my body rejoice but alienates my soul a little. Ah, what if our + dreams could really come true!</p> + +<p> "'Ah, say a word, just one word, from out your own heart. Don't + be afraid that even one of your letters can possibly fall into + other hands than mine.' </p></div> + +<p>"So, so, so. This is getting to be no laughing matter," concluded +Durtal, folding up the letter. "The woman is married to a man who knows +me, it seems. What a situation! Let's see, now. Whom have I ever +visited?" He tried vainly to remember. No woman he had ever met at an +evening party would address such declarations to him. And <!-- Page 89 -->that common +friend. "But I have no friends, except Des Hermies. I'd better try and +find out whom he has been seeing recently. But as a physician he meets +scores of people! And then, how can I explain to him? Tell him the +story? He will burst into a roar and disillusion me before I have got +halfway through the narrative."</p> + +<p>And Durtal became irritated, for within him a really incomprehensible +phenomenon was taking place. He was burning for this unknown woman. He +was positively obsessed by her. He who had renounced all carnal +relations years ago, who, when the barns of his senses were opened, +contented himself with driving the disgusting herd of sin to the +commercial shambles to be summarily knocked in the head by the butcher +girls of love, he, he! was getting himself to believe—in the teeth of +all experience, in the teeth of good judgment—that with a woman as +passionate as this one seemed to be, he would experience superhuman +sensations and novel abandon.</p> + +<p>And he imagined her as he would have her, blonde, firm of flesh, lithe, +feline, melancholy, capable of frenzies; and the picture of her brought +on such a tension of nerves that his teeth rattled.</p> + +<p>For a week, in the solitude in which he lived, he had dreamed of her and +had become thoroughly aroused and incapable of doing any work, even of +reading, for the image of this woman interposed itself between him and +the page.</p> + +<p>He tried suggesting to himself ignoble visions. He would imagine this +creature in moments of corporal distress and thus calm his desires with +unappetizing hallucinations; but the procedure which had formerly been +very effective when he desired a woman and could not have her now failed +utterly. He somehow could not imagine his unknown in quest of bismuth or +of linen. He could not see her otherwise than rebellious, melancholy, +dizzy with desire, kindling him with her eyes, inflaming him with her +pale hands.</p> + +<p>And his sensual resurrection was incredible—an aber<!-- Page 90 -->rated Dog Star +flaming in a physical November, at a spiritual All Hallows. Tranquil, +dried up, safe from crises, without veritable desires, almost impotent, +or rather completely forgetful of sex for months at a time, he was +suddenly roused—and for an unreality!—by the mystery of mad letters.</p> + +<p>"Enough!" he cried, smiting the table a jarring blow.</p> + +<p>He clapped on his hat and went out, slamming the door behind him.</p> + +<p>"I know how to make my imagination behave!" and he rushed over to the +Latin Quarter to see a prostitute he knew. "I have been a good boy too +long," he murmured as he hurried down the street. "One can't stay on the +straight and narrow path for ever."</p> + +<p>He found the woman at home and had a miserable time. She was a buxom +brunette with festive eyes and the teeth of a wolf. An expert, she +could, in a few seconds, drain one's marrow, granulate the lungs, and +demolish the loins.</p> + +<p>She chid him for having been away so long, then cajoled him and kissed +him. He felt pathetic, listless, out of breath, out of place, for he had +no genuine desires. He finally flung himself on a couch and, enervated +to the point of crying, he went through the back-breaking motions +mechanically, like a dredge.</p> + +<p>Never had he so execrated the flesh, never had he felt such repugnance +and lassitude, as when he issued from that room. He strolled haphazard +down the rue Soufflot, and the image of the unknown obsessed him, more +irritating, more tenacious.</p> + +<p>"I begin to understand the superstition of the succubus. I must try some +bromo-exorcism. Tonight I will swallow a gram of bromide of potassium. +That will make my senses be good."</p> + +<p>But he realized that the trouble was not primarily physical, that really +it was only the consequence of an extraordinary state of mind. His love +for that which departed from the <!-- Page 91 -->formula, for that projection <i>out of +the world</i> which had recently cheered him in art, had deviated and +sought expression in a woman. She embodied his need to soar upward from +the terrestrial humdrum.</p> + +<p>"It is those precious unworldly studies, those cloister thoughts +picturing ecclesiastical and demoniac scenes, which have prepared me for +the present folly," he said to himself. His unsuspected, and hitherto +unexpressed, mysticism, which had determined his choice of subject for +his last work was now sending him out, in disorder, to seek new pains +and pleasures.</p> + +<p>As he walked along he recapitulated what he knew of the woman. She was +married, blonde, in easy circumstances because she had her own sleeping +quarters and a maid. She lived in the neighbourhood, because she went to +the rue Littré post-office for her mail. Her name, supposing she had +prefixed her own initial to the name of Maubel, was Henriette, Hortense, +Honorine, Hubertine, or Hélène. What else? She must frequent the society +of artists, because she had met him, and for years he had not been in a +bourgeois drawing-room. She was some kind of a morbid Catholic, because +that word succubus was unknown to the profane. That was all. Then there +was her husband, who, gullible as he might be, must nevertheless suspect +their liaison, since, by her own confession, she dissembled her +obsession very badly.</p> + +<p>"This is what I get for letting myself be carried away. For I, too, +wrote at first to amuse myself with aphrodisiac statements. Then I ended +by becoming completely hysterical. We have taken turns fanning +smouldering ashes which now are blazing. It is too bad that we have both +become inflamed at the same time—for her case must be the same as mine, +to judge from the passionate letters she writes. What shall I do? Keep +on tantalizing myself for a chimera? No! I'll bring matters to a head, +see her, and if she is good-looking, sleep with her. I shall have peace, +anyway."</p> + +<p>He looked about him. Without knowing how he had <!-- Page 92 -->got there he found +himself in the Jardin des Plantes. He oriented himself, remembered that +there was a café on the side facing the quay, and went to find it.</p> + +<p>He tried to control himself and write a letter at once ardent and firm, +but the pen shook in his fingers. He wrote at a gallop, confessed that +he regretted not having consented, at the outset, to the meeting she +proposed, and, attempting to check himself, declared, "We must see each +other. Think of the harm we are doing ourselves, teasing each other at a +distance. Think of the remedy we have at hand, my poor darling, I +implore you."</p> + +<p>He must indicate a place of meeting. He hesitated. "Let me think," he +said to himself. "I don't want her to alight at my place. Too dangerous. +Then the best thing to do would be to offer her a glass of port and a +biscuit and conduct her to Lavenue's, which is a hotel as well as a +café. I will reserve a room. That will be less disgusting than an +assignation house. Very well, then, let us put in place of the rue de la +Chaise the waiting-room of the Gare Montparnasse. Sometimes it is quite +empty. Well, that's done." He gummed the envelope and felt a kind of +relief. "Ah! I was forgetting. Garçon! The Bottin de Paris."</p> + +<p>He searched for the name Maubel, thinking that by some chance it might +be her own. Of course it was hardly probable, but she seemed so +imprudent that with her anything was to be expected. He might very +easily have met a Mme. Maubel and forgotten her. He found a Maubé and a +Maubec, but no Maubel. "Of course, that proves nothing," he said, +closing the directory. He went out and threw his letter into the box. +"The joker in this is the husband. But hell, I am not likely to take his +wife away from him very long."</p> + +<p>He had an idea of going home, but he realized that he would do no work, +that alone he would relapse into daydream. "If I went up to Des +Hermies's place. Yes, today was his consultation day, it's an idea."<!-- Page 93 --></p> + +<p>He quickened his pace, came to the rue Madame, and rang at an entresol. +The housekeeper opened the door.</p> + +<p>"Ah, Monsieur Durtal, he is out, but he will be in soon. Will you wait?"</p> + +<p>"But you are sure he is coming back?"</p> + +<p>"Why, yes. He ought to be here now," she said, stirring the fire.</p> + +<p>As soon as she had retired Durtal sat down, then, becoming bored, he +went over and began browsing among the books which covered the wall as +in his own place.</p> + +<p>"Des Hermies certainly has some curious items," he murmured, opening a +very old book. Here's a treatise written centuries ago to suit my case +exactly. <i>Manuale exorcismorum</i>. Well, I'll be damned! It's a Plantin. +And what does this manual have to recommend in the treatment of the +possessed?</p> + +<p>"Hmmm. Contains some quaint counter-spells. Here are some for +energumens, for the bewitched; here are some against love-philtres and +against the plague; against spells cast on comestibles; some, even, to +keep butter and milk sweet. That isn't odd. The Devil entered into +everything in the good old days. And what can this be?" In his hand he +held two little volumes with crimson edges, bound in fawn-coloured calf. +He opened them and looked at the title, <i>The anatomy of the mass</i>, by +Pierre du Moulin, dated, Geneva, 1624. "Might prove interesting." He +went to warm his feet, and hastily skimmed through one of the volumes. +"Why!" he said, "it's mighty good."</p> + +<p>On the page which he was reading was a discussion of the priesthood. The +author affirmed that none might exercise the functions of the priesthood +if he was not sound in body, or if any of his members had been +amputated, and asking apropos of this, if a castrated man could be +ordained a priest, he answered his own question, "No, unless he carries +upon him, reduced to powder, the parts which are wanting." He added, +however, that Cardinal Tolet did <!-- Page 94 -->not admit this interpretation, which +nevertheless had been universally adopted.</p> + +<p>Durtal, amused, read on. Now du Moulin was debating with himself the +point whether it was necessary to interdict abbés ravaged by lechery. +And in answer he cited himself the melancholy glose of Canon Maximianus, +who, in his Distinction 81, sighs, "It is commonly said that none ought +to be deposed from his charge for fornication, in view of the fact that +few can be found exempt from this vice."</p> + +<p>"Why! You here?" said Des Hermies, entering. "What are you reading? <i>The +anatomy of the mass?</i> Oh, it's a poor thing, for Protestants. I am just +about distracted. Oh, my friend, what brutes those people are," and like +a man with a great weight on his chest he unburdened himself.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I have just come from a consultation with those whom the journals +characterize as 'princes of science.' For a quarter of an hour I have +had to listen to the most contradictory opinions. On one point, however, +all agreed: that my patient was a dead man. Finally they compromised and +decided that the poor wretch's torture should be needlessly prolonged by +a course of moxas. I timidly remarked that it would be simpler to send +for a confessor, and then assuage the sufferings of the dying man with +repeated injections of morphine. If you had seen their faces! They came +as near as anything to denouncing me as a tout for the priests.</p> + +<p>"And such is contemporary science. Everybody discovers a new or +forgotten disease, and trumpets a forgotten or a new remedy, and nobody +knows a thing! And then, too, what good does it do one not to be +hopelessly ignorant since there is so much sophistication going on in +pharmacy that no physician can be sure of having his prescriptions +filled to the letter? One example among many: at present, sirup of white +poppy, the diacodia of the old Codex, does not exist. It is manufactured +with laudanum and sirup of sugar, as if they were the same thing!</p> + +<p>"We have got so we no longer dose substances but pre<!-- Page 95 -->scribe ready-made +remedies and use those surprising specifics which fill up the fourth +pages of the journals. It's a compromise medicine, a democratic +medicine, one cure for all cases. It's scandalous, it's silly.</p> + +<p>"No, there is no use in talking. The old therapeutics based on +experience was better than this. At least it know that remedies ingested +in pill, powder, or bolus form were treacherous, so it prescribed them +only in the liquid state. Now, too, every physician specializes. The +oculists see only the eyes, and, to cure them, quite calmly poison the +body. With their pilocarpine they have ruined the health of how many +people for ever! Others treat cutaneous affections. They drive an eczema +inward on an old man who as soon as he is 'cured' becomes childish or +dangerous. There is no more solidarity. Allegiance to one party means +hostility to all others. Its a mess. Now my honourable confrères are +stumbling around, taking a fancy to medicaments which they don't even +know how to use. Take antipyrine, for example. It is one of the very few +really active products that the chemists have found in a long time. +Well, where is the doctor who knows that, applied in a compress with +iodide and cold Bondonneau spring water, antipyrine combats the +supposedly incurable ailment, cancer? And if that seems incredible, it +is true, nevertheless."</p> + +<p>"Honestly," said Durtal, "you believe that the old-time doctors came +nearer healing?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, because, miraculously, they know the effects of certain invariable +remedies prepared without fraud. Of course it is self-evident that when +old Paré eulogized 'sack medicine' and ordered his patients to carry +pulverized medicaments in a little sack whose form varied according to +the organ to be healed, assuming the form of a cap for the head, of a +bagpipe for the stomach, of an ox tongue for the spleen, he probably did +not obtain very signal results. His claim to have cured gastralgia by +appositions of powder of red rose, coral and mastic, wormwood and mint, +aniseed and <!-- Page 96 -->nutmeg, is certainly not to be borne out, but he also had +other systems, and often he cured, because he possessed the science of +simples, which is now lost.</p> + +<p>"The present-day physicians shrug their shoulders when the name of +Ambrose Paré is mentioned. They used to pooh-pooh the idea of the +alchemists that gold had medicinal virtue. Their fine scorn does not now +prevent them from using alternate doses of the salts and of the filings +of this metal. They use concentrated arseniate of gold against anemia, +muriate against syphilis, cyanide against amenorrhea and scrofula, and +chloride of sodium and gold against old ulcers. No, I assure you, it is +disgusting to be a physician, for in spite of the fact that I am a +doctor of science and have extensive hospital experience I am quite +inferior to humble country herborists, solitaries, who know a great deal +more than I about what is useful to know—and I admit it."</p> + +<p>"And homeopathy?"</p> + +<p>"It has some good things about it and some bad ones. It also palliates +without curing. It sometimes represses maladies, but for grave and acute +cases it is impotent, just like this Mattei system, which, however, is +useful as an intermediary to stave off a crisis. With its blood- and +lymph-purifying products, its antiscrofoloso, its angiotico, its +anti-canceroso, it sometimes modifies morbid states in which other +methods are of no avail. For instance, it permits a patient whose +kidneys have been demoralized by iodide of potassium to gain time and +recuperate so that he can safely begin to drink iodide again!</p> + +<p>"I add that terrific shooting pains, which rebel even against chloroform +and morphine, often yield to an application of 'green electricity.' You +ask me, perhaps, of what ingredients this liquid electricity is made. I +answer that I know absolutely nothing about it. Mattei claims that he +has been able to fix in his globules and liquors the electrical +properties of certain plants, but he has never given out his recipe, +hence he can tell whatever stories suit him. What <!-- Page 97 -->is curious, anyway, +is that this system, thought out by a Roman count, a Catholic, has its +most important following and propaganda among Protestant pastors, whose +original asininity becomes abysmal in the unbelievable homilies which +accompany their essays on healing. Indeed, considered seriously, these +systems are a lot of wind. The truth is that in the art of healing we +grope along at hazard. Nevertheless, with a little experience and a +great deal of nerve we can manage so as not too shockingly to depopulate +the cities. Enough of that, old man, and now where have you been keeping +yourself?"</p> + +<p>"Just what I was going to ask you. You haven't been to see me for over a +week."</p> + +<p>"Well, just now everybody in the world is ill and I am racing around all +the time. By the way, I've been attending Chantelouve, who has a pretty +serious attack of gout. He complains of your absence, and his wife, whom +I should not have taken for an admirer of your books, of your last novel +especially, speaks to me unceasingly of them and you. For a person +customarily so reserved, she seems to me to have become quite +enthusiastic about you, does Mme. Chantelouve. Why, what's the matter?" +he exclaimed, seeing how red Durtal had become.</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing, but I've got to be going. Good night."</p> + +<p>"Why, aren't you feeling well?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, it's nothing, I assure you."</p> + +<p>"Oh, well," said Des Hermies, knowing better than to insist. "Look at +this," and took him into the kitchen and showed him a superb leg of +mutton hanging beside the window. "I hung it up in a draft so as to get +some of the crass freshness out of it. We'll eat it when we have the +astrologer Gévingey to dine with us at Carhaix's. As I am the only +person alive who knows how to boil a <i>gigot à l'Anglaise</i>, I am going to +be the cook, so I shan't come by for you. You will find me in the tower, +disguised as a scullery maid."</p> + +<p>Once outside, Durtal took a long breath. Well, well, <!-- Page 98 -->his unknown was +Chantelouve's wife. Impossible! She had never paid the slightest +attention to him. She was silent and cold. Impossible! And yet, why had +she spoken that way to Des Hermies? But surely if she had wanted to see +him she would have come to his apartment, since they were acquaintances. +She would not have started this correspondence under a pseudonym—</p> + +<p>"H. de Maubel!" he said suddenly, "why, Mme. Chantelouve's name is +Hyacinthe, a boy's name which suits her very well. She lives in the rue +Babneux not vary far from the rue Littré post-office. She is a blonde, +she has a maid, she is a fervent Catholic. She's the one."</p> + +<p>And he experienced, almost simultaneously, two absolutely distinct +sensations.</p> + +<p>Of disappointment, first, for his unknown pleased him better. Mme. +Chantelouve would never realize the ideal he had fashioned for himself, +the tantalizing features, the agile, wild animal body, the melancholy +and ardent bearing, which he had dreamed. Indeed, the mere fact of +knowing the unknown rendered her less desirable, more vulgar. +Accessibility killed the chimera.</p> + +<p>At the same time he experienced a lively relief. He might have been +dealing with a hideous old crone, and Hyacinthe, as he immediately began +to call her, was desirable. Thirty-three at most, not pretty, but +peculiar; blonde, slight and supple, with no hips, she seemed thin +because she was small-boned. The face, mediocre, spoiled by too big a +nose, but the lips incandescent, the teeth superb, her complexion ever +so faint a rose in the slightly bluish milk white of rice water a little +troubled.</p> + +<p>Then her real charm, the really deceptive enigma of her, was in her +eyes; ash-grey eyes which seemed uncertain, myopic, and which conveyed +an expression of resigned boredom. At certain moments the pupils glowed +like a gem of grey water and sparks of silver twinkled to the surface. +By turns they were dolent, forsaken, languorous, and haughty. He +remembered that those eyes had often brought his heart into his throat!</p> + +<p><!-- Page 99 -->In spite of circumstantial evidence, he reflected that those +impassioned letters did not correspond in any way to this woman in the +flesh. Never was woman more controlled, more adept in the lies of good +breeding. He remembered the Chantelouve at-homes. She seemed attentive, +made no contribution to the conversation, played the hostess smiling, +without animation. It was a kind of case of dual personality. In one +visible phase a society woman, prudent and reserved, in another +concealed phase a wild romantic, mad with passion, hysterical of body, +nymphomaniac of soul. It hardly seemed probable.</p> + +<p>"No," he said, "I am on the wrong track. It's merely by chance that Mme. +Chantelouve spoke of my books to Des Hermies, and I mustn't jump to the +conclusion that she is smitten with me and that she has been writing me +these hot letters. It isn't she, but who on earth is it?"</p> + +<p>He continued to revolve the question, without coming any nearer a +solution. Again he called before his eyes the image of this woman, and +admitted that she was really potently seductive, with a fresh, girlish +body, flexible, and without a lot of repugnant flesh—and mysterious, +with her concentrated air, her plaintive eyes, and even her coldness, +real or feigned.</p> + +<p>He summarized all that he really knew about her: simply that she was a +widow when she married Chantelouve, that she had no children, that her +first husband, a manufacturer of chasubles, had, for unknown reasons, +committed suicide. That was all. On the other hand, too, too much was +known about Chantelouve!</p> + +<p>Author of a history of Poland and the cabinets of the north; of a +history of Boniface VIII and his times; a life of the blessed Jeanne de +Valois, founder of the Annonciade; a biography of the Venerable Mother +Anne de Xaintonge, teacher of the Company of Saint Ursula; and other +books of the same kind, published by Lecoffre, Palmé, Poussielgue, in +the inevitable shagreen or sheep bindings stamped with dendriform +patterns: Chantelouve was preparing his candidacy <!-- Page 100 -->for the Académie des +Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, and hoped for the support of the party +of the Ducs. That was why he received influential hypocrites, provincial +Tartufes, and priests every week. He doubtless had to drive himself to +do this, because in spite of his slinking slyness he was jovial and +enjoyed a joke. On the other hand, he aspired to figure in the +literature that counts at Paris, and he expended a good deal of +ingenuity inveigling men of letters to his house on another evening +every week, to make them his aides, or at least keep them from openly +attacking him, so soon as his candidacy—an entirely clerical +affair—should be announced. It was probably to attract and placate his +adversaries that he had contrived these baroque gatherings to which, out +of curiosity as a matter of fact, the most utterly different kinds of +people came.</p> + +<p>He had other motives. It was said that he had no scruples about +exploiting his social acquaintances. Durtal had even noticed that at +each of the dinners given by Chantelouve a well-dressed stranger was +present, and the rumour went about that this guest was a wealthy +provincial to whom men of letters were exhibited like a wax-work +collection, and from whom, before or afterward, important sums were +borrowed.</p> + +<p>"It is undeniable that the Chantelouves have no income and that they +live in style. Catholic publishing houses and magazines pay even worse +than the secular, so in spite of his established reputation in the +clerical world, Chantelouve cannot possibly maintain such a standard of +living on his royalties.</p> + +<p>"There simply is no telling what these people are up to. That this +woman's home life is unhappy, and that she does not love the sneaky +sacristan to whom she is married, is quite possible, but what is her +real rôle in that household? Is she accessory to Chantelouve's pecuniary +dodges? If that is the case I don't see why she should pick on me. If +she is in connivance with her husband, she certainly ought to have sense +enough to seek an influential or wealthy lover, and she <!-- Page 101 -->is perfectly +aware that I fulfil neither the one nor the other condition. Chantelouve +knows very well that I am incapable of paying for her gowns and thus +contributing to the upkeep of their establishment. I make about three +thousand livres, and I can hardly contrive to keep myself going.</p> + +<p>"So that is not her game. I don't know that I want to have anything to +do with their kind of people," he concluded, somewhat chilled by these +reflections. "But I am a big fool. What I know about them proves that my +unknown beloved is not Chantelouve's wife, and, all things considered, I +am glad she isn't."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_VIII"><!-- Page 102 -->CHAPTER VIII</a></h2> + + +<p>Next day his ferment had subsided. The unknown never left him, but she +kept her distance. Her less certain features were effaced in mist, her +fascination became feebler, and she no longer was his sole +preoccupation.</p> + +<p>The idea, suddenly formed on a word of Des Hermies, that the unknown +must be Chantelouve's wife, had, in fashion, checked his fever. If it +was she—and his contrary conclusions of the evening before seemed +hardly valid when he took up one by one the arguments by which he had +arrived at them—then her reasons for wanting him were obscure, +dangerous, and he was on his guard, no longer letting himself go in +complete self-abandon.</p> + +<p>And yet, there was another phenomenon taking place within him. He had +never paid any especial attention to Hyacinthe Chantelouve, he had never +been in love with her. She interested him by the mystery of her person +and her life, but outside her drawing-room he had never given her a +thought. Now ruminating about her he began almost to desire her.</p> + +<p>Suddenly she benefited by the face of the unknown, for when Durtal +evoked her she came confused to his sight, her physiognomy mingled with +that which he had visualized when the first letters came.</p> + +<p>Though the sneaking scoundrelism of her husband displeased him, he did +not think her the less attractive, but his desires were no longer beyond +control. In spite of the distrust which she aroused, she might be an +interesting mistress, making up for her barefaced vices by her good +grace, <!-- Page 103 -->but she was no longer the non-existent, the chimera raised in a +moment of uncertainty.</p> + +<p>On the other hand, if his conjectures were false, if it was not Mme. +Chantelouve who had written the letters, then the other, the unknown, +lost a little of her subtlety by the mere fact that she could be +incarnated in a creature whom he knew. Still remote, she became less so; +then her beauty deteriorated, because, in turn, she took on certain +features of Mme. Chantelouve, and if the latter had profited, the +former, on the contrary, lost by the confusion which Durtal had +established.</p> + +<p>In one as in the other case, whether she were Mme. Chantelouve or not, +he felt appeased, calmed. At heart he did not know, when he revolved the +adventure, whether he preferred his chimera, even diminished, or this +Hyacinthe, who at least, in her reality, was not a disenchanting frump, +wrinkled with age. He profited by the respite to get back to work, but +he had presumed too much upon his powers. When he tried to begin his +chapter on the crimes of Gilles de Rais he discovered that he was +incapable of sewing two sentences together. He wandered in pursuit of +the Marshal and caught up with him, but the prose in which he wished to +embody the man remained listless and lifeless, and he could think only +patchily.</p> + +<p>He threw down his pen and sank into an armchair. In revery he was +transported to Tiffauges, where Satan, who had refused so obstinately to +show himself, now became incarnate in the unwitting Marshal, to wallow +him, vociferating, in the joys of murder.</p> + +<p>"For this, basically, is what Satanism is," said Durtal to himself. "The +external semblance of the Demon is a minor matter. He has no need of +exhibiting himself in human or bestial form to attest his presence. For +him to prove himself, it is enough that he choose a domicile in souls +which he ulcerates and incites to inexplicable crimes. Then, he can hold +his victims by that hope which he breathes into them, that instead of +living in them as he does, and as they don't <!-- Page 104 -->often know, he will obey +evocations, appear to them, and deal out, duly, legally, the advantages +he concedes in exchange for certain forfeits. Our very willingness to +make a pact with him must be able often to produce his infusion into us.</p> + +<p>"All the modern theories of the followers of Maudsley and Lombroso do +not, in fact, render the singular abuses of the Marshal comprehensible. +Nothing could be more just than to class him as a monomaniac, for he was +one, if by the word monomaniac we designate every man who is dominated +by a fixed idea. But so is every one of us, more or less, from the +business man, all whose thoughts converge on the one idea of gain, to +the artist absorbed in bringing his masterpiece into the world. But why +was the Marshal a monomaniac, how did he become one? That is what all +the Lombrosos in the world can't tell you. Encephalic lesions, adherence +of the <i>pia mater</i> to the cerebrum, mean absolutely nothing in this +question. For they are simple resultants, effects derived from a cause +which ought to be explained, and which no materialist can explain. It is +easy to declare that a disturbance of the cerebral lobes produces +assassins and demonomaniacs. The famous alienists of our time claim that +analysis of the brain of an insane woman disclosed a lesion or a +deterioration of the grey matter. And suppose it did! It would still be +a question whether, in the case of a woman possessed with demonomania, +the lesion produced the demonomania, or the demonomania produced the +lesion.... Admitting that there was a lesion! The spiritual Comprachicos +have never resorted to cerebral surgery. They don't amputate the +lobes—supposed to be reliably identified—after carefully trepanning. +They simply act upon the pupil by inculcating ignoble ideas in him, +developing his bad instincts, pushing him little by little into the +paths of vice; and if this gymnastic of persuasion deteriorates the +cerebral tissues in the subject, that proves precisely that the lesion +is only the derivative and not the cause of the psychological state.<!-- Page 105 --></p> + +<p>"And then, and then, these doctrines which consist nowadays in +confounding the criminal with the insane, the demonomaniac with the mad, +have absolutely no foundation. Nine years ago a lad of fourteen, Felix +Lemaîre, assassinated a little boy whom he did not know. He just wanted +to see the child suffer, just wanted to hear him cry. Felix slashed the +little fellow's stomach with a knife, turned the blade round and round +in the warm flesh, then slowly sawed his victim's head off. Felix +manifested no remorse, and in the ensuing investigation proved himself +to be intelligent and atrocious. Dr. Legrand Du Saule and other +specialists kept him under vigilant surveillance for months, and could +not discover the slightest pathological symptom. And he had had fairly +good rearing and certainly had not been corrupted by others.</p> + +<p>"His behaviour was like that of the conscious or unconscious +demonomaniacs who do evil for evil's sake. They are no more mad than the +rapt monk in his cell, than the man who does good for good's sake. +Anybody but a medical theorist can see that the desire for good and the +desire for evil simply form the two opposing poles of the soul. In the +fifteenth century these extremes were represented by Jeanne d'Arc and +the Marshal de Rais. Now there is no more reason for attributing madness +to Gilles than there is for attributing it to Jeanne d'Arc, whose +admirable excesses certainly have no connection with vesania and +delirium.</p> + +<p>"All the same, some frightful nights must have been passed in that +fortress," said Durtal. He was thinking of the château de Tiffauges, +which he had visited a year ago, believing that it would aid him in his +work to live in the country where Gilles had lived and to dig among the +ruins.</p> + +<p>He had established himself in the little hamlet which stretches along +the base of the abandoned donjon. He learned what a living thing the +legend of Bluebeard was in this isolated part of La Vendée on the border +of Brittany.</p> + +<p>"He was a young man who came to a bad end," said the young women. More +fearful, their grandmothers crossed <!-- Page 106 -->themselves as they went along the +foot of the wall in the evening. The memory of the disembowelled +children persisted. The Marshal, known only by his surname, still had +power to terrify.</p> + +<p>Durtal had gone every day from the inn where he lodged to the château, +towering over the valleys of the Crume and of the Sèvre, facing hills +excoriated with blocks of granite and overgrown with formidable oaks, +whose roots, protruding out of the ground, resembled monstrous nests of +frightened snakes.</p> + +<p>One might have believed oneself transported into the real Brittany. +There was the same melancholy, heavy sky, the same sun, which seemed +older than in other parts of the world and which but feebly gilded the +sorrowful, age-old forests and the mossy sandstone. There were the same +endless stretches of broken, rocky soil, pitted with ponds of rusty +water, dotted with scattered clumps of gorse and furze copse, and +sprinkled with pink harebells and nameless yellow prairie flowers.</p> + +<p>One felt that this iron-grey sky; this starving soil, empurpled only +here and there by the bleeding flower of the buckwheat; that these +roads, bordered with stones placed one on top of the other, without +cement or plaster; that these paths, bordered with impenetrable hedges; +that these grudging plants; these inhospitable fields; these crippled +beggars, eaten with vermin, plastered with filth; that even the flocks, +undersized and wasted, the dumpy little cows, the black sheep whose blue +eyes had the cold, pale gleam that is in the eyes of the Slav or of the +tribade; had perpetuated their primordial state, preserving an identical +landscape through all the centuries.</p> + +<p>Except for an incongruous factory chimney further away on the bank of +the Sèvre, the countryside of Tiffauges remained in perfect harmony with +the immense château, erect among its ruins. Within the close, still to +be traced by the ruins of the towers, was a whole plain, now converted +into a miserable truck garden. Cabbages, in long bluish lines, +<!-- Page 107 -->impoverished carrots, consumptive navews, spread over this enormous +circle where iron mail had clanked in the tournament and where +processionals had slowly devolved, in the smoke of incense, to the +chanting of psalms.</p> + +<p>A thatched hut had been built in a corner. The peasant inhabitants, +returned to a state of savagery, no longer understood the meaning of +words, and could be roused out of their apathy only by the display of a +silver coin. Seizing the coin, they would hand over the keys.</p> + +<p>For hours one could browse around at ease among the ruins, and smoke and +daydream. Unfortunately, certain parts were inaccessible. The donjon was +still shut off, on the Tiffauges side, by a vast moat, at the bottom of +which mighty trees were growing. One would have had to pass over the +tops of the trees, growing to the very verge of the wall, to gain a +porch on the other side, for there was now no drawbridge.</p> + +<p>But quite accessible was another part which overhung the Sèvre. There +the wings of the castle, overgrown with ivy and white-crested viburnum, +were intact. Spongy, dry as pumice stone, silvered with lichen and +gilded with moss, the towers rose entire, though from their crenelated +collarettes whole blocks were blown away on windy nights.</p> + +<p>Within, room succeeded glacial room, cut into the granite, surmounted +with vaulted roofs, and as close as the hold of a ship. Then by spiral +stairways one descended into similar chambers, joined by cellar +passageways into the walls of which were dug deep niches and lairs of +unknown utility.</p> + +<p>Beneath, those corridors, so narrow that two persons could not walk +along them abreast, descended at a gentle slope, and bifurcated so that +there was a labyrinth of lanes, leading to veritable cells, on the walls +of which the nitre scintillated in the light of the lantern like steel +mica or twinkling grains of sugar. In the cells above, in the dungeons +beneath, one stumbled over rifts of hard earth, in the centre or in a +corner of which yawned now the mouth of an unsealed oubliette, now a +well.<!-- Page 108 --></p> + +<p>Finally, at the summit of one of the towers, that at the left as one +entered, there was a roofed gallery running parallel to a circular +foothold cut from the rock. There, without doubt, the men-at-arms had +been stationed to fire on their assailants through wide loopholes +opening overhead and underfoot. In this gallery the voice, even the +lowest, followed the curving walls and could be heard all around the +circuit.</p> + +<p>Briefly, the exterior of the castle revealed a fortified place built to +stand long sieges, and the dismantled interior made one think of a +prison in which flesh, mildewed by the moisture, must rot in a few +months. Out in the open air again, one felt a sensation of well-being, +of relief, which one lost on traversing the ruins of the isolated chapel +and penetrating, by a cellar door, to the crypt below.</p> + +<p>This chapel, low, squat, its vaulted roof upheld by massive columns on +whose capitals lozenges and bishop's croziers were carved, dated from +the eleventh century. The altar stone survived intact. Brackish +daylight, which seemed to have been filtered through layers of horn, +came in at the openings, hardly lighting the shadowed, begrimed walls +and the earth floor, which too was pierced by the entrance to an +oubliette or by a well shaft.</p> + +<p>In the evening after dinner he had often climbed up on the embankment +and followed the cracked walls of the ruins. On bright nights one part +of the castle was thrown back into shadow, and the other, by contrast, +stood forth, washed in silver and blue, as if rubbed with mercurial +lusters, above the Sèvre, along whose surface streaks of moonlight +darted like the backs of fishes. The silence was overpowering. After +nine o'clock not a dog, not a soul. He would return to the poor chamber +of the inn, where an old woman, in black, wearing the cornet head-dress +her ancestors wore in the sixteenth century, waited with a candle to bar +the door as soon as he returned.</p> + +<p>"All this," said Durtal to himself, "is the skeleton of a dead keep. To +reanimate it we must revisualize the opulent <!-- Page 109 -->flesh which once covered +these bones of sandstone. Documents give us every detail. This carcass +was magnificently clad, and if we are to see Gilles in his own +environment, we must remember all the sumptuosity of fifteenth century +furnishing.</p> + +<p>"We must reclothe these walls with wainscots of Irish wood or with high +warp tapestries of gold and thread of Arras, so much sought after in +that epoch. Then this hard, black soil must be repaved with green and +yellow bricks or black and white flagstones. The vault must be starred +with gold and sown with crossbows on a field <i>azur</i>, and the Marshal's +cross, <i>sable</i> on shield <i>or</i>, must be set shining there."</p> + +<p>Of themselves the furnishings returned, each to its own place. Here and +there were high-backed signorial chairs, thrones, and stools. Against +the walls were sideboards on whose carved panels were bas-reliefs +representing the Annunciation and the Adoration of the Magi. On top of +the sideboards, beneath lace canopies, stood the painted and gilded +statues of Saint Anne, Saint Marguerite, and Saint Catherine, so often +reproduced by the wood-carvers of the Middle Ages. There were +linen-chests, bound in iron, studded with great nails, and covered with +sowskin leather. Then there were coffers fastened by great metal clasps +and overlaid with leather or fabric on which fair faced angels, cut from +illuminated missal-backgrounds, had been mounted. There were great beds +reached by carpeted steps. There were tasselled pillows and counterpanes +heavily perfumed, and canopies and curtains embroidered with armories or +sprinkled with stars.</p> + +<p>So one must reconstruct the decorations of the other rooms, in which +nothing was standing but the walls and the high, basket-funneled +fireplaces, whose spacious hearths, wanting andirons, were still charred +from the old fires. One could easily imagine the dining-rooms and those +terrible repasts which Gilles deplored in his trial at Nantes. Gilles +admitted with tears that he had ordered his diet so as to <!-- Page 110 -->kindle the +fury of his senses, and these reprobate menus can be easily reproduced. +When he was at table with Eustache Blanchet, Prelati, Gilles de Sillé, +all his trusted companions, in the great room, the plates and the ewers +filled with water of medlar, rose, and melilote for washing the hands, +were placed on credences. Gilles ate beef-, salmon-, and bream-pies; +levert- and squab-tarts; roast heron, stork, crane, peacock, bustard, and +swan; venison in verjuice; Nantes lampreys; salads of briony, hops, +beard of judas, mallow; vehement dishes seasoned with marjoram and mace, +coriander and sage, peony and rosemary, basil and hyssop, grain of +paradise and ginger; perfumed, acidulous dishes, giving one a violent +thirst; heavy pastries; tarts of elder-flower and rape; rice with milk +of hazelnuts sprinkled with cinnamon; stuffy dishes necessitating +copious drafts of beer and fermented mulberry juice, of dry wine, or +wine aged to tannic bitterness, of heady hypocras charged with cinnamon, +with almonds, and with musk, of raging liquors clouded with golden +particles—mad drinks which spurred the guests in this womanless castle +to frenzies of lechery and made them, at the end of the meal, writhe in +monstrous dreams.</p> + +<p>"Remain the costumes to be restored," said Durtal to himself, and he +imagined Gilles and his friends, not in their damaskeened field harness, +but in their indoor costumes, their robes of peace. He visualized them +in harmony with the luxury of their surroundings. They wore glittering +vestments, pleated jackets, bellying out in a little flounced skirt at +the waist. The legs were encased in dark skin-tight hose. On their heads +were the artichoke chaperon hats like that of Charles VII in his +portrait in the Louvre. The torso was enveloped in silver-threaded +damask, which was crusted with jewelleries and bordered with marten.</p> + +<p>He thought of the costume of the women of the time, robes of precious +tentered stuffs, with tight sleeves, great collars thrown back over the +shoulders, cramping bodices, long trains lined with fur. And as he thus +dressed an imaginary manikin, hanging ropes of heavy stones, purplish +<!-- Page 111 -->or milky crystals, cloudy uncut gems, over the slashed corsage, a woman +slipped in, filled the robe, swelled the bodice, and thrust her head +under the two-horned steeple-headdress. From behind the pendent lace +smiled the composite features of the unknown and of Mme. Chantelouve. +Delighted, he gazed at the apparition without ever perceiving whom he +had evoked, when his cat, jumping into his lap, distracted his thoughts +and brought him back to his room.</p> + +<p>"Well, well, she won't let me alone," and in spite of himself he began +to laugh at the thought of the unknown following him even to the château +de Tiffauges. "It's foolish to let my thoughts wander this way," he +said, drawing himself up, "but daydream is the only good thing in life. +Everything else is vulgar and empty.</p> + +<p>"No doubt about it, that was a singular epoch, the Middle Epoch of +ignorance and darkness, the history professors and Ages," he went on, +lighting a cigarette. "For some it's all white and for others utterly +black. No intermediate shade, atheists reiterate. Dolorous and exquisite +epoch, say the artists and the religious savants.</p> + +<p>"What is certain is that the immutable classes, the nobility, the +clergy, the bourgeoisie, the people, had loftier souls at that time. You +can prove it: society has done nothing but deteriorate in the four +centuries separating us from the Middle Ages.</p> + +<p>"True, a baron then was usually a formidable brute. He was a drunken and +lecherous bandit, a sanguinary and boisterous tyrant, but he was a child +in mind and spirit. The Church bullied him, and to deliver the Holy +Sepulchre he sacrificed his wealth, abandoned home, wife, and children, +and accepted unconscionable fatigues, extraordinary sufferings, +unheard-of dangers.</p> + +<p>"By pious heroism he redeemed the baseness of his morals. The race has +since become moderate. It has reduced, sometimes even done away with, +its instincts of carnage and rape, but it has replaced them by the +monomania of business, the passion for lucre. It has done worse. It has +sunk to <!-- Page 112 -->such a state of abjectness as to be attracted by the doings of +the lowest of the low. The aristocracy disguises itself as a mountebank, +puts on tights and spangles, gives public trapeze performances, jumps +through hoops, and does weight-lifting stunts in the trampled tan-bark +ring!</p> + +<p>"The clergy, then a good example—if we except a few convents ravaged by +frenzied Satanism and lechery—launched itself into superhuman +transports and attained God. Saints swarmed, miracles multiplied, and +while still omnipotent the Church was gentle with the humble, it +consoled the afflicted, defended the little ones, and mourned or +rejoiced with the people of low estate. Today it hates the poor, and +mysticism dies in a clergy which checks ardent thoughts and preaches +sobriety of mind, continence of postulation, common sense in prayer, +bourgeoisie of the soul! Yet here and there, buried in cloisters far +from these lukewarm priests, there perhaps still are real saints who +weep, monks who pray, to the point of dying of sorrow and prayer, for +each of us. And they—with the demoniacs—are the sole connecting link +between that age and this.</p> + +<p>"The smug, sententious side of the bourgeoisie already existed in the +time of Charles VII. But cupidity was repressed by the confessor, and +the tradesman, just like the labourer, was maintained by the +corporations, which denounced overcharging and fraud, saw that decried +merchandise was destroyed, and fixed a fair price and a high standard of +excellence for commodities. Trades and professions were handed down from +father to son. The corporations assured work and pay. People were not, +as now, subject to the fluctuations of the market and the merciless +capitalistic exploitation. Great fortunes did not exist and everybody +had enough to live on. Sure of the future, unhurried, they created +marvels of art, whose secret remains for ever lost.</p> + +<p>"All the artisans who passed the three degrees of apprentice, +journeyman, and master, developed subtlety and became veritable artists. +They ennobled the simplest of iron work, the commonest faience, the most +ordinary chests and coffers.<!-- Page 113 --> Those corporations, putting themselves +under the patronage of Saints—whose images, frequently besought, +figured on their banners—preserved through the centuries the honest +existence of the humble and notably raised the spiritual level of the +people whom they protected.</p> + +<p>"All that is decisively at an end. The bourgeoise has taken the place +forfeited by a wastrel nobility which now subsists only to set ignoble +fashions and whose sole contribution to our 'civilization' is the +establishment of gluttonous dining clubs, so-called gymnastic societies, +and pari-mutuel associations. Today the business man has but these aims, +to exploit the working man, manufacture shoddy, lie about the quality of +merchandise, and give short weight.</p> + +<p>"As for the people, they have been relieved of the indispensable fear of +hell, and notified, at the same time, that they are not to expect to be +recompensed, after death, for their sufferings here. So they scamp their +ill-paid work and take to drink. From time to time, when they have +ingurgitated too violent liquids, they revolt, and then they must be +slaughtered, for once let loose they would act as a crazed stampeded +herd.</p> + +<p>"Good God, what a mess! And to think that the nineteenth century takes +on airs and adulates itself. There is one word in the mouths of all. +Progress. Progress of whom? Progress of what? For this miserable century +hasn't invented anything great.</p> + +<p>"It has constructed nothing and destroyed everything. At the present +hour it glorifies itself in this electricity which it thinks it +discovered. But electricity was known and used in remotest antiquity, +and if the ancients could not explain its nature nor even its essence, +the moderns are just as incapable of identifying that force which +conveys the spark and carries the voice—acutely nasalized—along the +wire. This century thinks it discovered the terrible science of +hypnotism, which the priests and Brahmins in Egypt and India knew and +practised to the utmost. No, the only thing <!-- Page 114 -->this century has invented +is the sophistication of products. Therein it is passed master. It has +even gone so far as to adulterate excrement. Yes, in 1888 the two houses +of parliament had to pass a law destined to suppress the falsification +of fertilizer. Now that's the limit."</p> + +<p>The doorbell rang. He opened the door and nearly fell over backward.</p> + +<p>Mme. Chantelouve was before him.</p> + +<p>Stupefied, he bowed, while Mme. Chantelouve, without a word, went +straight into the study. There she turned around, and Durtal, who had +followed, found himself face to face with her.</p> + +<p>"Won't you please sit down?" He advanced an armchair and hastened to +push back, with his foot, the edge of the carpet turned up by the cat. +He asked her to excuse the disorder. She made a vague gesture and +remained standing.</p> + +<p>In a calm but very low voice she said, "It is I who wrote you those mad +letters. I have come to drive away this bad fever and get it over with +in a quite frank way. As you yourself wrote, no liaison between us is +possible. Let us forget what has happened. And before I go, tell me that +you bear me no grudge."</p> + +<p>He cried out at this. He would not have it so. He had not been beside +himself when he wrote her those ardent pages, he was in perfectly good +faith, he loved her—</p> + +<p>"You love me! Why, you didn't even know that those letters were from me. +You loved an unknown, a chimera. Well, admitting that you are telling +the truth, the chimera does not exist now, for here I am."</p> + +<p>"You are mistaken. I knew perfectly that it was Mme. Chantelouve hiding +behind the pseudonym of Mme. Maubel." And he half-explained to her, +without, of course, letting her know of his doubts, how he had lifted +her mask.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" She reflected, blinking her troubled eyes. "At any rate," she +said, again facing him squarely, "you could not have recognized me in +the first letters, to which you re<!-- Page 115 -->sponded with cries of passion. Those +cries were not addressed to me."</p> + +<p>He contested this observation, and became entangled in the dates and +happenings and in the sequence of the notes. She at length lost the +thread of his remarks. The situation was so ridiculous that both were +silent. Then she sat down and burst out laughing.</p> + +<p>Her strident, shrill laugh, revealing magnificent, but short and pointed +teeth, in a mocking mouth, vexed him.</p> + +<p>"She has been playing with me," he said to himself, and dissatisfied +with the turn the conversation had taken, and furious at seeing this +woman so calm, so different from her burning letters, he asked, in a +tone of irritation, "Am I to know why you laugh?"</p> + +<p>"Pardon me. It's a trick my nerves play on me, sometimes in public +places. But never mind. Let us be reasonable and talk things over. You +tell me you love me—"</p> + +<p>"And I mean it."</p> + +<p>"Well, admitting that I too am not indifferent, where is this going to +lead us? Oh, you know so well, you poor dear, that you refused, right at +first, the meeting which I asked in a moment of madness—and you gave +well-thought-out reasons for refusing."</p> + +<p>"But I refused because I did not know then that you were the women in +the case! I have told you that it was several days later that Des +Hermies unwittingly revealed your identity to me. Did I hesitate as soon +as I knew? No! I immediately implored you to come."</p> + +<p>"That may be, but you admit that I'm right when I claim that you wrote +your first letters to another and not me."</p> + +<p>She was pensive for a moment. Durtal began to be prodigiously bored by +this discussion. He thought it more prudent not to answer, and was +seeking a change of subject that would put an end to the deadlock.</p> + +<p>She herself got him out of his difficulty. "Let us not discuss it any +more," she said, smiling, "we shall not get any<!-- Page 116 -->where. You see, this is +the situation: I am married to a very nice man who loves me and whose +only crime is that he represents the rather insipid happiness which one +has right at hand. I started this correspondence with you, so I am to +blame, and believe me, on his account I suffer. You have work to do, +beautiful books to write. You don't need to have a crazy woman come +walking into your life. So, you see, the best thing is for us to remain +friends, but true friends, and go no further."</p> + +<p>"And it is the woman who wrote me such vivid letters, who now speaks to +me of reason, good sense, and God knows what!"</p> + +<p>"But be frank, now. You don't love me."</p> + +<p>"I don't?"</p> + +<p>He took her hands, gently. She made no resistance, but looking at him +squarely she said, "Listen. If you had loved me you would have come to +see me; and yet for months you haven't tried to find out whether I was +alive or dead."</p> + +<p>"But you understand that I could not hope to be welcomed by you on the +terms we now are on, and too, in your parlour there are guests, your +husband—I have never had you even a little bit to myself at your home."</p> + +<p>He pressed her hands more tightly and came closer to her. She regarded +him with her smoky eyes, in which he now saw that dolent, almost +dolorous expression which had captivated him. He completely lost control +of himself before this voluptuous and plaintive face, but with a firm +gesture she freed her hands.</p> + +<p>"Enough. Sit down, now, and let's talk of something else. Do you know +your apartment is charming? Which saint is that?" she asked, examining +the picture, over the mantel, of the monk on his knees beside a +cardinal's hat and cloak.</p> + +<p>"I do not know."</p> + +<p>"I will find out for you. I have the lives of all the saints at home. It +ought to be easy to find out about a cardinal who renounced the purple +to go live in a hut. Wait. I <!-- Page 117 -->think Saint Peter Damian did, but I am not +sure. I have such a poor memory. Help me think."</p> + +<p>"But I don't know who he is!"</p> + +<p>She came closer to him and put her hand on his shoulder.</p> + +<p>"Are you angry at me?"</p> + +<p>"I should say I am! When I desire you frantically, when I've been +dreaming for a whole week about this meeting, you come here and tell me +that all is over between us, that you do not love me—"</p> + +<p>She became demure. "But if I did not love you, would I have come to you? +Understand, then, that reality kills a dream; that it is better for us +not to expose ourselves to fearful regrets. We are not children, you +see. No! Let me go. Do not squeeze me like that!" Very pale, she +struggled in his embrace. "I swear to you that I will go away and that +you shall never see me again if you do not let me loose." Her voice +became hard. She was almost hissing her words. He let go of her. "Sit +down there behind the table. Do that for me." And tapping the floor with +her heel, she said, in a tone of melancholy, "Then it is impossible to +be friends, only friends, with a man. But it would be very nice to come +and see you without having evil thoughts to fear, wouldn't it?" She was +silent. Then she added, "Yes, just to see each other—and if we did not +have any sublime things to say to each other, it is also very nice to +sit and say nothing!"</p> + +<p>Then she said, "My time is up. I must go home."</p> + +<p>"And leave me with no hope?" he exclaimed, kissing her gloved hands.</p> + +<p>She did not answer, but gently shook her head, then, as he looked +pleadingly at her, she said, "Listen. If you will promise to make no +demands on me and to be good, I will come here night after next at nine +o'clock."</p> + +<p>He promised whatever she wished. And as he raised his head from her +hands and as his lips brushed lightly over her breast, which seemed to +tighten, she disengaged her hands, <!-- Page 118 -->caught his nervously, and, clenching +her teeth, offered her neck to his lips. Then she fled.</p> + +<p>"Oof!" he said, closing the door after her. He was at the same time +satisfied and vexed.</p> + +<p>Satisfied, because he found her enigmatic, changeful, charming. Now that +he was alone he recalled her to memory. He remembered her tight black +dress, her fur cloak, the warm collar of which had caressed him as he +was covering her neck with kisses. He remembered that she wore no +jewellery, except sparkling blue sapphire eardrops. He remembered the +wayward blonde hair escaping from under the dark green otter hat. +Holding his hands to his nostrils he sniffed again the sweet and distant +odour, cinnamon lost among stronger perfumes, which he had caught from +the contact of her long, fawn-coloured suède gloves, and he saw again +her moist, rodent teeth, her thin, bitten lips, and her troubled eyes, +of a grey and opaque lustre which could suddenly be transfigured with +radiance. "Oh, night after next it will be great to kiss all that!"</p> + +<p>Vexed also, both with himself and with her. He reproached himself with +having been brusque and reserved. He ought to have shown himself more +expansive and less restrained. But it was her fault, for she had abashed +him! The incongruity between the woman who cried with voluptuous +suffering in her letters and the woman he had seen, so thoroughly +mistress of herself in her coquetries, was truly too much!</p> + +<p>"However you look at them, these women are astonishing creatures," he +thought. "Here is one who accomplishes the most difficult thing you can +imagine: coming to a man's room after having written him excessive +letters. I, I act like a goose. I stand there ill at ease. She, in a +second, has the self-assurance of a person in her own home, or visiting +in a drawing-room. No awkwardness, pretty gestures, a few words, and +eyes which supply everything! She isn't very agreeable," he thought, +reminded of the curt tone she had used when disengaging herself, "and +yet she has her tender <!-- Page 119 -->spots," he continued dreamily, remembering not +so much her words as certain inflections of her voice and a certain +bewildered look in her eyes. "I must go about it prudently that night," +he concluded, addressing his cat, which, never having seen a woman +before, had fled at the arrival of Mme. Chantelouve and taken refuge +under the bed, but had now advanced almost grovelling, to sniff the +chair where she had sat.</p> + +<p>"Come to think of it, she is an old hand, Mme. Hyacinthe! She would not +have a meeting in a café nor in the street. She scented from afar the +assignation house or the hotel. And though, from the mere fact of my not +inviting her here, she could not doubt that I did not want to introduce +her to my lodging, she came here deliberately. Then, this first denial, +come to think of it, is only a fine farce. If she were not seeking a +liaison she would not have visited me. No, she wanted me to beg her to +do what she wanted to do. Like all women, she wanted me to offer her +what she desired. I have been rolled. Her arrival has knocked the props +out from under my whole method. But what does it matter? She is no less +desirable," he concluded, happy to get rid of disagreeable reflections +and plunge back into the delirious vision which he retained of her. +"That night won't be exactly dreary," he thought, seeing again her eyes, +imagining them in surrender, deceptive and plaintive, as he would +disrobe her and make a body white and slender, warm and supple, emerge +from her tight skirt. "She has no children. That is an earnest promise +that her flesh is quite firm, even at thirty!"</p> + +<p>A whole draft of youth intoxicated him. Durtal, astonished, took a look +at himself in the mirror. His tired eyes brightened, his face seemed +more youthful, less worn. "Lucky I had just shaved," he said to himself. +But gradually, as he mused, he saw in this mirror, which he was so +little in the habit of consulting, his features droop and his eyes lose +their sparkle. His stature, which had seemed to increase in this +spiritual upheaval, diminished again. Sad<!-- Page 120 -->ness returned to his +thoughtful mien. "I haven't what you would call the physique of a lady's +man," he concluded. "What does she see in me? for she could very easily +find someone else with whom to be unfaithful to her husband. Enough of +these rambling thoughts. Let's cease to think them. To sum up the +situation: I love her with my head and not my heart. That's the +important thing. Under such conditions, whatever happens, a love affair +is brief, and I am almost certain to get out of it without committing +any follies."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_IX"><!-- Page 121 -->CHAPTER IX</a></h2> + + +<p>The next morning he woke, thinking of her, just as he had been doing +when he went to sleep. He tried to rationalize the episode and revolved +his conjectures over and over. Once again he put himself this question: +"Why, when I went to her house, did she not let me see that I pleased +her? Never a look, never a word to encourage me. Why this +correspondence, when it was so easy to insist on having me to dine, so +simple to prepare an occasion which would bring us together, either at +her home or elsewhere?" And he answered himself, "It would have been +usual and not at all diverting. She is perhaps skilled in these matters. +She knows that the unknown frightens a man's reason away, that the +unembodied puts the soul in ferment, and she wished to give me a fever +before trying an attack—to call her advances by their right name.</p> + +<p>"It must be admitted that if my conjectures are correct she is strangely +astute. At heart she is, perhaps, quite simply a crazy romantic or a +comedian. It amuses her to manufacture little adventures, to throw +tantalizing obstacles in the way of the realization of a vulgar desire. +And Chantelouve? He is probably aware of his wife's goings on, which +perhaps facilitate his career. Otherwise, how could she arrange to come +here at nine o'clock at night, instead of the morning or afternoon on +pretence of going shopping?"</p> + +<p>To this new question there could be no answer, and little by little he +ceased to interrogate himself on the point. He began to be obsessed by +the real woman as he had been by the imaginary creature. The latter had +completely vanished. He did not even remember her physiognomy now. Mme.<!-- Page 122 --> +Chantelouve, just as she was in reality, without borrowing the other's +features, had complete possession of him and fired his brain and senses +to white heat. He began to desire her madly and to wish furiously for +tomorrow night. And if she did not come? He felt cold in the small of +his back at the idea that she might be unable to get away from home or +that she might wilfully stay away.</p> + +<p>"High time it was over and done with," he said, for this Saint Vitus' +dance went on not without certain diminution of force, which disturbed +him. In fact he feared, after the febrile agitation of his nights, to +reveal himself as a sorry paladin when the time came. "But why bother?" +he rejoined, as he started toward Carhaix's, where he was to dine with +the astrologer Gévingey and Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"I shall be rid of my obsession awhile," he murmured, groping along in +the darkness of the tower.</p> + +<p>Des Hermies, hearing him come up the stair, opened the door, casting a +shaft of light into the spiral. Durtal, reaching the landing, saw his +friend in shirt sleeves and enveloped in an apron.</p> + +<p>"I am, as you see, in the heat of composition," and upon a stew-pan +boiling on the stove Des Hermies cast that brief and sure look which a +mechanic gives his machine, then he consulted, as if it were a +manometer, his watch, hanging to a nail. "Look," he said, raising the +pot lid.</p> + +<p>Durtal bent over and through a cloud of vapour he saw a coiled napkin +rising and falling with the little billows. "Where is the leg of +mutton?"</p> + +<p>"It, my friend, is sewn into that cloth so tightly that the air cannot +enter. It is cooking in this pretty, singing sauce, into which I have +thrown a handful of hay, some pods of garlic and slices of carrot and +onion, some grated nutmeg, and laurel and thyme. You will have many +compliments to make me if Gévingey doesn't keep us waiting too long, +because a <i>gigot à l'Anglaise</i> won't stand being cooked to shreds."</p> + +<p>Carhaix's wife looked in.</p> + +<p>"Come in," she said. "My husband is here."<!-- Page 123 --></p> + +<p>Durtal found him dusting the books. They shook hands. Durtal, at random, +looked over some of the dusted books lying on the table.</p> + +<p>"Are these," he asked, "technical works about metals and bell-founding +or are they about the liturgy of bells?"</p> + +<p>"They are not about founding, though there is sometimes reference to the +founders, the 'sainterers' as they were called in the good old days. You +will discover here and there some details about alloys of red copper and +fine tin. You will even find, I believe, that the art of the 'sainterer' +has been in decline for three centuries, probably due to the fact that +the faithful no longer melt down their ornaments of precious metals, +thus modifying the alloy. Or is it because the founders no longer invoke +Saint Anthony the Eremite when the bronze is boiling in the furnace? I +do not know. It is true, at any rate, that bells are now made in carload +lots. Their voices are without personality. They are all the same. +They're like docile and indifferent hired girls when formerly they were +like those aged servants who became part of the family whose joys and +griefs they have shared. But what difference does that make to the +clergy and the congregation? At present these auxiliaries devoted to the +cult do not represent any symbol. And that explains the whole +difficulty.</p> + +<p>"You asked me, a few seconds ago, whether these books treated of bells +from the liturgical point of view. Yes, most of them give tabulated +explanations of the significance of the various component parts. The +interpretations are simple and offer little variety."</p> + +<p>"What are a few of them?"</p> + +<p>"I can sum them all up for you in a very few words. According to the +<i>Rational</i> of Guillaume Durand, the hardness of the metal signifies the +force of the preacher. The percussion of the clapper on the sides +expresses the idea that the preacher must first scourge himself to +correct himself of his own vices before reproaching the vices of others. +The wooden frame represents the cross of Christ, and the cord, <!-- Page 124 -->which +formerly served to set the bell swinging, allegorizes the science of the +Scriptures which flows from the mystery of the Cross itself.</p> + +<p>"The most ancient liturgists expound practically the same symbols. Jean +Beleth, who lived in 1200, declares also that the bell is the image of +the preacher, but adds that its motion to and fro, when it is set +swinging, teaches that the preacher must by turns elevate his language +and bring it down within reach of the crowd. For Hugo of Saint Victor +the clapper is the tongue of the officiating priest, which strikes the +two sides of the vase and announces thus, at the same time, the truth of +the two Testaments. Finally, if we consult Fortunatus Amalarius, perhaps +the most ancient of the liturgists, we find simply that the body of the +bell denotes the mouth of the preacher and the hammer his tongue."</p> + +<p>"But," said Durtal, somewhat disappointed, "it isn't—what shall I +say?—very profound."</p> + +<p>The door opened.</p> + +<p>"Why, how are you!" said Carhaix, shaking hands with Gévingey, and then +introducing him to Durtal.</p> + +<p>While the bell-ringer's wife finished setting the table, Durtal examined +the newcomer. He was a little man, wearing a soft black felt hat and +wrapped up like an omnibus conductor in a cape with a military collar of +blue cloth.</p> + +<p>His head was like an egg with the hollow downward. The skull, waxed as +if with siccatif, seemed to have grown up out of the hair, which was +hard and like filaments of dried coconut and hung down over his neck. +The nose was bony, and the nostrils opened like two hatchways, over a +toothless mouth which was hidden by a moustache grizzled like the goatee +springing from the short chin. At first glance one would have taken him +for an art-worker, a wood engraver or a glider of saints' images, but on +looking at him more closely, observing the eyes, round and grey, set +close to the nose, almost crossed, and studying his solemn voice and +<!-- Page 125 -->obsequious manners, one asked oneself from what quite special kind of +sacristy the man had issued.</p> + +<p>He took off his things and appeared in a black frock coat of square, +boxlike cut. A fine gold chain, passed about his neck, lost itself in +the bulging pocket of an old vest. Durtal gasped when Gévingey, as soon +as he had seated himself, complacently put his hands on exhibition, +resting them on his knees. Enormous, freckled with blotches of orange, +and terminating in milk-white nails cut to the quick, the fingers were +covered with huge rings, the sets of which formed a phalanx.</p> + +<p>Seeing Durtal's gaze fixed on his fingers, he smiled. "You examine my +valuables, monsieur. They are of three metals, gold, platinum, and +silver. This ring bears a scorpion, the sign under which I was born. +That with its two accoupled triangles, one pointing downward and the +other upward, reproduces the image of the macrocosm, the seal of +Solomon, the grand pantacle. As for the little one you see here," he +went on, showing a lady's ring set with a tiny sapphire between two +roses, "that is a present from a person whose horoscope I was good +enough to cast."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Durtal, somewhat surprised at the man's self-satisfaction.</p> + +<p>"Dinner is ready," said the bell-ringer's wife.</p> + +<p>Des Hermies, doffing his apron, appeared in his tight cheviot garments. +He was not so pale as usual, his cheeks being red from the heat of the +stove. He set the chairs around.</p> + +<p>Carhaix served the broth, and everyone was silent, taking spoonfuls of +the cooler broth at the edge of the bowl. Then madame brought Des +Hermies the famous leg of mutton to cut. It was a magnificent red, and +large drops flowed beneath the knife. Everybody ecstasized when tasting +this robust meat, aromatic with a purée of turnips sweetened with caper +sauce.</p> + +<p>Des Hermies bowed under a storm of compliments. Carhaix filled the +glasses, and, somewhat confused in the pres<!-- Page 126 -->ence of Gévingey, paid the +astrologer effusive attention to make him forget their former +ill-feeling. Des Hermies assisted in this good work, and wishing also to +be useful to Durtal, brought the conversation around to the subject of +horoscopes.</p> + +<p>Then Gévingey mounted the rostrum. In a tone of satisfaction he spoke of +his vast labours, of the six months a horoscope required, of the +surprise of laymen when he declared that such work was not paid for by +the price he asked, five hundred francs.</p> + +<p>"But you see I cannot give my science for nothing," he said. "And now +people doubt astrology, which was revered in antiquity. Also in the +Middle Ages, when it was almost sacred. For instance, messieurs, look at +the portal of Notre Dame. The three doors which archeologists—not +initiated into the symbolism of Christianity and the occult—designate +by the names of the door of Judgment, the door of the Virgin, and the +door of Saint Marcel or Saint Anne, really represent Mysticism, +Astrology, and Alchemy, the three great sciences of the Middle Ages. +Today you find people who say, 'Are you quite sure that the stars have +an influence on the destiny of man?' But, messieurs, without entering +here into details reserved for the adept, in what way is this spiritual +influence stranger than that corporal influence which certain planets, +the moon, for example, exercise on the organs of men and women?</p> + +<p>"You are a physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, and you are not unaware that +the doctors Gillespin, Jackson, and Balfour, of Jamaica, have +established the influence of the constellations on human health in the +West Indies. At every change of the moon the number of sick people +augments. The acute crises of fever coincide with the phases of our +satellite. Finally, there are <i>lunatics</i>. Go out in the country and +ascertain at what periods madness becomes epidemic. But does this serve +to convince the incredulous?" he asked sorrowfully, contemplating his +rings.</p> + +<p>"It seems to me, on the contrary, that astrology is picking <!-- Page 127 -->up," said +Durtal. "There are now two astrologers casting horoscopes in the next +column to the secret remedies on the fourth page of the newspapers."</p> + +<p>"And it's a shame! Those people don't even know the first thing about +the science. They are simply tricksters who hope thus to pick up some +money. What's the use of speaking of them when they <i>don't even exist</i>! +Really it must be admitted that only in England and America is there +anybody who knows how to establish the genethliac theme and construct a +horoscope."</p> + +<p>"I am very much afraid," said Des Hermies, "that not only these +so-called astrologers, but also all the mages, theosophists, occultists, +and cabalists of the present day, know absolutely nothing—those with +whom I am acquainted are indubitably, incontestably, ignorant imbeciles. +And that is the pure truth, messieurs. These people are, for the most +part, down-and-out journalists or broken spendthrifts seeking to exploit +the taste of a public weary of positivism. They plagiarize Eliphas Levi, +steal from Fabre d'Olivet, and write treatises of which they themselves +are incapable of making head or tail. It's a real pity, when you come to +think of it."</p> + +<p>"The more so as they discredit sciences which certainly contain verities +omitted in their jumble," said Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Then another lamentable thing," said Des Hermies, "is that in addition +to the dupes and simpletons, these little sects harbour some frightful +charlatans and windbags."</p> + +<p>"Péladan, among others. Who does not know that shoddy mage, +commercialized to his fingertips?" cried Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, that fellow—"</p> + +<p>"Briefly, messieurs," resumed Gévingey, "all these people are incapable +of obtaining in practise any effect whatever. The only man in this +century who, without being either a saint or a diabolist, has penetrated +the mysteries, is William Crookes." And as Durtal, who appeared to doubt +the apparitions sworn to by this Englishman, declared that no <!-- Page 128 -->theory +could explain them, Gévingey perorated, "Permit me, messieurs. We have +the choice between two diverse, and I venture to say, very clear-cut +doctrines. Either the apparition is formed by the fluid disengaged by +the medium in trance to combine with the fluid of the persons present; +or else there are in the air immaterial beings, elementals as they are +called, which manifest themselves under very nearly determinable +conditions; or else, and this is the theory of pure spiritism, the +phenomena are produced by souls evoked from the dead."</p> + +<p>"I know it," Durtal said, "and that horrifies me. I know also the Hindu +dogma of the migrations of souls after death. These disembodied souls +stray until they are reincarnated or until they attain, from avatar to +avatar, to complete purity. Well, I think it's quite enough to live +once. I'd prefer nothingness, a hole in the ground, to all those +metamorphoses. It's more consoling to me. As for the evocation of the +dead, the mere thought that the butcher on the corner can force the soul +of Hugo, Balzac, Baudelaire, to converse with him, would put me beside +myself, if I believed it. Ah, no. Materialism, abject as it is, is less +vile than that."</p> + +<p>"Spiritism," said Carhaix, "is only a new name for the ancient +necromancy condemned and cursed by the Church."</p> + +<p>Gévingey looked at his rings, then emptied his glass.</p> + +<p>"In any case," he returned, "you will admit that these theories can be +upheld, especially that of the elementals, which, setting Satanism +aside, seems the most veridic, and certainly is the most clear. Space is +peopled by microbes. Is it more surprising that space should also be +crammed with spirits and larvæ? Water and vinegar are alive with +animalcules. The microscope shows them to us. Now why should not the +air, inaccessible to the sight and to the instruments of man, swarm, +like the other elements, with beings more or less corporeal, embryos +more or less mature?"</p> + +<p>"That is probably why cats suddenly look upward and <!-- Page 129 -->gaze curiously into +space at something that is passing and that we can't see," said the +bell-ringer's wife.</p> + +<p>"No, thanks," said Gévingey to Des Hermies, who was offering him another +helping of egg-and-dandelion salad.</p> + +<p>"My friends," said the bell-ringer, "you forget only one doctrine, that +of the Church, which attributes all these inexplicable phenomena to +Satan. Catholicism has known them for a long time. It did not need to +wait for the first manifestations of the spirits—which were produced, I +believe, in 1847, in the United States, through the Fox family—before +decreeing that spirit rapping came from the Devil. You will find in +Saint Augustine the proof, for he had to send a priest to put an end to +noises and overturning of objects and furniture, in the diocese of +Hippo, analogous to those which Spiritism points out. At the time of +Theodoric also, Saint Cæsaræus ridded a house of lemurs haunting it. You +see, there are only the City of God and the City of the Devil. Now, +since God is above these cheap manipulations, the occultists and +spiritists satanize more or less, whether they wish to or not."</p> + +<p>"Nevertheless, Spiritism has accomplished one important thing. It has +violated the threshold of the unknown, broken the doors of the +sanctuary. It has brought about in the extranatural a revolution similar +to that which was effected in the terrestrial order in France in 1789. +It has democratized evocation and opened a whole new vista. Only, it has +lacked initiates to lead it, and, proceeding at random without science, +it has agitated good and bad spirits together. In Spiritism you will +find a jumble of everything. It is the hash of mystery, if I may be +permitted the expression."</p> + +<p>"The saddest thing about it," said Des Hermies, laughing, "is that at a +séance one never sees a thing! I know that experiments have been +successful, but those which I have witnessed—well, the experimenters +seemed to take a long shot and miss."</p> + +<p>"That is not surprising," said the astrologer, spreading some firm +candied orange jelly on a piece of bread, "the first <!-- Page 130 -->law to observe in +magism and Spiritism is to send away the unbelievers, because very often +their fluid is antagonistic to that of the clairvoyant or the medium."</p> + +<p>"Then how can there be any assurance of the reality of the phenomena?" +thought Durtal.</p> + +<p>Carhaix rose. "I shall be back in ten minutes." He put on his greatcoat, +and soon the sound of his steps was lost in the tower.</p> + +<p>"True," murmured Durtal, consulting his watch. "It's a quarter to +eight."</p> + +<p>There was a moment of silence in the room. As all refused to have any +more dessert, Mme. Carhaix took up the tablecloth and spread an oilcloth +in its place.</p> + +<p>The astrologer played with his rings, turning them about; Durtal was +rolling a pellet of crumbled bread between his fingers; Des Hermies, +leaning over to one side, pulled from his patch pocket his embossed +Japanese pouch and made a cigarette.</p> + +<p>Then when the bell-ringer's wife had bidden them good night and retired +to her room, Des Hermies got the kettle and the coffee pot.</p> + +<p>"Want any help?" Durtal proposed.</p> + +<p>"You can get the little glasses and uncork the liqueur bottles, if you +will."</p> + +<p>As he opened the cupboard, Durtal swayed, dizzy from the strokes of the +bells which shook the walls and filled the room with clamour.</p> + +<p>"If there are spirits in this room, they must be getting knocked to +pieces," he said, setting the liqueur glasses on the table.</p> + +<p>"Bells drive phantoms and spectres away," Gévingey answered, doctorally, +filling his pipe.</p> + +<p>"Here," said Des Hermies, "will you pour hot water slowly into the +filter? I've got to feed the stove. It's getting chilly here. My feet +are freezing."</p> + +<p>Carhaix returned, blowing out his lantern.<!-- Page 131 --> "The bell was in good voice, +this clear, dry night," and he took off his mountaineer cap and his +overcoat.</p> + +<p>"What do you think of him?" Des Hermies asked Durtal in a very low +voice, and pointed at the astrologer, now lost in a cloud of pipe smoke.</p> + +<p>"In repose he looks like an old owl, and when he speaks he makes me +think of a melancholy and discursive schoolmaster."</p> + +<p>"Only one," said Des Hermies to Carhaix, who was holding a lump of sugar +over Des Hermies's coffee cup.</p> + +<p>"I hear, monsieur, that you are occupied with a history of Gilles de +Rais," said Gévingey to Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Yes, for the time being I am up to my eyes in Satanism with that man."</p> + +<p>"And," said Des Hermies, "we were just going to appeal to your extensive +knowledge. You only can enlighten my friend on one of the most obscure +questions of Diabolism."</p> + +<p>"Which one?"</p> + +<p>"That of incubacy and succubacy."</p> + +<p>Gévingey did not answer at once. "That is a much graver question than +Spiritism," he said at last, "and grave in a different way. But monsieur +already knows something about it?"</p> + +<p>"Only that opinions differ. Del Rio and Bodin, for instance, consider +the incubi as masculine demons which couple with women and the succubi +as demons who consummate the carnal act with men.</p> + +<p>"According to their theories the incubi take the semen lost by men in +dream and make use of it. So that two questions arise: first, can a +child be born of such a union? The possibility of this kind of +procreation has been upheld by the Church doctors, who affirm, even, +that children of such commerce are heavier than others and can drain +three nurses without taking on flesh. The second question is whether the +demon who copulates with the mother or the man whose semen has been +taken is the father of the child.<!-- Page 132 --> To which Saint Thomas answers, with +more or less subtle arguments, that the real father is not the incubus +but the man."</p> + +<p>"For Sinistrari d'Ameno," observed Durtal, "the incubi and succubi are +not precisely demons, but animal spirits, intermediate between the demon +and the angel, a sort of satyr or faun, such as were revered in the time +of paganism, a sort of imp, such as were exorcised in the Middle Ages. +Sinistrari adds that they do not need to pollute a sleeping man, since +they possess genitals and are endowed with prolificacy."</p> + +<p>"Well, there is nothing further," said Gévingey. "Görres, so learned, so +precise, in his <i>Mystik</i> passes rapidly over this question, even +neglects it, and the Church, you know, is completely silent, for the +Church does not like to treat this subject and views askance the priest +who does occupy himself with it."</p> + +<p>"I beg your pardon," said Carhaix, always ready to defend the Church. +"The Church has never hesitated to declare itself on this detestable +subject. The existence of succubi and incubi is certified by Saint +Augustine, Saint Thomas, Saint Bonaventure, Denys le Chartreux, Pope +Innocent VIII, and how many others! The question is resolutely settled +for every Catholic. It also figures in the lives of some of the saints, +if I am not mistaken. Yes, in the legend of Saint Hippolyte, Jacques de +Voragine tells how a priest, tempted by a naked succubus, cast his stole +at its head and it suddenly became the corpse of some dead woman whom +the Devil had animated to seduce him."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Gévingey, whose eyes twinkled. "The Church recognizes +succubacy, I grant. But let me speak, and you will see that my +observations are not uncalled for.</p> + +<p>"You know very well, messieurs," addressing Des Hermies and Durtal, +"what the books teach, but within a hundred years everything has +changed, and if the facts I am <!-- Page 133 -->are unknown to the many members of the +clergy, and you will not find them cited in any book whatever.</p> + +<p>"At present it is less frequently demons than bodies raised from the +dead which fill the indispensable rôle of incubus and succubus. In other +words, formerly the living being subject to succubacy was known to be +possessed. Now that vampirism, by the evocation of the dead, is joined +to demonism, the victim is worse than possessed. The Church did not know +what to do. Either it must keep silent or reveal the possibility of the +evocation of the dead, already forbidden by Moses, and this admission +was dangerous, for it popularized the knowledge of acts that are easier +to produce now than formerly, since without knowing it Spiritism has +traced the way.</p> + +<p>"So the Church has kept silent. And Rome is not unaware of the frightful +advance incubacy has made in the cloisters in our days."</p> + +<p>"That proves that continence is hard to bear in solitude," said Des +Hermies.</p> + +<p>"It merely proves that the soul is feeble and that people have forgotten +how to pray," said Carhaix.</p> + +<p>"However that may be, messieurs, to instruct you completely in this +matter, I must divide the creatures smitten with incubacy or succubacy +into two classes. The first is composed of persons who have directly and +voluntarily given themselves over to the demoniac action of the spirits. +These persons are quite rare and they all die by suicide or some other +form of violent death. The second is composed of persons on whom the +visitation of spirits has been imposed by a spell. These are very +numerous, especially in the convents dominated by the demoniac +societies. Ordinarily these victims end in madness. The psychopathic +hospitals are crowded with them. The doctors and the majority of the +priests do not know the cause of their madness, but the cases are +curable. A thaumaturge of my acquaintance has saved a good many of the +bewitched who without his aid would be <!-- Page 134 -->howling under hydrotherapeutic +douches. There are certain fumigations, certain exsufflations, certain +commandments written on a sheet of virgin parchment thrice blessed and +worn like an amulet which almost always succeed in delivering the +patient."</p> + +<p>"I want to ask you," said Des Hermies, "does a woman receive the visit +of the incubus while she is asleep or while she is awake?"</p> + +<p>"A distinction must be made. If the woman is not the victim of a spell, +if she voluntarily consorts with the impure spirit, she is always awake +when the carnal act takes place. If, on the other hand, the woman is the +victim of sorcery, the sin is committed either while she is asleep or +while she is awake, but in the latter case she is in a cataleptic state +which prevents her from defending herself. The most powerful of +present-day exorcists, the man who has gone most thoroughly into this +matter, one Johannès, Doctor of Theology, told me that he had saved nuns +who had been ridden without respite for two, three, even four days by +incubi!"</p> + +<p>"I know that priest," remarked Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"And the act is consummated in the same manner as the normal human act?"</p> + +<p>"Yes and no. Here the dirtiness of the details makes me hesitate," said +Gévingey, becoming slightly red. "What I can tell you is more than +strange. Know, then, that the organ of the incubus is bifurcated and at +the same time penetrates both vases. Formerly it extended, and while one +branch of the fork acted in the licit channels, the other at the same +time reached up to the lower part of the face. You may imagine, +gentlemen, how life must be shortened by operations which are multiplied +through all the senses."</p> + +<p>"And you are sure that these are facts?"</p> + +<p>"Absolutely."</p> + +<p>"But come now, you have proofs?"</p> + +<p>Gévingey was silent, then, "The subject is so grave and I have gone so +far that I had better go the rest of the way.<!-- Page 135 --> I am not mad nor the +victim of hallucination. Well, messieurs, I slept one time in the room +of the most redoubtable master Satanism now can claim."</p> + +<p>"Canon Docre," Des Hermies interposed.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and my sleep was fitful. It was broad daylight. I swear to you +that the succubus came, irritant and palpable and most tenacious. +Happily, I remembered the formula of deliverance, which kept me—</p> + +<p>"So I ran that very day to Doctor Johannès, of whom I have spoken. He +immediately and forever, I hope, liberated me from the spell."</p> + +<p>"If I did not fear to be indiscreet, I would ask you what kind of thing +this succubus was, whose attack you repulsed."</p> + +<p>"Why, it was like any naked woman," said the astrologer hesitantly.</p> + +<p>"Curious, now, if it had demanded its little gifts, its little gloves—" +said Durtal, biting his lips.</p> + +<p>"And do you know what has become of the terrible Docre?" Des Hermies +inquired.</p> + +<p>"No, thank God. They say he is in the south, somewhere around Nîmes, +where he formerly resided."</p> + +<p>"But what does this abbé do?" inquired Durtal.</p> + +<p>"What does he do? He evokes the Devil, and he feeds white mice on the +hosts which he consecrates. His frenzy for sacrilege is such that he had +the image of Christ tattooed on his heels so that he could always step +on the Saviour!"</p> + +<p>"Well," murmured Carhaix, whose militant moustache bristled while his +great eyes flamed, "if that abominable priest were here, I swear to you +that I would respect his feet, but that I would throw him downstairs +head first."</p> + +<p>"And the black mass?" inquired Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"He celebrates it with foul men and women. He is openly accused of +having influenced people to make wills in his favor and of causing +inexplicable death. Unfortunately, there are no laws to repress +sacrilege, and how can you prosecute a man who sends maladies from a +distance and kills slowly in such a way that at the autopsy no traces of +poison appear?"</p> + +<p>"The modern Gilles de Rais!" exclaimed Durtal.</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 136 -->Yes, less savage, less frank, more hypocritically cruel. He does not +cut throats. He probably limits himself to 'sendings' or to causing +suicide by suggestion," said Des Hermies, "for he is, I believe, a +master hypnotist."</p> + +<p>"Could he insinuate into a victim the idea to drink, regularly, in +graduated doses, a toxin which he would designate, and which would +simulate the phases of a malady?" asked Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Nothing simpler. 'Open window burglars' that the physicians of the +present day are, they recognize perfectly the ability of a more skilful +man to pull off such jobs. The experiments of Beaunis, Liégois, Liébaut, +and Bernheim are conclusive: you can even get a person assassinated by +another to whom you suggest, without his knowledge, the will to the +crime."</p> + +<p>"I was thinking of something, myself," said Carhaix, who had been +reflecting and not listening to this discussion of hypnotism. "Of the +Inquisition. It certainly had its reason for being. It is the only agent +that could deal with this fallen priest whom the Church has swept out."</p> + +<p>"And remember," said Des Hermies, with his crooked smile playing around +the corner of his mouth, "that the ferocity of the Inquisition has been +greatly exaggerated. No doubt the benevolent Bodin speaks of driving +long needles between the nails and the flesh of the sorcerers' fingers. +'An excellent gehenna,' says he. He eulogizes equally the torture by +fire, which he characterizes as 'an exquisite death.' But he wishes only +to turn the magicians away from their detestable practises and save +their souls. Then Del Rio declares that 'the question' must not be +applied to demoniacs after they have eaten, for fear they will vomit. He +worried about their stomachs, this worthy man. Wasn't it also he who +decreed that the torture must not be repeated twice in the same day, so +as to give fear and pain a chance to calm down? Admit that the good +Jesuit was not devoid of delicacy!"</p> + +<p>"Docre," Gévingey went on, not paying any attention to the words of Des +Hermies, "is the only individual who has <!-- Page 137 -->rediscovered the ancient +secrets and who obtains results in practise. He is rather more powerful, +I would have you believe, than all those fools and quacks of whom we +have been speaking. And they know the terrible canon, for he has sent +many of them serious attacks of ophthalmia which the oculists cannot +cure. So they tremble when the name Docre is pronounced in their +presence."</p> + +<p>"But how did a priest fall so low?"</p> + +<p>"I can't say. If you wish ampler information about him," said Gévingey, +addressing Des Hermies, "question your friend Chantelouve."</p> + +<p>"Chantelouve!" cried Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Yes, he and his wife used to be quite intimate with Canon Docre, but I +hope for their sakes that they have long since ceased to have dealings +with the monster."</p> + +<p>Durtal listened no more. Mme. Chantelouve knew Canon Docre! Ah, was she +Satanic, too? No, she certainly did not act like a possessed. "Surely +this astrologer is cracked," he thought. She! And he called her image +before him, and thought that tomorrow night she would probably give +herself to him. Ah, those strange eyes of hers, those dark clouds +suddenly cloven by radiant light!</p> + +<p>She came now and took complete possession of him, as before he had +ascended to the tower. "But if I didn't love you would I have come to +you?" That sentence which she had spoken, with a caressing inflection of +the voice, he heard again, and again he saw her mocking and tender face.</p> + +<p>"Ah, you are dreaming," said Des Hermies, tapping him on the shoulder. +"We have to go. It's striking ten."</p> + +<p>When they were in the street they said good night to Gévingey, who lived +on the other side of the river. Then they walked along a little way.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Des Hermies, "are you interested in my astrologer?"</p> + +<p>"He is slightly mad, isn't he?"</p> + +<p>"Slightly? Humph."</p> + +<p>"Well, his stories are incredible."</p> + +<p>"Everything is incredible," said Des Hermies placidly, <!-- Page 138 -->turning up the +collar of his overcoat. "However, I will admit that Gévingey astounds me +when he asserts that he was visited by a succubus. His good faith is not +to be doubted, for I know him to be a man who means what he says, though +he is vain and doctorial. I know, too, that at La Salpêtrière such +occurrences are not rare. Women smitten with hystero-epilepsy see +phantoms beside them in broad daylight and mate with them in a +cataleptic state, and every night couch with visions that must be +exactly like the fluid creatures of incubacy. But these women are +hystero-epileptics, and Gévingey isn't, for I am his physician. Then, +what can be believed and what can be proved? The materialists have taken +the trouble to revise the accounts of the sorcery trials of old. They +have found in the possession-cases of the Ursulines of Loudun and the +nuns of Poitiers, in the history, even, of the convulsionists of Saint +Médard, the symptoms of major hysteria, the same contractions of the +whole system, the same muscular dissolutions, the same lethargies, even, +finally, the famous arc of the circle. And what does this demonstrate, +that these demonomaniacs were hystero-epileptics? Certainly. The +observations of Dr. Richet, expert in such matters, are conclusive, but +wherein do they invalidate possession? From the fact that the patients +of La Salpêtrière are not possessed, though they are hysterical, does it +follow that others, smitten with the same malady as they, are not +possessed? It would have to be demonstrated also that all demonopathics +are hysterical, and that is false, for there are women of sound mind and +perfectly good sense who are demonopathic without knowing it. And +admitting that the last point is controvertible, there remains this +unanswerable question: is a woman possessed because she is hysterical, +or is she hysterical because she is possessed? Only the Church can +answer. Science cannot.</p> + +<p>"No, come to think it over, the effrontery of the positivists is +appalling. They decree that Satanism does not exist. They lay everything +at the account of major hysteria, and they <!-- Page 139 -->don't even know what this +frightful malady is and what are its causes. No doubt Charcot determines +very well the phases of the attack, notes the nonsensical and passional +attitudes, the contortionistic movements; he discovers hysterogenic +zones and can, by skilfully manipulating the ovaries, arrest or +accelerate the crises, but as for foreseeing them and learning the +sources and the motives and curing them, that's another thing. Science +goes all to pieces on the question of this inexplicable, stupefying +malady, which, consequently, is subject to the most diversified +interpretations, not one of which can be declared exact. For the soul +enters into this, the soul in conflict with the body, the soul +overthrown in the demoralization of the nerves. You see, old man, all +this is as dark as a bottle of ink. Mystery is everywhere and reason +cannot see its way."</p> + +<p>"Mmmm," said Durtal, who was now in front of his door. "Since anything +can be maintained and nothing is certain, succubacy has it. Basically it +is more literary—and cleaner—than positivism."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_X"><!-- Page 140 -->CHAPTER X</a></h2> + + +<p>The day was long and hard to kill. Waking at dawn, full of thoughts of +Mme. Chantelouve, he could not stay in one place, and kept inventing +excuses for going out. He had no cakes, bonbons, and exotic liqueurs, +and one must not be without all the little essentials when expecting a +visit from a woman. He went by the longest route to the avenue de +l'Opéra to buy fine essences of cedar and of that alkermes which makes +the person tasting it think he is in an Oriental pharmaceutic +laboratory. "The idea is," he said, "not so much to treat Hyacinthe as +to astound her by giving her a sip of an unknown elixir."</p> + +<p>He came back laden with packages, then went out again, and in the street +was assailed by an immense ennui. After an interminable tour of the +quays he finally tumbled into a beer hall. He fell on a bench and opened +a newspaper.</p> + +<p>What was he thinking as he sat, not reading but just looking at the +police news? Nothing, not even of her. From having revolved the same +matter over and over again and again his mind had reached a deadlock and +refused to function. Durtal merely found himself very tired, very +drowsy, as one in a warm bath after a night of travel.</p> + +<p>"I must go home pretty soon," he said when he could collect himself a +little, "for Père Rateau certainly has not cleaned house in the thorough +fashion which I commanded, and of course I don't want the furniture to +be covered with dust. Six o'clock. Suppose I dine, after a fashion, in +some not too unreliable place."</p> + +<p>He remembered a nearby restaurant where he had eaten before without a +great deal of dread. He chewed his way <!-- Page 141 -->laboriously through an extremely +dead fish, then through a piece of meat, flabby and cold; then he found +a very few lentils, stiff with insecticide, beneath a great deal of +sauce; finally he savoured some ancient prunes, whose juice smelt of +mould and was at the same time aquatic and sepulchral.</p> + +<p>Back in his apartment, he lighted fires in his bedroom and in his study, +then he inspected everything. He was not mistaken. The concierge had +upset the place with the same brutality, the same haste, as customarily. +However, he must have tried to wash the windows, because the glass was +streaked with finger marks.</p> + +<p>Durtal effaced the imprints with a damp cloth, smoothed out the folds in +the carpet, drew the curtains, and put the bookcases in order after +dusting them with a napkin. Everywhere he found grains of tobacco, +trodden cigarette ashes, pencil sharpenings, pen points eaten with rust. +He also found cocoons of cat fur and crumpled bits of rough draft +manuscript which had been whirled into all corners by the furious +sweeping.</p> + +<p>He finally could not help asking himself why he had so long tolerated +the fuzzy filth which obscured and incrusted his household. While he +dusted, his indignation against Rateau increased mightily. "Look at +that," he said, perceiving his wax candles grown as yellow as tallow +ones. He changed them. "That's better." He arranged his desk into +studied disarray. Notebooks, and books with paper-cutters in them for +book-marks, he laid in careful disorder. "Symbol of work," he said, +smiling, as he placed an old folio, open, on a chair. Then he passed +into his bedroom. With a wet sponge he freshened up the marble of the +dresser, then he smoothed the bed cover, straightened his photographs +and engravings, and went into the bathroom. Here he paused, +disheartened. In a bamboo rack over the wash-bowl there was a chaos of +phials. Resolutely he grabbed the perfume bottles, scoured the bottoms +and necks with emery, rubbed the labels with gum elastic and bread +crumbs, then he soaped <!-- Page 142 -->the tub, dipped the combs and brushes in an +ammoniac solution, got his vapourizer to working and sprayed the room +with Persian lilac, washed the linoleum, and scoured the seat and the +pipes. Seized with a mania for cleanliness, he polished, scrubbed, +scraped, moistened, and dried, with great sweeping strokes of the arm. +He was no longer vexed at the concierge; he was even sorry the old +villain had not left him more to do.</p> + +<p>Then he shaved, touched up his moustache, and proceeded to make an +elaborate toilet, asking himself, as he dressed, whether he had better +wear button shoes or slippers. He decided that shoes were less familiar +and more dignified but resolved to wear a flowing tie and a blouse, +thinking that this artistic negligée would please a woman.</p> + +<p>"All ready," he said, after a last stroke of the brush. He made the turn +of the other rooms, poked the fires, and fed the cat, which was running +about in alarm, sniffing all the cleaned objects and doubtless thinking +that those he rubbed against every day without paying any attention to +them had been replaced by new ones.</p> + +<p>"Oh, the 'little essentials' I am forgetting!" Durtal put the teakettle +on the hob and placed cups, teapot, sugar bowl, cakes, bonbons, and tiny +liqueur glasses on an old lacquered "waiter" so as to have everything on +hand when it was time to serve.</p> + +<p>"Now I'm through. I've given the place a thorough cleaning. Let her +come," he said to himself, realigning some books whose backs stuck out +further than the others on the shelves. "Everything in good shape. +Except the chimney of the lamp. Where it bulges, there are caramel +specks and blobs of soot, but I can't get the thing out; I don't want to +burn my fingers; and anyway, with the shade lowered a bit she won't +notice.</p> + +<p>"Well, how shall I proceed when she does come?" he asked himself, +sinking into an armchair. "She enters. Good. I take her hands. I kiss +them. Then I bring her into this room. I have her sit down beside the +fire, in this chair. I <!-- Page 143 -->station myself, facing her, on this stool. +Advancing a little, touching her knees, I can seize her. I make her bend +over. I am supporting her whole weight. I bring her lips to mine and I +am saved!</p> + +<p>"—Or rather lost. For then the bother begins. I can't bear to think of +getting her into the bedroom. Undressing and going to bed! That part is +appalling unless you know each other very well. And when you are just +becoming acquainted! The nice way is to have a cosy little supper for +two. The wine has an ungodly kick to it. She immediately passes out, and +when she comes to she is lying in bed under a shower of kisses. As we +can't do it that way we shall have to avoid mutual embarrassment by +making a show of passion. If I speed up the tempo and pretend to be in a +frenzy perhaps we shall not have time to think about the miserable +details. So I must possess her here, in this very spot, and she must +think I have lost my head when she succumbs.</p> + +<p>"It's hard to arrange in this room, because there isn't any divan. The +best way would be to throw her down on the carpet. She can put her hands +over her eyes, as they always do. I shall take good care to turn down +the lamp before she rises.</p> + +<p>"Well, I had better prepare a cushion for her head." He found one and +slid it under the chair. "And I had better not wear suspenders, for they +often cause ridiculous delays." He took them off and put on a belt. "But +then there is that damned question of the skirts! I admire the novelists +who can get a virgin unharnessed from her corsets and deflowered in the +winking of an eye—as if it were possible! How annoying to have to fight +one's way through all those starched entanglements! I do hope Mme. +Chantelouve will be considerate and avoid those ridiculous difficulties +as much as possible—for her own sake."</p> + +<p>He consulted his watch. "Half-past eight. I mustn't expect her for +nearly an hour, because, like all women, she will come late. What kind +of an excuse will she make to Chantelouve, to get away tonight? Well, +that is none of <!-- Page 144 -->my business. Hmmm. This water heater beside the fire +looks like the invitation to the toilet, but no, the tea things handy +banish any gross idea."</p> + +<p>And if Hyacinthe did not come?</p> + +<p>"She will come," he said to himself, suddenly moved. "What motive would +she have for staying away? She knows that she cannot inflame me more +than I am inflamed." Then, jumping from phase to phase of the same old +question, "This will turn out badly, of course," he decided. "Once I am +satisfied, disenchantment is inevitable. Oh, well, so much the better, +for with this romance going on I cannot work."</p> + +<p>"Miserable me! relapsing—only in mind, alas!—to the age of twenty. I +am waiting for a woman. I who have scorned the doings of lovers for +years and years. I look at my watch every five minutes, and I listen, in +spite of myself, thinking it is her step I hear on the stair.</p> + +<p>"No, there is no getting around it. The little blue flower, the +perennial of the soul, is difficult to extirpate, and it keeps growing +up again. It does not show itself for twenty years, and then all of a +sudden, you know not why nor how, it sprouts, and then forth comes a +burst of blossoms. My God! I am getting foolish."</p> + +<p>He jumped from his chair. There was a gentle ring. "Not nine o'clock +yet. It isn't she," he murmured, opening the door.</p> + +<p>He squeezed her hands and thanked her for being so punctual.</p> + +<p>She said she was not feeling well. "I came only because I didn't want to +keep you waiting in vain."</p> + +<p>His heart sank.</p> + +<p>"I have a fearful headache," she said, passing her gloved hands over her +forehead.</p> + +<p>He took her furs and motioned her to the armchair. Prepared to follow +his plan of attack, he sat down on the stool, but she refused the +armchair and took a seat beside the <!-- Page 145 -->table. Rising, he bent over her and +caught hold of her fingers.</p> + +<p>"Your hand is burning," she said.</p> + +<p>"Yes, a bit of fever, because I get so little sleep. If you knew how +much I have thought about you! Now I have you here, all to myself," and +he spoke of that persistent odour of cinnamon, faint, distant, expiring +amid the less definite odours which her gloves exhaled, "well," and he +sniffed her fingers, "you will leave some of yourself here when you go +away."</p> + +<p>She rose, sighing. "I see you have a cat. What is his name?"</p> + +<p>"Mouche."</p> + +<p>She called to the cat, which fled precipitately.</p> + +<p>"Mouche! Mouche!" Durtal called, but Mouche took refuge under the bed +and refused to come out. "You see he is rather bashful. He has never +seen a woman."</p> + +<p>"Oh, would you try to make me think you have never received a woman +here?"</p> + +<p>He swore that he never had, that she was the first....</p> + +<p>"And you were not really anxious that this—first—should come?"</p> + +<p>He blushed. "Why do you say that?"</p> + +<p>She made a vague gesture. "I want to tease you," she said, sitting down +in the armchair. "To tell you the truth, I do not know why I like to ask +you such presumptuous questions."</p> + +<p>He had sat down in front of her. So now, at last, the scene was set as +he wished and he must begin the attack. His knee touched hers.</p> + +<p>"You know," he said, "that you cannot presume here. You have claims +on—"</p> + +<p>"No, I haven't and I want none."</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"Because.... Listen," and her voice became grave and firm. "The more I +reflect, the more inclined I am to ask <!-- Page 146 -->you, for heaven's sake, not to +destroy our dream. And then.... Do you want me to be frank, so frank +that I shall doubtless seem a monster of selfishness? Well, personally, +I do not wish to spoil the—the—what shall I say?—the extreme +happiness our relation gives me. I know I explain badly and confusedly, +but this is the way it is: I possess you when and how I please, just as, +for a long time, I have possessed Byron, Baudelaire, Gérard de Nerval, +those I love—"</p> + +<p>"You mean ...?"</p> + +<p>"That I have only to desire them, to desire you, before I go to +sleep...."</p> + +<p>"And?"</p> + +<p>"And you would be inferior to my chimera, to the Durtal I adore, whose +caresses make my nights delirious!"</p> + +<p>He looked at her in stupefaction. She had that dolent, troubled look in +her eyes. She even seemed not to see him, but to be looking into space. +He hesitated.... In a sudden flash of thought he saw the scenes of +incubacy of which Gévingey had spoken. "We shall untangle all this +later," he thought within himself, "meanwhile—" He took her gently by +the arms, drew her to him and abruptly kissed her mouth.</p> + +<p>She rebounded as if she had had an electric shock. She struggled to +rise. He strained her to him and embraced her furiously, then with a +strange gurgling cry she threw her head back and caught his leg between +both of hers.</p> + +<p>He emitted a howl of rage, for he felt her haunches move. He understood +now—or thought he understood! She wanted a miserly pleasure, a sort of +solitary vice....</p> + +<p>He pushed her away. She remained there, quite pale, choking, her eyes +closed, her hands outstretched like those of a frightened child. Then +Durtal's wrath vanished. With a little cry he came up to her and caught +her again, but she struggled, crying, "No! I beseech you, let me go."</p> + +<p>He held her crushed against his body and attempted to make her yield.</p> + +<p>"I implore you, let me go."<!-- Page 147 --></p> + +<p>Her accent was so despairing that he relinquished her. Then he debated +with himself whether to throw her brutally on the floor and violate her. +But her bewildered eyes frightened him.</p> + +<p>She was panting and her arms hung limp at her sides as she leaned, very +pale, against the bookcase.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" he said, marching up and down, knocking into the furniture, "I +must really love you, if in spite of your supplications and refusals—"</p> + +<p>She joined her hands to keep him away.</p> + +<p>"Good God!" he said, exasperated, "what are you made of?"</p> + +<p>She came to herself, and, offended, she said to him, "Monsieur, I too +suffer. Spare me," and pell-mell she spoke of her husband, of her +confessor, and became so incoherent that Durtal was frightened. She was +silent, then in a singing voice she said, "Tell me, you will come to my +house tomorrow night, won't you?"</p> + +<p>"But I suffer too!"</p> + +<p>She seemed not to hear him. In her smoky eyes, far, far back, there +seemed to be a twinkle of feeble light. She murmured, in the cadence of +a canticle, "Tell me, dear, you will come tomorrow night, won't you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," he said at last.</p> + +<p>Then she readjusted herself and without saying a word quitted the room. +In silence he accompanied her to the entrance. She opened the door, +turned around, took his hand and very lightly brushed it with her lips.</p> + +<p>He stood there stupidly, not knowing what to make of her behaviour.</p> + +<p>"What does she mean?" he exclaimed, returning to the room, putting the +furniture back in place and smoothing the disordered carpet. "Heavens, I +wish I could as easily restore order to my brain. Let me think, if I +can. What is she after? Because, of course, she has something in view. +She does not want our relation to culminate in the act itself. Does she +really fear disillusion, as she claims? Is she really <!-- Page 148 -->thinking how +grotesque the amorous somersaults are? Or is she, as I believe, a +melancholy and terrible player-around-the-edges, thinking only of +herself? Well, her obscene selfishness is one of those complicated sins +that have to be shriven by the very highest confessor. She's a plain +teaser!</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Incubacy enters into this. She admits—so placidly!—that +in dream she cohabits at will with dead or living beings. Is she +Satanizing, and is this some of the work of Canon Docre? He's a friend +of hers.</p> + +<p>"So many riddles impossible to solve. What is the meaning of this +unexpected invitation for tomorrow night? Does she wish to yield nowhere +except in her own home? Does she feel more at ease there, or does she +think the propinquity of her husband will render the sin more piquant? +Does she loathe Chantelouve, and is this a meditated vengeance, or does +she count on the fear of danger to spur our senses?</p> + +<p>"After all, I think it is probably a final coquetry, an appetizer before +the repast. And women are so funny anyway! She probably thinks these +delays and subterfuges are necessary to differentiate her from a +cocotte. Or perhaps there is a physical necessity for stalling me off +another day."</p> + +<p>He sought other reasons but could find none.</p> + +<p>"Deep down in my heart," he said, vexed in spite of himself by this +rebuff, "I know I have been an imbecile. I ought to have acted the cave +man and paid no attention to her supplications and lies. I ought to have +taken violent possession of her lips and breast. Then it would be +finished, whereas now I must begin at the beginning again, and God damn +her! I have other things to do.</p> + +<p>"Who knows whether she isn't laughing at me this very moment? Perhaps +she wanted me to be more violent and bold—but no, her soul-sick voice +was not feigned, her poor eyes did not simulate bewilderment, and then +what would she have meant by that <i>respectful</i> kiss—for there was an +impalpable shade of respect and gratitude in that kiss which she planted +on my hand!"<!-- Page 149 --></p> + +<p>She was too much for him. "Meanwhile, in this hurly-burly I have +forgotten my refreshments. Suppose I take off my shoes, now that I am +alone, for my feet are swollen from parading up and down the room. +Suppose I do better yet and go to bed, for I am incapable of working or +reading," and he drew back the covers.</p> + +<p>"Decidedly, nothing happens the way one foresees it, yet my plan of +attack wasn't badly thought out," he said, crawling in. With a sigh he +blew out the lamp, and the cat, reassured, passed over him, lighter than +a breath, and curled up without a sound.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XI"><!-- Page 150 -->CHAPTER XI</a></h2> + + +<p>Contrary to his expectations, he slept all night, with clenched fists, +and woke next morning quite calm, even gay. The scene of the night +before, which ought to have exacerbated his senses, produced exactly the +opposite effect. The truth is that Durtal was not of those who are +attracted by difficulties. He always made one hardy effort to surmount +them, then when that failed he would withdraw, with no desire to renew +the combat. If Mme. Chantelouve thought to entice him by delays, she had +miscalculated. This morning, already, he was weary of the comedy.</p> + +<p>His reflections began to be slightly tinged with bitterness. He was +angry at the woman for having wished to keep him in suspense, and he was +angry at himself for having permitted her to make a fool of him. Then +certain expressions, the impertinence of which had not struck him at +first, chilled him now. "Her nervous trick of laughing, which sometimes +caught her in public places," then her declaration that she did not need +his permission, nor even his person, in order to possess him, seemed to +him unbecoming, to say the least, and uncalled for, as he had not run +after her nor indeed made any advances to her at all.</p> + +<p>"I will fix you," he said, "when I get some hold over you."</p> + +<p>But in the calm awakening of this morning the spell of the woman had +relaxed. Resolutely he thought, "Keep two dates with her. This one +tonight at her house. It won't count, because nothing can be done. For I +intend neither to allow myself to be assaulted nor to attempt an +assault. I certainly have no desire to be caught by Chantelouve <i>in<!-- Page 151 --> +flagrante delicto</i>, and probably get into a shooting scrape and be haled +into police court. Have her here once. If she does not yield then, why, +the matter is closed. She can go and tickle somebody else."</p> + +<p>And he made a hearty breakfast, and sat down to his writing table and +ran over the scattered notes for his book.</p> + +<p>"I had got," he said, glancing at his last chapter, "to where the +alchemic experiments and diabolic evocations have proved unavailing. +Prelati, Blanchet, all the sorcerers and sorcerers' helpers whom the +Marshal has about him, admit that to bring Satan to him Gilles must make +over his soul and body to the Devil or commit crimes.</p> + +<p>"Gilles refuses to alienate his existence and sell his soul, but he +contemplates murder without any horror. This man, so brave on the +battlefield, so courageous when he accompanied Jeanne d'Arc, trembles +before the Devil and is afraid when he thinks of eternity and of Christ. +The same is true of his accomplices. He has made them swear on the +Testament to keep the secret of the confounding turpitudes which the +château conceals, and he can be sure that not one will violate the oath, +for, in the Middle Ages, the most reckless of freebooters would not +commit the inexpiable sin of deceiving God.</p> + +<p>"At the same time that his alchemists abandon their unfruitful furnaces, +Gilles begins a course of systematic gluttony, and his flesh, set on +fire by the essences of inordinate potations and spiced dishes, seethes +in tumultuous eruption.</p> + +<p>"Now, there are no women in the château. Gilles appears to have despised +the sex ever since leaving the court. After experience of the ribalds of +the camps and frequentation, with Xaintrailles and La Hire, of the +prostitutes of Charles VII, it seems that a dislike for the feminine +form came over him. Like others whose ideal of concupiscence is +deteriorated and deviated, he certainly comes to be disgusted by the +delicacy of the grain of the skin of women and by that odour of +femininity which all sodomists abhor.<!-- Page 152 --></p> + +<p>"He depraves the choir boys who are under his authority. He chose them +in the first place, these little psaltry ministrants, for their beauty, +and 'beautiful as angels' they are. They are the only ones he loves, the +only ones he spares in his murderous transports.</p> + +<p>"But soon infantile pollution seems to him an insipid delicacy. The law +of Satanism which demands that the elect of Evil, once started, must go +the whole way, is once more fulfilled. Gilles's soul must become +thoroughly cankered, a red tabernacle, that in it the Very Low may dwell +at ease.</p> + +<p>"The litanies of lust arise in an atmosphere that is like the wind over +a slaughter house. The first victim is a very small boy whose name we do +not know. Gilles disembowels him, and, cutting off the hands and tearing +out the eyes and heart, carries these members into Prelati's chamber. +The two men offer them, with passionate objurgations, to the Devil, who +holds his peace. Gilles, confounded, flees. Prelati rolls up the poor +remains in linen and, trembling, goes out at night to bury them in +consecrated ground beside a chapel dedicated to Saint Vincent.</p> + +<p>"Gilles preserves the blood of this child to write formulas of evocation +and conjurements. It manures a horrible crop. Not long afterward the +Marshal reaps the most abundant harvest of crimes that has ever been +sown.</p> + +<p>"From 1432 to 1440, that is to say during the eight years between the +Marshal's retreat and his death, the inhabitants of Anjou, Poitou, and +Brittany walk the highways wringing their hands. All the children +disappear. Shepherd boys are abducted from the fields. Little girls +coming out of school, little boys who have gone to play ball in the +lanes or at the edge of the wood, return no more.</p> + +<p>"In the course of an investigation ordered by the duke of Brittany, the +scribes of Jean Touscheronde, duke's commissioner in these matters, +compile interminable lists of lost children.</p> + +<p>"Lost, at la Rochebernart, the child of the woman<!-- Page 153 --> Péronne, 'a child who +did go to school and who did apply himself to his book with exceeding +diligence.'</p> + +<p>"Lost, at Saint Etienne de Montluc, the son of Guillaume Brice, 'and +this was a poor man and sought alms.'</p> + +<p>"Lost, at Mâchecoul, the son of Georget le Barbier, 'who was seen, a +certain day, knocking apples from a tree behind the hôtel Rondeau, and +who since hath not been seen.'</p> + +<p>"Lost, at Thonaye, the child of Mathelin Thouars, 'and he had been heard +to cry and lament and the said child was about twelve years of age.'</p> + +<p>"At Mâchecoul, again, the day of Pentecost, mother and father Sergent +leave their eight-year-old boy at home, and when they return from the +fields 'they did not find the said child of eight years of age, +wherefore they marvelled and were exceeding grieved.'</p> + +<p>"At Chantelou, it is Pierre Badieu, mercer of the parish, who says that +a year or thereabouts ago, he saw, in the domain de Rais, 'two little +children of the age of nine who were brothers and the children of Robin +Pavot of the aforesaid place, and since that time neither have they been +seen neither doth any know what hath become of them.'</p> + +<p>"At Nantes, it is Jeanne Darel who deposes that 'on the day of the feast +of the Holy Father, her true child named Olivier did stray from her, +being of the age of seven and eight years, and since the day of the +feast of the Holy Father neither did she see him nor hear tidings.'</p> + +<p>"And the account of the investigation goes on, revealing hundreds of +names, describing the grief of the mothers who interrogate passersby on +the highway, and telling of the keening of the families from whose very +homes children have been spirited away when the elders went to the +fields to hoe or to sow the hemp. These phrases, like a desolate +refrain, recur again and again, at the end of every deposition: 'They +were seen complaining dolorously,' 'Exceedingly they did lament.' +Wherever the bloodthirsty Gilles dwells the women weep.</p> + +<p>"At first the frantic people tell themselves that evil <!-- Page 154 -->fairies and +malicious genii are dispersing the generation, but little by little +terrible suspicions are aroused. As soon as the Marshal quits a place, +as he goes from the château de Tiffauges to the château de Champtocé, +and from there to the castle of La Suze or to Nantes, he leaves behind +him a wake of tears. He traverses a countryside and in the morning +children are missing. Trembling, the peasant realizes also that wherever +Prelati, Roger de Bricqueville, Gilles de Sillé, any of the Marshal's +intimates, have shown themselves, little boys have disappeared. Finally, +the peasant learns to look with horror upon an old woman, Perrine +Martin, who wanders around, clad in grey, her face covered—as is that +of Gilles de Sillé—with a black stamin. She accosts children, and her +speech is so seductive, her face, when she raises her veil, so benign, +that all follow her to the edge of a wood, where men carry them off, +gagged, in sacks. And the frightened people call this purveyor of flesh, +this ogress, 'La Meffraye,' from the name of a bird of prey.</p> + +<p>"These emissaries spread out, covering all the villages and hamlets, +tracking the children down at the orders of the Chief Huntsman, the sire +de Bricqueville. Not content with these beaters, Gilles takes to +standing at a window of the château, and when young mendicants, +attracted by the renown of his bounty, ask an alms, he runs an +appraising eye over them, has any who excite his lust brought in and +thrown into an underground prison and kept there until, being in +appetite, he is pleased to order a carnal supper.</p> + +<p>"How many children did he disembowel after deflowering them? He himself +did not know, so many were the rapes he had consummated and the murders +he had committed. The texts of the times enumerate between seven and +eight hundred, but the estimate is inaccurate and seems +overconservative. Entire regions were devastated. The hamlet of +Tiffauges had no more young men. La Suze was without male posterity. At +Champtocé the whole foundation room of a tower was filled with corpses. +A witness cited in the inquest, Guillaume Hylairet, declared also, "that +one hight<!-- Page 155 --> Du Jardin hath heard say that there was found in the said +castle a wine pipe full of dead little children.'</p> + +<p>"Even today traces of these assassinations linger. Two years ago at +Tiffauges a physician discovered an oubliette and brought forth piles of +skulls and bones.</p> + +<p>"Gilles confessed to frightful holocausts, and his friends confirmed the +atrocious details.</p> + +<p>"At dusk, when their senses are phosphorescent, enkindled by +inflammatory spiced beverages and by 'high' venison, Gilles and his +friends retire to a distant chamber of the château. The little boys are +brought from their cellar prisons to this room. They are disrobed and +gagged. The Marshal fondles them and forces them. Then he hacks them to +pieces with a dagger, taking great pleasure in slowly dismembering them. +At other times he slashes the boy's chest and drinks the breath from the +lungs; sometimes he opens the stomach also, smells it, enlarges the +incision with his hands, and seats himself in it. Then while he +macerates the warm entrails in mud, he turns half around and looks over +his shoulder to contemplate the supreme convulsions, the last spasms. He +himself says afterwards, 'I was happier in the enjoyment of tortures, +tears, fright, and blood, than in any other pleasure.'</p> + +<p>"Then he becomes weary of these fecal joys. An unpublished passage in +his trial proceedings informs us that 'The said sire heated himself with +little boys, sometimes also with little girls, with whom he had congress +in the belly, saying that he had more pleasure and less pain than acting +in nature.' After which, he slowly saws their throats, cuts them to +pieces, and the corpses, the linen and the clothing, are put in the +fireplace, where a smudge fire of logs and leaves is burning, and the +ashes are thrown into the latrine, or scattered to the winds from the +top of a tower, or buried in the moats and mounds.</p> + +<p>"Soon his furies become aggravated. Until now he has appeased the rage +of his senses with living or moribund <!-- Page 156 -->beings. He wearies of stuprating +palpitant flesh and becomes a lover of the dead. A passionate artist, he +kisses, with cries of enthusiasm, the well-made limbs of his victims. He +establishes sepulchral beauty contests, and whichever of the truncated +heads receives the prize he raises by the hair and passionately kisses +the cold lips.</p> + +<p>"Vampirism satisfies him for months. He pollutes dead children, +appeasing the fever of his desires in the blood smeared chill of the +tomb. He even goes so far—one day when his supply of children is +exhausted—as to disembowel a pregnant woman and sport with the fœtus. +After these excesses he falls into horrible states of coma, similar to +those heavy lethargies which overpowered Sergeant Bertrand after his +violations of the grave. But if that leaden sleep is one of the known +phases of ordinary vampirism, if Gilles de Rais was merely a sexual +pervert, we must admit that he distinguished himself from the most +delirious sadists, the most exquisite virtuosi in pain and murder, by a +detail which seems extrahuman, it is so horrible.</p> + +<p>"As these terrifying atrocities, these monstrous outrages, no longer +suffice him, he corrodes them with the essence of a rare sin. It is no +longer the resolute, sagacious cruelty of the wild beast playing with +the body of a victim. His ferocity does not remain merely carnal; it +becomes spiritual. He wishes to make the child suffer both in body and +soul. By a thoroughly Satanic cheat he deceives gratitude, dupes +affection, and desecrates love. At a leap he passes the bounds of human +infamy and lands plump in the darkest depth of Evil.</p> + +<p>"He contrives this: One of the unfortunate children is brought into his +chamber, and hanged, by Bricqueville, Prelati, and de Sillé, to a hook +fixed into the wall. Just at the moment when the child is suffocating, +Gilles orders him to be taken down and the rope untied. With some +precaution, he takes the child on his knees, revives him, caresses him, +rocks him, dries his tears, and pointing to the <!-- Page 157 -->accomplices, says, +'These men are bad, but you see they obey me. Do not be afraid. I will +save your life and take you back to your mother,' and while the little +one, wild with joy, kisses him and at that moment loves him, Gilles +gently makes an incision in the back of the neck, rendering the child +'languishing,' to follow Gilles's own expression, and when the head, not +quite detached, bows, Gilles kneads the body, turns it about, and +violates it, bellowing.</p> + +<p>"After these abominable pastimes he may well believe that the art of the +charnalist has beneath his fingers expressed its last drop of pus, and +in a vaunting cry he says to his troop of parasites, 'There is no man on +earth who dare do as I have done.'</p> + +<p>"But if in Love and Well-doing the infinite is approachable for certain +souls, the out-of-the-world possibilities of Evil are limited. In his +excesses of stupration and murder the Marshal cannot go beyond a fixed +point. In vain he may dream of unique violations, of more ingenious slow +tortures, but human imagination has a limit and he has already reached +it—even passed it, with diabolic aid. Insatiable he seethes—there is +nothing material in which to express his ideal. He can verify that axiom +of demonographers, that the Evil One dupes all persons who give +themselves, or are willing to give themselves, to him.</p> + +<p>"As he can descend no further, he tries returning on the way by which he +has come, but now remorse overtakes him, overwhelms him, and wrenches +him without respite. His nights are nights of expiation. Besieged by +phantoms, he howls like a wounded beast. He is found rushing along the +solitary corridors of the château. He weeps, throws himself on his +knees, swears to God that he will do penance. He promises to found pious +institutions. He does establish, at Mâchecoul, a boys' academy in honour +of the Holy Innocents. He speaks of shutting himself up in a cloister, +of going to Jerusalem, begging his bread on the way.</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 158 -->But in this fickle and aberrated mind ideas superpose themselves on +each other, then pass away, and those which disappear leave their shadow +on those which follow. Abruptly, even while weeping with distress, he +precipitates himself into new debauches and, raving with delirium, hurls +himself upon the child brought to him, gouges out the eyes, runs his +finger around the bloody, milky socket, then he seizes a spiked club and +crushes the skull. And while the gurgling blood runs over him, he +stands, smeared with spattered brains, and grinds his teeth and laughs. +Like a hunted beast he flees into the wood, while his henchmen remove +the crimson stains from the ground and dispose prudently of the corpse +and the reeking garments.</p> + +<p>"He wanders in the forests surrounding Tiffauges, dark, impenetrable +forests like those which Brittany still can show at Carnoet. He sobs as +he walks along. He attempts to thrust aside the phantoms which accost +him. Then he looks about him and beholds obscenity in the shapes of the +aged trees. It seems that nature perverts itself before him, that his +very presence depraves it. For the first time he understands the +motionless lubricity of trees. He discovers priapi in the branches.</p> + +<p>"Here a tree appears to him as a living being, standing on its +root-tressed head, its limbs waving in the air and spread wide apart, +subdivided and re-subdivided into haunches, which again are divided and +re-subdivided. Here between two limbs another branch is jammed, in a +stationary fornication which is reproduced in diminished scale from +bough to twig to the top of the tree. There it seems the trunk is a +phallus which mounts and disappears into a skirt of leaves or which, on +the contrary, issues from a green clout and plunges into the glossy +belly of the earth.</p> + +<p>"Frightful images rise before him. He sees the skin of little boys, the +lucid white skin, vellum-like, in the pale, smooth bark of the slender +beeches. He recognizes the pachydermatous skin of the beggar boys in the +dark and <!-- Page 159 -->wrinkled envelope of the old oaks. Beside the bifurcations of +the branches there are yawning holes, puckered orifices in the bark, +simulating emunctoria, or the protruding anus of a beast. In the joints +of the branches there are other visions, elbows, armpits furred with +grey lichens. Even in the trunks there are incisions which spread out +into great lips beneath tufts of brown, velvety moss.</p> + +<p>"Everywhere obscene forms rise from the ground and spring, disordered, +into a firmament which satanizes. The clouds swell into breasts, divide +into buttocks, bulge as if with fecundity, scattering a train of spawn +through space. They accord with the sombre bulging of the foliage, in +which now there are only images of giant or dwarf hips, feminine +triangles, great V's, mouths of Sodom, glowing cicatrices, humid vents. +This landscape of abomination changes. Gilles now sees on the trunks +frightful cancers and horrible wens. He observes exostoses and ulcers, +membranous sores, tubercular chancres, atrocious caries. It is an +arboreal lazaret, a venereal clinic.</p> + +<p>"And there, at a detour of the forest aisle, stands a mottled red beech.</p> + +<p>"Amid the sanguinary falling leaves he feels that he has been spattered +by a shower of blood. He goes into a rage. He conceives the delusion +that beneath the bark lives a wood nymph, and he would feel with his +hands the palpitant flesh of the goddess, he would trucidate the Dryad, +violate her in a place unknown to the follies of men.</p> + +<p>"He is jealous of the woodman who can murder, can massacre, the trees, +and he raves. Tensely he listens and hears in the soughing wind a +response to his cries of desire. Overwhelmed, he resumes his walk, +weeping, until he arrives at the château and sinks to his bed exhausted, +an inert mass.</p> + +<p>"The phantoms take more definite shape, now that he sleeps. The lubric +enlacements of the branches, dilated crevices and cleft mosses, the +coupling of the diverse beings <!-- Page 160 -->of the wood, disappear; the tears of the +leaves whipped by the wind are dried; the white abscesses of the clouds +are resorbed into the grey of the sky; and—in an awful silence—the +incubi and succubi pass.</p> + +<p>"The corpses of his victims, reduced to ashes and scattered, return to +the larva state and attack his lower parts. He writhes, with the blood +bursting his veins. He rebounds in a somersault, then he crawls to the +crucifix, like a wolf, on all fours, and howling, strains his lips to +the feet of the Christ.</p> + +<p>"A sudden reaction overwhelms him. He trembles before the image whose +convulsed face looks down on him. He adjures Christ to have pity, +supplicates Him to spare a sinner, and sobs and weeps, and when, +incapable of further effort, he whimpers, he hears, terrified, in his +own voice, the lamentations of the children crying for their mothers and +pleading for mercy."</p> + +<hr style='width: 45%;'> + +<p>And Durtal, coming slowly out of the vision he had conjured up, closed +his notebook and remarked, "Rather petty, my own spiritual conflict +regarding a woman whose sin—like my own, to be sure—is commonplace and +bourgeois."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XII"><!-- Page 161 -->CHAPTER XII</a></h2> + + +<p>"Easy to find an excuse for this visit, though it will seem strange to +Chantelouve, whom I have neglected for months," said Durtal on his way +toward the rue Bagneux. "Supposing he is home this evening—and he +probably isn't, because surely Hyacinthe will have seen to that—I can +tell him that I have learned of his illness through Des Hermies and that +I have come to see how he is getting along."</p> + +<p>He paused on the stoop of the building in which Chantelouve lived. At +each side and over the door were these antique lamps with reflectors, +surmounted by a sort of casque of sheet iron painted green. There was an +old iron balustrade, very wide, and the steps, with wooden sides, were +paved with red tile. About this house there was a sepulchral and also +clerical odour, yet there was also something homelike—though a little +too imposing—about it such as is not to be found in the cardboard +houses they build nowadays. You could see at a glance that it did not +harbour the apartment house promiscuities: decent, respectable couples +with kept women for neighbours. The house pleased him, and he considered +Hyacinthe the more desirable for her substantial environment.</p> + +<p>He rang at a first-floor apartment. A maid led him through a long hall +into a sitting-room. He noticed, at a glance, that nothing had changed +since his last visit. It was the same vast, high-ceilinged room with +windows reaching to heaven. There was the huge fireplace; on the +mantelpiece the same reproduction, reduced, in bronze, of Fremiet's +Jeanne d'Arc, between the two globe lamps of Japanese <!-- Page 162 -->porcelain. He +recognized the grand piano, the table loaded with albums, the divan, the +chairs in the style of Louis XV with tapestried covers. In front of +every window there were imitation Chinese vases, mounted on tripods of +imitation ebony and containing sickly palms. On the walls were religious +pictures, without expression, and a portrait of Chantelouve in his +youth, three-quarter length, his hand resting on a pile of his works. An +ancient Russian icon in nielloed silver and one of these Christs in +carved wood, executed in the seventeenth century by Bogard de Nancy, in +an antique frame of gilded wood backed with velvet, were the only things +that slightly relieved the banality of the decoration. The rest of the +furniture looked like that of a bourgeois household fixed up for Lent, +or for a charity dance or for a visit from the priest. A great fire +blazed on the hearth. The room was lighted by a very high lamp with a +wide shade of pink lace—</p> + +<p>"Stinks of the sacristy!" Durtal was saying to himself at the moment the +door opened.</p> + +<p>Mme. Chantelouve entered, the lines of her figure advantageously +displayed by a wrapper of white swanskin, which gave off a fragrance of +frangipane. She pressed Durtal's hand and sat down facing him, and he +perceived under the wrap her indigo silk stockings in little patent +leather bootines with straps across the insteps.</p> + +<p>They talked about the weather. She complained of the way the winter hung +on, and declared that although the furnace seemed to be working all +right she was always shivering, was always frozen to death. She told him +to feel her hands, which indeed were cold, then she seemed worried about +his health.</p> + +<p>"You look pale," she said.</p> + +<p>"You might at least say that I <i>am</i> pale," he replied.</p> + +<p>She did not answer immediately, then, "Yesterday I saw how much you +desire me," she said. "But why, why, want to go so far?"</p> + +<p>He made a gesture, indicating vague annoyance.<!-- Page 163 --></p> + +<p>"How funny you are!" she went on. "I was re-reading one of your books +today, and I noticed this phrase, 'The only women you can continue to +love are those you lose.' Now admit that you were right when you wrote +that."</p> + +<p>"It all depends. I wasn't in love then."</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders. "Well," she said, "I must tell my husband +you are here."</p> + +<p>Durtal remained silent, wondering what rôle Chantelouve actually played +in this triangle.</p> + +<p>Chantelouve returned with his wife. He was in his dressing-gown and had +a pen in his mouth. He took it out and put it on the table, and after +assuring Durtal that his health was completely restored, he complained +of overwhelming labours. "I have had to quit giving dinners and +receptions," he said, "I can't even go visiting. I am in harness every +day at my desk."</p> + +<p>And when Durtal asked him the nature of these labours, he confessed to a +whole series of unsigned volumes on the lives of the saints, to be +turned out by the gross by a Tours firm for exportation.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said his wife, laughing, "and these are <i>sadly neglected</i> saints +whose biographies he is preparing."</p> + +<p>And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, Chantelouve, also laughing, +said, "It was their persons that were <i>sadly neglected</i>. The subjects +are chosen for me, and it does seem as if the publisher enjoyed making +me eulogize frowziness. I have to describe Blessed Saints most of whom +were deplorably unkempt: Labre, who was so lousy and ill-smelling as to +disgust the beasts in the stables; Saint Cunegonde who 'through +humility' neglected her body; Saint Oportune who never used water and +who washed her bed only with her tears; Saint Silvia who never removed +the grime from her face; Saint Radegonde who never changed her hair +shirt and who slept on a cinder pile; and how many others, around whose +heads I must draw a golden halo!"</p> + +<p>"There are worse than those," said Durtal. "Read the <!-- Page 164 -->life of Marie +Alacoque. You will see that she, to mortify herself, licked up with her +tongue the dejections of one sick person and sucked an abscess from the +toe of another."</p> + +<p>"I know, but I must admit that I am less touched than revolted by these +tales."</p> + +<p>"I prefer Saint Lucius the martyr," said Mme. Chantelouve. "His body was +so transparent that he could see through his chest the vileness of his +heart. His kind of 'vileness' at least we can stand. But I must admit +that this utter disregard of cleanliness makes me suspicious of the +monasteries and renders your beloved Middle Ages odious to me."</p> + +<p>"Pardon me, my dear," said her husband, "you are greatly mistaken. The +Middle Ages were not, as you believe, an epoch of uncleanliness. People +frequented the baths assiduously. At Paris, for example, where these +establishments were numerous, the 'stove-keepers' went about the city +announcing that the water was hot. It is not until the Renaissance that +uncleanliness becomes rife in France. When you think that that delicious +Reine Margot kept her body macerated with perfumes but as grimy as the +inside of a stovepipe! and that Henri Quatre plumed himself on having +'reeking feet and a fine armpit.'"</p> + +<p>"My dear, for heaven's sake," said madame, "spare us the details."</p> + +<p>While Chantelouve was speaking, Durtal was watching him. He was small +and rotund, with a bay window which his arms would not have gone around. +He had rubicund cheeks, long hair very much pomaded, trailing in the +back and drawn up in crescents along his temples. He had pink cotton in +his ears. He was smooth shaven and looked like a pious but convivial +notary. But his quick, calculating eye belied his jovial and sugary +mien. One divined in his look the cool, unscrupulous man of affairs, +capable, for all his honeyed ways, of doing one a bad turn.</p> + +<p>"He must be aching to throw me into the street," said<!-- Page 165 --> Durtal to +himself, "because he certainly knows all about his wife's goings-on."</p> + +<p>But if Chantelouve wished to be rid of his guest he did not show it. +With his legs crossed and his hands folded one over the other, in the +attitude of a priest, he appeared to be mightily interested in Durtal's +work. Inclining a little, listening as if in a theatre, he said, "Yes, I +know the material on the subject. I read a book some time ago about +Gilles de Rais which seemed to me well handled. It was by abbé Bossard."</p> + +<p>"It is the most complete and reliable of the biographies of the +Marshal."</p> + +<p>"But," Chantelouve went on, "there is one point which I never have been +able to understand. I have never been able to explain to myself why the +name Bluebeard should have been attached to the Marshal, whose history +certainly has no relation to the tale of the good Perrault."</p> + +<p>"As a matter of fact the real Bluebeard was not Gilles de Rais, but +probably a Breton king, Comor, a fragment of whose castle, dating from +the sixth century, is still standing, on the confines of the forest of +Carnoet. The legend is simple. The king asked Guerock, count of Vannes, +for the hand of his daughter, Triphine. Guerock refused, because he had +heard that the king maintained himself in a constant state of +widowerhood by cutting his wives' throats. Finally Saint Gildas promised +Guerock to return his daughter to him safe and sound when he should +reclaim her, and the union was celebrated.</p> + +<p>"Some months later Triphine learned that Comor did indeed kill his +consorts as soon as they became pregnant. She was big with child, so she +fled, but her husband pursued her and cut her throat. The weeping father +commanded Saint Gildas to keep his promise, and the Saint resuscitated +Triphine.</p> + +<p>"As you see, this legend comes much nearer than the history of our +Bluebeard to the told tale arranged by the <!-- Page 166 -->ingenious Perrault. Now, why +and how the name Bluebeard passed from King Comor to the Marshal de +Rais, I cannot tell. You know what pranks oral tradition can play."</p> + +<p>"But with your Gilles de Rais you must have to plunge into Satanism +right up to the hilt," said Chantelouve after a silence.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and it would really be more interesting if these scenes were not +so remote. What would have a timely appeal would be a study of the +Diabolism of the present day."</p> + +<p>"No doubt," said Chantelouve, pleasantly.</p> + +<p>"For," Durtal went on, looking at him intently, "unheard-of things are +going on right now. I have heard tell of sacrilegious priests, of a +certain canon who has revived the sabbats of the Middle Ages."</p> + +<p>Chantelouve did not betray himself by so much as a flicker of the +eyelids. Calmly he uncrossed his legs and looking up at the ceiling he +said, "Alas, certain scabby wethers succeed in stealing into the fold, +but they are so rare as hardly to be worth thinking about." And he +deftly changed the subject by speaking of a book he had just read about +the Fronde.</p> + +<p>Durtal, somewhat embarrassed, said nothing. He understood that +Chantelouve refused to speak of his relations with Canon Docre.</p> + +<p>"My dear," said Mme. Chantelouve, addressing her husband, "you have +forgotten to turn up your lamp wick. It is smoking. I can smell it from +here, even through the closed door."</p> + +<p>She was most evidently conveying him a dismissal. Chantelouve rose and, +with a vaguely malicious smile, excused himself as being obliged to +continue his work. He shook hands with Durtal, begged him not to stay +away so long in future, and gathering up the skirts of his dressing-gown +he left the room.</p> + +<p>She followed him with her eyes, then rose, in her turn, <!-- Page 167 -->ran to the +door, assured herself with a glance that it was closed, then returned to +Durtal, who was leaning against the mantel. Without a word she took his +head between her hands, pressed her lips to his mouth and opened it.</p> + +<p>He grunted furiously.</p> + +<p>She looked at him with indolent and filmy eyes, and he saw sparks of +silver dart to their surface. He held her in his arms. She was swooning +but vigilantly listening. Gently she disengaged herself, sighing, while +he, embarrassed, sat down at a little distance from her, clenching and +unclenching his hands.</p> + +<p>They spoke of banal things: she boasting of her maid, who would go +through fire for her, he responding only by gestures of approbation and +surprise.</p> + +<p>Then suddenly she passed her hands over her forehead. "Ah!" she said, "I +suffer cruelly when I think that he is there working. No, it would cost +me too much remorse. What I say is foolish, but if he were a different +man, a man who went out more and made conquests, it would not be so +bad."</p> + +<p>He was irritated by the inconsequentiality of her plaints. Finally, +feeling completely safe, he came closer to her and said, "You spoke of +remorse, but whether we embark or whether we stand on the bank, isn't +our guilt exactly the same?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know. My confessor talks to me like that—only more +severely—but I think you are both wrong."</p> + +<p>He could not help laughing, and he said to himself, "Remorse is perhaps +the condiment which keeps passion from being too unappetizing to the +blasé." Then aloud he jestingly, "Speaking of confessors, if I were a +casuist it seems to me I would try to invent new sins. I am not a +casuist, and yet, having looked about a bit, I believe I <i>have</i> found a +new sin."</p> + +<p>"You?" she said, laughing in turn. "Can I commit it?"</p> + +<p>He scrutinized her features. She had the expression of a greedy child.</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 168 -->You alone can answer that. Now I must admit that the sin is not +absolutely new, for it fits into the known category of lust. But it has +been neglected since pagan days, and was never well defined in any +case."</p> + +<p>"Do not keep me in suspense. What is this sin?"</p> + +<p>"It isn't easy to explain. Nevertheless I will try. Lust, I believe, can +be classified into: ordinary sin, sin against nature, bestiality, and +let us add <i>demoniality</i> and sacrilege. Well, there is, in addition to +these, what I shall call Pygmalionism, which embraces at the same time +cerebral onanism and incest.</p> + +<p>"Imagine an artist falling in love with his child, his creation: with an +Hérodiade, a Judith, a Helen, a Jeanne d'Arc, whom he has either +described or painted, and evoking her, and finally possessing her in +dream.</p> + +<p>"Well, this love is worse than normal incest. In the latter sin the +guilty one commits only a half-offence, because his daughter is not born +solely of his substance, but also of the flesh of another. Thus, +logically, in incest there is a quasi-natural side, almost licit, +because part of another person has entered into the engendering of the +<i>corpus delicti</i>; while in Pygmalionism the father violates the child of +his soul, of that which alone is purely and really his, which alone he +can impregnate without the aid of another. The offence is, then, entire +and complete. Now, is there not also disdain of nature, of the work of +God, since the subject of the sin is no longer—as even in bestiality—a +palpable and living creature, but an unreal being created by a +projection of the desecrated talent, a being almost celestial, since, by +genius, by artistry, it often becomes immortal?</p> + +<p>"Let us go further, if you wish. Suppose that an artist depicts a saint +and becomes enamoured of her. Thus we have complications of crime +against nature and of sacrilege. An enormity!"</p> + +<p>"Which, perhaps, is exquisite!"</p> + +<p>He was taken aback by the word she had used. She rose, opened the door, +and called her husband.<!-- Page 169 --> "Dear," she said, "Durtal has discovered a new +sin!"</p> + +<p>"Surely not," said Chantelouve, his figure framed in the doorway. "The +book of sins is an edition <i>ne varietur</i>. New sins cannot be invented, +but old ones may be kept from falling into oblivion. Well, what is this +sin of his?"</p> + +<p>Durtal explained the theory.</p> + +<p>"But it is simply a refined expression of succubacy. The consort is not +one's work become animate, but a succubus which by night takes that +form."</p> + +<p>"Admit, at any rate, that this cerebral hermaphrodism, self-fecundation, +is a distinguished vice at least—being the privilege of the artist—a +vice reserved for the elect, inaccessible to the mob."</p> + +<p>"If you like exclusive obscenity—" laughed Chantelouve. "But I must get +back to the lives of the saints; the atmosphere is fresher and more +benign. So excuse me, Durtal. I leave it to my wife to continue this +Marivaux conversation about Satanism with you."</p> + +<p>He said it in the simplest, most debonair fashion to be imagined, but +with just the slightest trace of irony.</p> + +<p>Which Durtal perceived. "It must be quite late," he thought, when the +door closed after Chantelouve. He consulted his watch. Nearly eleven. He +rose to take leave.</p> + +<p>"When shall I see you?" he murmured, very low.</p> + +<p>"Your apartment tomorrow night at nine."</p> + +<p>He looked at her with beseeching eyes. She understood, but wished to +tease him. She kissed him maternally on the forehead, then consulted his +eyes again. The expression of supplication must have remained unchanged, +for she responded to their imploration by a long kiss which closed them, +then came down to his lips, drinking their dolorous emotion.</p> + +<p>Then she rang and told her maid to light Durtal through the hall. He +descended, satisfied that she had engaged herself to yield tomorrow +night.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XIII"><!-- Page 170 -->CHAPTER XIII</a></h2> + + +<p>He began again, as on the other evening, to clean house and establish a +methodical disorder. He slipped a cushion under the false disarray of +the armchair, then he made roaring fires to have the rooms good and warm +when she came.</p> + +<p>But he was without impatience. That silent promise which he had +obtained, that Mme. Chantelouve would not leave him panting this night, +moderated him. Now that his uncertainty was at an end, he no longer +vibrated with the almost painful acuity which hitherto her malignant +delays had provoked. He soothed himself by poking the fire. His mind was +still full of her, but plethoric, content. When his thoughts stirred at +all it was, at the very most, to revolve the question, "How shall I go +about it, when the time comes, so as not to be ridiculous?" This +question, which had so harassed him the other night, left him troubled +but inert. He did not try to solve it, but decided to leave everything +to chance, since the best planned strategy was almost always abortive.</p> + +<p>Then he revolted against himself, accused himself of stagnation, and +walked up and down to shake himself out of a torpor which might have +been attributed to the hot fire. Well, well, was it because he had had +to wait so long that his desires had left him, or at least quit +bothering him—no, they had not, why, he was yearning now for the moment +when he might crush that woman! He thought he had the explanation of his +lack of enthusiasm in the stage fright inseparable from any beginning. +"It will not be really exquisite tonight until after the newness wears +off and the <!-- Page 171 -->grotesque with it. After I know her I shall be able to +consort with her again without feeling solicitous about her and +conscious of myself. I wish we were on that happy basis now."</p> + +<p>The cat, sitting on the table, cocked up its ears, gazed at the door +with its black eyes, and fled. The bell rang and Durtal went to let her +in.</p> + +<p>Her costume pleased him. He took off her furs. Her skirt was of a plum +colour so dark that it was almost black, the material thick and supple, +outlining her figure, squeezing her arms, making an hourglass of her +waist, accentuating the curve of her hips and the bulge of her corset.</p> + +<p>"You are charming," he said, kissing her wrists, and he was pleased to +find that his lips had accelerated her pulse. She did not speak, could +hardly breathe. She was agitated and very pale.</p> + +<p>He sat down facing her. She looked at him with her mysterious, half +sleepy eyes. He felt that he was falling in love all over again. He +forgot his reasonings and his fears, and took acute pleasure in +penetrating the mystery of these eyes and studying the vague smile of +this dolorous mouth.</p> + +<p>He enlaced her fingers in his, and for the first time, in a low voice, +he called her Hyacinthe.</p> + +<p>She listened, her breast heaving, her hands in a fever. Then in a +supplicating voice, "I implore you," she said, "let us have none of +that. Only desire is good. Oh, I am rational, I mean what I say. I +thought it all out on the way here. I left him very sad tonight. If you +knew how I feel—I went to church today and was afraid and hid myself +when I saw my confessor—"</p> + +<p>These plaints he had heard before, and he said to himself, "You may sing +whatever tune you want to, but you shall dance tonight." Aloud he +answered in monosyllables as he continued to take possession of her.</p> + +<p>He rose, thinking she would do the same, or that if she remained seated +he could better reach her lips by bending over her.<!-- Page 172 --></p> + +<p>"Your lips, your lips—the kiss you gave me last night—" he murmured, +as his face came close to hers. She put up her lips and stood, and they +embraced, but as his hands went seeking she recoiled.</p> + +<p>"Think how ridiculous it all is," she said in a low voice, "to undress, +put on night clothes—and that silly scene, getting into bed!"</p> + +<p>He avoided declaring, but attempted, by an embrace which bent her over +backward, to make her understand that she could spare herself those +embarrassments. Tacitly, in his own turn, feeling her body stiffen under +his fingers, he understood that she absolutely would not give herself in +the room here, in front of the fire.</p> + +<p>"Oh well," she said, disengaging herself, "if you will have it!"</p> + +<p>He made way to allow her to go into the other room, and seeing that she +desired to be alone he drew the portière.</p> + +<p>Sitting before the fire he reflected. Perhaps he ought to have pulled +down the bed covers, and not left her the task, but without doubt the +action would have been too direct, too obvious a hint. Ah! and that +water heater! He took it and, keeping away from the bedroom door, went +to the bathroom, placed the heater on the toilet table, and then, +swiftly, he set out the rice powder box, the perfumes, the combs, and, +returning into his study, he listened.</p> + +<p>She was making as little noise as possible, walking on tiptoe as if in +the presence of the dead. She blew out the candles, doubtless wishing no +more light than the rosy glow of the hearth.</p> + +<p>He felt positively annihilated. The irritating impression of the lips +and eyes of Hyacinthe was far from him now. She was nothing but a woman, +like any other, undressing in a man's room. Memories of similar scenes +overwhelmed him. He remembered girls who like her had crept about on the +carpet so as not to be heard, and who had stopped short, ashamed, for a +whole second, if they bumped against the water pitcher. And then, what +good was this going to <!-- Page 173 -->do him? Now that she was yielding he no longer +desired her! Disillusion had come even before possession, not waiting, +as usual, till afterward. He was distressed to the point of tears.</p> + +<p>The frightened cat glided under the curtain, ran from one room to the +other, and finally came back to his master and jumped onto his knees. +Caressing him, Durtal said to himself, "Decidedly, she was right when +she refused. It will be grotesque, atrocious. I was wrong to insist, but +no, it's her fault, too. She must have wanted to do this or she wouldn't +have come. What a fool to think she could aggravate passion by delay. +She is fearfully clumsy. A moment ago when I was embracing her and +really was aroused, it would perhaps have been delicious, but now! And +what do I look like? A young bridegroom waiting—or a green country boy. +Oh God, how stupid! Well," he said, straining his ears and hearing no +sound from the other room, "she's in bed. I must go in.</p> + +<p>"I suppose it took her all this time to unharness herself from her +corset. She was a fool to wear one," he concluded, when, drawing the +curtain, he stepped into the other room.</p> + +<p>Mme. Chantelouve was buried under the thick coverlet, her mouth +half-open and her eyes closed; but he saw that she was peering at him +through the fringe of her blonde eyelashes. He sat down on the edge of +the bed. She huddled up, drawing the cover over her chin.</p> + +<p>"Cold, dear?"</p> + +<p>"No," and she opened wide her eyes, which flashed sparks.</p> + +<p>He undressed, casting a rapid glance at Hyacinthe's face. It was hidden +in the darkness, but was sometimes revealed by a flare of the red hot +fire, as a stick, half consumed and smouldering, would suddenly burst +into flame. Swiftly he slipped between the covers. He clasped a corpse; +a body so cold that it froze him, but the woman's lips were burning as +she silently gnawed his features. He lay stupified in the grip of this +body wound around his own, supple as the ...<!-- Page 174 --> and hard! He could not +move; he could not speak for the shower of kisses traveling over his +face. Finally, he succeeded in disengaging himself, and, with his free +arm he sought her; then suddenly, while she devoured his lips he felt a +nervous inhibition, and, naturally, without profit, he withdrew.</p> + +<p>"I detest you!" she exclaimed.</p> + +<p>"Why?"</p> + +<p>"I detest you!"</p> + +<p>He wanted to cry out, "And I you!" He was exasperated, and would have +given all he owned to get her to dress and go home.</p> + +<p>The fire was burning low, unflickering. Appeased, now, he sat up and +looked into the darkness. He would have liked to get up and find another +nightshirt, because the one he had on was tearing and getting in his +way. But Hyacinthe was lying on top of it—then he reflected that the +bed was deranged and the thought affected him, because he liked to be +snug in winter, and knowing himself incapable of respreading the covers, +he foresaw a cold night.</p> + +<p>Once more, he was enlaced; the gripe of the woman's on his own was +renewed; rational, this time, he attended to her and crushed her with +mighty caresses. In a changed voice, lower, more guttural, she uttered +ignoble things and silly cries which gave him pain—"My dear!—oh, +hon!—oh I can't stand it!"—aroused nevertheless, he took this body +which creaked as it writhed, and he experienced the extraordinary +sensation of a spasmodic burning within a swaddle of ice-packs.</p> + +<p>He finally jumped over her, out of bed, and lighted the candles. On the +dresser the cat sat motionless, considering Durtal and Mme. Chantelouve +alternately. Durtal saw an inexpressible mockery in those black eyes +and, irritated, chased the beast away.</p> + +<p>He put some more wood on the fire, dressed, and started to leave the +room. Hyacinthe called him gently, in her usual voice. He approached the +bed. She threw her arms <!-- Page 175 -->around his neck and hung there, kissing him +hungrily. Then sinking back and putting her arms under the cover, she +said, "The deed is done. Now will you love me any better?"</p> + +<p>He did not have the heart to answer. Ah yes, his disillusion was +complete. The satiety following justified his lack of appetite +preceding. She revolted him, horrified him. Was it possible to have so +desired a woman, only to come to—that? He had idealized her in his +transports, he had dreamed in her eyes—he knew not what! He had wished +to exalt himself with her, to rise higher than the delirious ravenings +of the senses, to soar out of the world into joys supernal and +unexplored. And his dream had been shattered. He remained fettered to +earth. Was there no means of escaping out of one's self, out of earthly +limitations, and attaining an upper ether where the soul, ravished, +would glory in its giddy flight?</p> + +<p>Ah, the lesson was hard and decisive. For having one time hoped so much, +what regrets, what a tumble! Decidedly, Reality does not pardon him who +despises her; she avenges herself by shattering the dream and trampling +it and casting the fragments into a cesspool.</p> + +<p>"Don't be vexed, dear, because it is taking me so long," said Mme. +Chantelouve behind the curtain.</p> + +<p>He thought crudely, "I wish you would get to hell out of here," and +aloud he asked politely if she had need of his services.</p> + +<p>"She was so mysterious, so enticing," he resumed to himself. "Her eyes, +remote, deep as space, and reflecting cemeteries and festivals at the +same time. And she has shown herself up for all she is, within an hour. +I have seen a new Hyacinthe, talking like a silly little milliner in +heat. All the nastinesses of women unite in her to exasperate me."</p> + +<p>After a thoughtful silence he concluded, "I must be young indeed to have +lost my head the way I did."</p> + +<p>As if echoing his thought, Mme. Chantelouve, coming out through the +portière, laughed nervously and said, "A <!-- Page 176 -->woman of my age doing a mad +thing like that!" She looked at him, and though he forced a smile she +understood.</p> + +<p>"You will sleep tonight," she said, sadly, alluding to Durtal's former +complaints of sleeplessness on her account.</p> + +<p>He begged her to sit down and warm herself, but she said she was not +cold.</p> + +<p>"Why, in spite of the warmth of the room you were cold as ice!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, I am always that way. Winter and summer my flesh is chilly."</p> + +<p>He thought that in August this frigid body might be agreeable, but now!</p> + +<p>He offered her some bonbons, which she refused, then she said she would +take a sip of the alkermes, which he poured into a tiny silver goblet. +She took just a drop, and amicably they discussed the taste of this +preparation, in which she recognized an aroma of clove, tempered by +flower of cinnamon moistened with distillate of rose water.</p> + +<p>Then he became silent.</p> + +<p>"My poor dear," she said, "how I should love him if he were more +confiding and not always on his guard."</p> + +<p>He asked her to explain herself.</p> + +<p>"Why, I mean that you can't forget yourself and simply let yourself be +loved. Alas, you were reasoning all the time—"</p> + +<p>"I was not!"</p> + +<p>She kissed him tenderly. "You see I love you, anyway." And he was +surprised to see how sad and moved she looked, and he observed a sort of +frightened gratitude in her eyes.</p> + +<p>"She is easily satisfied," he said to himself.</p> + +<p>"What are you thinking about?"</p> + +<p>"You!"</p> + +<p>She sighed. Then, "What time is it?"</p> + +<p>"Half past ten."</p> + +<p>"I must go. He is waiting for me. No, don't say anything—"</p> + +<p>She passed her hands over her cheeks. He seized her <!-- Page 177 -->gently by the waist +and kissed her, holding her thus enlaced until they were at the door.</p> + +<p>"You will come again soon, won't you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes.... Yes."</p> + +<p>He returned to the fireside.</p> + +<p>"Oof! it's done," he thought, in a whirl of confused emotions. His +vanity was satisfied, his selfesteem was no longer bleeding, he had +attained his ends and possessed this woman. Moreover, her spell over him +had lost its force. He was regaining his entire liberty of mind, but who +could tell what trouble this liaison had yet in store for him? Then, in +spite of everything, he softened.</p> + +<p>After all, what could he reproach her with? She loved as well as she +could. She was, indeed, ardent and plaintive. Even this dualism of a +mistress who was a low cocotte in bed and a fine lady when dressed—or +no, too intelligent to be called a fine lady—was a delectable pimento. +Her carnal appetites were excessive and bizarre. What, then, was the +matter with him?</p> + +<p>And at last he quite justly accused himself. It was his own fault if +everything was spoiled. He lacked appetite. He was not really tormented +except by a cerebral erethism. He was used up in body, filed away in +soul, inept at love, weary of tendernesses even before he received them +and disgusted when he had. His heart was dead and could not be revived. +And his mania for thinking, thinking! previsualizing an incident so +vividly that actual enactment was an anticlimax—but probably would not +be if his mind would leave him alone and not be always jeering at his +efforts. For a man in his state of spiritual impoverishment all, save +art, was but a recreation more or less boring, a diversion more or less +vain. "Ah, poor woman, I am afraid she is going to get pretty sick of +me. If only she would consent to come no more! But no, she doesn't +deserve to be treated in that fashion," and, seized by pity, he swore to +himself that the next time she visited him he would caress her and <!-- Page 178 -->try +to persuade her that the disillusion which he had so ill concealed did +not exist.</p> + +<p>He tried to spread up the bed, get the tousled blankets together, and +plump the pillows, then he lay down.</p> + +<p>He put out his lamp. In the darkness his distress increased. With death +in his heart he said to himself, "Yes, I was right in declaring that the +only women you can continue to love are those you lose.</p> + +<p>"To learn, three years later, when the woman is inaccessible, chaste and +married, dead, perhaps, or out of France—to learn that she loved you, +though you had not dared believe it while she was near you, ah, that's +the dream! These real and intangible loves, these loves made up of +melancholy and distant regrets, are the only ones that count. Because +there is no flesh in them, no earthly leaven.</p> + +<p>"To love at a distance and without hope; never to possess; to dream +chastely of pale charms and impossible kisses extinguished on the waxen +brow of death: ah, that is something like it. A delicious straying away +from the world, and never the return. As only the unreal is not ignoble +and empty, existence must be admitted to be abominable. Yes, imagination +is the only good thing which heaven vouchsafes to the skeptic and +pessimist, alarmed by the eternal abjectness of life."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XIV"><!-- Page 179 -->CHAPTER XIV</a></h2> + + +<p>From this scene he had learned an alarming lesson: that the flesh +domineers the soul and refuses to admit any schism. The flesh decisively +does not intend that one shall get along without it and indulge in +out-of-the-world pleasures which it can partake only on condition that +it keep quiet. For the first time, reviewing these turpitudes, he really +understood the meaning of that now obsolete word <i>chastity</i>, and he +savoured it in all its pristine freshness. Just as a man who has drunk +too deeply the night before thinks, the morning after, of drinking +nothing but mineral water in future, so he dreamed, today, of pure +affection far from a bed.</p> + +<p>He was still ruminating these thoughts when Des Hermies entered.</p> + +<p>They spoke of amorous misadventures. Astonished at once by Durtal's +languor and the ascetic tone of his remarks, Des Hermies exclaimed, "Ah, +we had a gay old time last night?"</p> + +<p>With the most decisive bad grace Durtal shook his head.</p> + +<p>"Then," replied Des Hermies, "you are superior and inhuman. To love +without hope, immaculately, would be perfect if it did not induct such +brainstorms. There is no excuse for chastity, unless one has a pious end +in view, or unless the senses are failing, and if they are one had best +see a doctor, who will solve the question more or less unsatisfactorily. +To tell the truth, everything on earth culminates in the act you +reprove. The heart, which is supposed to be the noble part of man, has +the same form as the penis, which is the so-called ignoble part of man. +There's <!-- Page 180 -->symbolism in that similarity, because every love which is of +the heart soon extends to the organ resembling it. The human +imagination, the moment it tries to create artificially animated beings, +involuntarily reproduces in them the movements of animals propagating. +Look at the machines, the action of the piston and the cylinder; Romeos +of steel and Juliets of cast iron. Nor do the loftier expressions of the +human intellect get away from the advance and withdrawal copied by the +machines. One must bow to nature's law if one is neither impotent nor a +saint. Now you are neither the one nor the other, I think, but if, from +inconceivable motives, you desire to live in temporary continence, +follow the prescription of an occultist of the sixteenth century, the +Neapolitan Piperno. He affirms that whoever eats vervain cannot approach +a woman for seven days. Buy a jar, and let's try it."</p> + +<p>Durtal laughed. "There is perhaps a middle course: never consummate the +carnal act with her you love, and, to keep yourself quiet, frequent +those you do not love. Thus, in a certain measure, you would conjure +away possible disgust."</p> + +<p>"No, one would never get it out of one's head that with the woman of +whom one was enamoured one would experience carnal delights absolutely +different from those which one feels with the others, so your method +also would end badly. And too, the women who would not be indifferent to +one, have not charity and discretion enough to admire the wisdom of this +selfishness, for of course that's what it is. But what say, now, to +putting on your shoes? It's almost six o'clock and Mama Carhaix's beef +can't wait."</p> + +<p>It had already been taken out of the pot and couched on a platter amid +vegetables when they arrived. Carhaix, sprawling in an armchair, was +reading his breviary.</p> + +<p>"What's going on in the world?" he asked, closing his book.</p> + +<p>"Nothing. Politics doesn't interest us, and General<!-- Page 181 --> Boulanger's +American tricks of publicity weary you as much as they do us, I suppose. +The other newspaper stories are just a little more shocking or dull than +usual.—Look out, you'll burn your mouth," as Durtal was preparing to +take a spoonful of soup.</p> + +<p>"In fact," said Durtal, grimacing, "this marrowy soup, so artistically +golden, is like liquid fire. But speaking of the news, what do you mean +by saying there is nothing of pressing importance? And the trial of that +astonishing abbé Boudes going on before the Assizes of Aveyron! After +trying to poison his curate through the sacramental wine, and committing +such other crimes as abortion, rape, flagrant misconduct, forgery, +qualified theft and usury, he ended by appropriating the money put in +the coin boxes for the souls in purgatory, and pawning the ciborium, +chalice, all the holy vessels. That case is worth following."</p> + +<p>Carhaix raised his eyes to heaven.</p> + +<p>"If he is not sent to jail, there will be one more priest for Paris," +said Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"How's that?"</p> + +<p>"Why, all the ecclesiastics who get in bad in the provinces, or who have +a serious falling out with the bishop, are sent here where they will be +less in view, lost in the crowd, as it were. They form a part of that +corporation known as 'scratch priests.'"</p> + +<p>"What are they?"</p> + +<p>"Priests loosely attached to a parish. You know that in addition to a +curate, ministrants, vicars, and regular clergy, there are in every +church adjunct priests, supply priests. Those are the ones I am talking +about. They do the heavy work, celebrate the morning masses when +everybody is asleep and the late masses when everybody is doing. It is +they who get up at night to take the sacrament to the poor, and who sit +up with the corpses of the devout rich and catch cold standing under the +dripping church porches at funerals, and get sunstroke or pneumonia in +the cemetery. They do all the dirty work. For a five or ten franc fee +they act as <!-- Page 182 -->substitutes for colleagues who have good livings and are +tired of service. They are men under a cloud for the most part. Churches +take them on, ready to fire them at a moment's notice, and keep strict +watch over them while waiting for them to be interdicted or to have +their <i>celebret</i> taken away. I simply mean that the provincial parishes +excavate on the city the priests who for one reason or another have +ceased to please."</p> + +<p>"But what do the curates and other titulary abbés <i>do</i>, if they unload +their duties onto the backs of others?"</p> + +<p>"They do the elegant, easy work, which requires no effort, no charity. +They shrive society women who come to confession in their most stunning +gowns; they teach proper little prigs the catechism, and preach, and +play the limelight rôles in the gala ceremonials which are got up to +pander to the tastes of the faithful. At Paris, not counting the scratch +priests, the clergy is divided thus: Man-of-the-world priests in easy +circumstances: these are placed at la Madeleine and Saint Roch where the +congregations are wealthy. They are wined and dined, they pass their +lives in drawing-rooms, and comfort only elegant souls. Other priests +who are good desk clerks, for the most part, but who have neither the +education nor the fortune necessary to participate in the +inconsequentialities of the idle rich. They live more in seclusion and +visit only among the middle class. They console themselves for their +unfashionableness by playing cards with each other and uttering crude +commonplaces at the table."</p> + +<p>"Now, Des Hermies," said Carhaix, "you are going too far. I claim to +know the clerical world myself, and there are, even in Paris, honest men +who do their duty. They are covered with opprobrium and spat on. Every +Tom, Dick, and Harry accuses them of the foulest vices. But after all, +it must be said that the abbé Boudes and the Canon Docres are +exceptions, thank God! and outside of Paris there are veritable saints, +especially among the country clergy."</p> + +<p>"It's a fact that Satanic priests are relatively rare, and <!-- Page 183 -->the +lecheries of the clergy and the knaveries of the episcopate are +evidently exaggerated by an ignoble press. But that isn't what I have +against them. If only they were gamblers and libertines! But they're +lukewarm, mediocre, lazy, imbeciles. That is their sin against the Holy +Ghost, the only sin which the All Merciful does not pardon."</p> + +<p>"They are of their time," said Durtal. "You wouldn't expect to find the +soul of the Middle Ages inculcated by the milk-and-water seminaries."</p> + +<p>"Then," Carhaix observed, "our friend forgets that there are impeccable +monastic orders, the Carthusians, for instance."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and the Trappists and the Franciscans. But they are cloistered +orders which live in shelter from an infamous century. Take, on the +other hand, the order of Saint Dominic, which exists for the fashionable +world. That is the order which produces jewelled dudes like Monsabre and +Didon. Enough said."</p> + +<p>"They are the hussars of religion, the jaunty lancers, the spick and +span and primped-up Zouaves, while the good Capuchins are the humble +poilus of the soul," said Durtal.</p> + +<p>"If only they loved bells," sighed Carhaix, shaking his head. "Well, +pass the Coulommiers," he said to his wife, who was taking up the salad +bowl and the plates.</p> + +<p>In silence they ate this Brie-type cheese. Des Hermies filled the +glasses.</p> + +<p>"Tell me," Durtal asked Des Hermies, "do you know whether a woman who +receives visits from the incubi necessarily has a cold body? In other +words, is a cold body a presumable symptom of incubacy, as of old the +inability to shed tears served the Inquisition as proof positive to +convict witches?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I can answer you. Formerly women smitten with incubacy had frigid +flesh even in the month of August. The books of the specialists bear +witness. But now the majority of the creatures who voluntarily or +involuntarily summon or receive the amorous larvæ have, on the contrary, +a skin <!-- Page 184 -->that is burning and dry to the touch. This transformation is not +yet general, but tends to become so. I remember very well that Dr. +Johannès, he of whom Gévingey told you, was often obliged, at the moment +when he attempted to deliver the patient, to bring the body back to +normal temperature with lotions of dilute hydriodate of potassium."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Durtal, who was thinking of Mme. Chantelouve.</p> + +<p>"You don't know what has become of Dr. Johannès?" asked Carhaix.</p> + +<p>"He is living very much in retirement at Lyons. He continues, I believe, +to cure venefices, and he preaches the blessed coming of the Paraclete."</p> + +<p>"For heaven's sake, who is this doctor?" asked Durtal.</p> + +<p>"He is a very intelligent and learned priest. He was superior of a +community, and he directed, here in Paris, the only review which ever +was really mystical. He was a theologian much consulted, a recognized +master of divine jurisprudence; then he had distressing quarrels with +the papal Curia at Rome and with the Cardinal-Archbishop of Paris. His +exorcisms and his battles against the incubi, especially in the female +convents, ruined him.</p> + +<p>"Ah, I remember the last time I saw him, as if it were yesterday. I met +him in the rue Grenelle coming out of the Archbishop's house, the day he +quitted the Church, after a scene which he told me all about. Again I +can see that priest walking with me along the deserted boulevard des +Invalides. He was pale, and his defeated but impressive voice trembled. +He had been summoned and commanded to explain his actions in the case of +an epileptic woman whom he claimed to have cured with the aid of a +relic, the seamless robe of Christ preserved at Argenteuil. The +Cardinal, assisted by two grand vicars, listened to him, standing.</p> + +<p>"When he had likewise furnished the information which they demanded +about his cures of witch spells, Cardinal Guibert said, 'You had best go +to La Trappe.'</p> + +<p>"And I remember word for word his reply, 'If I have <!-- Page 185 -->violated the laws +of the Church, I am ready to undergo the penalty of my fault. If you +think me culpable, pass a canonical judgment and I will execute it, I +swear on my sacerdotal honour; but I wish a formal sentence, for, in +law, nobody is bound to condemn himself: "<i>Nemo se tradere tenetur</i>," +says the Corpus Juris Canonici.'</p> + +<p>"There was a copy of his review on the table. The Cardinal pointed to a +page and asked, 'Did you write that?'</p> + +<p>"'Yes, Eminence.'</p> + +<p>"'Infamous doctrines!' and he went from his office into the next room, +crying, 'Out of my sight!'</p> + +<p>"Then Johannès advanced as far as the threshold of the other room, and +falling on his knees, he said, 'Eminence, I had no intention of +offending. If I have done so, I beg forgiveness.'</p> + +<p>"The Cardinal cried more loudly, 'Out of my sight before I call for +assistance!'</p> + +<p>"Johannès rose and left.</p> + +<p>"'All my old ties are broken,' he said, as he parted from me. He was so +sad that I had not the heart to question him further."</p> + +<p>There was a silence. Carhaix went up to his tower to ring a peal. His +wife removed the dessert dishes and the cloth. Des Hermies prepared the +coffee. Durtal, pensive, rolled his cigarette.</p> + +<p>Carhaix, when he returned, as if enveloped in a fog of sounds, +exclaimed, "A while ago, Des Hermies, you were speaking of the +Franciscans. Do you know that that order, to live up to its professions +of poverty, was supposed not to possess even a bell? True, this rule has +been relaxed somewhat. It was too severe! Now they have a bell, but only +one."</p> + +<p>"Just like most other abbeys, then."</p> + +<p>"No, because all communities have at least three, in honour of the holy +and triple Hypostasis."</p> + +<p>"Do you mean to say that the number of bells a monastery or church can +have is limited by rule?"<!-- Page 186 --></p> + +<p>"Formerly it was. There was a pious hierarchy of ringing: the bells of a +convent could not sound when the bells of a church pealed. They were the +vassals, and, respectful and submissive as became their rank, they were +silent when the Suzerain spoke to the multitudes. These principles of +procedure, consecrated, in 1590, by a canon of the Council of Toulouse +and confirmed by two decrees of the Congress of Rites, are no longer +followed. The rulings of San Carlo Borromeo, who decreed that a church +should have from five to seven bells, a boy's academy three, and a +parochial school two, are abolished. Today churches have more or fewer +bells as they are more or less rich.... Oh, well, why worry? Where are +the little glasses?"</p> + +<p>His wife brought them, shook hands with the guests, and retired.</p> + +<p>Then while Carhaix was pouring the cognac, Des Hermies said in a low +voice, "I did not want to speak before her, because these matters +distress and frighten her, but I received a singular visit this morning +from Gévingey, who is running over to Lyons to see Dr. Johannès. He +claims to have been bewitched by Canon Docre, who, it seems, is making a +flying visit to Paris. What have been their relations? I don't know. +Anyway, Gévingey is in a deplorable state."</p> + +<p>"Just what seems to be the matter with him?" asked Durtal.</p> + +<p>"I positively do not know. I made a careful auscultation and examined +him thoroughly. He complains of needles pricking him around the heart. I +observed nervous trouble and nothing else. What I am most worried about +is a state of enfeeblement inexplicable in a man who is neither +cancerous nor diabetical."</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Carhaix, "I suppose people are not betwitched now with wax +images and needles, with the 'Manei' or the 'Dagyde' as it was called in +the good old days."</p> + +<p>"No, those practises are now out of date and almost everywhere fallen +into disuse. Gévingey who took me completely <!-- Page 187 -->into his confidence this +morning, told me what extraordinary recipes the frightful canon uses. +These are, it seems, the unrevealed secrets of modern magic."</p> + +<p>"Ah, that's what interests me," exclaimed Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Of course I limit myself to repeating what was told me," resumed Des +Hermies, lighting his cigarette. "Well, Docre keeps white mice in cages, +and he takes them along when he travels. He feeds them on consecrated +hosts and on pastes impregnated with poisons skilfully dosed. When these +unhappy beasts are saturated, he takes them, holds them over a chalice, +and with a very sharp instrument he pricks them here and there. The +blood flows into the vase and he uses it, in a way which I shall explain +in a moment, to strike his enemies with death. Formerly he operated on +chickens and guinea pigs, but he used the grease, not the blood, of +these animals, become thus execrated and venomous tabernacles.</p> + +<p>"Formerly he also used a recipe discovered by the Satanic society of the +Re-Theurgistes-Optimates, of which I have spoken before, and he prepared +a hash composed of flour, meat, Eucharist bread, mercury, animal semen, +human blood, acetate of morphine and aspic oil.</p> + +<p>"Latterly, and according to Gévingey this abomination is more perilous +yet, he stuffs fishes with communion bread and with toxins skilfully +graduated. These toxins are chosen from those which produce madness or +lockjaw when absorbed through the pores. Then, when these fishes are +thoroughly permeated with the substances sealed by sacrilege, Docre +takes them out of the water, lets them rot, distills them, and expresses +from them an essential oil one drop of which will produce madness. This +drop, it appears, is applied externally, by touching the hair, as in +Balzac's <i>Thirteen</i>."</p> + +<p>"Hmmm," said Durtal, "I am afraid that a drop of this oil long ago fell +on the scalp of poor old Gévingey."</p> + +<p>"What is interesting about this story is not the outlandishness of these +diabolical pharmacopoeia so much as the <!-- Page 188 -->psychology of the persons who +invent and manipulate them. Think. This is happening at the present day, +and it is the priests who have invented philtres unknown to the +sorcerers of the Middle Ages."</p> + +<p>"The priests, no! A priest. And what a priest!" remarked Carhaix.</p> + +<p>"Gévingey is very precise. He affirms that others use them. Bewitchment +by veniniferous blood of mice took place in 1879 at Châlons-sur-Marne in +a demoniac circle—to which the canon belonged, it is true. In 1883, in +Savoy, the oil of which I have spoken was prepared in a group of +defrocked abbés. As you see, Docre is not the only one who practises +this abominable science. It is known in the convents; some laymen, even, +have an inkling of it."</p> + +<p>"But now, admitting that these preparations are real and that they are +active, you have not explained how one can poison a man with them either +from a distance or near at hand."</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's another matter. One has a choice of two methods to reach +the enemy one is aiming at. The first and least used is this: the +magician employs a voyant, a woman who is known in that world as 'a +flying spirit'; she is a somnambulist, who, put into a hypnotic state, +can betake herself, in spirit, wherever one wishes her to go. It is then +possible to have her transmit the magic poisons to a person whom one +designates, hundreds of leagues away. Those who are stricken in this +manner have seen no one, and they go mad or die without suspecting the +venefice. But these voyants are not only rare, they are also unreliable, +because other persons can likewise fix them in a cataleptic state and +extract confessions from them. So you see why persons like Docre have +recourse to the second method, which is surer. It consists in evoking, +just as in Spiritism, the soul of a dead person and sending it to strike +the victim with the prepared spell. The result is the same but the +vehicle is different. There," concluded Des Hermies, "reported with +<!-- Page 189 -->painstaking exactness, are the confidences which our friend Gévingey +made me this morning."</p> + +<p>"And Dr. Johannès cures people poisoned in this manner?" asked Carhaix.</p> + +<p>"Yes, Dr. Johannès—to my knowledge—has made inexplicable cures."</p> + +<p>"But with what?"</p> + +<p>"Gévingey tells me, in this connection, that the doctor celebrates a +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek. I haven't the faintest idea what +this sacrifice is, but Gévingey will perhaps enlighten us if he returns +cured."</p> + +<p>"In spite of all, I should not be displeased, once in my life to get a +good look at Canon Docre," said Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Not I! He is the incarnation of the Accursed on earth!" cried Carhaix, +assisting his friends to put on their overcoats.</p> + +<p>He lighted his lantern, and while they were descending the stair, as +Durtal complained of the cold, Des Hermies burst into a laugh.</p> + +<p>"If your family had known the magical secrets of the plants, you would +not shiver this way," he said. "It was learned in the sixteenth century +that a child might be immune to heat or cold all his life if his hands +were rubbed with juice of absinth before the twelfth month of his life +had passed. That, you see, is a tempting prescription, less dangerous +than those which Canon Docre abuses."</p> + +<p>Once below, after Carhaix had closed the door of his tower, they +hastened their steps, for the north wind swept the square.</p> + +<p>"After all," said Des Hermies, "Satanism aside—and yet Satanism also is +a phase of religion—admit that, for two miscreants of our sort, we hold +singularly pious conversations. I hope they will be counted in our +favour up above."</p> + +<p>"No merit on our part," replied Durtal, "for what else is there to talk +about? Conversations which do not treat of religion or art are so base +and vain."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XV"><!-- Page 190 -->CHAPTER XV</a></h2> + + +<p>The memory of these frightful magisteria kept racing through his head +next day, and, while smoking cigarettes beside the fire, Durtal thought +of Docre and Johannès fighting across Gévingey's back, smiting and +parrying with incantations and exorcisms.</p> + +<p>"In the Christian symbolism," he said to himself, "the fish is one of +the representations of Christ. Doubtless the Canon thinks to aggravate +his sacrileges by feeding fishes on genuine hosts. His is the reverse of +the system of the mediæval witches who chose a vile beast dedicated to +the Devil to submit the body of the Saviour to the processes of +digestion. How real is the pretended power which the deicide chemists +are alleged to wield? What faith can we put in the tales of evoked larvæ +killing a designated person to order with corrosive oil and blood virus? +None, unless one is extremely credulous, and even a bit mad.</p> + +<p>"And yet, come to think of it, we find today, unexplained and surviving +under other names, the mysteries which were so long reckoned the product +of mediæval imagination and superstition. At the charity hospital Dr. +Louis transfers maladies from one hypnotized person to another. Wherein +is that less miraculous than evocation of demons, than spells cast by +magicians or pastors? A larva, a flying spirit, is not, indeed, more +extraordinary than a microbe coming from afar and poisoning one without +one's knowledge, and the atmosphere can certainly convey spirits as well +as bacilli. Certainly the ether carries, untransformed, emanations, +effluences, electricity, for instance, or the fluids of a magnet which +sends to a distant subject an order to traverse all<!-- Page 191 --> Paris to rejoin it. +Science has no call to contest these phenomena. On the other hand, Dr. +Brown-Sequard rejuvenates infirm old men and revitalizes the impotent +with distillations from the parts of rabbits and cavies. Were not the +elixirs of life and the love philtres which the witches sold to the +senile and impotent composed of similar or analogous substances? Human +semen entered almost always, in the Middle Ages, into the compounding of +these mixtures. Now, hasn't Dr. Brown-Sequard, after repeated +experiments, recently demonstrated the virtues of semen taken from one +man and instilled into another?</p> + +<p>"Finally, the apparitions, doppelgänger, bilocations—to speak thus of +the spirits—that terrified antiquity, have not ceased to manifest +themselves. It would be difficult to prove that the experiments carried +on for three years by Dr. Crookes in the presence of witnesses were +cheats. If he has been able to photograph visible and tangible spectres, +we must recognize the veracity of the mediæval thaumaturges. Incredible, +of course—and wasn't hypnotism, possession of one soul by another which +could dedicate it to crime—incredible only ten years ago?</p> + +<p>"We are groping in shadow, that is sure. But Des Hermies hit the +bull's-eye when he remarked, 'It is less important to know whether the +modern pharmaceutic sacrileges are potent, than to study the motives of +the Satanists and fallen priests who prepare them.'</p> + +<p>"Ah, if there were some way of getting acquainted with Canon Docre, of +insinuating oneself into his confidence, perhaps one would attain clear +insight into these questions. I learned long ago that there are no +people interesting to know except saints, scoundrels, and cranks. They +are the only persons whose conversation amounts to anything. Persons of +good sense are necessarily dull, because they revolve over and over +again the tedious topics of everyday life. They are the crowd, more or +less intelligent, but they are the crowd, and they give me a pain. Yes, +but who will put me in touch with this monstrous priest?" and, as he +poked the fire,<!-- Page 192 --> Durtal said to himself, "Chantelouve, if he would, but +he won't. There remains his wife, who used to be well acquainted with +Docre. I must interrogate her and find out whether she still corresponds +with him and sees him."</p> + +<p>The entrance of Mme. Chantelouve into his reflections saddened him. He +took out his watch and murmured, "What a bore. She will come again, and +again I shall have to—if only there were any possibility of convincing +her of the futility of the carnal somersaults! In any case, she can't be +very well pleased, because, to her frantic letter soliciting a meeting, +I responded three days later by a brief, dry note, inviting her to come +here this evening. It certainly was lacking in lyricism, too much so, +perhaps."</p> + +<p>He rose and went into his bedroom to make sure that the fire was burning +brightly, then he returned and sat down, without even arranging his room +as he had the other times. Now that he no longer cared for this woman, +gallantry and self-consciousness had fled. He awaited her without +impatience, his slippers on his feet.</p> + +<p>"To tell the truth, I have had nothing pleasant from Hyacinthe except +that kiss we exchanged when her husband was only a few feet away. I +certainly shall not again find her lips a-flame and fragrant. Here her +kiss is insipid."</p> + +<p>Mme. Chantelouve rang earlier than usual.</p> + +<p>"Well," she said, sitting down. "You wrote me a nice letter."</p> + +<p>"How's that?"</p> + +<p>"Confess frankly that you are through with me."</p> + +<p>He denied this, but she shook her head.</p> + +<p>"Well," he said, "what have you to reproach me with? Having written you +only a short note? But there was someone here, I was busy and I didn't +have time to assemble pretty speeches. Not having set a date sooner? I +told you our relation necessitates precautions, and we can't see each +other very often. I think I gave you clearly to understand my +motives—"<!-- Page 193 --></p> + +<p>"I am so stupid that I probably did not understand them. You spoke to me +of 'family reasons,' I believe."</p> + +<p>"Yes."</p> + +<p>"Rather vague."</p> + +<p>"Well, I couldn't go into detail and tell you that—"</p> + +<p>He stopped, asking himself whether the time had come to break decisively +with her, but he remembered that he wanted her aid in getting +information about Docre.</p> + +<p>"That what? Tell me."</p> + +<p>He shook his head, hesitating, not to tell her a lie, but to insult and +humiliate her.</p> + +<p>"Well," he went on, "since you force me to do it, I will confess, at +whatever cost, that I have had a mistress for several years—I add that +our relations are now purely amical—"</p> + +<p>"Very well," she interrupted, "your family reasons are sufficient."</p> + +<p>"And then," he pursued, in a lower tone, "if you wish to know all, +well—I have a child by her."</p> + +<p>"A child! Oh, you poor dear." She rose. "Then there is nothing for me to +do but withdraw."</p> + +<p>But he seized her hands, and, at the same time satisfied with the +success of his deception and ashamed of his brutality, he begged her to +stay awhile. She refused. Then he drew her to him, kissed her hair, and +cajoled her. Her troubled eyes looked deep into his.</p> + +<p>"Ah, then!" she said. "No, let me undress."</p> + +<p>"Not for the world!"</p> + +<p>"Yes!"</p> + +<p>"Oh, the scene of the other night beginning all over again," he +murmured, sinking, overwhelmed, into a chair. He felt borne down, +burdened by an unspeakable weariness.</p> + +<p>He undressed beside the fire and warmed himself while waiting for her to +get to bed. When they were in bed she enveloped him with her supple, +cold limbs.</p> + +<p>"Now is it true that I am to come here no more?"</p> + +<p>He did not answer, but understood that she had no inten<!-- Page 194 -->tion of going +away and that he had to do with a person of the staying kind.</p> + +<p>"Tell me."</p> + +<p>He buried his head in her breast to keep from having to answer.</p> + +<p>"Tell me in my lips."</p> + +<p>He beset her furiously, to make her keep silent, then he lay disabused, +weary, happy that it was over. When they lay down again she put her arm +about his neck and ran her tongue around in his mouth like an auger, but +he paid little heed to caresses and remained feeble and pathetic. Then +she bent over, reached him, and he groaned.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" she exclaimed suddenly, rising, "at last I have heard you cry!"</p> + +<p>He lay, broken in body and spirit, incapable of thinking two thoughts in +sequence. His brain seemed to whir, undone, in his skull.</p> + +<p>He collected himself, however, rose and went into the other room to +dress and let her do the same.</p> + +<p>Through the drawn portière separating the two rooms he saw a little +pinhole of light which came from the wax candle placed on the mantel +opposite the curtain. Hyacinthe, going back and forth, would momentarily +intercept this light, then it would flash out again.</p> + +<p>"Ah," she said, "my poor darling, you have a child."</p> + +<p>"The shot struck home," said he to himself, and aloud, "Yes, a little +girl."</p> + +<p>"How old?"</p> + +<p>"She will soon be six," and he described her as flaxen-haired, lively, +but in very frail health, requiring multiple precautions and constant +care.</p> + +<p>"You must have very sad evenings," said Mme. Chantelouve, in a voice of +emotion, from behind the curtain.</p> + +<p>"Oh yes! If I were to die tomorrow, what would become of those two +unfortunates?"</p> + +<p>His imagination took wing. He began himself to believe <!-- Page 195 -->the mother and +her. His voice trembled. Tears very nearly came to his eyes.</p> + +<p>"He is unhappy, my darling is," she said, raising the curtain and +returning, clothed, into the room. "And that is why he looks so sad, +even when he smiles!"</p> + +<p>He looked at her. Surely at that moment her affection was not feigned. +She really clung to him. Why, oh, why, had she had to have those rages +of lust? If it had not been for those they could probably have been good +comrades, sin moderately together, and love each other better than if +they wallowed in the sty of the senses. But no, such a relation was +impossible with her, he concluded, seeing those sulphurous eyes, that +ravenous, despoiling mouth.</p> + +<p>She had sat down in front of his writing table and was playing with a +penholder. "Were you working when I came in? Where are you in your +history of Gilles de Rais?"</p> + +<p>"I am getting along, but I am hampered. To make a good study of the +Satanism of the Middle Ages one ought to get really into the +environment, or at least fabricate a similar environment, by becoming +acquainted with the practitioners of Satanism all about us—for the +psychology is the same, though the operations differ." And looking her +straight in the eye, thinking the story of the child had softened her, +he hazarded all on a cast, "Ah! if your husband would give me the +information he has about Canon Docre!"</p> + +<p>She stood motionless, but her eyes clouded over. She did not answer.</p> + +<p>"True," he said, "Chantelouve, suspecting our liaison—"</p> + +<p>She interrupted him. "My husband has no concern with the relations which +may exist between you and me. He evidently suffers when I go out, as +tonight, for he knows where I am going; but I admit no right of control +either on his part or mine. He is free, and I am free, to go wherever we +please. I must keep house for him, watch out for his interests, take +care of him, love him like a devoted companion, and that I do, with all +my heart. As to being responsible <!-- Page 196 -->for my acts, they're none of his +business, no more his than anybody else's."</p> + +<p>She spoke in a crisp, incisive tone.</p> + +<p>"The devil;" said Durtal. "You certainly reduce the importance of the +rôle of husband."</p> + +<p>"I know that my ideas are not the ideas of the world I live in, and they +appear not to be yours. In my first marriage they were a source of +trouble and disaster—but I have an iron will and I bend the people who +love me. In addition, I despise deceit, so when a few years after +marriage I became smitten on a man I quite frankly told my husband and +confessed my fault."</p> + +<p>"Dare I ask you in what spirit he received this confidence?"</p> + +<p>"He was so grieved that in one night his hair turned white. He could not +bear what he called—wrongly, I think—my treason, and he killed +himself."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" said Durtal, dumbfounded by the placid and resolute air of this +woman, "but suppose he had strangled you first?"</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders and picked a cat hair off her skirt.</p> + +<p>"The result," he resumed after a silence, "being that you are now almost +free, that your second husband tolerates—"</p> + +<p>"Let us not discuss my second husband. He is an excellent man who +deserves a better wife. I have absolutely no reason to speak of +Chantelouve otherwise than with praise, and then—oh, let's talk of +something else, for I have had sufficient botheration on this subject +from my confessor, who interdicts me from the Holy Table."</p> + +<p>He contemplated her, and saw yet another Hyacinthe, a hard, pertinacious +woman whom he had not known. Not a sign nor an accent of emotion, +nothing, while she was describing the suicide of her first husband—she +did not even seem to imagine that she had a crime on her conscience. She +remained pitiless, and yet, a moment ago, when she was commiserating him +because of his fictitious parenthood, he had <!-- Page 197 -->thought she was trembling. +"After all, perhaps she is acting a part—like myself."</p> + +<p>He remained awed by the turn the conversation had taken. He sought, +mentally, a way of getting back to the subject from which Hyacinthe had +diverted him, of the Satanism of Canon Docre.</p> + +<p>"Well, let us think of that no more," she said, coming very near. She +smiled, and was once more the Hyacinthe he knew.</p> + +<p>"But if on my account you can no longer take communion—"</p> + +<p>She interrupted him. "Would you be sorry if I did not love you?" and she +kissed his eyes. He squeezed her politely in his arms, but he felt her +trembling, and from motives of prudence he got away.</p> + +<p>"Is he so inexorable, your confessor?"</p> + +<p>"He is an incorruptible man, of the old school. I chose him expressly."</p> + +<p>"If I were a woman it seems to me I should take, on the contrary, a +confessor who was pliable and caressible and who would not violently +pillory my dainty little sins. I would have him indulgent, oiling the +hinges of confession, enticing forth with beguiling gestures the +misdeeds that hung back. It is true there would be risk of seducing a +confessor who perhaps would be defenceless—"</p> + +<p>"And that would be incest, because the priest is a spiritual father, and +it would also be sacrilege, because the priest is consecrated.—Oh," +speaking to herself, "I was mad, mad—" suddenly carried away.</p> + +<p>He observed her; sparks glinted in the myopic eyes of this extraordinary +woman. Evidently he had just stumbled, unwittingly, onto a guilty secret +of hers.</p> + +<p>"Well," and he smiled, "do you still commit infidelities to me with a +false me?"</p> + +<p>"I do not understand."</p> + +<p>"Do you receive, at night, the visit of the incubus which resembles +me?"<!-- Page 198 --></p> + +<p>"No. Since I have been able to possess you in the flesh I have no need +to evoke your image."</p> + +<p>"What a downright Satanist you are!"</p> + +<p>"Maybe. I have been so constantly associated with priests."</p> + +<p>"You're a great one," he said, bowing. "Now listen to me, and do me a +great favour. You know Canon Docre?"</p> + +<p>"I should say!"</p> + +<p>"Well, what in the world is this man, about whom I hear so much?"</p> + +<p>"From whom?"</p> + +<p>"Gévingey and Des Hermies."</p> + +<p>"Ah, you consult the astrologer! Yes, he met the Canon in my own house, +but I didn't know that Docre was acquainted with Des Hermies, who didn't +attend our receptions in those days."</p> + +<p>"Des Hermies has never seen Docre. He knows him, as I do, only by +hearsay, from Gévingey. Now, briefly, how much truth is there in the +stories of the sacrileges of which this priest is accused?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know. Docre is a gentleman, learned and well bred. He was even +the confessor of royalty, and he would certainly have become a bishop if +he had not quitted the priesthood. I have heard a great deal of evil +spoken about him, but, especially in the clerical world, people are so +fond of saying all sorts of things."</p> + +<p>"But you knew him personally."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I even had him for a confessor."</p> + +<p>"Then it isn't possible that you don't know what to make of him?"</p> + +<p>"Very possible, indeed presumable. Look here, you have been beating +around the bush a long time. Exactly what do you want to know?"</p> + +<p>"Everything you care to tell me. Is he young or old, handsome or ugly, +rich or poor?"</p> + +<p>"He is forty years old, very fastidious of his person, and he spends a +lot of money."</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 199 -->Do you believe that he indulges in sorcery, that he celebrates the +black mass?"</p> + +<p>"It is quite possible."</p> + +<p>"Pardon me for dunning you, for extorting information from you as if +with forceps—suppose I were to ask you a really personal question—this +faculty of incubacy ...?"</p> + +<p>"Why, certainly I got it from him. I hope you are satisfied."</p> + +<p>"Yes and no. Thanks for your kindness in telling me—I know I am abusing +your good nature—but one more question. Do you know of any way whereby +I may see Canon Docre in person?"</p> + +<p>"He is at Nîmes."</p> + +<p>"Pardon me. For the moment, he is in Paris."</p> + +<p>"Ah, you know that! Well, if I knew of a way, I would not tell you, be +sure. It would not be good for you to get to seeing too much of this +priest."</p> + +<p>"You admit, then, that he is dangerous?"</p> + +<p>"I do not admit nor deny. I tell you simply that you have nothing to do +with him."</p> + +<p>"Yes I have. I want to get material for my book from him."</p> + +<p>"Get it from somebody else. Besides," she said, putting on her hat in +front of the glass, "my husband got a bad scare and broke with that man +and refuses to receive him."</p> + +<p>"That is no reason why—"</p> + +<p>"What do you mean?"</p> + +<p>"Oh, nothing." He repressed the remark: "Why you should not see him."</p> + +<p>She did not insist. She was poking her hair under her veil. "Heavens! +what a fright I look!"</p> + +<p>He took her hands and kissed them. "When shall I see you again?"</p> + +<p>"I thought I wasn't to come here any more."</p> + +<p>"Oh, now, you know I love you as a good friend. Tell me, when will you +come again?"<!-- Page 200 --></p> + +<p>"Tomorrow night, unless it is inconvenient for you."</p> + +<p>"Not at all."</p> + +<p>"Then, <i>au revoir</i>."</p> + +<p>Their lips met.</p> + +<p>"And above all, don't think about Canon Docre," she said, turning and +shaking her finger at him threateningly as she went out.</p> + +<p>"Devil take you and your reticence," he said to himself, closing the +door after her.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XVI"><!-- Page 201 -->CHAPTER XVI</a></h2> + + +<p>"When I think," said Durtal to himself the next morning, "that in bed, +at the moment when the most pertinacious will succumbs, I held firm and +refused to yield to the instances of Hyacinthe wishing to establish a +footing here, and that after the carnal decline, at that instant when +annihilated man recovers—alas!—his reason, I supplicated her, myself, +to continue her visits, why, I simply cannot understand myself. Deep +down, I have not got over my firm resolution of breaking with her, but I +could not dismiss her like a cocotte. And," to justify his +inconsistency, "I hoped to get some information about the canon. Oh, on +that subject I am not through with her. She's got to make up her mind to +speak out and quit answering me by monosyllables and guarded phrases as +she did yesterday.</p> + +<p>"Indeed, what can she have been up to with that abbé who was her +confessor and who, by her own admission, launched her into incubacy? She +has been his mistress, that is certain. And how many other of these +priests she has gone around with have been her lovers also? For she +confessed, in a cry, that those are the men she loves. Ah, if one went +about much in the clerical world one would doubtless learn remarkable +things concerning her and her husband. It is strange, all the same that +Chantelouve, who plays a singular rôle in that household, has acquired a +deplorable reputation, and she hasn't. Never have I heard anybody speak +of her dodges—but, oh, what a fool I am! It isn't strange. Her husband +doesn't confine himself to religious and polite circles. He hobnobs with +men of letters, and in consequence exposes himself to every sort of +slander, while <!-- Page 202 -->she, if she takes a lover, chooses him out of a pious +society in which not one of us would ever be received. And then, abbés +are discreet. But how explain her infatuation with me? By the simple +fact that she is surfeited of priests and a layman serves as a change of +diet.</p> + +<p>"Just the same, she is quite singular, and the more I see her the less I +understand her. There are in her three distinct beings.</p> + +<p>"First the woman seated or standing up, whom I knew in her drawing-room, +reserved, almost haughty, who becomes a good companion in private, +affectionate and even tender.</p> + +<p>"Then the woman in bed, completely changed in voice and bearing, a +harlot spitting mud, losing all shame.</p> + +<p>"Third and last, the pitiless vixen, the thorough Satanist, whom I +perceived yesterday.</p> + +<p>"What is the binding-alloy that amalgamates all these beings of hers? I +can't say. Hypocrisy, no doubt. No. I don't think so, for she is often +of a disconcerting frankness—in moments, it is true, of forgetfulness +and unguardedness. Seriously, what is the use of trying to understand +the character of this pious harlot? And to be candid with myself, what I +wish ideally will never be realized; she does not ask me to take her to +swell places, does not force me to dine with her, exacts no revenue: she +isn't trying to compromise and blackmail me. I shan't find a +better—but, oh, Lord! I now prefer to find no one at all. It suits me +perfectly to entrust my carnal business to mercenary agents. For my +twenty francs I shall receive more considerate treatment. There is no +getting around it, only professionals know how to cook up a delicious +sensual dish.</p> + +<p>"Odd," he said to himself after a reflective silence, "but, all +proportions duly observed, Gilles de Rais divides himself like her, into +three different persons.</p> + +<p>"First, the brave and honest fighting man.</p> + +<p>"Then the refined and artistic criminal.</p> + +<p>"Finally the repentant sinner, the mystic.<!-- Page 203 --></p> + +<p>"He is a mass of contradictions and excesses. Viewing his life as a +whole one finds each of his vices compensated by a contradictory virtue, +but there is no key characteristic which reconciles them.</p> + +<p>"He is of an overweening arrogance, but when contrition takes possession +of him, he falls on his knees in front of the people of low estate, and +has the tears, the humility of a saint.</p> + +<p>"His ferocity passes the limits of the human scale, and yet he is +generous and sincerely devoted to his friends, whom he cares for like a +brother when the Demon has mauled them.</p> + +<p>"Impetuous in his desires, and nevertheless patient; brave in battle, a +coward confronting eternity; he is despotic and violent, yet he is putty +in the hands of his flatterers. He is now in the clouds, now in the +abyss, never on the trodden plain, the lowlands of the soul. His +confessions do not throw any light on his invariable tendency to +extremes. When asked who suggested to him the idea of such crimes, he +answers, 'No one. The thought came to me only from myself, from my +reveries, my daily pleasures, my taste for debauchery.' And he arraigns +his indolence and constantly asserts that delicate repasts and strong +drink have helped uncage the wild animal in him.</p> + +<p>"Unresponsive to mediocre passions, he is carried away alternately by +good as well as evil, and he bounds from spiritual pole to spiritual +pole. He dies at the age of thirty-six, but he has completely exhausted +the possibilities of joy and grief. He has adored death, loved as a +vampire, kissed inimitable expressions of suffering and terror, and has, +himself, been racked by implacable remorse, insatiable fear. He has +nothing more to try, nothing more to learn, here below.</p> + +<p>"Let's see," said Durtal, running over his notes. "I left him at the +moment when the expiation begins. As I had written in one of my +preceding chapters, the inhabitants of the region dominated by the +châteaux of the Marshal know now who the inconceivable monster is who +carries children <!-- Page 204 -->off and cuts their throats. But no one dare speak. +When, at a turn in the road, the tall figure of the butcher is seen +approaching, all flee, huddle behind the hedges, or shut themselves up +in the cottages.</p> + +<p>"And Gilles passes, haughty and sombre, in the solitude of villages +where no one dares venture abroad. Impunity seems assured him, for what +peasant would be mad enough to attack a master who could have him +gibbeted at a word?</p> + +<p>"Again, if the humble give up the idea of bringing Gilles de Rais to +justice, his peers have no intention of combating him for the benefit of +peasants whom they disdain, and his liege, the duke of Brittany, Jean V, +burdens him with favours and blandishments in order to extort his lands +from him at a low price.</p> + +<p>"A single power can rise and, above feudal complicities, above earthly +interest, avenge the oppressed and the weak. The Church. And it is the +Church in fact, in the person of Jean de Malestroit, which rises up +before the monster and fells him.</p> + +<p>"Jean de Malestroit, Bishop of Nantes, belongs to an illustrious line. +He is a near kinsman of Jean V, and his incomparable piety, his +infallible Christian wisdom, and his enthusiastic charity, make him +venerated, even by the duke.</p> + +<p>"The wailing of Gilles's decimated flock reaches his ears. In silence he +begins an investigation and, setting spies upon the Marshal, waits only +for an opportune moment to begin the combat. And Gilles suddenly commits +an inexplicable crime which permits the Bishop to march forthwith upon +him and smite him.</p> + +<p>"To recuperate his shattered fortune, Gilles has sold his signorie of +Saint Etienne de Mer Morte to a subject of Jean V, Guillaume le Ferron, +who delegates his brother, Jean le Ferron, to take possession of the +domain.</p> + +<p>"Some days later the Marshal gathers the two hundred men of his military +household and at their head marches on Saint Etienne. There, the day of +Pentecost, when the as<!-- Page 205 -->sembled people are hearing mass, he precipitates +himself, sword in hand, into the church, sweeps aside the faithful, +throwing them into tumult, and, before the dumbfounded priest, threatens +to cleave Jean le Ferron, who is praying. The ceremony is broken off, +the congregation take flight. Gilles drags le Ferron, pleading for +mercy, to the château, orders that the drawbridge be let down, and by +force occupies the place, while his prisoner is carried away to +Tiffauges and thrown into an underground dungeon.</p> + +<p>"Gilles has, at one and the same time, violated the unwritten law of +Brittany forbidding any baron to raise troops without the consent of the +duke, and committed double sacrilege in profaning a chapel and seizing +Jean le Ferron, who is a tonsured clerk of the Church.</p> + +<p>"The Bishop learns of this outrage and prevails upon the reluctant Jean +V to march against the rebel. Then, while one army advances on Saint +Etienne, which Gilles abandons to take refuge with his little band in +the fortified manor of Mâchecoul, another army lays siege to Tiffauges.</p> + +<p>"During this time the priest hastens his redoubled investigations. He +delegates commissioners and procurators in all the villages where +children have disappeared. He himself quits his palace at Nantes, +travels about the countryside, and takes the depositions of the bereft. +The people at last speak, and on their knees beseech the Bishop to +protect them. Enraged by the atrocities which they reveal, he swears +that justice shall be done.</p> + +<p>"It takes a month to hear all the reports. By letters-patent Jean de +Malestroit establishes publicly the '<i>infamatio</i>' of Gilles, then, when +all the forms of canonic procedure have been gone through with, he +launches the mandate of arrest.</p> + +<p>"In this writ of warrant, given at Nantes the 13th day of September in +the year of Our Lord 1440, the Bishop notes all the crimes imputed to +the Marshal, then, in an energetic style, he commands his diocese to +march against <!-- Page 206 -->the assassin and dislodge him. 'Thus we do enjoin you, +each and all, individually, by these presents, that ye cite immediately +and peremptorily, without counting any man upon his neighbor, without +discharging the burden any man upon his neighbour, that ye cite before +us or before the Official of our cathedral church, for Monday of the +feast of Exaltation of the Holy Cross, the 19th of September, Gilles, +noble baron de Rais, subject to our puissance and to our jurisdiction; +and we do ourselves cite him by these presents to appear before our bar +to answer for the crimes which weigh upon him. Execute these orders, and +do each of you cause them to be executed.'</p> + +<p>"And the next day the captain-at-arms, Jean Labbé, acting in the name of +the duke, and Robin Guillaumet, notary, acting in the name of the +Bishop, present themselves, escorted by a small troop, before the +château of Mâchecoul.</p> + +<p>"What sudden change of heart does the Marshal now experience? Too feeble +to hold his own in the open field, he can nevertheless defend himself +behind the sheltering ramparts—yet he surrenders.</p> + +<p>"Roger de Bricqueville and Gilles de Sillé, his trusted councillors, +have taken flight. He remains alone with Prelati, who also attempts, in +vain, to escape. He, like Gilles, is loaded with chains. Robin +Guillaumet searches the fortress from top to bottom. He discovers bloody +clothes, imperfectly calcinated ashes which Prelati has not had time to +throw into the latrines. Amid universal maledictions and cries of horror +Gilles and his servitors are conducted to Nîmes and incarcerated in the +château de la Tour Neuve.</p> + +<p>"Now this part is not very clear," said Durtal to himself. "Remembering +what a daredevil the Marshal had been, how can we reconcile ourselves to +the idea that he could give himself up to certain death and torture +without striking a blow?</p> + +<p>"'Was he softened, weakened by his nights of debauchery, terrified by +the audacity of his own sacrileges, ravaged and <!-- Page 207 -->torn by remorse? Was he +tired of living as he did, and did he give himself up, as so many +murderers do, because he was irresistibly attracted to punishment? +Nobody knows. Did he think himself above the law because of his lofty +rank? Or did he hope to disarm the duke by playing upon his venality, +offering him a ransom of manors and farm land?</p> + +<p>"One answer is as plausible as another. He may also have known how +hesitant Jean V had been, for fear of rousing the wrath of the nobility +of his duchy, about yielding to the objurgations of the Bishop and +raising troops for the pursuit and arrest.</p> + +<p>"Well, there is no document which answers these questions. An author can +take some liberties here and set down his own conjectures. But that +curious trial is going to give me some trouble.</p> + +<p>"As soon as Gilles and his accomplices are incarcerated, two tribunals +are organized, one ecclesiastical to judge the crimes coming under the +jurisdiction of the Church, the other civil to judge those on which the +state must pass.</p> + +<p>"To tell the truth, the civil tribunal, which is present at the +ecclesiastical hearings, effaces itself completely. As a matter of form +it makes a brief cross-examination—but it pronounces the sentence of +death, which the Church cannot permit itself to utter, according to the +old adage, '<i>Ecclesia abhorret a sanguine</i>.'</p> + +<p>"The ecclesiastical trial lasts five weeks, the civil, forty-eight +hours. It seems that, to hide behind the robes of the Bishop, the duke +of Brittany has voluntarily subordinated the rôle of civil justice, +which ordinarily stands up for its rights against the encroachments of +the ecclesiastical court.</p> + +<p>"Jean de Malestroit presides over the hearings. He chooses for +assistants the Bishops of Mans, of Saint Brieuc, and of Saint Lô, then +in addition he surrounds himself with a troop of jurists who work in +relays in the interminable sessions of the trial. Some of the more +important are Guillaume de Montigné, advocate of the secular court; +Jean<!-- Page 208 --> Blanchet, bachelor of laws; Guillaume Groyguet and Robert de la +Rivière, licentiates <i>in utroque jure</i>, and Hervé Lévi, senescal of +Quimper. Pierre de l'Hospital, chancellor of Brittany, who is to preside +over the civil hearings after the canonic judgment, assists Jean de +Malestroit.</p> + +<p>"The public prosecutor is Guillaume Chapeiron, curate of Saint Nicolas, +an eloquent and subtile man. Adjunct to him, to relieve him of the +fatigue of the readings, are Geoffroy Pipraire, dean of Sainte Marie, +and Jacques de Pentcoetdic, Official of the Church of Nantes.</p> + +<p>"In connection with the episcopal jurisdiction, the Church has called in +the assistance of the extraordinary tribunal of the Inquisition, for the +repression of the crime of heresy, then comprehending perjury, +blasphemy, sacrilege, all the crimes of magic.</p> + +<p>"It sits at the side of Jean de Malestroit in the redoubtable and +learned person of Jean Blouyn of the order of Saint Dominic, delegated +by the Grand Inquisitor of France, Guillaume Merici, to the functions of +Vice Inquisitor of the city and diocese of Nantes.</p> + +<p>"The tribunal constituted, the trial opens the first thing in the +morning, because judges and witnesses, in accordance with the custom of +the times, must proceed fasting to the giving and hearing of evidence. +The testimony of the parents of the victims is heard, and Robin +Guillaumet, acting sergeant-at-arms, the man who arrested the Marshal at +Mâchecoul, reads the citation bidding Gilles de Rais appear. He is +brought in and declares disdainfully that he does not recognize the +competence of the Tribunal, but, as canonic procedure demands, the +Prosecutor at once 'in order that by this means the correction of +sorcery be not prevented,' petitions for and obtains from the tribunal a +ruling that this objection be quashed as being null in law and +'frivolous.' He begins to read to the accused the counts on which he is +to be tried. Gilles cries out that the Prosecutor is a liar <!-- Page 209 -->and a +traitor. Then Guillaume Chapeiron extends his hand toward the crucifix, +swears that he is telling the truth, and challenges the Marshal to take +the same oath. But this man, who has recoiled from no sacrilege, is +troubled. He refuses to perjure himself before God, and the session ends +with Gilles still vociferating outrageous denunciations of the +Prosecutor.</p> + +<p>"The preliminaries completed, a few days later, the public hearings +begin. The act of indictment is read aloud to the accused, in front of +an audience who shudder when Chapeiron indefatigably enumerates the +crimes one by one, and formally accuses the Marshal of having practised +sorcery and magic, of having polluted and slain little children, of +having violated the immunities of Holy Church at Saint Etienne de Mer +Morte.</p> + +<p>"Then after a silence he resumes his discourse, and making no account of +the murders, but dwelling only on the crimes of which the punishment, +foreseen by canonic law, can be fixed by the Church, he demands that +Gilles be smitten with double excommunication, first as an evoker of +demons, a heretic, apostate and renegade, second as a sodomist and +perpetrator of sacrilege.</p> + +<p>"Gilles, who has listened to this incisive and scathing indictment, +completely loses control of himself. He insults the judges, calls them +simonists and ribalds, and refuses to answer the questions put to him. +The Prosecutor and advocates are unmoved; they invite him to present his +defence.</p> + +<p>"Again he denounces them, insults them, but when called upon to refute +them he remains silent.</p> + +<p>"The Bishop and Vice Inquisitor declare him in contempt and pronounce +against him the sentence of excommunication, which is soon made public. +They decide in addition that the hearing shall be continued next day—"</p> + +<p>A ring of the doorbell interrupted Durtal's perusal of his notes. Des +Hermies entered.<!-- Page 210 --></p> + +<p>"I have just seen Carhaix. He is ill," he said.</p> + +<p>"That so? What seems to be the matter?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing very serious. A slight attack of bronchitis. He'll be up in a +few days if he will consent to keep quiet."</p> + +<p>"I must go see him tomorrow," said Durtal.</p> + +<p>"And what are you doing?" enquired Des Hermies. "Working hard?"</p> + +<p>"Why, yes. I am digging into the trial of the noble baron de Rais. It +will be as tedious to read as to write!"</p> + +<p>"And you don't know yet when you will finish your volume?"</p> + +<p>"No," answered Durtal, stretching. "As a matter of fact I wish it might +never be finished. What will become of me when it is? I'll have to look +around for another subject, and, when I find one, do all the drudgery of +planning and then getting the introductory chapter written—the mean +part of any literary work is getting started. I shall pass mortal hours +doing nothing. Really, when I think it over, literature has only one +excuse for existing; it saves the person who makes it from the +disgustingness of life."</p> + +<p>"And, charitably, it lessens the distress of us few who still love art."</p> + +<p>"Few indeed!"</p> + +<p>"And the number keeps diminishing. The new generation no longer +interests itself in anything except gambling and jockeys."</p> + +<p>"Yes, you're quite right. The men can't spare from gambling the time to +read, so it is only the society women who buy books and pass judgment on +them. It is to The Lady, as Schopenhauer called her, to the little +goose, as I should characterize her, that we are indebted for these +shoals of lukewarm and mucilaginous novels which nowadays get puffed."</p> + +<p>"You think, then, that we are in for a pretty literature. Naturally you +can't please women by enunciating vigorous ideas in a crisp style."</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 211 -->But," Durtal went on, after a silence, "it is perhaps best that the +case should be as it is. The rare artists who remain have no business to +be thinking about the public. The artist lives and works far from the +drawing-room, far from the clamour of the little fellows who fix up the +custom-made literature. The only legitimate source of vexation to an +author is to see his work, when printed, exposed to the contaminating +curiosity of the crowd."</p> + +<p>"That is," said Des Hermies, "a veritable prostitution. To advertise a +thing for sale is to accept the degrading familiarities of the first +comer."</p> + +<p>"But our impenitent pride—and also our need of the miserable sous—make +it impossible for us to keep our manuscripts sheltered from the asses. +Art ought to be—like one's beloved—out of reach, out of the world. Art +and prayer are the only decent ejaculations of the soul. So when one of +my books appears, I let go of it with horror. I get as far as possible +from the environment in which it may be supposed to circulate. I care +very little about a book of mine until years afterward, when it has +disappeared from all the shop windows and is out of print. Briefly, I am +in no hurry to finish the history of Gilles de Rais, which, +unfortunately, is getting finished in spite of me. I don't give a damn +how it is received."</p> + +<p>"Are you doing anything this evening?"</p> + +<p>"No. Why?"</p> + +<p>"Shall we dine together?"</p> + +<p>"Certainly."</p> + +<p>And while Durtal was putting on his shoes, Des Hermies remarked, "To me +the striking thing about the so-called literary world of this epoch is +its cheap hypocrisy. What a lot of laziness, for instance, that word +dilettante has served to cover."</p> + +<p>"Yes, it's a great old alibi. But it is confounding to see that the +critic who today decrees himself the title of dilettante accepts it as a +term of praise and does not even suspect <!-- Page 212 -->that he is slapping himself. +The whole thing can be resolved into syllogism:</p> + +<p>"The dilettante has no personal temperament, since he objects to nothing +and likes everything.</p> + +<p>"Whoever has no personal temperament has no talent."</p> + +<p>"Then," rejoined Des Hermies, putting on his hat, "an author who boasts +of being a dilettante, confesses by that very thing that he is no +author?"</p> + +<p>"Exactly."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XVII"><!-- Page 213 -->CHAPTER XVII</a></h2> + + +<p>Toward the end of the afternoon Durtal quit work and went up to the +towers of Saint Sulpice.</p> + +<p>He found Carhaix in bed in a chamber connecting with the one in which +they were in the habit of dining. These rooms were very similar, with +their walls of unpapered stone, and with their vaulted ceilings, only, +the bedroom was darker. The window opened its half-wheel not on the +place Saint Sulpice but on the rear of the church, whose roof prevented +any light from getting in. This cell was furnished with an iron bed, +whose springs shrieked, with two cane chairs, and with a table that had +a shabby covering of green baize. On the bare wall was a crucifix of no +value, with a dry palm over it. That was all. Carhaix was sitting up in +bed reading, with books and papers piled all around him. His eyes were +more watery and his face paler than usual. His beard, which had not been +shaved for several days, grew in grey clumps on his hollow cheeks, but +his poor features were radiant with an affectionate, affable smile.</p> + +<p>To Durtal's questions he replied, "It is nothing. Des Hermies gives me +permission to get up tomorrow. But what a frightful medicine!" and he +showed Durtal a potion of which he had to take a teaspoonful every hour.</p> + +<p>"What is it he's making you take?"</p> + +<p>But the bell-ringer did not know. Doubtless to spare him the expense, +Des Hermies himself always brought the bottle.</p> + +<p>"Isn't it tiresome lying in bed?"</p> + +<p>"I should say! I am obliged to entrust my bells to an assistant who is +no good. Ah, if you heard him ring! It makes me shudder, it sets my +teeth on edge."<!-- Page 214 --></p> + +<p>"Now you mustn't work yourself up," said his wife. "In two days you will +be able to ring your bells yourself."</p> + +<p>But he went on complaining. "You two don't understand. My bells are used +to being well treated. They're like domestic animals, those instruments, +and they obey only their master. Now they won't harmonize, they jangle. +I can hardly recognize their voices."</p> + +<p>"What are you reading?" asked Durtal, wishing to change a subject which +he judged to be dangerous.</p> + +<p>"Books about bells! Ah, Monsieur Durtal, I have some inscriptions here +of truly rare beauty. Listen," and he opened a worm-bored book, "listen +to this motto printed in raised letters on the bronze robe of the great +bell of Schaffhausen, 'I call the living, I mourn the dead, I break the +thunder.' And this other which figured on an old bell in the belfry of +Ghent, 'My name is Roland. When I toll, there is a fire; when I peal, +there is a tempest in Flanders.'"</p> + +<p>"Yes," Durtal agreed, "there is a certain vigour about that one."</p> + +<p>"Ah," said Carhaix, seeming not to have heard the other's remark, "it's +ridiculous. Now the rich have their names and titles inscribed on the +bells which they give to the churches, but they have so many qualities +and titles that there is no room for a motto. Truly, humility is a +forgotten virtue in our day."</p> + +<p>"If that were the only forgotten virtue!" sighed Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Ah!" replied Carhaix, not to be turned from his favourite subject, "and +if this were the only abuse! But bells now rust from inactivity. The +metal is no longer hammer-hardened and is not vibrant. Formerly these +magnificent auxiliaries of the ritual sang without cease. The canonical +hours were sounded, Matins and Laudes before daybreak, Prime at dawn, +Tierce at nine o'clock, Sexte at noon, Nones at three, and then Vespers +and Compline. Now we announce the curate's mass, ring three angeluses, +morning, noon, and evening, occasionally a Salute, and on certain days +<!-- Page 215 -->launch a few peals for prescribed ceremonies. And that's all. It's only +in the convents where the bells do not sleep, for these, at least, the +night offices are kept up."</p> + +<p>"You mustn't talk about that," said his wife, straightening the pillows +at his back. "If you keep working yourself up, you will never get well."</p> + +<p>"Quite right," he said, resigned, "but what would you have? I shall +still be a man with a grievance, whom nothing can pacify," and he smiled +at his wife who was bringing him a spoonful of the potion to swallow.</p> + +<p>The doorbell rang. Mme. Carhaix went to answer it and a hilarious and +red-faced priest entered, crying in a great voice, "It's Jacob's ladder, +that stairway! I climbed and climbed and climbed, and I'm all out of +breath," and he sank, puffing, into an armchair.</p> + +<p>"Well, my friend," he said at last, coming into the bedroom, "I learned +from the beadle that you were ill, and I came to see how you were +getting on."</p> + +<p>Durtal examined him. An irrepressible gaiety exuded from this sanguine, +smooth-shaven face, blue from the razor. Carhaix introduced them. They +exchanged a look, of distrust on the priest's side, of coldness on +Durtal's.</p> + +<p>Durtal felt embarrassed and in the way, while the honest pair were +effusively and with excessive humility thanking the abbé for coming up +to see them. It was evident that for this pair, who were not ignorant of +the sacrileges and scandalous self-indulgences of the clergy, an +ecclesiastic was a man elect, a man so superior that as soon as he +arrived nobody else counted.</p> + +<p>Durtal took his leave, and as he went downstairs he thought, "That +jubilant priest sickens me. Indeed, a gay priest, physician, or man of +letters must have an infamous soul, because they are the ones who see +clearly into human misery and console it, or heal it, or depict it. If +after that they can act the clown—they are unspeakable! Though I'll +admit that thoughtless persons deplore the sadness of the <!-- Page 216 -->novel of +observation and its resemblance to the life it represents. These people +would have it jovial, smart, highly coloured, aiding them, in their base +selfishness, to forget the hag-ridden existences of their brothers.</p> + +<p>"Truly, Carhaix and his wife are peculiar. They bow under the paternal +despotism of the priests—and there are moments when that same despotism +must be no joke—and revere them and adore them. But then these two are +simple believers, with humble, unsmirched souls. I don't know the priest +who was there, but he is rotund and rubicund, he shakes in his fat and +seems bursting with joy. Despite the example of Saint Francis of Assisi, +who was gay—spoiling him for me—I have difficulty in persuading myself +that this abbé is an elevated being. It's all right to say that the best +thing for him is to be mediocre; to ask how, if he were otherwise, he +would make his flock understand him; and add that if he really had +superior gifts he would be hated by his colleagues and persecuted by his +bishop."</p> + +<p>While conversing thus disjointedly with himself Durtal had reached the +base of the tower. He stopped under the porch. "I intended to stay +longer up there," thought he. "It's only half-past five. I must kill at +least half an hour before dinner."</p> + +<p>The weather was almost mild. The clouds had been swept away. He lighted +a cigarette and strolled about the square, musing. Looking up he hunted +for the bell-ringer's window and recognized it. Of the windows which +opened over the portico it alone had a curtain.</p> + +<p>"What an abominable construction," he thought, contemplating the church. +"Think. That cube flanked by two towers presumes to invite comparison +with the façade of Notre Dame. What a jumble," he continued, examining +the details. "From the foundation to the first story are Ionic columns +with volutes, then from the base of the tower to the summit are +Corinthian columns with acanthus leaves. What significance can this +salmagundi of pagan orders have <!-- Page 217 -->on a Christian church? And as a rebuke +to the over-ornamented bell tower there stands the other tower +unfinished, looking like an abandoned grain elevator, but the less +hideous of the two, at that.</p> + +<p>"And it took five or six architects to erect this indigent heap of +stones. Yet Servandoni and Oppenord and their ilk were the real major +prophets, the Ezekiels of building. Their work is the work of seers +looking beyond the eighteenth century to the day of transportation by +steam. For Saint Sulpice is not a church, it's a railway station!</p> + +<p>"And the interior of the edifice is not more religious nor artistic than +the exterior. The only thing in it that pleases me is good Carhaix's +aërial cave." Then he looked about him. "This square is very ugly, but +how provincial and homelike it is! Surely nothing could equal the +hideousness of that seminary, which exhales the rancid, frozen odour of +a hospital. The fountain with its polygonal basins, its saucepan urns, +its lion-headed spouts, its niches with prelates in them, is no +masterpiece. Neither is the city hall, whose administrative style is a +cinder in the eye. But on this square, as in the neighbouring streets, +Servandoni, Garancière, and Ferrou, one respires an atmosphere +compounded of benign silence and mild humidity. You think of a +clothes-press that hasn't been open for years, and, somehow, of incense. +This square is in perfect harmony with the houses in the decayed streets +around here, with the shops where religious paraphernalia are sold, the +image and ciborium factories, the Catholic bookstores with books whose +covers are the colour of apple seeds, macadam, nutmeg, bluing.</p> + +<p>"Yes, it's dilapidated and quiet."</p> + +<p>The square was then almost deserted. A few women were going up the +church steps, met by mendicants who murmured paternosters as they +rattled their tin cups. An ecclesiastic, carrying under his arm a book +bound in black cloth, saluted white-eyed women. A few dogs were running +about. Children were chasing each other or jumping rope.<!-- Page 218 --> The enormous +chocolate-coloured la Villette omnibus and the little honey-yellow bus +of the Auteuil line went past, almost empty. Hackmen were standing +beside their hacks on the sidewalk, or in a group around a comfort +station, talking. There were no crowds, no noise, and the great trees +gave the square the appearance of the silent mall of a little town.</p> + +<p>"Well," said Durtal, considering the church again, "I really must go up +to the top of the tower some clear day." Then he shook his head. "What +for? A bird's-eye view of Paris would have been interesting in the +Middle Ages, but now! I should see, as from a hill top, other heights, a +network of grey streets, the whiter arteries of the boulevards, the +green plaques of gardens and squares, and, away in the distance, files +of houses like lines of dominoes stood up on end, the black dots being +windows.</p> + +<p>"And then the edifices emerging from this jumble of roofs, Notre Dame, +la Sainte Chapelle, Saint Severin, Saint Etienne du Mont, the Tour Saint +Jacques, are put out of countenance by the deplorable mass of newer +edifices. And I am not at all eager to contemplate that specimen of the +art of the maker of toilet articles which l'Opéra is, nor that bridge +arch, l'arc de la Triomphe, nor that hollow chandelier, the Tour Eiffel! +It's enough to see them separately, from the ground, as you turn a +street corner. Well, I must go and dine, for I have an engagement with +Hyacinthe and I must be back before eight."</p> + +<p>He went to a neighbouring wine shop where the dining-room, depopulated +at six o'clock, permitted one to ruminate in tranquillity, while eating +fairly sanitary food and drinking not too dangerously coloured wines. He +was thinking of Mme. Chantelouve, but more of Docre. The mystery of this +priest haunted him. What could be going on in the soul of a man who had +had the figure of Christ tattooed on his heels the better to trample +Him?</p> + +<p>What hate the act revealed! Did Docre hate God for <!-- Page 219 -->not having given him +the blessed ecstasies of a saint, or more humanly for not having raised +him to the highest ecclesiastical dignities? Evidently the spite of this +priest was inordinate and his pride unlimited. He seemed not displeased +to be an object of terror and loathing, for thus he was somebody. Then, +for a thorough-paced scoundrel, as this man seemed to be, what delight +to make his enemies languish in slow torment by casting spells on them +with perfect impunity.</p> + +<p>"And sacrilege carries one out of oneself in furious transports, in +voluptuous delirium, which nothing can equal. Since the Middle Ages it +has been the coward's crime, for human justice does not prosecute it, +and one can commit it with impunity, but it is the most extreme of +excesses for a believer, and Docre believes in Christ, or he wouldn't +hate Him so.</p> + +<p>"A monster! And what ignoble relations he must have had with +Chantelouve's wife! Now, how shall I make her speak up? She gave me +quite clearly to understand, the other day, that she refused to explain +herself on this topic. Meanwhile, as I have not intention of submitting +to her young girl follies tonight, I will tell her that I am not feeling +well, and that absolute rest and quiet are necessary."</p> + +<p>He did so, an hour later when she came in.</p> + +<p>She proposed a cup of tea, and when he refused, she embraced him and +nursed him like a baby. Then withdrawing a little, "You work too hard. +You need some relaxation. Come now, to pass the time you might court me +a little, because up to now I have done it all. No? That idea does not +amuse him. Let us try something else. Shall we play hide-and-seek with +the cat? He shrugs his shoulders. Well, since there is nothing to change +your grouchy expression, let us talk. What has become of your friend Des +Hermies?"</p> + +<p>"Nothing in particular."</p> + +<p>"And his experiments with Mattei medicine?"</p> + +<p>"<!-- Page 220 -->I don't know whether he continues to prosecute them or not."</p> + +<p>"Well, I see that the conversational possibilities of that topic are +exhausted. You know your replies are not very encouraging, dear."</p> + +<p>"But," he said, "everybody sometimes gets so he doesn't answer questions +at great length. I even know a young woman who becomes excessively +laconic when interrogated on a certain subject."</p> + +<p>"Of a canon, for instance."</p> + +<p>"Precisely."</p> + +<p>She crossed her legs, very coolly. "That young woman undoubtedly had +reasons for keeping still. But perhaps that young woman is really eager +to oblige the person who cross-examines her; perhaps, since she last saw +him, she has gone to a great deal of trouble to satisfy his curiosity."</p> + +<p>"Look here, Hyacinthe darling, explain yourself," he said, squeezing her +hands, an expression of joy on his face.</p> + +<p>"If I have made your mouth water so as not to have a grouchy face in +front of my eyes, I have succeeded remarkably."</p> + +<p>He kept still, wondering whether she was making fun of him or whether +she really was ready to tell him what he wanted to know.</p> + +<p>"Listen," she said. "I hold firmly by my decision of the other night. I +will not permit you to become acquainted with Canon Docre. But at a +settled time I can arrange, without your forming any relations with him, +to have you be present at the ceremony you most desire to know about."</p> + +<p>"The Black Mass?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. Within a week Docre will have left Paris. If once, in my company, +you see him, you will never see him afterward. Keep your evenings free +all this week. When the time comes I will notify you. But you may thank +me, dear, because to be useful to you I am disobeying the commands of my +confessor, whom I dare not see now, so I am damning myself."<!-- Page 221 --></p> + +<p>He kissed her, then, "Seriously, that man is really a monster?"</p> + +<p>"I fear so. In any case I would not wish anybody the misfortune of +having him for an enemy."</p> + +<p>"I should say not, if he poisons people by magic, as he seems to have +done Gévingey."</p> + +<p>"And he probably has. I should not like to be in the astrologer's +shoes."</p> + +<p>"You believe in Docre's potency, then. Tell me, how does he operate, +with the blood of mice, with broths, or with oil?"</p> + +<p>"So you know about that! He does employ these substances. In fact, he is +one of the very few persons who know how to manage them without +poisoning themselves. It's as dangerous as working with explosives. +Frequently, though, when attacking defenceless persons, he uses simpler +recipes. He distils extracts of poison and adds sulphuric acid to fester +the wound, then he dips in this compound the point of a lancet with +which he has his victim pricked by a flying spirit or a larva. It is +ordinary, well-known magic, that of Rosicrucians and tyros."</p> + +<p>Durtal burst out laughing. "But, my dear, to hear you, one would think +death could be sent to a distance like a letter."</p> + +<p>"Well, isn't cholera transmitted by letters? Ask the sanitary corps. +Don't they disinfect all mail in the time of epidemics?"</p> + +<p>"I don't contradict that, but the case is not the same."</p> + +<p>"It is too, because it is the question of transmission, invisibility, +distance, which astonishes you."</p> + +<p>"What astonishes me more than that is to hear of the Rosicrucians +actively satanizing. I confess that I had never considered them as +anything more than harmless suckers and funereal fakes."</p> + +<p>"But all societies are composed of suckers and the wily leaders who +exploit them. That's the case of the Rosicru<!-- Page 222 -->cians. Yes, their leaders +privately attempt crime. One does not need to be erudite or intelligent +to practise the ritual of spells. At any rate, and I affirm this, there +is among them a former man of letters whom I know. He lives with a +married woman, and they pass the time, he and she, trying to kill the +husband by sorcery."</p> + +<p>"Well, it has its advantages over divorce, that system has."</p> + +<p>She pouted. "I shan't say another word. I think you are making fun of +me. You don't believe in anything—"</p> + +<p>"Indeed. I was not laughing at you. I haven't very precise ideas on this +subject. I admit that at first blush all this seems improbable, to say +the least. But when I think that all the efforts of modern science do +but confirm the discoveries of the magic of other days, I keep my mouth +shut. It is true," he went on after a silence,—"to cite only one +fact—that people can no longer laugh at the stories of women being +changed into cats in the Middle Ages. Recently there was brought to M. +Charcot a little girl who suddenly got down on her hands and knees and +ran and jumped around, scratching and spitting and arching her back. So +that metamorphosis is possible. No, one cannot too often repeat it, the +truth is that we know nothing and have no right to deny anything. But to +return to your Rosicrucians. Using purely chemical formulæ, they get +along without sacrilege?"</p> + +<p>"That is as much as to say that their venefices—supposing they know how +to prepare them well enough to accomplish their purpose, though I doubt +that—are easy to defeat. Yet I don't mean to say that this group, one +member of which is an ordained priest, does not make use of contaminated +Eucharists at need."</p> + +<p>"Another nice priest! But since you are so well informed, do you know +how spells are conjured away?"</p> + +<p>"Yes and no. I know that when the poisons are sealed by sacrilege, when +the operation is performed by a master, Docre or one of the princes of +magic at Rome, it is not at <!-- Page 223 -->all easy—nor healthy—to attempt to apply +an antidote. Though I have heard of a certain abbé at Lyons who, +practically alone, is succeeding right now in these difficult cures."</p> + +<p>"Dr. Johannès!"</p> + +<p>"You know him!"</p> + +<p>"No. But Gévingey, who has gone to seek his medical aid, has told me of +him."</p> + +<p>"Well, I don't know how he goes about it, but I know that spells which +are not complicated with sacrilege are usually evaded by the law of +return. The blow is sent back to him who struck it. There are, at the +present time, two churches, one in Belgium, the other in France, where, +when one prays before a statue of the Virgin, the spell which has been +cast on one flies off and goes and strikes one's adversary."</p> + +<p>"Rats!"</p> + +<p>"One of these churches is at Tougres, eighteen kilometres from Liége, +and the name of it is Notre Dame de Retour. The other is the church of +l'Epine, 'the thorn,' a little village near Châlons. This church was +built long ago to conjure away the spells produced with the aid of the +thorns which grew in that country and served to pierce images cut in the +shape of hearts."</p> + +<p>"Near Châlons," said Durtal, digging in his memory, "it does seem to me +now that Des Hermies, speaking of bewitchment by the blood of white +mice, pointed out that village as the habitation of certain diabolic +circles."</p> + +<p>"Yes, that country in all times has been a hotbed of Satanism."</p> + +<p>"You are mighty well up on these matters. Is it Docre who transmitted +this knowledge to you?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I owe him the little I am able to pass on to you. He took a fancy +to me and even wanted to make me his pupil. I refused, and am glad now I +did, for I am much more wary than I was then of being constantly in a +state of mortal sin."</p> + +<p>"Have you ever attended the Black Mass?"<!-- Page 224 --></p> + +<p>"Yes. And I warn you in advance that you will regret having seen such +terrible things. It is a memory that persists and horrifies, +even—especially—when one does not personally take part in the +offices."</p> + +<p>He looked at her. She was pale, and her filmed eyes blinked rapidly.</p> + +<p>"It's your own wish," she continued. "You will have no complaint if the +spectacle terrifies you or wrings your heart."</p> + +<p>He was almost dumbfounded to see how sad she was and with what +difficulty she spoke.</p> + +<p>"Really. This Docre, where did he come from, what did he do formerly, +how did he happen to become a master Satanist?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know very much about him. I know he was a supply priest in +Paris, then confessor of a queen in exile. There were terrible stories +about him, which, thanks to his influential patronage, were hushed up +under the Empire. He was interned at La Trappe, then driven out of the +priesthood, excommunicated by Rome. I learned in addition that he had +several times been accused of poisoning, but had always been acquitted +because the tribunals had never been able to get any evidence. Today he +lives I don't know how, but at ease, and he travels a good deal with a +woman who serves as voyant. To all the world he is a scoundrel, but he +is learned and perverse, and then he is so charming."</p> + +<p>"Oh," he said, "how changed your eyes and voice are! Admit that you are +in love with him."</p> + +<p>"No, not now. But why should I not tell you that we were mad about each +other at one time?"</p> + +<p>"And now?"</p> + +<p>"It is over. I swear it is. We have remained friends and nothing more."</p> + +<p>"But then you often went to see him. What kind of a place did he have? +At least it was curious and heterodoxically arranged?"<!-- Page 225 --></p> + +<p>"No, it was quite ordinary, but very comfortable and clean. He had a +chemical laboratory and an immense library. The only curious book he +showed me was an office of the Black Mass on parchment. There were +admirable illuminations, and the binding was made of the tanned skin of +a child who had died unbaptized. Stamped into the cover, in the shape of +a fleuron, was a great host consecrated in a Black Mass."</p> + +<p>"What did the manuscript say?"</p> + +<p>"I did not read it."</p> + +<p>They were silent. Then she took his hands.</p> + +<p>"Now you are yourself again. I knew I should cure you of your bad +humour. Admit that I am awfully good-natured not to have got angry at +you."</p> + +<p>"Got angry? What about?"</p> + +<p>"Because it is not very flattering to a woman to be able to entertain a +man only by telling him about another one."</p> + +<p>"Oh, no, it isn't that way at all," he said, kissing her eyes tenderly.</p> + +<p>"Let me go now," she said, very low, "this enervates me, and I must get +home. It's late."</p> + +<p>She sighed and fled, leaving him amazed and wondering in what weird +activities the life of that woman had been passed.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XVIII"><!-- Page 226 -->CHAPTER XVIII</a></h2> + + +<p>The day after that on which he had spewed such furious vituperation over +the Tribunal, Gilles de Rais appeared again before his judges. He +presented himself with bowed head and clasped hands. He had once more +jumped from one extreme to the other. A few hours had sufficed to break +the spirit of the energumen, who now declared that he recognized the +authority of the magistrates and begged forgiveness for having insulted +them.</p> + +<p>They affirmed that for the love of Our Lord they forgot his +imprecations, and, at his prayer, the Bishop and the Inquisitor revoked +the sentence of excommunication which they had passed on him the day +before.</p> + +<p>This hearing was, in addition, taken up with the arraignment of Prelati +and his accomplices. Then, authorized by the ecclesiastical text which +says that a confession cannot be regarded as sufficient if it is "dubia, +vaga, generalis illativa, jocosa," the Prosecutor asserted that to +certify the sincerity of his confessions Gilles must be subjected to the +"canonic question," that is, to torture.</p> + +<p>The Marshal besought the Bishop to wait until the next day, and claiming +the right of confessing immediately to such judges as the Tribunal were +pleased to designate, he swore that he would thereafter repeat his +confession before the public and the court.</p> + +<p>Jean de Malestroit granted this request, and the Bishop of Saint Brieuc +and Pierre de l'Hospital were appointed to hear Gilles in his cell. When +he had finished the recital of his debauches and murders they ordered +Prelati to be brought to them.</p> + +<p><!-- Page 227 -->At sight of him Gilles burst into tears and when, after the +interrogatory, preparations were made to conduct the Italian back to his +dungeon, Gilles embraced him, saying, "Farewell, Francis my friend, we +shall never see each other again in this world. I pray God to give you +good patience and I hope in Him that we may meet again in great joy in +Paradise. Pray God for me and I shall pray for you."</p> + +<p>And Gilles was left alone to meditate on his crimes which he was to +confess publicly at the hearing next day. That day was the impressive +day of the trial. The room in which the Tribunal sat was crammed, and +there were multitudes sitting on the stairs, standing in the corridors, +filling the neighbouring courts, blocking the streets and lanes. From +twenty miles around the peasants were come to see the memorable beast +whose very name, before his capture, had served to close the doors those +evenings when in universal trembling the women dared not weep aloud.</p> + +<p>This meeting of the Tribunal was to be conducted with the most minute +observance of all the forms. All the assize judges, who in a long +hearing generally had their places filled by proxies, were present.</p> + +<p>The courtroom, massive, obscure, upheld by heavy Roman pillars, had been +rejuvenated. The wall, ogival, threw to cathedral height the arches of +its vaulted ceiling, which were joined together, like the sides of an +abbatial mitre, in a point. The room was lighted by sickly daylight +which was filtered through small panes between heavy leads. The azure of +the ceiling was darkened to navy blue, and the golden stars, at that +height, were as the heads of steel pins. In the shadows of the vaults +appeared the ermine of the ducal arms, dimly seen in escutcheons which +were like great dice with black dots.</p> + +<p>Suddenly the trumpets blared, the room was lighted up, and the Bishops +entered. Their mitres of cloth of gold flamed like the lightning. About +their necks were brilliant collars with orphreys crusted, as were the +robes, with car<!-- Page 228 -->buncles. In silent processional the Bishops advanced, +weighted down by their rigid copes, which fell in a flare from their +shoulders and were like golden bells split in the back. In their hands +they carried the crozier from which hung the maniple, a sort of green +veil.</p> + +<p>At each step they glowed like coals blown upon. Themselves were +sufficient to light the room, as they reanimated with their jewels the +pale sun of a rainy October day and scattered a new lustre to all parts +of the room, over the mute audience.</p> + +<p>Outshone by the shimmer of the orphreys and the stones, the costumes of +the other judges appeared darker and discordant. The black vestments of +secular justice, the white and black robe of Jean Blouyn, the silk +symars, the red woollen mantles, the scarlet chaperons lined with fur, +seemed faded and common.</p> + +<p>The Bishops seated themselves in the front row, surrounding Jean de +Malestroit, who from a raised seat dominated the court.</p> + +<p>Under the escort of the men-at-arms Gilles entered. He was broken and +haggard and had aged twenty years in one night. His eyes burned behind +seared lids. His cheeks shook. Upon injunction he began the recital of +his crimes.</p> + +<p>In a laboured voice, choked by tears, he recounted his abductions of +children, his hideous tactics, his infernal stimulations, his impetuous +murders, his implacable violations. Obsessed by the vision of his +victims, he described their agonies drawn out or hastened, their cries, +the rattle in their throats. He confessed to having wallowed in the +elastic warmth of their intestines. He confessed that he had ripped out +their hearts through wounds enlarged and opening like ripe fruit. And +with the eyes of a somnambulist he looked down at his fingers and shook +them as if blood were dripping from them.</p> + +<p>The thunder-struck audience kept a mournful silence which was lacerated +suddenly by a few short cries, and the <!-- Page 229 -->attendants, at a run, carried +out fainting women, mad with horror.</p> + +<p>He seemed to see nothing, to hear nothing. He continued to tell off the +frightful rosary of his crimes. Then his voice became raucous. He was +coming to the sepulchral violations, and now to the torture of the +little children whom he had cajoled in order to cut their throats as he +kissed them.</p> + +<p>He divulged every detail. The account was so formidable, so atrocious, +that beneath their golden caps the bishops blanched. These priests, +tempered in the fires of confessional, these judges who in that time of +demonomania and murder had never heard more terrifying confessions, +these prelates whom no depravity had ever astonished, made the sign of +the Cross, and Jean de Malestroit rose and for very shame veiled the +face of the Christ.</p> + +<p>Then all lowered their heads, and without a word they listened. The +Marshal, bathed in sweat, his face downcast, looked now at the crucifix +whose invisible head and bristling crown of thorns gave their shapes to +the veil.</p> + +<p>He finished his narrative and broke down completely. Till now he had +stood erect, speaking as if in a daze, recounting to himself, aloud, the +memory of his ineradicable crimes. But at the end of the story his +forces abandoned him. He fell on his knees and, shaken by terrific sobs, +he cried, "O God, O my Redeemer, I beseech mercy and pardon!" Then the +ferocious and haughty baron, the first of his caste no doubt, humiliated +himself. He turned toward the people and said, weeping, "Ye, the parents +of those whom I have so cruelly put to death, give, ah give me, the +succour of your pious prayers!"</p> + +<p>Then in its white splendour the soul of the Middle Ages burst forth +radiant.</p> + +<p>Jean de Malestroit left his seat and raised the accused, who was beating +the flagstones with his despairing forehead. The judge in de Malestroit +disappeared, the priest alone remained. He embraced the sinner who was +repenting and lamenting his fault.</p> + +<p><!-- Page 230 -->A shudder overran the audience when Jean de Malestroit, with Gilles's +head on his breast, said to him, "Pray that the just and rightful wrath +of the Most High be averted, weep that your tears may wash out the blood +lust from your being!"</p> + +<p>And with one accord everybody in the room knelt down and prayed for the +assassin. When the orisons were hushed there was an instant of wild +terror and commotion. Driven beyond human limits of horror and pity, the +crowd tossed and surged. The judges of the Tribunal, silent, enervated, +reconquered themselves.</p> + +<p>With a gesture, brushing away his tears, the Prosecutor arrested the +proceedings. He said that the crimes were "clear and apparent," that the +proofs were manifest, that the court would now "in its conscience and +soul" chastise the culprit, and he demanded that the day of passing +judgment be fixed. The Tribunal designated the day after the next.</p> + +<p>And that day the Official of the church of Nantes, Jacques de +Pentcoetdic, read in succession the two sentences. The first, passed by +the Bishop and the Inquisitor for the acts coming under their common +jurisdiction, began thus:</p> + +<p>"The Holy Name of Christ invoked, we, Jean, Bishop of Nantes, and +Brother Jean Blouyn, bachelor in our Holy Scriptures, of the order of +the preaching friars of Nantes, and delegate of the Inquisitor of +heresies for the city and diocese of Nantes, in session of the Tribunal +and having before our eyes God alone—"</p> + +<p>And after enumerating the crimes it concluded:</p> + +<p>"We pronounce, decide, and declare, that thou, Gilles de Rais, cited +unto our Tribunal, art heinously guilty of heresy, apostasy, and +evocation of demons; that for these crimes thou hast incurred the +sentence of excommunication and all other penalties determined by the +law."</p> + +<p>The second judgment, rendered by the Bishop alone, on the crimes of +sodomy, sacrilege, and violation of the immunities of the Church, which +more particularly concerned <!-- Page 231 -->his authority, ended in the same +conclusions and in the pronunciation, in almost identical form, of the +same penalty.</p> + +<p>Gilles listened with bowed head to the reading of these judgments. When +it was over the Bishop and the Inquisitor said to him, "Will you, now +that you detest your errors, your evocations, and your crimes, be +reincorporated into the Church our Mother?"</p> + +<p>And upon the ardent prayers of the Marshal they relieved him of all +excommunication and admitted him to participate in the sacraments. The +justice of God was satisfied, the crime was recognized, punished, but +effaced by contrition and penitence. Only human justice remained.</p> + +<p>The Bishop and the Inquisitor remanded the culprit to the secular court, +which, holding against him the abductions and the murders, pronounced +the penalty of death and attainder. Prelati and the other accomplices +were at the same time condemned to be hanged and burned alive.</p> + +<p>"Cry to God mercy," said Pierre de l'Hospital, who presided over the +civil hearings, "and dispose yourself to die in good state with a great +repentance for having committed such crimes."</p> + +<p>The recommendation was unnecessary. Gilles now faced death without fear. +He hoped, humbly, avidly, in the mercy of the Saviour. He cried out +fervently for the terrestrial expiation, the stake, to redeem him from +the eternal flames after his death.</p> + +<p>Far from his châteaux, in his dungeon, alone, he had opened himself and +viewed the cloaca which had so long been fed by the residual waters +escaped from the abattoirs of Tiffauges and Mâchecoul. He had sobbed in +despair of ever draining this stagnant pool. And thunder-smitten by +grace, in a cry of horror and joy, he had suddenly seen his soul +overflow and sweep away the dank fen before a torrential current of +prayer and ecstasy. The butcher of Sodom had destroyed himself, the +companion of Jeanne d'Arc had reappeared, the mystic whose soul poured +out to God, in bursts of adoration, in floods of tears.<!-- Page 232 --></p> + +<p>Then he thought of his friends and wished that they also might die in a +state of grace. He asked the Bishop of Nantes that they might be +executed not before nor after him, but at the same time. He carried his +point that he was the most guilty and that he must instruct them in +saving their souls and assist them at the moment when they should mount +the scaffold. Jean de Malestroit granted the supplication.</p> + +<p>"What is curious," said Durtal, interrupting his writing to light a +cigarette, "is that—"</p> + +<p>A gentle ring. Mme. Chantelouve entered.</p> + +<p>She declared that she could stay only two minutes. She had a carriage +waiting below. "Tonight," she said, "I will call for you at nine. First +write me a letter in practically these terms," and she handed him a +paper. He unfolded it and read this declaration:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"I certify that all that I have said and written about the Black + Mass, about the priest who celebrated it, about the place where + I claimed to have witnessed it, about the persons alleged to + have been there, is pure invention. I affirm that I imagined all + these incidents, that, in consequence, all that I have narrated + is false." </p></div> + +<p>"Docre's?" he asked, studying the handwriting, minute, pointed, twisted, +aggressive.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and he wants this declaration, not dated, to be made in the form +of a letter from you to a person consulting you on the subject."</p> + +<p>"Your canon distrusts me."</p> + +<p>"Of course. You write books."</p> + +<p>"It doesn't please me infinitely to sign that," murmured Durtal. "What +if I refuse?"</p> + +<p>"You will not go to the Black Mass."</p> + +<p>His curiosity overcame his reluctance. He wrote and signed the letter +and Mme. Chantelouve put it in her card-case.<!-- Page 233 --></p> + +<p>"And in what street is the ceremony to take place?"</p> + +<p>"In the rue Olivier de Serres."</p> + +<p>"Where is that?"</p> + +<p>"Near the rue de Vaugirard, away up."</p> + +<p>"Is that where Docre lives?"</p> + +<p>"No, we are going to a private house which belongs to a lady he knows. +Now, if you'll be so good, put off your cross-examination to some other +time, because I am in an awful hurry. At nine o'clock. Don't forget. Be +all ready."</p> + +<p>He had hardly time to kiss her and she was gone.</p> + +<p>"Well," said he, "I already had data on incubacy and poisoning by +spells. There remained only the Black Mass, to make me thoroughly +acquainted with Satanism as it is practised in our day. And I am to see +it! I'll be damned if I thought there were such undercurrents in Paris. +And how circumstances hang together and lead to each other! I had to +occupy myself with Gilles de Rais and the diabolism of the Middle Ages +to get contemporary diabolism revealed to me." And he thought of Docre +again. "What a sharper that priest is! Among the occultists who maunder +today in the universal decomposition of ideas he is the only one who +interests me.</p> + +<p>"The others, the mages, the theosophists, the cabalists, the spiritists, +the hermetics, the Rosicrucians, remind me, when they are not mere +thieves, of children playing and scuffling in a cellar. And if one +descend lower yet, into the hole-in-the-wall places of the pythonesses, +clairvoyants, and mediums, what does one find except agencies of +prostitution and gambling? All these pretended peddlers of the future +are extremely nasty; that's the only thing in the occult of which one +can be sure."</p> + +<p>Des Hermies interrupted the course of these reflections by ringing and +walking in. He came to announce that Gévingey had returned and that they +were all to dine at Carhaix's the night after next.</p> + +<p>"Is Carhaix's bronchitis cured?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, completely."<!-- Page 234 --></p> + +<p>Preoccupied with the idea of the Black Mass, Durtal could not keep +silent. He let out the fact that he was to witness the ceremony—and, +confronted by Des Hermies's stare of stupefaction, he added that he had +promised secrecy and that he could not, for the present, tell him more.</p> + +<p>"You're the lucky one!" said Des Hermies. "Is it too much to ask you the +name of the abbé who is to officiate?"</p> + +<p>"Not at all. Canon Docre."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" and the other was silent. He was evidently trying to divine by +what manipulations his friend had been able to get in touch with the +renegade.</p> + +<p>"Some time ago you told me," Durtal said, "that in the Middle Ages the +Black Mass was said on the naked buttocks of a woman, that in the +seventeenth century it was celebrated on the abdomen, and now?"</p> + +<p>"I believe that it takes place before an altar as in church. Indeed it +was sometimes celebrated thus at the end of the fifteenth century in +Biscay. It is true that the Devil then officiated in person. Clothed in +rent and soiled episcopal habits, he gave communion with round pieces of +shoe leather for hosts, saying, 'This is my body.' And he gave these +disgusting wafers to the faithful to eat after they had kissed his left +hand and his breech. I hope that you will not be obliged to render such +base homage to your canon."</p> + +<p>Durtal laughed. "No, I don't think he requires a pretend like that. But +look here, aren't you of the decided opinion that the creatures who so +piously, infamously, follow these offices are a bit mad?"</p> + +<p>"Mad? Why? The cult of the Demon is no more insane than that of God. One +is rotten and the other resplendent, that is all. By your reckoning all +people who worship any god whatever would be demented. No. The +affiliates of Satanism are mystics of a vile order, but they are +mystics. Now, it is highly probable that their exaltations into the +extra-terrestrial of Evil coincide with the rages of their frenzied +senses, for lechery is the wet nurse of De<!-- Page 235 -->monism. Medicine classes, +rightly or wrongly, the hunger for ordure in the unknown categories of +neurosis, and well it may, for nobody knows anything about neuroses +except that everybody has them. It is quite certain that in this, more +than in any previous century, the nerves quiver at the least shock. For +instance, recall the newspaper accounts of executions of criminals. We +learn that the executioner goes about his work timidly, that he is on +the point of fainting, that he has nervous prostration when he +decapitates a man. Then compare this nervous wreck with the invincible +torturers of the olden time. They would thrust your arm into a sleeve of +moistened parchment which when set on fire would draw up and in a +leisurely fashion reduce your flesh to dust. Or they would drive wedges +into your thighs and split the bones. They would crush your thumbs in +the thumbscrew. Or they would singe all the hair off your epidermis with +a poker, or roll up the skin from your abdomen and leave you with a kind +of apron. They would drag you at the cart's tail, give you the +strappado, roast you, drench you with ignited alcohol, and through it +all preserve an impassive countenance and tranquil nerves not to be +shaken by any cry or plaint. Only, as these exercises were somewhat +fatiguing, the torturers, after the operation, were ravenously hungry +and required a deal of drink. They were sanguinaries of a mental +stability not to be shaken, while now! But to return to your companions +in sacrilege. This evening, if they are not maniacs, you will find +them—doubt it not—repulsive lechers. Observe them closely. I am sure +that to them the invocation of Beelzebub is a prelibation of carnality. +Don't be afraid, because, Lord! in this group there won't be any to make +you imitate the martyr of whom Jacques de Voragine speaks in his history +of Saint Paul the Eremite. You know that legend?"</p> + +<p>"No."</p> + +<p>"Well, to refresh your soul I will tell you. This martyr, who was very +young, was stretched out, his hands and feet <!-- Page 236 -->bound, on a bed, then a +superb specimen of femininity was brought in, who tried to force him. As +he was burning and was about to sin, he bit off his tongue and spat it +in the face of the woman, 'and thus pain drove out temptation,' says the +good de Voragine."</p> + +<p>"My heroism would not carry me so far as that, I confess. But must you +go so soon?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I have a pressing engagement."</p> + +<p>"What a queer age," said Durtal, conducting him to the door. "It is just +at the moment when positivism is at its zenith that mysticism rises +again and the follies of the occult begin."</p> + +<p>"Oh, but it's always been that way. The tail ends of all centuries are +alike. They're always periods of vacillation and uncertainty. When +materialism is rotten-ripe magic takes root. This phenomenon reappears +every hundred years. Not to go further back, look at the decline of the +last century. Alongside of the rationalists and atheists you find +Saint-Germain, Cagliostro, Saint-Martin, Gabalis, Cazotte, the +Rosicrucian societies, the infernal circles, as now. With that, good-bye +and good luck."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Durtal, closing the door, "but Cagliostro and his ilk had a +certain audacity, and perhaps a little knowledge, while the mages of our +time—what inept fakes!"</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XIX"><!-- Page 237 -->CHAPTER XIX</a></h2> + + +<p>In a fiacre they went up the rue de Vaugirard. Mme. Chantelouve was as +in a shell and spoke not a word. Durtal looked closely at her when, as +they passed a street lamp, a shaft of light played over her veil a +moment, then winked out. She seemed agitated and nervous beneath her +reserve. He took her hand. She did not withdraw it. He could feel the +chill of it through her glove, and her blonde hair tonight seemed +disordered, dry, and not so fine as usual.</p> + +<p>"Nearly there?"</p> + +<p>But in a low voice full of anguish she said, "Do not speak."</p> + +<p>Bored by this taciturn, almost hostile tête-à-tête, he began to examine +the route through the windows of the cab. The street stretched out +interminable, already deserted, so badly paved that at every step the +cab springs creaked. The lamp-posts were beginning to be further and +further apart. The cab was approaching the ramparts.</p> + +<p>"Singular itinerary," he murmured, troubled by the woman's cold, +inscrutable reserve.</p> + +<p>Abruptly the vehicle turned up a dark street, swung around, and stopped.</p> + +<p>Hyacinthe got out. Waiting for the cabman to give him his change, Durtal +inspected the lay of the land. They were in a sort of blind alley. Low +houses, in which there was not a sign of life, bordered a lane that had +no sidewalk. The pavement was like billows. Turning around, when the cab +drove away, he found himself confronted by a long high wall above which +dry leaves rustled in the shadows. A little door with a square grating +in it was cut into the <!-- Page 238 -->thick unlighted wall, which was seamed with +fissures. Suddenly, further away, a ray of light shot out of a show +window, and, doubtless attracted by the sound of the cab wheels, a man +wearing the black apron of a wineshop keeper lounged through the shop +door and spat on the threshold.</p> + +<p>"This is the place," said Mme. Chantelouve.</p> + +<p>She rang. The grating opened. She raised her veil. A shaft of lantern +light struck her full in the face, the door opened noiselessly, and they +penetrated into a garden.</p> + +<p>"Good evening, madame."</p> + +<p>"Good evening, Marie. In the chapel?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. Does madame wish me to guide her?"</p> + +<p>"No, thanks."</p> + +<p>The woman with the lantern scrutinized Durtal. He perceived, beneath a +hood, wisps of grey hair falling in disorder over a wrinkled old face, +but she did not give him time to examine her and returned to a tent +beside the wall serving her as a lodge.</p> + +<p>He followed Hyacinthe, who traversed the dark lanes, between rows of +palms, to the entrance of a building. She opened the doors as if she +were quite at home, and her heels clicked resolutely on the flagstones.</p> + +<p>"Be careful," she said, going through a vestibule. "There are three +steps."</p> + +<p>They came out into a court and stopped before an old house. She rang. A +little man advanced, hiding his features, and greeted her in an +affected, sing-song voice. She passed, saluting him, and Durtal brushed +a fly-blown face, the eyes liquid, gummy, the cheeks plastered with +cosmetics, the lips painted.</p> + +<p>"I have stumbled into a lair of sodomists.—You didn't tell me that I +was to be thrown into such company," he said to Hyacinthe, overtaking +her at the turning of a corridor lighted by a lamp.</p> + +<p>"Did you expect to meet saints here?"</p> + +<p>She shrugged her shoulders and opened a door. They <!-- Page 239 -->were in a chapel +with a low ceiling crossed by beams gaudily painted with coal-tar +pigment. The windows were hidden by great curtains. The walls were +cracked and dingy. Durtal recoiled after a few steps. Gusts of humid, +mouldy air and of that indescribable new-stove acridity poured out of +the registers to mingle with an irritating odour of alkali, resin, and +burnt herbs. He was choking, his temples throbbing.</p> + +<p>He advanced groping, attempting to accustom his eyes to the +half-darkness. The chapel was vaguely lighted by sanctuary lamps +suspended from chandeliers of gilded bronze with pink glass pendants. +Hyacinthe made him a sign to sit down, then she went over to a group of +people sitting on divans in a dark corner. Rather vexed at being left +here, away from the centre of activity, Durtal noticed that there were +many women and few men present, but his efforts to discover their +features were unavailing. As here and there a lamp swayed, he +occasionally caught sight of a Junonian brunette, then of a +smooth-shaven, melancholy man. He observed that the women were not +chattering to each other. Their conversation seemed awed and grave. Not +a laugh, not a raised voice, was heard, but an irresolute, furtive +whispering, unaccompanied by gesture.</p> + +<p>"Hmm," he said to himself. "It doesn't look as if Satan made his +faithful happy."</p> + +<p>A choir boy, clad in red, advanced to the end of the chapel and lighted +a stand of candles. Then the altar became visible. It was an ordinary +church altar on a tabernacle above which stood an infamous, derisive +Christ. The head had been raised and the neck lengthened, and wrinkles, +painted in the cheeks, transformed the grieving face to a bestial one +twisted into a mean laugh. He was naked, and where the loincloth should +have been, there was a virile member projecting from a bush of +horsehair. In front of the tabernacle the chalice, covered with a pall, +was placed. The choir boy folded the altar cloth, wiggled his haunches, +stood <!-- Page 240 -->tiptoe on one foot and flipped his arms as if to fly away like a +cherub, on pretext of reaching up to light the black tapers whose odour +of coal tar and pitch was now added to the pestilential smell of the +stuffy room.</p> + +<p>Durtal recognized beneath the red robe the "fairy" who had guarded the +chapel entrance, and he understood the rôle reserved for this man, whose +sacrilegious nastiness was substituted for the purity of childhood +acceptable to the Church.</p> + +<p>Then another choir boy, more hideous yet, exhibited himself. Hollow +chested, racked by coughs, withered, made up with white grease paint and +vivid carmine, he hobbled about humming. He approached the tripods +flanking the altar, stirred the smouldering incense pots and threw in +leaves and chunks of resin.</p> + +<p>Durtal was beginning to feel uncomfortable when Hyacinthe rejoined him. +She excused herself for having left him by himself so long, invited him +to change his place, and conducted him to a seat far in the rear, behind +all the rows of chairs.</p> + +<p>"This is a real chapel, isn't it?" he asked.</p> + +<p>"Yes. This house, this church, the garden that we crossed, are the +remains of an old Ursuline convent. For a long time this chapel was used +to store hay. The house belonged to a livery-stable keeper, who sold it +to that woman," and she pointed out a stout brunette of whom Durtal +before had caught a fleeting glimpse.</p> + +<p>"Is she married?"</p> + +<p>"No. She is a former nun who was debauched long ago by Docre."</p> + +<p>"Ah. And those gentlemen who seem to be hiding in the darkest places?"</p> + +<p>"They are Satanists. There is one of them who was a professor in the +School of Medicine. In his home he has an oratorium where he prays to a +statue of Venus Astarte mounted on an altar."</p> + +<p>"No!"<!-- Page 241 --></p> + +<p>"I mean it. He is getting old, and his demoniac orisons increase tenfold +his forces, which he is using up with creatures of that sort," and with +a gesture she indicated the choir boys.</p> + +<p>"You guarantee the truth of this story?"</p> + +<p>"You will find it narrated at great length in a religious journal. <i>Les +annales de la sainteté</i>. And though his identity was made pretty patent +in the article, the man did not dare prosecute the editors.—What's the +matter with you?" she asked, looking at him closely.</p> + +<p>"I'm strangling. The odour from those incense burners is unbearable."</p> + +<p>"You will get used to it in a few seconds."</p> + +<p>"But what do they burn that smells like that?"</p> + +<p>"Asphalt from the street, leaves of henbane, datura, dried nightshade, +and myrrh. These are perfumes delightful to Satan, our master." She +spoke in that changed, guttural voice which had been hers at times when +in bed with him. He looked her squarely in the face. She was pale, the +lips pressed tight, the pluvious eyes blinking rapidly.</p> + +<p>"Here he comes!" she murmured suddenly, while women in front of them +scurried about or knelt in front of the chairs.</p> + +<p>Preceded by the two choir boys the canon entered, wearing a scarlet +bonnet from which two buffalo horns of red cloth protruded. Durtal +examined him as he marched toward the altar. He was tall, but not well +built, his bulging chest being out of proportion to the rest of his +body. His peeled forehead made one continuous line with his straight +nose. The lips and cheeks bristled with that kind of hard, clumpy beard +which old priests have who have always shaved themselves. The features +were round and insinuating, the eyes, like apple pips, close together, +phosphorescent. As a whole his face was evil and sly, but energetic, and +the hard, fixed eyes were not the furtive, shifty orbs that Durtal had +imagined.<!-- Page 242 --></p> + +<p>The canon solemnly knelt before the altar, then mounted the steps and +began to say mass. Durtal saw then that he had nothing on beneath his +sacrificial habit. His black socks and his flesh bulging over the +garters, attached high up on his legs, were plainly visible. The +chasuble had the shape of an ordinary chasuble but was of the dark red +colour of dried blood, and in the middle, in a triangle around which was +an embroidered border of colchicum, savin, sorrel, and spurge, was the +figure of a black billy-goat presenting his horns.</p> + +<p>Docre made the genuflexions, the full- or half-length inclinations +specified by the ritual. The kneeling choir boys sang the Latin +responses in a crystalline voice which trilled on the ultimate syllables +of the words.</p> + +<p>"But it's a simple low mass," said Durtal to Mme. Chantelouve.</p> + +<p>She shook her head. Indeed, at that moment the choir boys passed behind +the altar and one of them brought back copper chafing-dishes, the other, +censers, which they distributed to the congregation. All the women +enveloped themselves in the smoke. Some held their heads right over the +chafing-dishes and inhaled deeply, then, fainting, unlaced themselves, +heaving raucous sighs.</p> + +<p>The sacrifice ceased. The priest descended the steps backward, knelt on +the last one, and in a sharp, tripidant voice cried:</p> + +<p>"Master of Slanders, Dispenser of the benefits of crime, Administrator +of sumptuous sins and great vices, Satan, thee we adore, reasonable God, +just God!</p> + +<p>"Superadmirable legate of false trances, thou receivest our beseeching +tears; thou savest the honour of families by aborting wombs impregnated +in the forgetfulness of the good orgasm; thou dost suggest to the mother +the hastening of untimely birth, and thine obstetrics spares the +still-born children the anguish of maturity, the contamination of +original sin.<!-- Page 243 --></p> + +<p>"Mainstay of the despairing Poor, Cordial of the Vanquished, it is thou +who endowest them with hypocrisy, ingratitude, and stiff-neckedness, +that they may defend themselves against the children of God, the Rich.</p> + +<p>"Suzerain of Resentment, Accountant of Humiliations, Treasurer of old +Hatreds, thou alone dost fertilize the brain of man whom injustice has +crushed; thou breathest into him the idea of meditated vengeance, sure +misdeeds; thou incitest him to murder; thou givest him the abundant joy +of accomplished reprisals and permittest him to taste the intoxicating +draught of the tears of which he is the cause.</p> + +<p>"Hope of Virility, Anguish of the Empty Womb, thou dost not demand the +bootless offering of chaste loins, thou dost not sing the praises of +Lenten follies; thou alone receivest the carnal supplications and +petitions of poor and avaricious families. Thou determinest the mother +to sell her daughter, to give her son; thou aidest sterile and reprobate +loves; Guardian of strident Neuroses, Leaden Tower of Hysteria, bloody +Vase of Rape!</p> + +<p>"Master, thy faithful servants, on their knees, implore thee and +supplicate thee to satisfy them when they wish the torture of all those +who love them and aid them; they supplicate thee to assure them the joy +of delectable misdeeds unknown to justice, spells whose unknown origin +baffles the reason of man; they ask, finally, glory, riches, power, of +thee, King of the Disinherited, Son who art to overthrow the inexorable +Father!"</p> + +<p>Then Docre rose, and erect, with arms outstretched, vociferated in a +ringing voice of hate:</p> + +<p>"And thou, thou whom, in my quality of priest, I force, whether thou +wilt or no, to descend into this host, to incarnate thyself in this +bread, Jesus, Artisan of Hoaxes, Bandit of Homage, Robber of Affection, +hear! Since the day when thou didst issue from the complaisant bowels of +a Virgin, thou hast failed all thine engagements, belied all thy +promises. Centuries have wept, awaiting thee, fugitive<!-- Page 244 --> God, mute God! +Thou wast to redeem man and thou hast not, thou wast to appear in thy +glory, and thou sleepest. Go, lie, say to the wretch who appeals to +thee, 'Hope, be patient, suffer; the hospital of souls will receive +thee; the angels will assist thee; Heaven opens to thee.' Impostor! thou +knowest well that the angels, disgusted at thine inertness, abandon +thee! Thou wast to be the Interpreter of our plaints, the Chamberlain of +our tears; thou wast to convey them to the Father and thou hast not done +so, for this intercession would disturb thine eternal sleep of happy +satiety.</p> + +<p>"Thou hast forgotten the poverty thou didst preach, enamoured vassal of +Banks! Thou hast seen the weak crushed beneath the press of profit; thou +hast heard the death rattle of the timid, paralyzed by famine, of women +disembowelled for a bit of bread, and thou hast caused the Chancery of +thy Simoniacs, thy commercial representatives, thy Popes, to answer by +dilatory excuses and evasive promises, sacristy Shyster, huckster God!</p> + +<p>"Master, whose inconceivable ferocity engenders life and inflicts it on +the innocent whom thou darest damn—in the name of what original +sin?—whom thou darest punish—by the virtue of what covenants?—we +would have thee confess thine impudent cheats, thine inexpiable crimes! +We would drive deeper the nails into thy hands, press down the crown of +thorns upon thy brow, bring blood and water from the dry wounds of thy +sides.</p> + +<p>"And that we can and will do by violating the quietude of thy body, +Profaner of ample vices, Abstractor of stupid purities, cursed Nazarene, +do-nothing King, coward God!" "Amen!" trilled the soprano voices of the +choir boys.</p> + +<p>Durtal listened in amazement to this torrent of blasphemies and insults. +The foulness of the priest stupefied him. A silence succeeded the +litany. The chapel was foggy with the smoke of the censers. The women, +hitherto taciturn, flustered now, as, remounting the altar, the canon +turned toward them and blessed them with his left hand <!-- Page 245 -->in a sweeping +gesture. And suddenly the choir boys tinkled the prayer bells.</p> + +<p>It was a signal. The women fell to the carpet and writhed. One of them +seemed to be worked by a spring. She threw herself prone and waved her +legs in the air. Another, suddenly struck by a hideous strabism, +clucked, then becoming tongue-tied stood with her mouth open, the tongue +turned back, the tip cleaving to the palate. Another, inflated, livid, +her pupils dilated, lolled her head back over her shoulders, then jerked +it brusquely erect and belaboured herself, tearing her breast with her +nails. Another, sprawling on her back, undid her skirts, drew forth a +rag, enormous, meteorized; then her face twisted into a horrible +grimace, and her tongue, which she could not control, stuck out, bitten +at the edges, harrowed by red teeth, from a bloody mouth.</p> + +<p>Suddenly Durtal rose, and now he heard and saw Docre distinctly.</p> + +<p>Docre contemplated the Christ surmounting the tabernacle, and with arms +spread wide apart he spewed forth frightful insults, and, at the end of +his forces, muttered the billingsgate of a drunken cabman. One of the +choir boys knelt before him with his back toward the altar. A shudder +ran around the priest's spine. In a solemn but jerky voice he said, +"<i>Hoc est enim corpus meum</i>," then, instead of kneeling, after the +consecration, before the precious Body, he faced the congregation, and +appeared tumefied, haggard, dripping with sweat. He staggered between +the two choir boys, who, raising the chasuble, displayed his naked +belly. Docre made a few passes and the host sailed, tainted and soiled, +over the steps.</p> + +<p>Durtal felt himself shudder. A whirlwind of hysteria shook the room. +While the choir boys sprinkled holy water on the pontiff's nakedness, +women rushed upon the Eucharist and, grovelling in front of the altar, +clawed from the bread humid particles and drank and ate divine ordure.</p> + +<p>Another woman, curled up over a crucifix, emitted a rend<!-- Page 246 -->ing laugh, then +cried to Docre, "Father, father!" A crone tore her hair, leapt, whirled +around and around as on a pivot and fell over beside a young girl who, +huddled to the wall, was writhing in convulsions, frothing at the mouth, +weeping, and spitting out frightful blasphemies. And Durtal, terrified, +saw through the fog the red horns of Docre, who, seated now, frothing +with rage, was chewing up sacramental wafers, taking them out of his +mouth, wiping himself with them, and distributing them to the women, who +ground them underfoot, howling, or fell over each other struggling to +get hold of them and violate them.</p> + +<p>The place was simply a madhouse, a monstrous pandemonium of prostitutes +and maniacs. Now, while the choir boys gave themselves to the men, and +while the woman who owned the chapel, mounted the altar caught hold of +the phallus of the Christ with one hand and with the other held a +chalice between "His" naked legs, a little girl, who hitherto had not +budged, suddenly bent over forward and howled, howled like a dog. +Overcome with disgust, nearly asphyxiated, Durtal wanted to flee. He +looked for Hyacinthe. She was no longer at his side. He finally caught +sight of her close to the canon and, stepping over the writhing bodies +on the floor, he went to her. With quivering nostrils she was inhaling +the effluvia of the perfumes and of the couples.</p> + +<p>"The sabbatic odour!" she said to him between clenched teeth, in a +strangled voice.</p> + +<p>"Here, let's get out of this!"</p> + +<p>She seemed to wake, hesitated a moment, then without answering she +followed him. He elbowed his way through the crowd, jostling women whose +protruding teeth were ready to bite. He pushed Mme. Chantelouve to the +door, crossed the court, traversed the vestibule, and, finding the +portress' lodge empty, he drew the cord and found himself in the street.</p> + +<p>There he stopped and drew the fresh air deep into his lungs. Hyacinthe, +motionless, dizzy, huddled to the wall away from him.<!-- Page 247 --></p> + +<p>He looked at her. "Confess that you would like to go in there again."</p> + +<p>"No," she said with an effort. "These scenes shatter me. I am in a daze. +I must have a glass of water."</p> + +<p>And she went up the street, leaning on him, straight to the wine shop, +which was open. It was an ignoble lair, a little room with tables and +wooden benches, a zinc counter, cheap bar fixtures, and blue-stained +wooden pitchers; in the ceiling a U-shaped gas bracket. Two +pick-and-shovel labourers were playing cards. They turned around and +laughed. The proprietor took the excessively short-stemmed pipe from his +mouth and spat into the sawdust. He seemed not at all surprised to see +this fashionably gowned woman in his dive. Durtal, who was watching him, +thought he surprised an understanding look exchanged by the proprietor +and the woman.</p> + +<p>The proprietor lighted a candle and mumbled into Durtal's ear, +"Monsieur, you can't drink here with these people watching. I'll take +you to a room where you can be alone."</p> + +<p>"Hmmm," said Durtal to Hyacinthe, who was penetrating the mysteries of a +spiral staircase, "A lot of fuss for a glass of water!"</p> + +<p>But she had already entered a musty room. The paper was peeling from the +walls, which were nearly covered with pictures torn out of illustrated +weeklies and tacked up with hairpins. The floor was all in pieces. There +were a wooden bed without any curtains, a chamber pot with a piece +broken out of the side, a wash bowl and two chairs.</p> + +<p>The man brought a decanter of gin, a large one of water, some sugar, and +glasses, then went downstairs.</p> + +<p>Her eyes were sombre, mad. She enlaced Durtal.</p> + +<p>"No!" he shouted, furious at having fallen into this trap. "I've had +enough of that. It's late. Your husband is waiting for you. It's time +for you to go back to him—"</p> + +<p>She did not even hear him.</p> + +<p>"I want you," she said, and she took him treacherously and obliged him +to desire her. She disrobed, threw her skirts on the floor, opened wide +the abominable couch, and <!-- Page 248 -->raising her chemise in the back she rubbed +her spine up and down over the coarse grain of the sheets. A look of +swooning ecstasy was in her eyes and a smile of joy on her lips.</p> + +<p>She seized him, and, with ghoulish fury, dragged him into obscenities of +whose existence he had never dreamed. Suddenly, when he was able to +escape, he shuddered, for he perceived that the bed was strewn with +fragments of hosts.</p> + +<p>"Oh, you fill me with horror! Dress, and let's get out of here."</p> + +<p>While, with a faraway look in her eyes, she was silently putting on her +clothes, he sat down on a chair. The fetidness of the room nauseated +him. Then, too—he was not absolutely convinced of +Transubstantiation—he did not believe very firmly that the Saviour +resided in that soiled bread—but—In spite of himself, the sacrilege he +had involuntarily participated in saddened him.</p> + +<p>"Suppose it were true," he said to himself, "that the Presence were +real, as Hyacinthe and that miserable priest attest—No, decidedly, I +have had enough. I am through. The occasion is timely for me to break +with this creature whom from our very first interview I have only +tolerated, and I'm going to seize the opportunity."</p> + +<p>Below, in the dive, he had to face the knowing smiles of the labourers. +He paid, and without waiting for his change, he fled. They reached the +rue de Vaugirard and he hailed a cab.</p> + +<p>As they were whirled along they sat lost in their thoughts, not looking +at each other.</p> + +<p>"Soon?" asked Mme. Chantelouve, in an almost timid tone when he left her +at her door.</p> + +<p>"No," he answered. "We have nothing in common. You wish everything and I +wish nothing. Better break. We might drag out our relation, but it would +finally terminate in recrimination and bitterness. Oh, and then—after +what happened this evening, no! Understand me? No!"</p> + +<p>And he gave the cabman his address and huddled himself into the furthest +corner of the fiacre.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XX"><!-- Page 249 -->CHAPTER XX</a></h2> + + +<p>"He doesn't lead a humdrum life, that canon!" said Des Hermies, when +Durtal had related to him the details of the Black Mass. "It's a +veritable seraglio of hystero-epileptics and erotomaniacs that he has +formed for himself. But his vices lack warmth. Certainly, in the matter +of contumelious blasphemies, of sacrilegious atrocities, and sensual +excitation, this priest may seem to have exceeded the limits, to be +almost unique. But the bloody and investuous side of the old sabbats is +wanting. Docre is, we must admit, greatly inferior to Gilles de Rais. +His works are incomplete, insipid; weak, if I may say so."</p> + +<p>"I like that. You know it isn't easy to procure children whom one may +disembowel with impunity. The parents would raise a row and the police +would interfere."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and it is to difficulties of this sort that we must evidently +attribute the bloodless celebration of the Black Mass. But I am thinking +just now of the women you described, the ones that put their heads over +the chafing-dishes to drink in the smoke of the burning resin. They +employ the procedure of the Aissaouas, who hold their heads over the +braseros whenever the catalepsy necessary to their orgies is slow in +coming. As for the other phenomena you cite, they are known in the +hospitals, and except as symptoms of the demoniac effluence they teach +us nothing new. Now another thing. Not a word of this to Carhaix, +because he would be quite capable of closing his door in your face if he +knew you had been present at an office in honour of Satan."<!-- Page 250 --></p> + +<p>They went downstairs from Durtal's apartment and walked along toward the +tower of Saint Sulpice.</p> + +<p>"I didn't bring anything to eat, because you said you would look after +that," said Durtal, "but this morning I sent Mme. Carhaix—in lieu of +desserts and wine—some real Dutch gingerbread, and a couple of rather +surprising liqueurs, an elixir of life which we shall take, by way of +appetizer, before the repast, and a flask of crême de céléri. I have +discovered an honest distiller."</p> + +<p>"Impossible!"</p> + +<p>"You shall see. This elixir of life is manufactured from Socotra aloes, +little cardamom, saffron, myrrh, and a heap of other aromatics. It's +inhumanly bitter, but it's exquisite."</p> + +<p>"I am anxious to taste it. The least we can do is fête Gévingey a little +on his deliverance."</p> + +<p>"Have you seen him?"</p> + +<p>"Yes. He's looking fine. We'll make him tell us about his cure."</p> + +<p>"I keep wondering what he lives on."</p> + +<p>"On what his astrological skill brings him."</p> + +<p>"Then there are rich people who have their horoscopes cast?"</p> + +<p>"We must hope so. To tell you the truth, I think Gévingey is not in very +easy circumstances. Under the Empire he was astrologer to the Empress, +who was very superstitious and had faith—as did Napoleon, for that +matter—in predictions and fortune telling, but since the fall of the +Empire I think Gévingey's situation has changed a good deal for the +worse. Nevertheless he passes for being the only man in France who has +preserved the secrets of Cornelius Agrippa, Cremona, Ruggieri, Gauric, +Sinibald the Swordsman, and Tritemius."</p> + +<p>While discoursing they had climbed the stair and arrived at the +bell-ringer's door.</p> + +<p>The astrologer was already there and the table was set.<!-- Page 251 --> All grimaced a +bit as they tasted the black and active liqueur which Durtal poured.</p> + +<p>Joyous to have all her family about her, Mama Carhaix brought the rich +soup. She filled the plates.</p> + +<p>When a dish of vegetables was passed and Durtal chose a leek, Des +Hermies said, laughing, "Look out! Porta, a thaumaturge of the late +sixteenth century, informs us that this plant, long considered an emblem +of virility, perturbs the quietude of the most chaste."</p> + +<p>"Don't listen to him," said the bell-ringer's wife. "And you, Monsieur +Gévingey, some carrots?"</p> + +<p>Durtal looked at the astrologer. His head still looked like a +sugar-loaf, his hair was the same faded, dirty brown of hydroquinine or +ipecac powders, his bird eyes had the same startled look, his enormous +hands were covered with the same phalanx of rings, he had the same +obsequious and imposing manner, and sacerdotal tone, but he was +freshened up considerably, the wrinkles had gone out of his skin, and +his eyes were brighter, since his visit to Lyons.</p> + +<p>Durtal congratulated him on the happy result of the treatment.</p> + +<p>"It was high time, monsieur, I was putting myself under the care of Dr. +Johannès, for I was nearly gone. Not possessing a shred of the gift of +voyance and knowing no extralucid cataleptic who could inform me of the +clandestine preparations of Canon Docre, I could not possibly defend +myself by using the laws of countersign and of the shock in return."</p> + +<p>"But," said Des Hermies, "admitting that you could, through the +intermediation of a flying spirit, have been aware of the operations of +the priest, how could you have parried them?"</p> + +<p>"The law of countersigns consists, when you know in advance the day and +hour of the attack, in going away from home, thus throwing the spell off +the track and neutralizing it, or in saying an hour beforehand, 'Here I +am. Strike!'<!-- Page 252 --> The last method is calculated to scatter the fluids to the +wind and paralyze the powers of the assailant. In magic, any act known +and made public is lost. As for the shock in return, one must also know +beforehand of the attempt if one is to cast back the spells on the +person sending them before one is struck by them.</p> + +<p>"I was certain to perish. A day had passed since I was bewitched. Two +days more and I should have been ready for the cemetery."</p> + +<p>"How's that?"</p> + +<p>"Every individual struck by magic has three days in which to take +measures. That time past, the ill is incurable. So when Docre announced +to me that he condemned me to death by his own authority and when, two +hours later, on returning home, I felt desperately ill, I lost no time +packing my grip and starting for Lyons."</p> + +<p>"And there?" asked Durtal.</p> + +<p>"There I saw Dr. Johannès. I told him of Docre's threat and of my +illness. He said to me simply. 'That priest can dress the most virulent +poisons in the most frightful sacrileges. The fight will be bitter, but +I shall conquer,' and he immediately called in a woman who lives in his +house, a voyant.</p> + +<p>"He hypnotized her and she, at his injunction, explained the nature of +the sorcery of which I was the victim. She reconstructed the scene. She +literally saw me being poisoned by food and drink mixed with menstrual +fluid that had been reinforced with macerated sacramental wafers and +drugs skilfully dosed. That sort of spell is so terrible that aside from +Dr. Johannès no thaumaturge in France dare try to cure it.</p> + +<p>"So the doctor finally said to me, 'Your cure can be obtained only +through an invincible power. We must lose no time. We must at once +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek.'</p> + +<p>"He raised an altar, composed of a table and a wooden tabernacle. It was +shaped like a little house surmounted by a cross and encircled, under +the pediment, by the dial-<!-- Page 253 -->like figure of the tetragram. He brought the +silver chalice, the unleavened bread and the wine. He donned his +sacerdotal habits, put on his finger the ring which has received the +supreme benedictions, then he began to read from a special missal the +prayers of the sacrifice.</p> + +<p>"Almost at once the voyant cried, 'Here are the spirits evoked for the +spell. These are they which have carried the venefice, obedient to the +command of the master of black magic, Canon Docre!'</p> + +<p>"I was sitting beside the altar. Dr. Johannès placed his left hand on my +head and raising toward heaven his right he besought the Archangel +Michael to assist him, and adjured the glorious legions of the +invincible seraphim to dominate, to enchain, the spirits of Evil.</p> + +<p>"I was already feeling greatly relieved. The sensation of internal +gnawing which tortured me in Paris was diminishing. Dr. Johannès +continued to recite his orisons, then when the moment came for the +deprecatory prayer, he took my hand, laid it on the altar, and three +times chanted:</p> + +<p>"'May the projects and the designs of the worker of iniquity, who has +made enchantment against you, be brought to naught; may any influence +obtained by Satanic means, any attack directed against you, be null and +void of effect; may all the maledictions of your enemy be transformed +into benedictions from the highest summits of the eternal hills; may his +fluids of death be transmuted into ferments of life; finally, may the +Archangels of Judgment and Chastisement decide the fate of the miserable +priest who has put his trust in the works of Darkness and Evil.'</p> + +<p>"'You,' he said to me, 'are delivered. Heaven has cured you. May your +heart therefore repay the living God and Jesus Christ, through the +glorious Mary, with the most ardent devotion.'</p> + +<p>"He offered me unleavened bread and wine. I was saved. You who are a +physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, can bear witness that human science was +impotent to aid me—and now look at me!"<!-- Page 254 --></p> + +<p>"Yes," Des Hermies replied, "without discussing the means, I certify the +cure, and, I admit, it is not the first time that to my knowledge +similar results have been obtained.—No thanks," to Mme. Carhaix, who +was inviting him to take another helping from a plate of sausages with +horseradish in creamed peas. "But," said Durtal, "permit me to ask you +several questions. Certain details interest me. What were the sacerdotal +ornaments of Dr. Johannès?"</p> + +<p>"His costume was a long robe of vermilion cashmere caught up at the +waist by a red and white sash. Above this robe he had a white mantle of +the same stuff, cut, over the chest, in the form of a cross upside +down."</p> + +<p>"Cross upside down?"</p> + +<p>"Yes, this cross, reversed like the figure of the Hanged Man in the +old-fashioned Tarot card deck, signifies that the priest Melchisedek +must die in the Old Man—that is, man affected by original sin—and live +again the Christ, to be powerful with the power of the Incarnate Word +which died for us."</p> + +<p>Carhaix seemed ill at ease. His fanatical and suspicious Catholicism +refused to countenance any save the prescribed ceremonies. He made no +further contribution to the conversation, and in significant silence +filled the glasses, seasoned the salad, and passed the plates.</p> + +<p>"What sort of a ring was that you spoke of?"</p> + +<p>"It is a symbolic ring of pure gold. It has the image of a serpent, +whose head, in relief, set with a ruby, is connected by a fine chain +with a tiny circlet which fastens the jaws of the reptile."</p> + +<p>"What I should like awfully to know is the origin and the aim of this +sacrifice. What has Melchisedek to do with your affair?"</p> + +<p>"Ah," said the astrologer, "Melchisedek is one of the most mysterious of +all the figures in the Holy Bible. He was king of Salem, sacrificer to +the Most High God. He blessed Abraham and Abraham gave him tithes of the +spoil <!-- Page 255 -->of the vanquished kings of Sodom and Gomorrah. That is the story +in Genesis 14:18-20. But Saint Paul cites him also, in Hebrews 7, and in +the third verse of that chapter says that Melchisedek, 'without father, +without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of day, nor +end of life, but made like unto the Son of God, abideth, a priest +continually.' In Hebrews 5:6 Paul, quoting Psalm 110:4, says Jesus is +called 'a priest forever after the order of Melchisedek.'</p> + +<p>"All this, you see, is obscure enough. Some exegetes recognize in him +the prophetic figure of the Saviour, others, that of Saint Joseph, and +all admit that the sacrifice of Melchisedek offering to Abraham the +blood and wine of which he had first made oblation to the Lord +prefigures, to follow the expression of Isidore of Damietta, the +archetype of the divine mysteries, otherwise known as the holy mass."</p> + +<p>"Very well," said Des Hermies, "but all that Scripture does not explain +the alexipharmacal virtues which Dr. Johannès attributes to the +sacrifice."</p> + +<p>"You are asking more than I can answer. Only Dr. Johannès could tell +you. This much I can say. Theology teaches us that the mass, as it is +celebrated, is the re-enaction of the Sacrifice of Calvary, but the +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek is not that. It is, in some sort, +the future mass, the glorious office which will be known during the +earthly reign of the divine Paraclete. This sacrifice is offered to God +by man regenerated, redeemed by the infusion of the Love of the Holy +Ghost. Now, the hominal being whose heart has thus been purified and +sanctified is invincible, and the enchantments of hell cannot prevail +against him if he makes use of this sacrifice to dissipate the Spirits +of Evil. That explains to you the potency of Dr. Johannès, whose heart +unites, in this ceremony, with the divine heart of Jesus."</p> + +<p>"Your exposition is not very clear," Carhaix mildly objected.<!-- Page 256 --></p> + +<p>"Then it must be supposed that Johannès is a man amended ahead of time, +an apostle animated by the Holy Ghost?"</p> + +<p>"And so he is," said the astrologer, firmly assured.</p> + +<p>"Will you please pass the gingerbread?" Carhaix requested.</p> + +<p>"Here's the way to fix it," said Durtal. "First cut a slice very thin, +then take a slice of ordinary bread, equally thin, butter them and put +them together. Now tell me if this sandwich hasn't the exquisite taste +of fresh walnuts."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Des Hermies, pursuing his cross-examination, "aside from +that, what has Dr. Johannès been doing in this long time since I last +saw him?"</p> + +<p>"He leads what ought to be a peaceful life. He lives with friends who +revere and adore him. With them he rests from the tribulations of all +sorts—save one—that he has been subjected to. He would be perfectly +happy if he did not have to repulse the attacks launched at him almost +daily by the tonsured magicians of Rome."</p> + +<p>"Why do they attack him?"</p> + +<p>"A thorough explanation would take a long time. Johannès is commissioned +by Heaven to break up the venomous practises of Satanism and to preach +the coming of the glorified Christ and the divine Paraclete. Now the +diabolical Curia which holds the Vatican in its clutches has every +reason of self-interest for putting out of the way a man whose prayers +fetter their conjurements and neutralize their spells."</p> + +<p>"Ah!" exclaimed Durtal, "and would it be too much to ask you how this +former priest foresees and checks these astonishing assaults?"</p> + +<p>"No indeed. The doctor can tell by the flight and cry of certain birds. +Falcons and male sparrow-hawks are his sentinels. If they fly toward him +or away from him, to East or West, whether they emit a single cry or +many; these are omens, letting him know the hour of the combat so that +he can be on guard. Thus he told me one day, the <!-- Page 257 -->sparrow-hawks are +easily influenced by the spirits, and he uses them as the hypnotist +makes use of somnambulism, as the spiritist makes use of tables and +slates."</p> + +<p>"They are the telegraph wires for magic despatches."</p> + +<p>"Yes. And of course you know that the method is not new. Indeed, its +origin is lost in the darkness of the ages. Ornithomancy is world-old. +One finds traces of it in the Holy Bible, and the Zohar asserts that one +may receive numerous notifications if one knows how to observe the +flight and distinguish the cries of birds."</p> + +<p>"But," said Durtal, "why is the sparrow-hawk chosen in preference to +other birds?"</p> + +<p>"Well, it has always been, since remotest antiquity, the harbinger of +charms. In Egypt the god with the head of a hawk was the one who +possessed the science of the hieroglyphics. Formerly in that country the +hierogrammatists swallowed the heart and blood of the hawk to prepare +themselves for the magic rites. Even today African chiefs put a hawk +feather in their hair, and this bird is sacred in India."</p> + +<p>"How does your friend go about it," asked Mme. Carhaix, "raising and +housing birds of prey?—because that is what they are."</p> + +<p>"He does not raise them nor house them. They nest in the high bluffs +along the Saône, near Lyons. They come and see him in time of need."</p> + +<p>Durtal, looking around this cozy dining-room and recalling the +extraordinary conversations which had been held here, was thinking, "How +far we are from the language and the ideas of modern times.—All that +takes us back to the Middle Ages," he said, finishing his thought aloud.</p> + +<p>"Happily!" exclaimed Carhaix, who was rising to go and ring his bells.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Des Hermies, "and what is mighty strange in this day of +crass materialism is the idea of battles fought in space, over the +cities, between a priest of Lyons and prelates of Rome."<!-- Page 258 --></p> + +<p>"And between this priest and the Rosicrusians and Canon Docre."</p> + +<p>Durtal remembered that Mme. Chantelouve had assured him that the chiefs +of the Rosicrucians were making frantic efforts to establish connections +with the devil and prepare spells.</p> + +<p>"You think that the Rosicrucians are satanizing?"</p> + +<p>"They would like to, but they don't know how. They are limited to +reproducing, mechanically, the few fluidic and veniniferous operations +revealed to them by the three brahmins who visited Paris a few years +ago."</p> + +<p>"I am thankful, myself," said Mme. Carhaix, as she took leave of the +company, "that I am not mixed up in any of this frightful business, and +that I can pray and live in peace."</p> + +<p>Then while Des Hermies, as usual, prepared the coffee and Durtal brought +the liqueur glasses, Gévingey filled his pipe, and when the sound of the +bells died away—dispersed and as if absorbed by the pores of the +wall—he blew out a great cloud of smoke and said, "I passed some +delightful days with the family with whom Dr. Johannès is living. After +the shocks which I had received, it was a privilege without equal to +complete my convalescence in that sweet atmosphere of Christian Love. +And, too, Johannès is of all men I have ever met the most learned in the +occult sciences. No one, except his antithesis, the abominable Docre, +has penetrated so far into the arcana of Satanism. One may even say that +in France these two are the only ones who have crossed the terrestrial +threshold and obtained, each in his field, sure results. But in addition +to the charm of his conversation and the scope of his knowledge—for +even on the subject in which I excel, that of astrology, he surprised +me—Johannès delighted me with the beauty of his vision of the future +transformation of peoples. He is really, I swear, the prophet whose +earthly mission of suffering and glory has been authorized by the Most +High."</p> + +<p>"I don't doubt it," said Durtal, smiling, "but his theory <!-- Page 259 -->of the +Paraclete is, if I am not mistaken, the very ancient heresy of Montanus +which the Church has formally condemned."</p> + +<p>"All depends on the manner in which the coming of the Paraclete is +conceived," interjected the bell-ringer, returning at that moment. "It +is also the orthodox doctrine of Saint Irenæus, Saint Justin, Scotus +Erigena, Amaury of Chartres, Saint Doucine, and that admirable mystic, +Joachim of Floris. This was the belief throughout the Middle Ages, and I +admit that it obsesses me and fills me with joy, that it responds to the +most ardent of my yearnings. Indeed," he said, sitting down and crossing +his legs, "if the third kingdom is an illusion, what consolation is left +for Christians in face of the general disintegration of a world which +charity requires us not to hate?"</p> + +<p>"I am furthermore obliged to admit," said Des Hermies, "that in spite of +the blood shed on Golgotha, I personally feel as if my ransom had not +been quite effected."</p> + +<p>"There are three kingdoms," the astrologer resumed, pressing down the +ashes of his pipe with his finger. "Of the Old Testament, that of the +Father, the kingdom of fear. Of the New Testament, that of the Son, the +kingdom of expiation. Of the Johannite Gospel, that of the Holy Ghost, +the kingdom of redemption and love. They are the past, present and +future; winter, spring and summer. The first, says Joachim of Floris, +gives us the blade, the second, the leaf, and the third, the ear. Two of +the Persons of the Trinity have shown themselves. Logically the Third +must appear."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and the Biblical texts abound, conclusive, explicit, irrefutable," +said Carhaix. "All the prophets, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Zachariah, +Malachi, speak of it. The Acts of the Apostles is very precise on this +point. In the first chapter you will read these lines, 'This same Jesus, +which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as +ye have seen him go into heaven.' Saint John <!-- Page 260 -->also announces the tidings +in the Apocalypse, which is the gospel of the second coming of Christ, +'Christ shall come and reign a thousand years.' Saint Paul is +inexhaustible in revelations of this nature. In the epistle to Timothy +he invokes the Lord 'who shall judge the quick and the dead at his +appearance and his kingdom.' In the second epistle to the Thessalonians +he writes, 'And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall +consume with the Spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the +brightness of his coming.' Now, he declares that the Antichrist is not +yet, so the coming which he prophesies is not that already realized by +the birth of the Saviour at Bethlehem. In the Gospel according to Saint +Matthew, Jesus responds to Caiaphas, who asks Him if He is the Christ, +Son of God, 'Thou hast said, and nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter +shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power and +coming in the clouds of heaven.' And in another verse He says to His +apostles, 'Watch, therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth +come.'</p> + +<p>"And there are other texts I could put my finger on. No, there is no use +in talking, the partisans of the glorious kingdom are supported with +certitude by inspired passages, and can, under certain conditions and +without fear of heresy, uphold this doctrine, which, Saint Jerome +attests, was in the fourth century a dogma of faith recognized by all. +But what say we taste a bit of this crême de céléri which Monsieur +Durtal praises so highly?"</p> + +<p>It was a thick liqueur, sirupy like anisette, but even sweeter and more +feminine, only, when one had swallowed this inert semi-liquid, there +lingered in the roots of the papillæ a faint taste of celery.</p> + +<p>"It isn't bad," said the astrologer, "but there's no life to it," and he +poured into his glass a stiff tot of rum.</p> + +<p>"Come to think of it," said Durtal, "the third kingdom is also announced +in the words of the Paternoster, 'Thy kingdom come.'"</p> + +<p>"Certainly," said the bell-ringer.<!-- Page 261 --></p> + +<p>"But you see," interjected Gévingey, "heresy would gain the upper hand +and the whole belief would be turned into nonsense and absurdity if we +admitted, as certain Paracletists do, an authentic fleshly incarnation. +For instance, remember Fareinism, which has been rife, since the +eighteenth century, in Fareins, a village of the Doubs, where Jansenism +took refuge when driven out of Paris after the closing of the cemetery +of Saint Médard. There a priest, François Bonjour, reproduced the +'convulsionist' orgies which, under the Regency, desecrated the tomb of +Deacon Paris. Then Bonjour had an affair with a woman and she claimed to +be big with the prophet Elijah, who, according to the Apocalypse, is to +precede the last arrival of Christ. This child came into the world, then +there was a second who was none other than the Paraclete. The latter did +business as a woolen merchant in Paris, was a colonel in the National +Guard under Louis-Philippe, and died in easy circumstances in 1866. A +tradesman Paraclete, a Redeemer with epaulettes and gold braid!</p> + +<p>"In 1886 one Dame Brochard of Vouvray affirmed to whoever would listen +that Jesus was reincarnate in her. In 1889 a pious madman named David +published at Angers a brochure entitled <i>The Voice of God</i>, in which he +assumed the modest appellation of 'only Messiah of the Creator Holy +Ghost,' and informed the world that he was a sewer contractor and wore a +beard a yard and a half long. At the present moment his throne is not +empty for want of successors. An engineer named Pierre Jean rode all +over the Mediterranean provinces on horseback announcing that he was the +Holy Ghost. In Paris, Bérard, an omnibus conductor on the +Panthéon-Courcelles line, likewise asserts that he incorporates the +Paraclete, while a magazine article avers that the hope of Redemption +has dawned in the person of the poet Jhouney. Finally, in America, from +time to time, women claim to be Messiahs, and they recruit adherents +among persons worked up to fever pitch by Advent revivals."</p> + +<p>"They are no worse than the people who deny God and<!-- Page 262 --> Creation," said +Carhaix. "God is immanent in His creatures. He is their Life principle, +the source of movement, the foundation of existence, says Saint Paul. He +has His personal existence, being the 'I AM,' as Moses says.</p> + +<p>"The Holy Ghost, through Christ in glory, will be immanent in all +beings. He will be the principle which transforms and regenerates them, +but there is no need for him to be incarnate. The Holy Ghost proceeds +from the Father through the Son. He is sent to act, not to materialize +himself. It is downright madness to maintain the contrary, thus falling +into the heresies of the Gnostics and the Fratricelli, into the errors +of Dulcin de Novare and his wife Marguerite, into the filth of abbé +Beccarelli, and the abominations of Segarelli of Parma, who, on pretext +of becoming a child the better to symbolize the simple, naïf love of the +Paraclete, had himself diapered and slept on the breast of a nurse."</p> + +<p>"But," said Durtal, "you haven't made yourself quite clear to me. If I +understand you, the Holy Ghost will act by an infusion into us. He will +transmute us, renovate our souls by a sort of 'passive purgation'—to +drop into the theological vernacular."</p> + +<p>"Yes, he will purify us soul and body."</p> + +<p>"How will he purify our bodies?"</p> + +<p>"The action of the Paraclete," the astrologer struck in, "will extend to +the principle of generation. The divine life will sanctify the organs +which henceforth can procreate only elect creatures, exempt from +original sin, creatures whom it will not be necessary to test in the +fires of humiliation, as the Holy Bible says. This was the doctrine of +the prophet Vintras, that extraordinary unlettered man who wrote such +impressive and ardent pages. The doctrine has been continued and +amplified, since Vintras's death, by his successor, Dr. Johannès."</p> + +<p>"Then there is to be Paradise on earth," said Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"Yes, the kingdom of liberty, goodness, and love."</p> + +<p>"You've got me all mixed up," said Durtal. "Now you <!-- Page 263 -->announce the +arrival of the Holy Ghost, now the glorious advent of Christ. Are these +kingdoms identical or is one to follow the other?"</p> + +<p>"There is a distinction," answered Gévingey, "between the coming of the +Paraclete and the victorious return of Christ. They occur in the order +named. First a society must be recreated, embraced by the third +Hypostasis, by Love, in order that Jesus may descend, as He has +promised, from the clouds and reign over the people formed in His +image."</p> + +<p>"What rôle is the Pope to play?"</p> + +<p>"Ah, that is one of the most curious points of the Johannite doctrine. +Time, since the first appearance of the Messiah, is divided, as you +know, into two periods, the period of the Victim, of the expiant +Saviour, the period in which we now are, and the other, that which we +await, the period of Christ bathed in the spittle of mockery but radiant +with the superadorable splendour of His person. Well, there is a +different pope for each of these eras. The Scriptures announce these two +sovereign pontificates—and so do my horoscopes, for that matter.</p> + +<p>"It is an axiom of theology that the spirit of Peter lives in his +successors. It will live in them, more or less hidden, until the +longed-for expansion of the Holy Ghost. Then John, who has been held in +reserve, as the Gospel says, will begin his ministry of love and will +live in the souls of the new popes."</p> + +<p>"I don't understand the utility of a pope when Jesus is to be visible," +said Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"To tell the truth, there is no use in having one, and the papacy is to +exist only during the epoch reserved for the effluence of the divine +Paraclete. The day on which, in a shower of meteors, Jesus appears, the +pontificate of Rome ceases."</p> + +<p>"Without going more deeply into questions which we could discuss the +rest of our lives," said Durtal, "I marvel at the placidity of the +Utopian who imagines that man is <!-- Page 264 -->perfectible. There is no denying that +the human creature is born selfish, abusive, vile. Just look around you +and see. Society cynical and ferocious, the humble heckled and pillaged +by the rich traffickers in necessities. Everywhere the triumph of the +mediocre and unscrupulous, everywhere the apotheosis of crooked politics +and finance. And you think you can make any progress against a stream +like that? No, man has never changed. His soul was corrupt in the days +of Genesis and is not less rotten at present. Only the form of his sins +varies. Progress is the hypocrisy which refines the vices."</p> + +<p>"All the more reason," Carhaix rejoined, "why society—if it is as you +have described it—should fall to pieces. I, too, think it is putrefied, +its bones ulcerated, its flesh dropping off. It can neither be poulticed +nor cured, it must be interred and a new one born. And who but God can +accomplish such a miracle?"</p> + +<p>"If we admit," said Des Hermies, "that the infamousness of the times is +transitory, it is self-evident that only the intervention of a God can +wash it away; for neither socialism nor any other chimera of the +ignorant and hate-filled workers will modify human nature and reform the +peoples. These tasks are above human forces."</p> + +<p>"And the time awaited by Johannès is at hand," Gévingey proclaimed. +"Here are some of the manifest proofs. Raymond Lully asserted that the +end of the old world would be announced by the diffusion of the +doctrines of Antichrist. He defined these doctrines. They are +materialism and the monstrous revival of magic. This prediction applies +to our age, I think. On the other hand, the good tidings was to be +realized, according to Our Lord, as reported by Saint Matthew, 'When ye +shall see the abomination of desolation ... stand in the holy place.' +And isn't it standing in the holy place now? Look at our timorous, +skeptical Pope, lukewarm and politic, our episcopate of simonists and +cowards, our flabby, indulgent clergy. See how they are ravaged by +Satanism, then tell me if the Church can fall any lower."<!-- Page 265 --></p> + +<p>"The promises are explicit and cannot fail," and with his elbows on the +table, his chin in his hands, and his eyes to heaven, the bell-ringer +murmured, "Our father—thy kingdom come!"</p> + +<p>"It's getting late," said Des Hermies, "time we were going."</p> + +<p>While they were putting on their coats, Carhaix questioned Durtal. "What +do you hope for if you have no faith in the coming of Christ?"</p> + +<p>"I hope for nothing at all."</p> + +<p>"I pity you. Really, you believe in no future amelioration?"</p> + +<p>"I believe, alas, that a dotard Heaven maunders over an exhausted +Earth."</p> + +<p>The bell-ringer raised his hands and sadly shook his head.</p> + +<p>When they had left Gévingey, Des Hermies, after walking in silence for +some time, said, "You are not astonished that all the events spoken of +tonight happened at Lyons." And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, he +continued, "You see I am well acquainted with Lyons. People's brains +there are as foggy as the streets when the morning mists roll up from +the Rhone. That city looks magnificent to travellers who like the long +avenues, wide boulevards, green grass, and penitentiary architecture of +modern cities. But Lyons is also the refuge of mysticism, the haven of +preternatural ideas and doubtful creeds. That's where Vintras died, the +one in whom, it seems, the soul of the prophet Elijah was incarnate. +That's where Naundorff found his last partisans. That is where +enchantment is rampant, because in the suburb of La Guillotière you can +have a person bewitched for a louis. Add that it is likewise, in spite +of its swarms of radicals and anarchists, an opulent market for a dour +Protestant Catholicism; a Jansenist factory, richly productive of +bourgeois bigotry.</p> + +<p>"Lyons is celebrated for delicatessen, silk, and churches. At the top of +every hill—and there's a hill every block—is a chapel or a convent, +and Notre Dame de Fourvière domi<!-- Page 266 -->nates them all. From a distance this +pile looks like an eighteenth century dresser turned upside down, but +the interior, which is in process of completion, is amazing. You ought +to go and take a look at it some day. You will see the most +extraordinary jumble of Assyrian, Roman, Gothic, and God knows what, +jacked together by Bossan, the only architect for a century who has +known how to create a cathedral interior. The nave glitters with inlays +and marble, with bronze and gold. Statues of angels diversify the rows +of columns and break up, with impressive grace, the known harmonies of +line. It's Asiatic and barbarous, and reminds one of the architecture +shown in Gustave Moreau's Hérodiade.</p> + +<p>"And there is an endless stream of pilgrims. They strike bargains with +Our Lady. They pray for an extension of markets, new outlets for +sausages and silks. They consult her on ways and means of getting rid of +spoiled vegetables and pushing off their shoddy. In the centre of the +city, in the church of Saint Boniface, I found a placard requesting the +faithful, out of respect for the holy place, not to give alms. It was +not seemly, you see, that the commercial orisons be disturbed by the +ridiculous plaints of the indigent."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Durtal, "it's a strange thing, but democracy is the most +implacable of the enemies of the poor. The Revolution, which, you would +think, ought to have protected them, proved for them the most cruel of +régimes. I will show you some day a decree of the Year II, pronouncing +penalties not only for those who begged but for those who gave."</p> + +<p>"And yet democracy is the panacea which is going to cure every ill," +said Des Hermies, laughing. And he pointed to enormous posters +everywhere in which General Boulanger peremptorily demanded that the +people of Paris vote for him in the coming election.</p> + +<p>Durtal shrugged his shoulders. "Quite true. The people are very sick. +Carhaix and Gévingey are perhaps right in maintaining that no human +agency is powerful enough to effect a cure."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XXI"><!-- Page 267 -->CHAPTER XXI</a></h2> + + +<p>Durtal had resolved not to answer Mme. Chantelouve's letters. Every day, +since their rupture, she had sent him an inflamed missive, but, as he +soon noticed, her Mænad cries were subsiding into plaints and +reproaches. She now accused him of ingratitude, and repented having +listened to him and having permitted him to participate in sacrileges +for which she would have to answer before the heavenly tribunal. She +pleaded to see him once more. Then she was silent for a while week. +Finally, tired, no doubt, of writing unanswered letters, she admitted, +in a last epistle, that all was over.</p> + +<p>After agreeing with him that their temperaments were incompatible, she +ended:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"Thanks for the trig little love, ruled like music-paper, that + you gave me. My heart cannot be so straitly measured, it + requires more latitude—" </p></div> + +<p>"Her heart!" he laughed, then he continued to read:</p> + +<div class="blockquot"><p>"I understand that it is not your earthly mission to satisfy my + heart but you might at least have conceded me a frank + comradeship which would have permitted me to leave my sex at + home and to come and spend an evening with you now and then. + This, seemingly, so simple, you have rendered impossible. + Farewell forever. I have only to renew my pact with Solitude, to + which I have tried to be unfaithful—" </p></div> + +<p>"With solitude! and that complaisant and paternal cuckold, her husband! +Well, he is the one most to be pitied now. Thanks to me, he had evenings +of quiet. I restored his wife, <!-- Page 268 -->pliant and satisfied. He profited by my +fatigues, that sacristan. Ah, when I think of it, his sly, hypocritical +eyes, when he looked at me, told me a great deal.</p> + +<p>"Well, the little romance is over. It's a good thing to have your heart +on strike. In my brain I still have a house of ill fame, which sometimes +catches fire, but the hired myrmidons will stamp out the blaze in a +hurry.</p> + +<p>"When I was young and ardent the women laughed at me. Now that I am old +and stale I laugh at them. That's more in my character, old fellow," he +said to the cat, which, with ears pricked up, was listening to the +soliloquy. "Truly, Gilles de Rais is a great deal more interesting than +Mme. Chantelouve. Unfortunately, my relations with him are also drawing +to a close. Only a few more pages and the book is done. Oh, Lord! Here +comes Rateau to knock my house to pieces."</p> + +<p>Sure enough, the concierge entered, made an excuse for being late, took +off his vest, and cast a look of defiance at the furniture. Then he +hurled himself at the bed, grappled with the mattress, got a half-Nelson +on it, and balancing himself, turning half around, hurled it onto the +springs.</p> + +<p>Durtal, followed by his cat, went into the other room, but suddenly +Rateau ceased wrestling and came and stood before Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Monsieur, do you know what has happened?" he blubbered.</p> + +<p>"Why, no."</p> + +<p>"My wife has left me."</p> + +<p>"Left you! but she must be over sixty."</p> + +<p>Rateau raised his eyes to heaven.</p> + +<p>"And she ran off with another man?"</p> + +<p>Rateau, disconsolate, let the feather duster fall from his listless +hand.</p> + +<p>"The devil! Then, in spite of her age, your wife had needs which you +were unable to satisfy?"</p> + +<p>The concierge shook his head and finally succeeded in saying, "It was +the other way around."<!-- Page 269 --></p> + +<p>"Oh," said Durtal, considering the old caricature, shrivelled by bad air +and "three-six," "but if she is tired of that sort of thing, why did she +run off with a man?"</p> + +<p>Rateau made a grimace of pitying contempt, "Oh, he's impotent. Good for +nothing—"</p> + +<p>"Ah!"</p> + +<p>"It's my job I'm sore about. The landlord won't keep a concierge that +hasn't a wife."</p> + +<p>"Dear Lord," thought Durtal, "how hast thou answered my prayers!—Come +on, let's go over to your place," he said to Des Hermies, who, finding +Rateau's key in the door, had walked in.</p> + +<p>"Righto! since your housecleaning isn't done yet, descend like a god +from your clouds of dust, and come on over to the house."</p> + +<p>On the way Durtal recounted his concierge's conjugal misadventure.</p> + +<p>"Oh!" said Des Hermies, "many a woman would be happy to wreathe with +laurel the occiput of so combustible a sexagenarian.—Look at that! +Isn't it revolting?" pointing to the walls covered with posters.</p> + +<p>It was a veritable debauch of placards. Everywhere on lurid coloured +paper in box car letters were the names of Boulanger and Jacques.</p> + +<p>"Thank God, this will be over tomorrow."</p> + +<p>"There is one resource left," said Des Hermies. "To escape the horrors +of present day life never raise your eyes. Look down at the sidewalk +always, preserving the attitude of timid modesty. When you look only at +the pavement you see the reflections of the sky signs in all sorts of +fantastic shapes; alchemic symbols, talismanic characters, bizarre +pantacles with suns, hammers, and anchors, and you can imagine yourself +right in the midst of the Middle Ages."</p> + +<p>"Yes, but to keep from seeing the disenchanting crowd you would have to +wear a long-vizored cap like a jockey and blinkers like a horse."</p> + +<p>Des Hermies sighed. "Come in," he said, opening the <!-- Page 270 -->door. They went in +and sitting down in easy chairs they lighted their cigarettes.</p> + +<p>"I haven't got over that conversation we had with Gévingey the other +night at Carhaix's," said Durtal. "Strange man, that Dr. Johannès. I +can't keep from thinking about him. Look here, do you sincerely believe +in his miraculous cures?"</p> + +<p>"I am obliged to. I didn't tell you all about him, for a physician can't +lightly make these dangerous admissions. But you may as well know that +this priest heals hopeless cases.</p> + +<p>"I got acquainted with him when he was still a member of the Parisian +clergy. It came about by one of those miracles of his which I don't +pretend to understand.</p> + +<p>"My mother's maid had a granddaughter who was paralyzed in her arms and +legs and suffered death and destruction in her chest and howled when you +touched her there. She had been in this condition two years. It had come +on in one night, how produced nobody knows. She was sent away from the +Lyons hospitals as incurable. She came to Paris, underwent treatment at +La Salpêtrière, and was discharged when nobody could find out what was +the matter with her nor what medication would give her any relief. One +day she spoke to me of this abbé Johannès, who, she said, had cured +persons in as bad shape as she. I did not believe a word, but hearing +that the priest refused to take any money for his services I did not +dissuade her from visiting him, and out of curiosity I went along.</p> + +<p>"They placed her in a chair. The ecclesiastic, little, active, +energetic, took her hand and applied to it, one after the other, three +precious stones. Then he said coolly, 'Mademoiselle, you are the victim +of consanguineal sorcery.'</p> + +<p>"I could hardly keep from laughing.</p> + +<p>"'Remember,' he said, 'two years back, for that is when your paralytic +stroke came on. You must have had a quarrel with a kinsman or +kinswoman?'</p> + +<p>"It was true. Poor Marie had been unjustly accused of <!-- Page 271 -->the theft of a +watch which was an heirloom belonging to an aunt of hers. The aunt had +sworn vengeance.</p> + +<p>"'Your aunt lives in Lyons?'</p> + +<p>"She nodded.</p> + +<p>"'Nothing astonishing about that,' continued the priest. 'In Lyons, +among the lower orders, there are witch doctors who know a little about +the witchcraft practised in the country. But be reassured. These people +are not powerful. They know little more than the A B C's of the art. +Then, mademoiselle, you wish to be cured?'</p> + +<p>"And after she replied that she did, he said gently, 'That is all. You +may go.'</p> + +<p>"He did not touch her, did not prescribe any remedy. I came away +persuaded that he was a mountebank. But when, three days later, the girl +was able to raise her arms, and all her pain had left her, and when, at +the end of a week, she could walk, I had to yield in face of the +evidence. I went back to see him, had occasion to do him a service; and +thus our relations began."</p> + +<p>"But what are his methods?"</p> + +<p>"He opens, like the curate of Ars, with prayer. Then he evokes the +militant archangels, then he breaks the magic circles and +chases—'classes,' as he says—the spirits of Evil. I know very well +that this is confounding. Whenever I speak of this man's potency to my +confrères they smile with a superior air or serve up to me the specious +arguments which they have fabricated to explain the cures wrought by +Christ and the Virgin. The method they have imagined consists in +striking the patient's imagination, suggesting to him the will to be +cured, persuading him that he is well, hypnotizing him in a waking +state—so to speak. This done—say they—the twisted legs straighten, +the sores disappear, the consumption-torn lungs are patched up, the +cancers become benign pimples, and the blind eyes see. This procedure +they attribute to miracle workers to explain away the supernatural—why +don't they use the method themselves if it is so simple?"</p> + +<p>"But haven't they tried?"<!-- Page 272 --></p> + +<p>"After a fashion. I was present myself at an experiment attempted by Dr. +Luys. Ah, it was inspiring! At the charity hospital there was a poor +girl paralyzed in both legs. She was put to sleep and commanded to rise. +She struggled in vain. Then two interns held her up in a standing +posture, but her lifeless legs bent useless under her weight. Need I +tell you that she could not walk, and that after they had held her up +and pushed her along a few steps, they put her to bed again, having +obtained no result whatever."</p> + +<p>"But Dr. Johannès does not cure all sufferers, without discrimination?"</p> + +<p>"No. He will not meddle with any ailments which are not the result of +spells. He says he can do nothing with natural ills, which are the +province of the physician. He is a specialist in Satanic affections. He +has most to do with the possessed whose neuroses have proved obdurate to +hydrotherapeutic treatment."</p> + +<p>"What does he do with the precious stones you mentioned?"</p> + +<p>"First, before answering your question, I must explain the significance +and virtue of these stones. I shall be telling you nothing new when I +say that Aristotle, Pliny, all the sages of antiquity, attributed +medical and divine virtues to them. According to the pagans, agate and +carnelian stimulate, topaz consoles, jasper cures languor, hyacinth +drives away insomnia, turquoise prevents falls or lightens the shock, +amethyst combats drunkenness.</p> + +<p>"Catholic symbolism, in its turn, takes over the precious stones and +sees in them emblems of the Christian virtues. Then, sapphire represents +the lofty aspirations of the soul, chalcedony charity, sard and onyx +candor, beryl allegorizes theological science, hyacinth humility, while +the ruby appeases wrath, and emerald 'lapidifies' incorruptible faith.</p> + +<p>"Now in magic," Des Hermies rose and took from a shelf a very small +volume bound like a prayer book. He showed Durtal the title: <i>Natural +magic, or: The secrets and miracles of nature, in four volumes, by +Giambattista Porta of Naples.<!-- Page 273 --> Paris. Nicolas Bonjour, rue Neuve Nostre +Dame at the sign Saint Nicolas</i>. 1584.</p> + +<p>"Natural magic," said Des Hermies, "which was merely the medicine of the +time, ascribes a new meaning to gems. Listen to this. After first +celebrating an unknown stone, the Alectorius, which renders its +possessor invincible if it has been taken out of the stomach of a cock +caponized four years before or if it has been ripped out of the +ventricle of a hen, Porta informs us that chalcedony wins law suits, +that carnelian stops bloody flux 'and is exceeding useful to women who +are sick of their flower,' that hyacinth protects against lightning and +keeps away pestilence and poison, that topaz quells 'lunatic' passions, +that turquoise is of advantage against melancholy, quartan fever, and +heart failure. He attests finally that sapphire preserves courage and +keeps the members vigorous, while emerald, hung about one's neck, keeps +away Saint John's evil and breaks when the wearer is unchaste.</p> + +<p>"You see, antique philosophy, mediæval Christianity, and sixteenth +century magic do not agree on the specific virtues of every stone. +Almost in every case the significations, more or less far-fetched, +differ. Dr. Johannès has revised these beliefs, adopted and rejected +great numbers of them, finally he has, on his own authority, admitted +new acceptations. According to him, amethyst does cure drunkenness; but +moral drunkenness, pride; ruby relieves sex pressure; beryl fortifies +the will; sapphire elevates the thoughts and turns them toward God.</p> + +<p>"In brief, he believes that every stone corresponds to a species of +malady, and also to a class of sins; and he affirms that when we have +chemically got possession of the active principle of gems we shall have +not only antidotes but preventatives. While waiting for this chimerical +dream to be realized and for our medicine to become the mock of lapidary +chemists, he uses precious stones to formulate diagnoses of illnesses +produced by sorcery."</p> + +<p>"How?"<!-- Page 274 --></p> + +<p>"He claims that when such or such a stone is placed in the hand or on +the affected part of the bewitched a fluid escapes from the stone into +his hands, and that by examining this fluid he can tell what is the +matter. In this connection he told me that a woman whom he did not know +came to him one day to consult him about a malady, pronounced incurable, +from which she had suffered since childhood. He could not get any +precise answers to his questions. He saw no signs of venefice. After +trying out his whole array of stones he placed in her hand lapis lazuli, +which, he says, corresponds to the sin of incest. He examined the stone.</p> + +<p>"'Your malady,' he said, 'is the consequence of an act of incest.'</p> + +<p>"'Well,' she said, 'I did not come here to confessional,' but she +finally admitted that her father had violated her before she attained +the age of puberty.</p> + +<p>"That, of course, is against reason and contrary to all accepted ideas, +but there is no getting around the fact that this priest cures patients +whom we physicians have given up for lost."</p> + +<p>"Such as the only astrologer Paris now can boast, the astounding +Gévingey, who would have been dead without his aid. I wonder how +Gévingey came to cast the Empress Eugenie's horoscope."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I told you. Under the Empire the Tuileries was a hotbed of magic. +Home, the American, was revered as the equal of a god. In addition to +spiritualistic séances he evoked demons at court. One evocation had +fatal consequences. A certain marquis, whose wife had died, implored +Home to let him see her again. Home took him to a room, put him in bed, +and left him. What ensued? What dreadful phantom rose from the tomb? Was +the story of Ligeia re-enacted? At any rate, the marquis was found dead +at the foot of the bed. This story has recently been reported by Le +Figaro from unimpeachable documents.</p> + +<p>"You see it won't do to play with the world spirits of Evil.<!-- Page 275 --> I used to +know a rich bachelor who had a mania for the occult sciences. He was +president of a theosophic society and he even wrote a little book on the +esoteric doctrine, in the Isis series. Well, he could not, like the +Péladan and Papus tribe, be content with knowing nothing, so he went to +Scotland, where Diabolism is rampant. There he got in touch with the man +who, if you stake him, will initiate you into the Satanic arcana. My +friend made the experiment. Did he see him whom Bulwer Lytton in +<i>Zanoni</i> calls 'the dweller of the threshold'? I don't know, but certain +it is that he fainted from horror and returned to France exhausted, half +dead."</p> + +<p>"Evidently all is not rosy in that line of work," said Durtal. "But it +is only spirits of Evil that can be evoked?"</p> + +<p>"Do you suppose that the Angels, who, of earth, obey only the saints, +would ever consent to take orders from the first comer?"</p> + +<p>"But there must be an intermediate order of angels, who are neither +celestial nor infernal, who, for instance, commit the well-known +asininities in the spiritist séances."</p> + +<p>"A priest told me one day that the neuter larvæ inhabit an invisible, +neutral territory, something like a little island, which is beseiged on +all sides by the good and evil spirits. The larvæ cannot long hold out +and are soon forced into one or the other camp. Now, because it is these +larvæ they evoke, the occultists, who cannot, of course, draw down the +angels, always get the ones who have joined the party of Evil, so +unconsciously and probably involuntarily the spiritist is always +diabolizing."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and if one admits the disgusting idea that an imbecile medium can +bring back the dead, one must, in reason, recognize the stamp of Satan +on these practises."</p> + +<p>"However viewed, Spiritism is an abomination."</p> + +<p>"So you don't believe in theurgy, white magic?"</p> + +<p>"It's a joke. Only a Rosicrucian who wants to hide his more repulsive +essays at black magic ever hints at such a <!-- Page 276 -->thing. No one dare confess +that he satanizes. The Church, not duped by these hair-splitting +distinctions, condemns black and white magic indifferently."</p> + +<p>"Well," said Durtal, lighting a cigarette, after a silence, "this is a +better topic of conversation than politics or the races, but where does +it get us? Half of these doctrines are absurd, the other half so +mysterious as to produce only bewilderment. Shall we grant Satanism? +Well, gross as it is, it seems a sure thing. And if it is, and one is +consistent, one must also grant Catholicism—for Buddhism and the like +are not big enough to be substituted for the religion of Christ."</p> + +<p>"All right. Believe."</p> + +<p>"I can't. There are so many discouraging and revolting dogmas in +Christianity—"</p> + +<p>"I am uncertain about a good many things, myself," said Des Hermies, +"and yet there are moments when I feel that the obstacles are giving +way, that I almost believe. Of one thing I <i>am</i> sure. The supernatural +does exist, Christian or not. To deny it is to deny evidence—and who +wants to be a materialist, one of these silly freethinkers?"</p> + +<p>"It is mighty tiresome to be vacillating forever. How I envy Carhaix his +robust faith!"</p> + +<p>"You don't want much!" said Des Hermies. "Faith is the breakwater of the +soul, affording the only haven in which dismasted man can glide along in +peace."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;"> +<h2 style="padding-top: 4em;"><a id="CHAPTER_XXII"><!-- Page 277 -->CHAPTER XXII</a></h2> + + +<p>"You like that?" asked Mme. Carhaix. "For a change I served the broth +yesterday and kept the beef for tonight. So we'll have vermicelli soup, +a salad of cold meat with pickled herring and celery, some nice mashed +potatoes <i>au gratin</i>, and a dessert. And then you shall taste the new +cider we just got."</p> + +<p>"Oh!" and "Ah!" exclaimed Des Hermies and Durtal, who, while waiting for +dinner, were sipping the elixir of life. "Do you know, Mme. Carhaix, +your cooking tempts us to the sin of gluttony—If you keep on you will +make perfect pigs of us."</p> + +<p>"Oh, you are joking. I wonder what is keeping Louis."</p> + +<p>"Somebody is coming upstairs," said Durtal, hearing the creaking of +shoes in the tower.</p> + +<p>"No, it isn't his step," and she went and opened the door. "It's +Monsieur Gévingey."</p> + +<p>And indeed, clad in his blue cape, with his soft black hat on his head, +the astrologer entered, made a bow, like an actor taking a curtain call, +nibbed his great knuckles against his massive rings, and asked where the +bell-ringer was.</p> + +<p>"He is at the carpenter's. The oak beams holding up the big bell are +cracked and Louis is afraid they will break down."</p> + +<p>"Any news of the election?" and Gévingey took out his pipe and filled +it.</p> + +<p>"No. In this quarter we shan't know the results until nearly ten +o'clock. There's no doubt about the outcome, though, because Paris is +strong for this democratic stuff. General Boulanger will win hands +down."<!-- Page 278 --></p> + +<p>"This certainly is the age of universal imbecility."</p> + +<p>Carhaix entered and apologized for being so late. While his wife brought +in the soup he took off his goloshes and said, in answer to his friends' +questions, "Yes; the dampness had rusted the frets and warped the beams. +It was time for the carpenter to intervene. He finally promised that he +would be here tomorrow and bring his men without fail. Well, I am mighty +glad to get back. In the streets everything whirls in front of my eyes. +I am dizzy. I don't know what to do. The only places where I am at home +are the belfry and this room. Here, wife, let me do that," and he pushed +her aside and began to stir the salad.</p> + +<p>"How good it smells!" said Durtal, drinking in the incisive tang of the +herring. "Do you know what this perfume suggests? A basket funnelled +fireplace, twigs of juniper snapping in it, in a ground-floor room +opening on to a great harbour. It seems to me there is a sort of salt +water halo around these little rings of gold and rusted +iron.—Exquisite," he said as he tasted the salad.</p> + +<p>"We'll make it again for you, Monsieur Durtal," said Mme. Carhaix, "you +are not hard to please."</p> + +<p>"Alas!" said her husband, "his palate isn't, but his soul is. When I +think of his despairing aphorisms of the other night! However, we are +praying God to enlighten him. I'll tell you," he said to his wife, "we +will invoke Saint Nolasque and Saint Theodulus, who are always +represented with bells. They sort of belong to the family, and they will +certainly be glad to intercede for people who revere them and their +emblems."</p> + +<p>"It would take a stunning miracle to convince Durtal," said Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"Bells have been known to perform them," said the astrologer. "I +remember to have read, though I forget where, that angels tolled the +knell when Saint Isidro of Madrid was dying."</p> + +<p>"And there are many other cases," said Carhaix. "Of <!-- Page 279 -->their own accord +the bells chimed when Saint Sigisbert chanted the De Profundis over the +corpse of the martyr Placidus, and when the body of Saint Ennemond, +Bishop of Lyons, was thrown by his murderers into a boat without oars or +sails, the bells rang out, though nobody set them in motion, as the boat +passed down the Saône."</p> + +<p>"Do you know what I think?" asked Des Hermies, looking at Carhaix. "I +think you ought to prepare a compendium of hagiography or a really +informative work on heraldry."</p> + +<p>"What makes you think that?"</p> + +<p>"Well, you are, thank God, remote from this epoch and fond of things +which it knows nothing about or execrates, and a work of that kind would +take you still further away. My good friend, you are the man forever +unintelligible to the coming generations. To ring bells because you love +them, to give yourself over to the abandoned study of feudal art or +monasticism would make you complete—take you clear out of Paris, out of +the world, back into the Middle Ages."</p> + +<p>"Alas," said Carhaix, "I am only a poor ignorant man. But the type you +speak of does exist. In Switzerland, I believe, a bell-ringer has for +years been collecting material for a heraldic memorial. I should think," +he continued, laughing, "that his avocation would interfere with his +vocation."</p> + +<p>"And do you think," said Gévingey bitterly, "that the profession of +astrologer is less decried, less neglected?"</p> + +<p>"How do you like our cider?" asked the bell-ringer's wife. "Do you find +it a bit raw?"</p> + +<p>"No, it's tart if you sip it, but sweet if you take a good mouthful," +answered Durtal.</p> + +<p>"Wife, serve the potatoes. Don't wait for me. I delayed so long getting +my business done that it's time for the angelus. Don't bother about me. +Go on eating. I shall catch up with you when I get back."<!-- Page 280 --></p> + +<p>And as her husband lighted his lantern and left the room the woman +brought in on a plate what looked to be a cake covered with golden brown +caramel icing.</p> + +<p>"Mashed potatoes, I thought you said!"</p> + +<p>"<i>Au gratin</i>. Browned in the oven. Taste it. I put in everything that +ought to make it very good."</p> + +<p>All exclaimed over it.</p> + +<p>Then it became impossible to hear oneself. Tonight the bell boomed out +with unusual clarity and power. Durtal tried to analyze the sound which +seemed to rock the room. There was a sort of flux and reflux of sound. +First, the formidable shock of the clapper against the vase, then a sort +of crushing and scattering of the sounds as if ground fine with the +pestle, then a rounding of the reverberation; then the recoil of the +clapper, adding, in the bronze mortar, other sonorous vibrations which +it ground up and cast out and dispersed through the sounding shutters.</p> + +<p>Then the bell strokes came further apart. Now there was only the +whirring as of a spinning wheel; a few crumbs were slow about falling. +And now Carhaix returned.</p> + +<p>"It's a two-sided age," said Gévingey, pensive. "People believe nothing, +yet gobble everything. Every day a new science is invented. Nobody reads +that admirable Paracelsus who rediscovered all that had ever been found +and created everything that had not. Say now to your congress of +scientists that, according to this great master, life is a drop of the +essence of the stars, that each of our organs corresponds to a planet +and depends upon it; that we are, in consequence, a foreshortening of +the divine sphere. Tell them—and this, experience attests—that every +man born under the sign of Saturn is melancholy and pituitous, taciturn +and solitary, poor and vain; that that sluggish star predisposes to +superstition and fraud, directs epilepsies and varices, hemorrhoids and +leprosies; that it is, alas! the great purveyor to hospital and +prison—and the scientists will shrug their shoulders and laugh at you. +The glorified pedants and homiletic asses!"<!-- Page 281 --></p> + +<p>"Paracelsus," said Des Hermies, "was one of the most extraordinary +practitioners of occult medicine. He knew the now forgotten mysteries of +the blood, the still unknown medical effects of light. Professing—as +did also the cabalists, for that matter—that the human being is +composed of three parts, a material body, a soul, and a perispirit +called also an astral body, he attended this last especially and +produced reactions on the carnal envelope by procedures which are either +incomprehensible or fallen into disuse. He cared for wounds by treating +not the tissues, but the blood which came out of them. However, we are +assured that he healed certain ailments."</p> + +<p>"Thanks to his profound knowledge of astrology," said Gévingey.</p> + +<p>"But if the study of the sidereal influence is so important," said +Durtal, "why don't you take pupils?"</p> + +<p>"I can't get them. Where will you unearth people willing to study twenty +years without glory or profit? Because, to be able to establish a +horoscope one must be an astronomer of the first order, know mathematics +from top to bottom, and one must have put in long hours tussling with +the obscure Latin of the old masters. Besides, you must have the +vocation and the faith, and they are lost."</p> + +<p>"Just the way it is with bell ringing," said Carhaix.</p> + +<p>"No, you see, messieurs," Gévingey went on, "the day when the grand +sciences of the Middle Ages fell foul of the systematic and hostile +indifference of an impious people was the death-day of the soul in +France. All we can do now is fold our arms and listen to the wild +vagaries of society, which by turns shrieks with farcical joy and bitter +grief."</p> + +<p>"We must not despair. A better time is coming," said Mme. Carhaix in a +conciliating tone, and before she retired she shook hands with all her +guests.</p> + +<p>"The people," said Des Hermies, pouring the water into the coffee-pot, +"instead of being ameliorated with time, grow, from century to century, +more avaricious, abject, and <!-- Page 282 -->stupid. Remember the Siege, the Commune; +the unreasonable infatuations, the tumultuous hatreds, all the dementia +of a deteriorated, malnourished people in arms. They certainly cannot +compare with the naïf and tender-hearted plebes of the Middle Ages. Tell +us, Durtal, how the people acted when Gilles de Rais was conducted to +the stake."</p> + +<p>"Yes, tell us," said Carhaix, his great eyes made watery by the smoke of +his pipe.</p> + +<p>"Well, you know, as a consequence of unheard-of crimes, the Marshal de +Rais was condemned to be hanged and burned alive. After the sentence was +passed, when he was brought back to his dungeon, he addressed a last +appeal to the Bishop, Jean de Malestroit, beseeching the Bishop to +intercede for him with the fathers and mothers of the children Gilles +had so ferociously violated and put to death, to be present when he +suffered.</p> + +<p>"The people whose hearts he had lacerated wept with pity. They now saw +in this demoniac noble only a poor man who lamented his crimes and was +about to confront the Divine Wrath. The day of execution, by nine +o'clock they were marching through the city in processional. They +chanted psalms in the streets and took vows in the churches to fast +three days in order to help assure the repose of the Marshal's soul."</p> + +<p>"Pretty far, as you see, from American lynch law," said Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"Then," resumed Durtal, "at eleven they went to the prison to get Gilles +de Rais and accompanied him to the prairie of Las Biesse, where tall +stakes stood, surmounted by gibbets.</p> + +<p>"The Marshal supported his accomplices, embraced them, adjured them to +have 'great displeasure and contrition of their ill deeds' and, beating +his breast, he supplicated the Virgin to spare them, while the clergy, +the peasants, and the people joined in the psalmody, intoning the +sinister and imploring strophes of the chant for the departed:<!-- Page 283 --></p> + +<div class='poem'> + <div class='stanza'> + <div class='line'>"'Nos timemus diem judicii</div> + <div class='line'>Quia mali et nobis conscii.</div> + <div class='line'>Sed tu, Mater summi concilii,</div> + <div class='line'>Para nobis locum refugii,</div> + <div class='line2'>O Maria.</div> + </div> + <div class='stanza'> + <div class='line'>"'Tunc iratus Judex—'"</div> + </div> +</div> + +<p>"Hurrah for Boulanger!"</p> + +<p>The noise as of a stormy sea mounted from the Place Saint Sulpice, and a +hubbub of cries floated up to the tower room. "Boulange—Lange—" Then +an enormous, raucous voice, the voice of an oyster woman, a push-cart +peddler, rose, dominating all others, howling, "Hurrah for Boulanger!"</p> + +<p>"The people are cheering the election returns in front of the city +hall," said Carhaix disdainfully.</p> + +<p>They looked at each other.</p> + +<p>"The people of today!" exclaimed Des Hermies.</p> + +<p>"Ah," grumbled Gévingey, "they wouldn't acclaim a sage, an artist, that +way, even—if such were conceivable now—a saint."</p> + +<p>"And they did in the Middle Ages."</p> + +<p>"Well, they were more naïf and not so stupid then," said Des Hermies. +"And as Gévingey says, where now are the saints who directed them? You +cannot too often repeat it, the spiritual councillors of today have +tainted hearts, dysenteric souls, and slovenly minds. Or they are worse. +They corrupt their flock. They are of the Docre order and Satanize."</p> + +<p>"To think that a century of positivism and atheism has been able to +overthrow everything but Satanism, and it cannot make Satanism yield an +inch."</p> + +<p>"Easily explained!" cried Carhaix. "Satan is forgotten by the great +majority. Now it was Father Ravignan, I believe, who proved that the +wiliest thing the Devil can do is to get people to deny his existence."<!-- Page 284 --></p> + +<p>"Oh, God!" murmured Durtal forlornly, "what whirlwinds of ordure I see +on the horizon!"</p> + +<p>"No," said Carhaix, "don't say that. On earth all is dead and +decomposed. But in heaven! Ah, I admit that the Paraclete is keeping us +waiting. But the texts announcing his coming are inspired. The future is +certain. There will be light," and with bowed head he prayed fervently.</p> + +<p>Des Hermies rose and paced the room. "All that is very well," he +groaned, "but this century laughs the glorified Christ to scorn. It +contaminates the supernatural and vomits on the Beyond. Well, how can we +hope that in the future the offspring of the fetid tradesmen of today +will be decent? Brought up as they are, what will they do in Life?"</p> + +<p>"They will do," replied Durtal, "as their fathers and mothers do now. +They will stuff their guts and crowd out their souls through their +alimentary canals."</p> + + + +<hr> +<h2>FINIS</h2> +<hr> + +<div class="footnote">Footnote: <a id="Footnote_1_1" href="#FNanchor_1_1"> 1 </a> A watchmaker who at the time of the July monarchy attempted +to pass himself off for Louis XVII.</div> + +<div>*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 14323 ***</div> +</body> +</html> + diff --git a/14323.txt b/14323.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f28e3c8 --- /dev/null +++ b/14323.txt @@ -0,0 +1,10626 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of La-bas, by J. K. Huysmans + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: La-bas + +Author: J. K. Huysmans + +Release Date: December 10, 2004 [EBook #14323] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LA-BAS *** + + + + +Produced by Suzanne Shell, Cori Samuel and the PG Online Distributed +Proofreading Team. + + + + + +LA-BAS + +(DOWN THERE) + +by +J.K. HUYSMANS + +Translated +by +KEENE WALLACE + + +[Transcriber's note: +Original published 1891, +English translation privately published 1928.] + + + + +CHAPTER I + + +"You believe pretty thoroughly in these things, or you wouldn't abandon +the eternal triangle and the other stock subjects of the modern +novelists to write the story of Gilles de Rais," and after a silence Des +Hermies added, "I do not object to the latrine; hospital; and workshop +vocabulary of naturalism. For one thing, the subject matter requires +some such diction. Again, Zola, in _L'Assommoir_, has shown that a +heavy-handed artist can slap words together hit-or-miss and give an +effect of tremendous power. I do not really care how the naturalists +maltreat language, but I do strenuously object to the earthiness of +their ideas. They have made our literature the incarnation of +materialism--and they glorify the democracy of art! + +"Say what you will, their theory is pitiful, and their tight little +method squeezes all the life out of them. Filth and the flesh are their +all in all. They deny wonder and reject the extra-sensual. I don't +believe they would know what you meant if you told them that artistic +curiosity begins at the very point where the senses leave off. + +"You shrug your shoulders, but tell me, how much has naturalism done to +clear up life's really troublesome mysteries? When an ulcer of the +soul--or indeed the most benign little pimple--is to be probed, +naturalism can do nothing. 'Appetite and instinct' seem to be its sole +motivation and rut and brainstorm its chronic states. The field of +naturalism is the region below the umbilicus. Oh, it's a hernia clinic +and it offers the soul a truss! + +"I tell you, Durtal, it's superficial quackery, and that isn't all. +This fetid naturalism eulogizes the atrocities of modern life and +flatters our positively American ways. It ecstasizes over brute force +and apotheosizes the cash register. With amazing humility it defers to +the nauseating taste of the mob. It repudiates style, it rejects every +ideal, every aspiration towards the supernatural and the beyond. It is +so perfectly representative of bourgeois thought that it might be sired +by Homais and dammed by Lisa, the butcher girl in _Ventre de Paris_." + +"Heavens, how you go after it!" said Durtal, somewhat piqued. He lighted +his cigarette and went on, "I am as much revolted by materialism as you +are, but that is no reason for denying the unforgettable services which +naturalism has rendered. + +"It has demolished the inhuman puppets of romanticism and rescued our +literature from the clutches of booby idealists and sex-starved old +maids. It has created visible and tangible human beings--after +Balzac--and put them in accord with their surroundings. It has carried +on the work, which romanticism began, of developing the language. Some +of the naturalists have had the veritable gift of laughter, a very few +have had the gift of tears, and, in spite of what you say, they have not +all been carried away by an obsession for baseness." + +"Yes, they have. They are in love with the age, and that shows them up +for what they are." + +"Do you mean to tell me Flaubert and the De Goncourts were in love with +the age?" + +"Of course not. But those men were artists, honest, seditious, and +aloof, and I put them in a class by themselves. I will also grant that +Zola is a master of backgrounds and masses and that his tricky handling +of people is unequalled. Then, too, thank God, he has never followed +out, in his novels, the theories enunciated in his magazine articles, +adulating the intrusion of positivism upon art. But in the works of his +best pupil, Rosny, the only talented novelist who is really imbued with +the ideas of the master, naturalism has become a sickening jargon of +chemist's slang serving to display a layman's erudition, which is about +as profound as the scientific knowledge of a shop foreman. No, there is +no getting around it. Everything this whole poverty-stricken school has +produced shows that our literature has fallen upon evil days. The +grovellers! They don't rise above the moral level of the tumblebug. Read +the latest book. What do you find? Simple anecdotes: murder, suicide, +and accident histories copied right out of the newspaper, tiresome +sketches and wormy tales, all written in a colorless style and +containing not the faintest hint of an outlook on life nor an +appreciation of human nature. When I have waded through one of these +books its insipid descriptions and interminable harangues go instantly +out of my mind, and the only impression that remains is one of surprise +that a man can write three or four hundred pages when he has absolutely +nothing to reveal to us--nothing to say!" + +"If it's all the same to you, Des Hermies, let's speak of something +else. We shall never agree on the subject of naturalism, as the very +mention of it makes you see red. What about this Mattei system of +medicine? Your globules and electric phials at least relieve a few +sufferers?" + +"Hmph. A little better than the panaceas of the Codex, though I can't +say the effects are either lasting or sure. But, it serves, like +anything else. And now I must run along. The clock is striking ten and +your concierge is coming to put out the hall light. See you again very +soon, I hope. Good night." + +When the door closed Durtal put some more coke in the grate and resumed +a comfortless train of thought aggravated by this too pertinent +discussion with his friend. For some months Durtal had been trying to +reassemble the fragments of a shattered literary theory which had once +seemed inexpugnable, and Des Hermies's opinions troubled him, in spite +of their exaggerated vehemence. + +Certainly if naturalism confined one to monotonous studies of mediocre +persons and to interminable inventories of the objects in a drawing-room +or a landscape, an honest and clear-sighted artist would soon cease to +produce, and a less conscientious workman would be under the necessity +of repeating himself over and over again to the point of nausea. +Nevertheless Durtal could see no possibilities for the novelist outside +of naturalism. Were we to go back to the pyrotechnics of romanticism, +rewrite the lanuginous works of the Cherbuliez and Feuillet tribe, or, +worse yet, imitate the lachrymose storiettes of Theuriet and George +Sand? Then what was to be done? And Durtal, with desperate +determination, set to work sorting out a tangle of confused theories and +inchoate postulations. He made no headway. He felt but could not define. +He was afraid to. Definition of his present tendencies would plump him +back into his old dilemma. + +"We must," he thought, "retain the documentary veracity, the precision +of detail, the compact and sinewy language of realism, but we must also +dig down into the soul and cease trying to explain mystery in terms of +our sick senses. If possible the novel ought to be compounded of two +elements, that of the soul and that of the body, and these ought to be +inextricably bound together as in life. Their interreactions, their +conflicts, their reconciliation, ought to furnish the dramatic interest. +In a word, we must follow the road laid out once and for all by Zola, +but at the same time we must trace a parallel route in the air by which +we may go above and beyond.... A spiritual naturalism! It must be +complete, powerful, daring in a different way from anything that is +being attempted at present. Perhaps as approaching my concept I may cite +Dostoyevsky. Yet that _exorable_ Russian is less an elevated realist +than an evangelic socialist. In France right now the purely corporal +recipe has brought upon itself such discredit that two clans have +arisen: the liberal, which prunes naturalism of all its boldness of +subject matter and diction in order to fit it for the drawing-room, and +the decadent, which gets completely off the ground and raves +incoherently in a telegraphic patois intended to represent the language +of the soul--intended rather to divert the reader's attention from the +author's utter lack of ideas. As for the right wing verists, I can only +laugh at the frantic puerilities of these would-be psychologists, who +have never explored an unknown district of the mind nor ever studied an +unhackneyed passion. They simply repeat the saccharine Feuillet and the +saline Stendhal. Their novels are dissertations in school-teacher style. +They don't seem to realize that there is more spiritual revelation in +that one reply of old Hulot, in Balzac's _Cousine Bette_, 'Can't I take +the little girl along?' than in all their doctoral theses. We must +expect of them no idealistic straining toward the infinite. For me, +then, the real psychologist of this century is not their Stendhal but +that astonishing Ernest Hello, whose unrelenting unsuccess is simply +miraculous!" + +He began to think that Des Hermies was right. In the present +disorganized state of letters there was but one tendency which seemed to +promise better things. The unsatisfied need for the supernatural was +driving people, in default of something loftier, to spiritism and the +occult. + +Now his thoughts carried him away from his dissatisfaction with +literature to the satisfaction he had found in another art, in painting. +His ideal was completely realized by the Primitives. These men, in +Italy, Germany, and especially in Flanders, had manifested the amplitude +and purity of vision which are the property of saintliness. In authentic +and patiently accurate settings they pictured beings whose postures were +caught from life itself, and the illusion was compelling and sure. From +these heads, common enough, many of them, and these physiognomies, often +ugly but powerfully evocative, emanated celestial joy or acute anguish, +spiritual calm or turmoil. The effect was of matter transformed, by +being distended or compressed, to afford an escape from the senses into +remote infinity. + +Durtal's introduction to this naturalism had come as a revelation the +year before, although he had not then been so weary as now of _fin de +siecle_ silliness. In Germany, before a Crucifixion by Matthaeus +Gruenewald, he had found what he was seeking. + +He shuddered in his armchair and closed his eyes as if in pain. With +extraordinary lucidity he revisualized the picture, and the cry of +admiration wrung from him when he had entered the little room of the +Cassel museum was reechoing in his mind as here, in his study, the +Christ rose before him, formidable, on a rude cross of barky wood, the +arm an untrimmed branch bending like a bow under the weight of the body. + +This branch seemed about to spring back and mercifully hurl afar from +our cruel, sinful world the suffering flesh held to earth by the +enormous spike piercing the feet. Dislocated, almost ripped out of their +sockets, the arms of the Christ seemed trammelled by the knotty cords of +the straining muscles. The laboured tendons of the armpits seemed ready +to snap. The fingers, wide apart, were contorted in an arrested gesture +in which were supplication and reproach but also benediction. The +trembling thighs were greasy with sweat. The ribs were like staves, or +like the bars of a cage, the flesh swollen, blue, mottled with +flea-bites, specked as with pin-pricks by spines broken off from the +rods of the scourging and now festering beneath the skin where they had +penetrated. + +Purulence was at hand. The fluvial wound in the side dripped thickly, +inundating the thigh with blood that was like congealing mulberry juice. +Milky pus, which yet was somewhat reddish, something like the colour of +grey Moselle, oozed from the chest and ran down over the abdomen and the +loin cloth. The knees had been forced together and the rotulae touched, +but the lower legs were held wide apart, though the feet were placed one +on top of the other. These, beginning to putrefy, were turning green +beneath a river of blood. Spongy and blistered, they were horrible, the +flesh tumefied, swollen over the head of the spike, and the gripping +toes, with the horny blue nails, contradicted the imploring gesture of +the hands, turning that benediction into a curse; and as the hands +pointed heavenward, so the feet seemed to cling to earth, to that ochre +ground, ferruginous like the purple soil of Thuringia. + +Above this eruptive cadaver, the head, tumultuous, enormous, encircled +by a disordered crown of thorns, hung down lifeless. One lacklustre eye +half opened as a shudder of terror or of sorrow traversed the expiring +figure. The face was furrowed, the brow seamed, the cheeks blanched; all +the drooping features wept, while the mouth, unnerved, its under jaw +racked by tetanic contractions, laughed atrociously. + +The torture had been terrific, and the agony had frightened the mocking +executioners into flight. + +Against a dark blue night-sky the cross seemed to bow down, almost to +touch the ground with its tip, while two figures, one on each side, kept +watch over the Christ. One was the Virgin, wearing a hood the colour of +mucous blood over a robe of wan blue. Her face was pale and swollen with +weeping, and she stood rigid, as one who buries his fingernails deep +into his palms and sobs. The other figure was that of Saint John, like a +gipsy or sunburnt Swabian peasant, very tall, his beard matted and +tangled, his robe of a scarlet stuff cut in wide strips like slabs of +bark. His mantle was a chamois yellow; the lining, caught up at the +sleeves, showed a feverish yellow as of unripe lemons. Spent with +weeping, but possessed of more endurance than Mary, who was yet erect +but broken and exhausted, he had joined his hands and in an access of +outraged loyalty had drawn himself up before the corpse, which he +contemplated with his red and smoky eyes while he choked back the cry +which threatened to rend his quivering throat. + +Ah, this coarse, tear-compelling Calvary was at the opposite pole from +those debonair Golgothas adopted by the Church ever since the +Renaissance. This lockjaw Christ was not the Christ of the rich, the +Adonis of Galilee, the exquisite dandy, the handsome youth with the +curly brown tresses, divided beard, and insipid doll-like features, whom +the faithful have adored for four centuries. This was the Christ of +Justin, Basil, Cyril, Tertullian, the Christ of the apostolic church, +the vulgar Christ, ugly with the assumption of the whole burden of our +sins and clothed, through humility, in the most abject of forms. + +It was the Christ of the poor, the Christ incarnate in the image of the +most miserable of us He came to save; the Christ of the afflicted, of +the beggar, of all those on whose indigence and helplessness the greed +of their brother battens; the human Christ, frail of flesh, abandoned by +the Father until such time as no further torture was possible; the +Christ with no recourse but His Mother, to Whom--then powerless to aid +Him--He had, like every man in torment, cried out with an infant's cry. + +In an unsparing humility, doubtless, He had willed to suffer the Passion +with all the suffering permitted to the human senses, and, obeying an +incomprehensible ordination, He, in the time of the scourging and of the +blows and of the insults spat in His face, had put off divinity, nor had +He resumed it when, after these preliminary mockeries, He entered upon +the unspeakable torment of the unceasing agony. Thus, dying like a +thief, like a dog, basely, vilely, physically, He had sunk himself to +the deepest depth of fallen humanity and had not spared Himself the last +ignominy of putrefaction. + +Never before had naturalism transfigured itself by such a conception and +execution. Never before had a painter so charnally envisaged divinity +nor so brutally dipped his brush into the wounds and running sores and +bleeding nail holes of the Saviour. Gruenewald had passed all measure. He +was the most uncompromising of realists, but his morgue Redeemer, his +sewer Deity, let the observer know that realism could be truly +transcendent. A divine light played about that ulcerated head, a +superhuman expression illuminated the fermenting skin of the epileptic +features. This crucified corpse was a very God, and, without aureole, +without nimbus, with none of the stock accoutrements except the +blood-sprinkled crown of thorns, Jesus appeared in His celestial +super-essence, between the stunned, grief-torn Virgin and a Saint John +whose calcined eyes were beyond the shedding of tears. + +These faces, by nature vulgar, were resplendent, transfigured with the +expression of the sublime grief of those souls whose plaint is not +heard. Thief, pauper, and peasant had vanished and given place to +supraterrestial creatures in the presence of their God. + +Gruenewald was the most uncompromising of idealists. Never had artist +known such magnificent exaltation, none had ever so resolutely bounded +from the summit of spiritual altitude to the rapt orb of heaven. He had +gone to the two extremes. From the rankest weeds of the pit he had +extracted the finest essence of charity, the mordant liquor of tears. In +this canvas was revealed the masterpiece of an art obeying the +unopposable urge to render the tangible and the invisible, to make +manifest the crying impurity of the flesh and to make sublime the +infinite distress of the soul. + +It was without its equivalent in literature. A few pages of Anne +Emmerich upon the Passion, though comparatively attenuated, approached +this ideal of supernatural realism and of veridic and exsurrected life. +Perhaps, too, certain effusions of Ruysbroeck, seeming to spurt forth in +twin jets of black and white flame, were worthy of comparison with the +divine befoulment of Gruenewald. Hardly, either. Gruenewald's masterpiece +remained unique. It was at the same time infinite and of earth earthy. + +"But," said Durtal to himself, rousing out of his revery, "if I am +consistent I shall have to come around to the Catholicism of the Middle +Ages, to _mystic_ naturalism. Ah, no! I will not--and yet, perhaps I +may!" + +Here he was in the old dilemma. How often before now had he halted on +the threshold of Catholicism, sounding himself thoroughly and finding +always that he had no faith. Decidedly there had been no effort on the +part of God to reclaim him, and he himself had never possessed the kind +of will that permits one to let oneself go, trustingly, without reserve, +into the sheltering shadows of immutable dogma. + +Momentarily at times when, after reading certain books, his disgust for +everyday life was accentuated, he longed for lenitive hours in a +cloister, where the monotonous chant of prayers in an incense-laden +atmosphere would bring on a somnolence, a dreamy rapture of mystical +ideas. But only a simple soul, on which life's wear and tear had left no +mark, was capable of savouring the delights of such a self-abandon, and +his own soul was battered and torn with earthly conflict. He must admit +that the momentary desire to believe, to take refuge in the timeless, +proceeded from a multitude of ignoble motives: from lassitude with the +petty and repeated annoyances of existence, quarrels with the laundress, +with the waiter, with the landlord; the sordid scramble for money; in a +word, from the general spiritual failure of a man approaching forty. He +thought of escaping into a monastery somewhat as street girls think of +going into a house where they will be free from the dangers of the +chase, from worry about food and lodging, and where they will not have +to do their own washing and ironing. + +Unmarried, without settled income, the voice of carnality now +practically stilled in him, he sometimes cursed the existence he had +shaped for himself. At times, weary of attempting to coerce words to do +his bidding, he threw down his pen and looked into the future. He could +see nothing ahead of him but bitterness and cause for alarm, and, +seeking consolation, he was forced to admit that only religion could +heal, but religion demanded in return so arrant a desertion of common +sense, so pusillanimous a willingness to be astonished at nothing, that +he threw up his hands and begged off. + +Yet he was always playing with the thought, indeed he could not escape +it. For though religion was without foundation it was also without limit +and promised a complete escape from earth into dizzy, unexplored +altitudes. Then, too, Durtal was attracted to the Church by its intimate +and ecstatic art, the splendour of its legends, and the radiant naivete +of the histories of its saints. + +He did not believe, and yet he admitted the supernatural. Right here on +earth how could any of us deny that we are hemmed in by mystery, in our +homes, in the street,--everywhere when we came to think of it? It was +really the part of shallowness to ignore those extrahuman relations and +account for the unforeseen by attributing to fate the more than +inexplicable. Did not a chance encounter often decide the entire life of +a man? What was love, what the other incomprehensible shaping +influences? And, knottiest enigma of all, what was money? + +There one found oneself confronted by primordial organic law, atrocious +edicts promulgated at the very beginning of the world and applied ever +since. + +The rules were precise and invariable. Money attracted money, +accumulating always in the same places, going by preference to the +scoundrelly and the mediocre. When, by an inscrutable exception, it +heaped up in the coffers of a rich man who was not a miser nor a +murderer, it stood idle, incapable of resolving itself into a force for +good, however charitable the hands which fain would administer it. One +would say it was angry at having got into the wrong box and avenged +itself by going into voluntary paralysis when possessed by one who was +neither a sharper nor an ass. + +It acted still more strangely when by some extraordinary chance it +strayed into the home of a poor man. Immediately it defiled the clean, +debauched the chaste, and, acting simultaneously on the body and the +soul, it insinuated into its possessor a base selfishness, an ignoble +pride; it suggested that he spend for himself alone; it made the humble +man a boor, the generous man a skinflint. In one second it changed every +habit, revolutionized every idea, metamorphosed the most deeply rooted +passions. + +It was the instigator and vigilant accomplice of all the important sins. +If it permitted one of its detainers to forget himself and bestow a boon +it awakened hatred in the recipient, it replaced avarice with +ingratitude and re-established equilibrium so that the account might +balance and not one sin of commission be wanting. + +But it reached its real height of monstrosity when, concealing its +identity under an assumed name, it entitled itself capital. Then its +action was not limited to individual incitation to theft and murder but +extended to the entire human race. With one word capital decided +monopolies, erected banks, cornered necessities, and, if it wished, +caused thousands of human beings to starve to death. + +And it grew and begot itself while slumbering in a safe, and the Two +Worlds adored it on bended knee, dying of desire before it as before a +God. + +Well! money was the devil, otherwise its mastery of souls was +inexplicable. And how many other mysteries, equally unintelligible, how +many other phenomena were there to make a reflective man shudder! + +"But," thought Durtal, "seeing that there are so many more things +betwixt heaven and earth than are dreamed of in anybody's philosophy, +why not believe in the Trinity? Why reject the divinity of Christ? It is +no strain on one to admit the _Credo quia absurdum_ of Saint Augustine +and Tertullian and say that if the supernatural were comprehensible it +would not be supernatural, and that precisely because it passes the +faculties of man it is divine. + +"And--oh, to hell with it! What's it all about, anyway?" + +And again, as so often when he had found himself before this +unbridgeable gulf between reason and belief, he recoiled from the leap. + +Well, his thoughts had strayed far from the subject of that naturalism +so reviled by Des Hermies. He returned to Gruenewald and said to himself +that the great Crucifixion was the masterpiece of an art driven out of +bounds. One need not go far in search of the extra-terrestrial as to +fall into perfervid Catholicism. Perhaps spiritualism would give one all +one required to formulate a supernaturalistic method. + +He rose and went into his tiny workroom. His pile of manuscript notes +about the Marshal de Rais, surnamed Bluebeard, looked at him derisively +from the table where they were piled. + +"All the same," he said, "it's good to be here, in out of the world and +above the limits of time. To live in another age, never read a +newspaper, not even know that the theatres exist--ah, what a dream! To +dwell with Bluebeard and forget the grocer on the corner and all the +other petty little criminals of an age perfectly typified by the cafe +waiter who ravishes the boss's daughter--the goose who lays the golden +egg, as he calls her--so that she will have to marry him!" + +Bed was a good place, he added, smiling, for he saw his cat, a creature +with a perfect time sense, regarding him uneasily as if to remind him of +their common convenience and to reproach him for not having prepared the +couch. Durtal arranged the pillows and pulled back the coverlet, and the +cat jumped to the foot of the bed but remained humped up, tail coiled +beneath him, waiting till his master was stretched out at length before +burrowing a little hollow to curl up in. + + + + +CHAPTER II + + +Nearly two years ago Durtal had ceased to associate with men of letters. +They were represented in books and in the book-chat columns of magazines +as forming an aristocracy which had a monopoly on intelligence. Their +conversation, if one believed what one read, sparkled with effervescent +and stimulating wit. Durtal had difficulty accounting to himself for the +persistence of this illusion. His sad experience led him to believe that +every literary man belonged to one of two classes, the thoroughly +commercial or the utterly impossible. + +The first consisted of writers spoiled by the public, and drained dry in +consequence, but "successful." Ravenous for notice they aped the ways of +the world of big business, delighted in gala dinners, gave formal +evening parties, spoke of copyrights, sales, and long run plays, and +made great display of wealth. + +The second consisted of cafe loafers, "bohemians." Rolling on the +benches, gorged with beer they feigned an exaggerated modesty and at the +same time cried their wares, aired their genius, and abused their +betters. + +There was now no place where one could meet a few artists and privately, +intimately, discuss ideas at ease. One was at the mercy of the cafe +crowd or the drawing-room company. One's interlocutor was listening +avidly to steal one's ideas, and behind one's back one was being +vituperated. And the women were always intruding. + +In this indiscriminate world there was no illuminating criticism, +nothing but small talk, elegant or inelegant. + +Then Durtal learned, also by experience, that one cannot associate with +thieves without becoming either a thief or a dupe, and finally he broke +off relations with his confreres. + +He not only had no sympathy but no common topic of conversation with +them. Formerly when he accepted naturalism--airtight and unsatisfactory +as it was--he had been able to argue esthetics with them, but now! + +"The point is," Des Hermies was always telling him, "that there is a +basic difference between you and the other realists, and no patched-up +alliance could possibly be of long duration. You execrate the age and +they worship it. There is the whole matter. You were fated some day to +get away from this Americanized art and attempt to create something less +vulgar, less miserably commonplace, and infuse a little spirituality +into it. + +"In all your books you have fallen on our _fin de siecle_--our _queue du +siecle_--tooth and nail. But, Lord! a man soon gets tired of whacking +something that doesn't fight back but merely goes its own way repeating +its offences. You needed to escape into another epoch and get your +bearings while waiting for a congenial subject to present itself. That +explains your spiritual disarray of the last few months and your +immediate recovery as soon as you stumbled onto Giles de Rais." + +Des Hermies had diagnosed him accurately. The day on which Durtal had +plunged into the frightful and delightful latter mediaeval age had been +the dawn of a new existence. The flouting of his actual surroundings +brought peace to Durtal's soul, and he had completely reorganized his +life, mentally cloistering himself, far from the furore of contemporary +letters, in the chateau de Tiffauges with the monster Bluebeard, with +whom he lived in perfect accord, even in mischievous amity. + +Thus history had for Durtal supplanted the novel, whose forced banality, +conventionality, and tidy structure of plot simply griped him. Yet +history, too, was only a peg for a man of talent to hang style and +ideas on, for events could not fail to be coloured by the temperament +and distorted by the bias of the historian. + +As for the documents and sources! Well attested as they might be, they +were all subject to revision, even to contradiction by others exhumed +later which were no less authentic than the first and which also but +waited their turn to be refuted by newer discoveries. + +In the present rage for grubbing around in dusty archives writing of +history served as an outlet for the pedantry of the moles who reworked +their mouldy findings and were duly rewarded by the Institute with +medals and diplomas. + +For Durtal history was, then, the most pretentious as it was the most +infantile of deceptions. Old Clio ought to be represented with a +sphinx's head, mutton-chop whiskers, and one of those padded bonnets +which babies wore to keep them from bashing their little brains out when +they took a tumble. + +Of course exactitude was impossible. Why should he dream of getting at +the whole truth about the Middle Ages when nobody had been able to give +a full account of the Revolution, of the Commune for that matter? The +best he could do was to imagine himself in the midst of creatures of +that other epoch, wearing their antique garb, thinking their thoughts, +and then, having saturated himself with their spirit, to convey his +illusion by means of adroitly selected details. + +That is practically what Michelet did, and though the garrulous old +gossip drivelled endlessly about matters of supreme unimportance and +ecstasized in his mild way over trivial anecdotes which he expanded +beyond all proportion, and though his sentimentality and chauvinism +sometimes discredited his quite plausible conjectures, he was +nevertheless the only French historian who had overcome the limitation +of time and made another age live anew before our eyes. + +Hysterical, garrulous, manneristic as he was, there was yet a truly epic +sweep in certain passages of his History of France. The personages were +raised from the oblivion into which the dry-as-dust professors had sunk +them, and became live human beings. What matter, then, if Michelet was +the least trustworthy of historians since he was the most personal and +the most evocative? + +As for the others, they simply ferreted around among the old state +papers, clipped them, and, following M. Taine's example, arranged, +ticketed, and mounted their sensational gleanings in logical sequence, +rejecting, of course, everything that did not advance the case they were +trying to make. They denied themselves imagination and enthusiasm and +claimed that they did not invent. True enough, but they did none the +less distort history by the selection they employed. And how simply and +summarily they disposed of things! It was discovered that such and such +an event occurred in France in several communities, and straightway it +was decided that the whole country lived, acted, and thought in a +certain manner at a certain hour, on a certain day, in a certain year. + +No less than Michelet they were doughty falsifiers, but they lacked his +vision. They dealt in knickknacks, and their trivialities were as far +from creating a unified impression as were the pointillistic puzzles of +modern painters and the word hashes cooked up by the decadent poets. + +And worst of all, thought Durtal, the biographers. The depilators! +taking all the hair off a real man's chest. They wrote ponderous tomes +to prove that Jan Steen was a teetotaler. Somebody had deloused Villon +and shown that the Grosse Margot of the ballade was not a woman but an +inn sign. Pretty soon they would be representing the poet as a +priggishly honest and judicious man. One would say that in writing their +monographs these historians feared to dishonour themselves by treating +of artists who had tasted somewhat fully and passionately of life. Hence +the expurgation of masterpieces that an artist might appear as +commonplace a bourgeois as his commentator. + +This rehabilitation school, today all-powerful, exasperated Durtal. In +writing his study of Gilles de Rais he was not going to fall into the +error of these bigoted sustainers of middle-class morality. With his +ideas of history he could not claim to give an exact likeness of +Bluebeard, but he was not going to concede to the public taste for +mediocrity in well-and evil-doing by whitewashing the man. + +Durtal's material for this study consisted of: a copy of the memorial +addressed by the heirs of Gilles de Rais to the king, notes taken from +the several true copies at Paris of the proceedings in the criminal +trial at Nantes, extracts from Vallet de Viriville's history of Charles +VII, finally the _Notice_ by Armand Gueraut and the biography of the +abbe Bossard. These sufficed to bring before Durtal's eyes the +formidable figure of that Satanic fifteenth century character who was +the most artistically, exquisitely cruel, and the most scoundrelly of +men. + +No one knew of the projected study but Des Hermies, whom Durtal saw +nearly every day. + +They had met in the strangest of homes, that of Chantelouve, the +Catholic historian, who boasted of receiving all classes of people. And +every week in the social season that drawing-room in the rue de Bagneux +was the scene of a heterogeneous gathering of under sacristans, cafe +poets, journalists, actresses, partisans of the cause of Naundorff,[1] +and dabblers in equivocal sciences. + +[Footnote 1: A watchmaker who at the time of the July monarchy attempted +to pass himself off for Louis XVII.] + +This salon was on the edge of the clerical world, and many religious +came here at the risk of their reputations. The dinners were +discriminately, if unconventionally, ordered. Chantelouve, rotund, +jovial, bade everyone make himself at home. Now and then through his +smoked spectacles there stole an ambiguous look which might have given +an analyst pause, but the man's bonhomie, quite ecclesiastical, was +instantly disarming. Madame was no beauty, but possessed a certain +bizarre charm and was always surrounded. She, however, remained silent +and did nothing to encourage her voluble admirers. As void of prudery as +her husband, she listened impassively, absently, with her thoughts +evidently afar, to the boldest of conversational imprudences. + +At one of these evening parties, while La Rousseil, recently converted, +howled a hymn, Durtal, sitting in a corner having a quiet smoke, had +been struck by the physiognomy and bearing of Des Hermies, who stood out +sharply from the motley throng of defrocked priests and grubby poets +packed into Chantelouve's library and drawing-room. + +Among these smirking and carefully composed faces, Des Hermies, +evidently a man of forceful individuality, seemed, and probably felt, +singularly out of place. He was tall, slender, somewhat pale. His eyes, +narrowed in a frown, had the cold blue gleam of sapphires. The nose was +short and sharp, the cheeks smooth shaven. With his flaxen hair and +Vandyke he might have been a Norwegian or an Englishman in not very good +health. His garments were of London make, and the long, tight, +wasp-waisted coat, buttoned clear up to the neck, seemed to enclose him +like a box. Very careful of his person, he had a manner all his own of +drawing off his gloves, rolling them up with an almost inaudible +crackling, then seating himself, crossing his long, thin legs, and +leaning over to the right, reaching into the patch pocket on his left +side and bringing forth the embossed Japanese pouch which contained his +tobacco and cigarette papers. + +He was methodic, guarded, and very cold in the presence of strangers. +His superior and somewhat bored attitude, not exactly relieved by his +curt, dry laugh, awakened, at a first meeting, a serious antipathy which +he sometimes justified by venomous words, by meaningless silences, by +unspoken innuendoes. He was respected and feared at Chantelouve's, but +when one came to know him one found, beneath his defensive shell, great +warmth of heart and a capacity for true friendship of the kind that is +not expansive but is capable of sacrifice and can always be relied upon. + +How did he live? Was he rich or just comfortable? No one knew, and he, +tight lipped, never spoke of his affairs. He was doctor of the Faculty +of Paris--Durtal had chanced to see his diploma--but he spoke of +medicine with great disdain. He said he had become convinced of the +futility of all he had been taught, and had thrown it over for +homeopathy, which in turn he had thrown over for a Bolognese system, and +this last he was now excoriating. + +There were times when Durtal could not doubt that his friend was an +author, for Des Hermies spoke understandingly of tricks of the trade +which one learns only after long experience, and his literary judgment +was not that of a layman. When, one day, Durtal reproached him for +concealing his productions, he replied with a certain melancholy, "No, I +caught myself in time to choke down a base instinct, the desire of +resaying what has been said. I could have plagiarized Flaubert as well +as, if not better than, the poll parrots who are doing it, but I decided +not to. I would rather phrase abstruse medicaments of rare application; +perhaps it is not very necessary, but at least it isn't cheap." + +What surprised Durtal was his friend's prodigious erudition. Des Hermies +had the run of the most out-of-the-way book shops, he was an authority +on antique customs and, at the same time, on the latest scientific +discoveries. He hobnobbed with all the freaks in Paris, and from them he +became deeply learned in the most diverse and hostile sciences. He, so +cold and correct, was almost never to be found save in the company of +astrologers, cabbalists, demonologists, alchemists, theologians, or +inventors. + +Weary of the advances and the facile intimacies of artists, Durtal had +been attracted by this man's fastidious reserve. It was perfectly +natural that Durtal, surfeited with skin-deep friendships, should feel +drawn to Des Hermies, but it was difficult to imagine why Des Hermies, +with his taste for strange associations, should take a liking to +Durtal, who was the soberest, steadiest, most normal of men. Perhaps Des +Hermies felt the need of talking with a sane human being now and then as +a relief. And, too, the literary discussions which he loved were out of +the question with these addlepates who monologued indefatigably on the +subject of their monomania and their ego. + +At odds, like Durtal, with his confreres, Des Hermies could expect +nothing from the physicians, whom he avoided, nor from the specialists +with whom he consorted. + +As a matter of fact there had been a juncture of two beings whose +situation was almost identical. At first restrained and on the +defensive, they had come finally to _tu-toi_ each other and establish a +relation which had been a great advantage to Durtal. His family were +dead, the friends of his youth married and scattered, and since his +withdrawal from the world of letters he had been reduced to complete +solitude. Des Hermies kept him from going stale and then, finding that +Durtal had not lost all interest in mankind, promised to introduce him +to a really lovable old character. Of this man Des Hermies spoke much, +and one day he said, "You really ought to know him. He likes the books +of yours which I have lent him, and he wants to meet you. You think I am +interested only in obscure and twisted natures. Well, you will find +Carhaix really unique. He is the one Catholic with intelligence and +without sanctimoniousness; the one poor man with envy and hatred for +none." + + + + +CHAPTER III + + +Durtal was in a situation familiar to all bachelors who have the +concierge do their cleaning. Only these know how a tiny lamp can fairly +drink up oil, and how the contents of a bottle of cognac can become +paler and weaker without ever diminishing. They know, too, how a once +comfortable bed can become forbidding, and how scrupulously a concierge +can respect its least fold or crease. They learn to be resigned and to +wash out a glass when they are thirsty and make their own fire when they +are cold. + +Durtal's concierge was an old man with drooping moustache and a powerful +breath of "three-six." Indolent and placid, he opposed an unbudgeable +inertia to Durtal's frantic and profanely expressed demand that the +sweeping be done at the same hour every morning. + +Threats, prayers, insults, the withholding of gratuities, were without +effect. Pere Rateau took off his cap, scratched his head, promised, in +the tone of a man much moved, to mend his ways, and next day came later +than ever. + +"What a nuisance!" thought Durtal today, as he heard a key turning in +the lock, then he looked at his watch and observed that once again the +concierge was arriving after three o'clock in the afternoon. + +There was nothing for it but to submit with a sigh to the ensuing +hullabaloo. Rateau, somnolent and pacific in his lodge, became a demon +when he got a broom in his hand. In this sedentary being, who could +drowse all morning in the stale basement atmosphere heavy with the +cumulative aroma of many meat-stews, a martial ardour, a warlike +ferocity, then asserted themselves, and like a red revolutionary he +assaulted the bed, charged the chairs, manhandled the picture frames, +knocked the tables over, rattled the water pitcher, and whirled Durtal's +brogues about by the laces as when a pillaging conqueror hauls a +ravished victim along by the hair. So he stormed the apartment like a +barricade and triumphantly brandished his battle standard, the dust rag, +over the reeking carnage of the furniture. + +Durtal at such times sought refuge in the room which was not being +attacked. Today Rateau launched his offensive against the workroom, so +Durtal fled to the bedroom. From there, through the half open door, he +could see the enemy, with a feather duster like a Mohican war bonnet +over his head, doing a scalp dance around a table. + +"If I only knew at what time that pest would break in on me so I could +always arrange to be out!" groaned Durtal. Now he ground his teeth, as +Rateau, with a yell, grabbed up the mop and, skating around on one leg, +belaboured the floor lustily. + +The perspiring conqueror then appeared in the doorway and advanced to +reduce the chamber where Durtal was. The latter had to return to the +subjugated workroom, and the cat, shocked by the racket, arched its back +and, rubbing against its master's legs, followed him to a place of +safety. + +In the thick of the conflict Des Hermies rang the door bell. + +"I'll put on my shoes," cried Durtal, "and we'll get out of this. +Look--" he passed his hand over the table and brought back a coat of +grime that made him appear to be wearing a grey glove--"look. That brute +turns the house upside down and knocks everything to pieces, and here's +the result. He leaves more dust when he goes than he found when he came +in!" + +"Bah," said Des Hermies, "dust isn't a bad thing. Besides having the +taste of ancient biscuit and the smell of an old book, it is the +floating velvet which softens hard surfaces, the fine dry wash which +takes the garishness out of crude colour schemes. It is the caparison of +abandon, the veil of oblivion. Who, then, can despise it--aside from +certain persons whose lamentable lot must often have wrung a tear from +you? + +"Imagine living in one of these Paris _passages_. Think of a consumptive +spitting blood and suffocating in a room one flight up, behind the +'ass-back' gables of, say the passage des Panoramas, for instance. When +the window is open the dust comes in impregnated with snuff and +saturated with clammy exudations. The invalid, choking, begs for air, +and in order that he may breathe the window is _closed_. + +"Well, the dust that you complain of is rather milder than that. Anyway +I don't hear you coughing.... But if you're ready we'll be on our way." + +"Where shall we go?" asked Durtal. + +Des Hermies did not answer. They left the rue du Regard, in which Durtal +lived, and went down the rue du Cherche-Midi as far as the Croix-Rouge. + +"Let's go on to the place Saint-Sulpice," said Des Hermies, and after a +silence he continued, "Speaking of dust, 'out of which we came and to +which we shall return,' do you know that after we are dead our corpses +are devoured by different kinds of worms according as we are fat or +thin? In fat corpses one species of maggot is found, the rhizophagus, +while thin corpses are patronized only by the phora. The latter is +evidently the aristocrat, the fastidious gourmet which turns up its nose +at a heavy meal of copious breasts and juicy fat bellies. Just think, +there is no perfect equality, even in the manner in which we feed the +worms. + +"But this is where we stop." + +They had come to where the rue Ferou opens into the place Saint-Sulpice. +Durtal looked up and on an unenclosed porch in the flank of the church +of Saint-Sulpice he read the placard, "Tower open to visitors." + +"Let's go up," said Des Hermies. + +"What for! In this weather?" and Durtal pointed at the yellow sky over +which black clouds, like factory smoke, were racing, so low that the tin +chimneys seemed to penetrate them and crenelate them with little spots +of clarity. "I am not enthusiastic about trying to climb a flight of +broken, irregular stairs. And anyway, what do you think you can see up +there? It's misty and getting dark. No, have a heart." + +"What difference is it to you where you take your airing? Come on. I +assure you you will see something unusual." + +"Oh! you brought me here on purpose?" + +"Yes." + +"Why didn't you say so?" + +He followed Des Hermies into the darkness under the porch. At the back +of the cellarway a little essence lamp, hanging from a nail, lighted a +door, the tower entrance. + +For a long time, in utter darkness, they climbed a winding stair. Durtal +was wondering where the keeper had gone, when, turning a corner, he saw +a shaft of light, then he stumbled against the rickety supports of a +"double-current" lamp in front of a door. Des Hermies pulled a bell cord +and the door swung back. + +Above them on a landing they could see feet, whether of a man or of a +woman they could not tell. + +"Ah! it's you, M. des Hermies," and a woman bent over, describing an +arc, so that her head was in a stream of light. "Louis will be very glad +to see you." + +"Is he in?" asked Des Hermies, reaching up and shaking hands with the +woman. + +"He is in the tower. Won't you stop and rest a minute?" + +"Why, when we come down, if you don't mind." + +"Then go up until you see a grated door--but what an old fool I am! You +know the way as well as I do." + +"To be sure, to be sure.... But, in passing, permit me to introduce my +friend Durtal." + +Durtal, somewhat flustered, made a bow in the darkness. + +"Ah, monsieur, how fortunate. Louis is so anxious to meet you." + +"Where is he taking me?" Durtal wondered as again he groped along behind +his friend, now and then, just as he felt completely lost, coming to the +narrow strip of light admitted by a barbican, and again proceeding in +inky darkness. The climb seemed endless. Finally they came to the barred +door, opened it, and found themselves on a frame balcony with the abyss +above and below. Des Hermies, who seemed perfectly at home, pointed +downward, then upward. They were halfway up a tower the face of which +was overlaid with enormous criss-crossing joists and beams riveted +together with bolt heads as big as a man's fist. Durtal could see no +one. He turned and, clinging to the hand rail, groped along the wall +toward the daylight which stole down between the inclined leaves of the +sounding-shutters. + +Leaning out over the precipice, he discerned beneath him a formidable +array of bells hanging from oak supports lined with iron. The sombre +bell metal was slick as if oiled and absorbed light without refracting +it. Bending backward, he looked into the upper abyss and perceived new +batteries of bells overhead. These bore the raised effigy of a bishop, +and a place in each, worn by the striking of the clapper, shone golden. + +All were in quiescence, but the wind rattled against the +sounding-shutters, stormed through the cage of timbers, howled along the +spiral stair, and was caught and held whining in the bell vases. +Suddenly a light breeze, like the stirring of confined air, fanned his +cheek. He looked up. The current had been set in motion by the swaying +of a great bell beginning to get under way. There was a crash of sound, +the bell gathered momentum, and now the clapper, like a gigantic pestle, +was grinding the great bronze mortar with a deafening clamour. The tower +trembled, the balcony on which Durtal was standing trepidated like the +floor of a railway coach, there was the continuous rolling of a mighty +reverberation, interrupted regularly by the jar of metal upon metal. + +In vain Durtal scanned the upper abyss. Finally he managed to catch +sight of a leg, swinging out into space and back again, in one of those +wooden stirrups, two of which, he had noticed, were fastened to the +bottom of every bell. Leaning out so that he was almost prone on one of +the timbers, he finally perceived the ringer, clinging with his hands to +two iron handles and balancing over the gulf with his eyes turned +heavenward. + +Durtal was shocked by the face. Never had he seen such disconcerting +pallor. It was not the waxen hue of the convalescent, not the lifeless +grey of the perfume-or snuff-maker, it was a prison pallor of a +bloodless lividness unknown today, the ghastly complexion of a wretch of +the Middle Ages shut up till death in a damp, airless, pitch-dark +_in-pace_. + +The eyes were blue, prominent, even bulging, and had the mystic's +readiness to tears, but their expression was singularly contradicted by +the truculent Kaiser Wilhelm moustache. The man seemed at once a dreamer +and a fighter, and it would have been difficult to tell which character +predominated. + +He gave the bell stirrup a last yank with his foot and with a heave of +his loins regained his equilibrium. He mopped his brow and smiled down +at Des Hermies. + +"Well! well!" he said, "you here." + +He descended, and when he learned Durtal's name his face brightened and +the two shook hands cordially. + +"We have been expecting you a long time, monsieur. Our friend here +speaks of you at great length, and we have been asking him why he didn't +bring you around to see us. But come," he said eagerly, "I must conduct +you on a tour of inspection about my little domain. I have read your +books and I know a man like you can't help falling in love with my +bells. But we must go higher if we are really to see them." + +And he bounded up a staircase, while Des Hermies pushed Durtal along in +front of him in a way that made retreat impossible. + +As he was once more groping along the winding stairs, Durtal asked, "Why +didn't you tell me your friend Carhaix--for of course that's who he +is--was a bell-ringer?" + +Des Hermies did not have time to answer, for at that moment, having +reached the door of the room beneath the tower roof, Carhaix was +standing aside to let them pass. They were in a rotunda pierced in the +centre by a great circular hole which had around it a corroded iron +balustrade orange with rust. By standing close to the railing, which was +like the well curb of the Pit, one could see down, down, to the +foundation. The "well" seemed to be undergoing repairs, and from the top +to the bottom of the tube the beams supporting the bells were +crisscrossed with timbers bracing the walls. + +"Don't be afraid to lean over," said Carhaix. "Now tell me, monsieur, +how do you like my foster children?" + +But Durtal was hardly heeding. He felt uneasy, here in space, and as if +drawn toward the gaping chasm, whence ascended, from time to time, the +desultory clanging of the bell, which was still swaying and would be +some time in returning to immobility. + +He recoiled. + +"Wouldn't you like to pay a visit to the top of the tower?" asked +Carhaix, pointing to an iron stair sealed into the wall. + +"No, another day." + +They descended and Carhaix, in silence, opened a door. They advanced +into an immense storeroom, containing colossal broken statues of saints, +scaly and dilapidated apostles, Saint Matthew legless and armless, Saint +Luke escorted by a fragmentary ox, Saint Mark lacking a shoulder and +part of his beard, Saint Peter holding up an arm from which the hand +holding the keys was broken off. + +"There used to be a swing in here," said Carhaix, "for the little girls +of the neighbourhood. But the privilege was abused, as privileges always +are. In the dusk all kinds of things were done for a few sous. The +curate finally had the swing taken down and the room closed up." + +"And what is that over there?" inquired Durtal, perceiving, in a corner, +an enormous fragment of rounded metal, like half a gigantic skull-cap. +On it the dust lay thick, and and in the hollow the meshes on meshes of +fine silken web, dotted with the black bodies of lurking spiders, were +like a fisherman's hand net weighted with little slugs of lead. + +"That? Ah, monsieur!" and there was fire in Carhaix's mild eyes, "that +is the skull of an old, old bell whose like is not cast these days. The +ring of that bell, monsieur, was like a voice from heaven." And suddenly +he exploded, "Bells have had their day!--As I suppose Des Hermies has +told you.--Bell ringing is a lost art. And why wouldn't it be? Look at +the men who are doing it nowadays. Charcoal burners, roofers, masons out +of a job, discharged firemen, ready to try their hand at anything for a +franc. There are curates who think nothing of saying, 'Need a man? Go +out in the street and pick up a soldier for ten sous. He'll do.' That's +why you read about accidents like the one that happened lately at Notre +Dame, I think. The fellow didn't withdraw in time and the bell came down +like the blade of a guillotine and whacked his leg right off. + +"People will spend thirty thousand francs on an altar baldachin, and +ruin themselves for music, and they have to have gas in their churches, +and Lord knows what all besides, but when you mention bells they shrug +their shoulders. Do you know, M. Durtal, there are only two men in Paris +who can ring chords? Myself and Pere Michel, and he is not married and +his morals are so bad that he can't be regularly attached to a church. +He can ring music the like of which you never heard, but he, too, is +losing interest. He drinks, and, drunk or sober, goes to work, then he +bowls up again and goes to sleep. + +"Yes, the bell has had its day. Why, this very morning, Monsignor made +his pastoral visit to this church. At eight o'clock we sounded his +arrival. The six bells you see down here boomed out melodiously. But +there were sixteen up above, and it was a shame. Those extras jangled +away haphazard. It was a riot of discord." + +Carhaix ruminated in silence as they descended. Then, "Ah, monsieur," he +said, his watery eyes fairly bubbling, "the ring of bells, there's your +real sacred music." + +They were now above the main door of the building and they came out into +the great covered gallery on which the towers rest. Carhaix smiled and +pointed out a complete peal of miniature bells, installed between two +pillars on a plank. He pulled the cords, and, in ecstasies, his eyes +protruding, his moustache bristling, he listened to the frail tinkling +of his toy. + +And suddenly he relinquished the cords. + +"I once had a crazy idea," he said, "of forming a class here and +teaching all the intricacies of the craft, but no one cared to learn a +trade which was steadily going out of existence. Why, you know we don't +even sound for weddings any more, and nobody comes to look at the tower. + +"But I really can't complain. I hate the streets. When I try to cross +one I lose my head. So I stay in the tower all day, except once in the +early morning when I go to the other side of the square for a bucket of +water. Now my wife doesn't like it up here. You see, the snow does come +in through all the loopholes and it heaps up, and sometimes we are +snowbound with the wind blowing a gale." + +They had come to Carhaix's lodge. His wife was waiting for them on the +threshold. + +"Come in, gentlemen," she said. "You have certainly earned some +refreshment," and she pointed to four glasses which she had set out on +the table. + +The bell-ringer lighted a little briar pipe, while Des Hermies and +Durtal each rolled a cigarette. + +"Pretty comfortable place," remarked Durtal, just to be saying +something. It was a vast room, vaulted, with walls of rough stone, and +lighted by a semi-circular window just under the ceiling. The tiled +floor was badly covered by an infamous carpet, and the furniture, very +simple, consisted of a round dining-room table, some old _bergere_ +armchairs covered with slate-blue Utrecht velours, a little stained +walnut sideboard on which were several plates and pitchers of Breton +faience, and opposite the sideboard a little black bookcase, which might +contain fifty books. + +"Of course a literary man would be interested in the books," said +Carhaix, who had been watching Durtal. "You mustn't be too critical, +monsieur. I have only the tools of my trade." + +Durtal went over and took a look. The collection consisted largely of +works on bells. He read some of the titles: + +On the cover of a slim parchment volume he deciphered the faded legend, +hand-written, in rust-coloured ink, "_De tintinnabulis_ by Jerome +Magius, 1664"; then, pell-mell, there were: _A curious and edifying +miscellany concerning church bells_ by Dom Remi Carre; another _Edifying +miscellany_, anonymous; a _Treatise of bells_ by Jean-Baptiste Thiers, +curate of Champrond and Vibraye; a ponderous tome by an architect named +Blavignac; a smaller work entitled _Essay on the symbolism of bells_ by +a parish priest of Poitiers; a _Notice_ by the abbe Baraud; then a whole +series of brochures, with covers of grey paper, bearing no titles. + +"It's no collection at all," said Carhaix with a sigh. "The best ones +are wanting, the _De campanis commentarius_ of Angelo Rocca and the _De +tintinnabulo_ of Percichellius, but they are so hard to find, and so +expensive when you do find them." + +A glance sufficed for the rest of the books, most of them being pious +works, Latin and French Bibles, an _Imitation of Christ_, Goerres' +_Mystik_ in five volumes, the abbe Aubert's _History and theory of +religious symbolism_, Pluquet's _Dictionary of heresies_, and several +lives of saints. + +"Ah, monsieur, my own books are not much account, but Des Hermies lends +me what he knows will interest me." + +"Don't talk so much!" said his wife. "Give monsieur a chance to sit +down," and she handed Durtal a brimming glass aromatic with the +acidulous perfume of genuine cider. + +In response to his compliments she told him that the cider came from +Brittany and was made by relatives of hers at Landevennec, her and +Carhaix's native village. + +She was delighted when Durtal affirmed that long ago he had spent a day +in Landevennec. + +"Why, then we know each other already!" she said, shaking hands with him +again. + +The room was heated to suffocation by a stove whose pipe zigzagged over +to the window and out through a sheet-iron square nailed to the sash in +place of one of the panes. Carhaix and his good wife, with her honest, +weak face and frank, kind eyes, were the most restful of people. Durtal, +made drowsy by the warmth and the quiet domesticity, let his thoughts +wander. He said to himself, "If I had a place like this, above the roofs +of Paris, I would fix it up and make of it a real haven of refuge. Here, +in the clouds, alone and aloof, I would work away on my book and take my +time about it, years perhaps. What inconceivable happiness it would be +to escape from the age, and, while the waves of human folly were +breaking against the foot of the tower, to sit up here, out of it all, +and pore over antique tomes by the shaded light of the lamp." + +He smiled at the naivete of his daydream. + +"I certainly do like your place," he said aloud, as if to sum up his +reflections. + +"Oh, you wouldn't if you had to live here," said the good wife. "We have +plenty of room, too much room, because there are a couple of bedchambers +as big as this, besides plenty of closet space, but it's so +inconvenient--and so cold! And no kitchen--" and she pointed to a +landing where, blocking the stairway, the cook stove had had to be +installed. "And there are so many, many steps to go up when you come +back from market. I am getting old, and I have a twinge of the +rheumatics whenever I think about making the climb." + +"You can't even drive a nail into this rock wall and have a peg to hang +things on," said Carhaix. "But I like this place. I was made for it. Now +my wife dreams constantly of spending her last days in Landevennec." + +Des Hermies rose. All shook hands, and monsieur and madame made Durtal +swear that he would come again. + +"What refreshing people!" exclaimed Durtal as he and Des Hermies crossed +the square. + +"And Carhaix is a mine of information." + +"But tell me, what the devil is an educated man, of no ordinary +intelligence, doing, working as a--as a day labourer?" + +"If Carhaix could hear you! But, my friend, in the Middle Ages +bell-ringers were high officials. True, the craft has declined +considerably in modern times. I couldn't tell you myself how Carhaix +became hipped on the subject of bells. All I know is that he studied at +a seminary in Brittany, that he had scruples of conscience and +considered himself unworthy to enter the priesthood, that he came to +Paris and apprenticed himself to a very intellectual master bell-ringer, +Pere Gilbert, who had in his cell at Notre Dame some ancient and of +course unique plans of Paris that would make your mouth water. Gilbert +wasn't a 'labourer,' either. He was an enthusiastic collector of +documents relating to old Paris. From Notre Dame Carhaix came to Saint +Sulpice, fifteen years ago, and has been there ever since." + +"How did you happen to make his acquaintance?" + +"First he was my patient, then my friend. I've known him ten years." + +"Funny. He doesn't look like a seminary product. Most of them have the +shuffling gait and sheepish air of an old gardener." + +"Carhaix will be all right for a few more years," said Des Hermies, as +if to himself, "and then let us mercifully wish him a speedy death. The +Church, which has begun by sanctioning the introduction of gas into the +chapels, will end by installing mechanical chimes instead of bells. That +will be charming. The machinery will be run by electricity and we shall +have real up-to-date, timbreless, Protestant peals." + +"Then Carhaix's wife will have a chance to go back to Finistere." + +"No, they are too poor, and then too Carhaix would be broken-hearted if +he lost his bells. Curious, a man's affection for the object that he +manipulates. The mechanic's love for his machine. The thing that one +tends, and that obeys one, becomes personalized, and one ends by falling +in love with it. And the bell is an instrument in a class of its own. It +is baptized like a Christian, anointed with sacramental oil, and +according to the pontifical rubric it is also to be sanctified, in the +interior of its chalice, by a bishop, in seven cruciform unctions with +the oil of the infirm that it may send to the dying the message which +shall sustain them in their last agonies. + +"It is the herald of the Church, the voice from without as the priest is +the voice from within. So you see it isn't a mere piece of bronze, a +reversed mortar to be swung at a rope's end. Add that bells, like fine +wines, ripen with age, that their tone becomes more ample and mellow, +that they lose their sharp bouquet, their raw flavour. That will +explain--imperfectly--how one can become attached to them." + +"Why, you seem to be an enthusiast yourself." + +"Oh, I don't know anything about it. I am simply repeating what I have +heard Carhaix say. If the subject interests you, he will be only too +glad to teach you the symbolism of bells. He is inexhaustible. The man +is a monomaniac." + +"I can understand," said Durtal dreamily. "I live in a quarter where +there are a good many convents and at dawn the air is a-tingle with the +vibrance of the chimes. When I was ill I used to lie awake at night +awaiting the sound of the matin bells and welcoming them as a +deliverance. In the grey light I felt that I was being cuddled by a +distant and secret caress, that a lullaby was crooned over me, and a +cool hand applied to my burning forehead. I had the assurance that the +folk who were awake were praying for the others, and consequently for +me. I felt less lonely. I really believe the bells are sounded for the +special benefit of the sick who cannot sleep." + +"The bells ring for others, notably for the trouble-makers. The rather +common inscription for the side of a bell, '_Paco cruentos_,' 'I pacify +the bloody-minded,' is singularly apt, when you think it over." + +This conversation was still haunting Durtal when he went to bed. +Carhaix's phrase, "The ring of the bells is the real sacred music," took +hold of him like an obsession. And drifting back through the centuries +he saw in dream the slow processional of monks and the kneeling +congregations responding to the call of the angelus and drinking in the +balm of holy sound as if it were consecrated wine. + +All the details he had ever known of the liturgies of ages came crowding +into his mind. He could hear the sounding of matin invitatories; chimes +telling a rosary of harmony over tortuous labyrinths of narrow streets, +over cornet towers, over pepper-box pignons, over dentelated walls; the +chimes chanting the canonical hours, prime and tierce, sexte and none, +vespers and compline; celebrating the joy of a city with the tinkling +laughter of the little bells, tolling its sorrow with the ponderous +lamentation of the great ones. And there were master ringers in those +times, makers of chords, who could send into the air the expression of +the whole soul of a community. And the bells which they served as +submissive sons and faithful deacons were as humble and as truly of the +people as was the Church itself. As the priest at certain times put off +his chasuble, so the bell at times had put off its sacred character and +spoken to the baptized on fair day and market day, inviting them, in the +event of rain, to settle their affairs inside the nave of the church +and, that the sanctity of the place might not be violated by the +conflicts arising from sharp bargaining, imposing upon them a probity +unknown before or since. + +Today bells spoke an obsolete language, incomprehensible to man. Carhaix +was under no misapprehension. Living in an aerial tomb outside the human +scramble, he was faithful to his art, and in consequence no longer had +any reason for existing. He vegetated, superfluous and demoded, in a +society which insisted that for its amusement the holy place be turned +into a concert hall. He was like a creature reverted, a relic of a +bygone age, and he was supremely contemptuous of the miserable _fin de +siecle_ church showmen who to draw fashionable audiences did not fear to +offer the attraction of cavatinas and waltzes rendered on the cathedral +organ by manufacturers of profane music, by ballet mongers and comic +opera-wrights. + +"Poor Carhaix!" said Durtal, as he blew out the candle. "Another who +loves this epoch about as well as Des Hermies and I do. But he has the +tutelage of his bells, and certainly among his wards he has his +favourite. He is not to be pitied. He has his hobby, which renders life +possible for him, as hobbies do." + + + + +CHAPTER IV + + +"How is Gilles de Rais progressing?" + +"I have finished the first part of his life, making just the briefest +possible mention of his virtues and achievements." + +"Which are of no interest," remarked Des Hermies. + +"Evidently, since the name of Gilles de Rais would have perished four +centuries ago but for the enormities of vice which it symbolizes. I am +coming to the crimes now. The great difficulty, you see, is to explain +how this man, who was a brave captain and a good Christian, all of a +sudden became a sacrilegious sadist and a coward." + +"Metamorphosed over night, as it were." + +"Worse. As if at a touch of a fairy's wand or of a playwright's pen. +That is what mystifies his biographers. Of course untraceable influences +must have been at work a long time, and there must have been occasional +outcropping not mentioned in the chronicles. Here is a recapitulation of +our material. + +"Gilles de Rais was born about 1404 on the boundary between Brittany and +Anjou, in the chateau de Machecoul. We know nothing of his childhood. +His father died about the end of October, 1415, and his mother almost +immediately married a Sieur d'Estouville, abandoning her two sons, +Gilles and Rene. They became the wards of their grandfather, Jean de +Craon, 'a man old and ancient and of exceeding great age,' as the texts +say. He seems to have allowed his two charges to run wild, and then to +have got rid of Gilles by marrying him to Catherine de Thouars, November +30, 1420. + +"Gilles is known to have been at the court of the Dauphin five years +later. His contemporaries represent him as a robust, active man, of +striking beauty and rare elegance. We have no explicit statement as to +the role he played in this court, but one can easily imagine what sort +of treatment the richest baron in France received at the hands of an +impoverished king. + +"For at that moment Charles VII was in extremities. He was without +money, prestige, or real authority. Even the cities along the Loire +scarcely obeyed him. France, decimated a few years before, by the +plague, and further depopulated by massacres, was in a deplorable +situation. + +"England, rising from the sea like the fabled polyp the Kraken, had cast +her tentacles over Brittany, Normandy, l'Ile de France, part of Picardy, +the entire North, the Interior as far as Orleans, and crawling forward +left in her wake towns squeezed dry and country exhausted. + +"In vain Charles clamoured for subsidies, invented excuses for +exactions, and pressed the imposts. The paralyzed cities and fields +abandoned to the wolves could afford no succour. Remember his very claim +to the throne was disputed. He became like a blind man going the rounds +with a tin cup begging sous. His court at Chinon was a snarl of intrigue +complicated by an occasional murder. Weary of being hunted, more or less +out of harm's way behind the Loire, Charles and his partisans finally +consoled themselves by flaunting in the face of inevitable disaster the +devil-may-care debaucheries of the condemned making the most of the few +moments left them. Forays and loans furnished them with opulent cheer +and permitted them to carouse on a grand scale. The eternal _qui-vive_ +and the misfortunes of war were forgotten in the arms of courtesans. + +"What more could have been expected of a used-up sleepy-headed king, the +issue of an infamous mother and a mad father?" + +"Oh, whatever you say about Charles VII pales beside the testimony of +the portrait of him in the Louvre painted by Foucquet. That bestial +face, with the eyes of a small-town ursurer and the sly psalm-singing +mouth that butter wouldn't melt in, has often arrested me. Foucquet +depicts a debauched priest who has a bad cold and has been drinking sour +wine. Yet you can see that this monarch is of the very same type as the +more refined, less salacious, more prudently cruel, more obstinate and +cunning Louis XI, his son and successor. Well, Charles VII was the man +who had Jean Sans Peur assassinated, and who abandoned Jeanne d'Arc. +What more need be said?" + +"What indeed? Well, Gilles de Rais, who had raised an army at his own +expense, was certainly welcomed by this court with open arms. There is +no doubt that he footed the bills for tournaments and banquets, that he +was vigilantly 'tapped' by the courtiers, and that he lent the king +staggering sums. But in spite of his popularity he never seems to have +evaded responsibility and wallowed in debauchery, like the king. We find +Gilles shortly afterward defending Anjou and Maine against the English. +The chronicles say that he was 'a good and hardy captain,' but his +'goodness' and 'hardiness' did not prevent him from being borne back by +force of numbers. The English armies, uniting, inundated the country, +and, pushing on unchecked, invaded the interior. The king was ready to +flee to the Mediterranean provinces and let France go, when Jeanne d'Arc +appeared. + +"Gilles returned to court and was entrusted by Charles with the 'guard +and defence' of the Maid of Orleans. He followed her everywhere, fought +at her side, even under the walls of Paris, and was with her at Rheims +the day of the coronation, at which time, says Monstrelet, the king +rewarded his valour by naming him Marshal of France, at the age of +twenty-five." + +"Lord!" Des Hermies interrupted, "promotion came rapidly in those times. +But I suppose warriors then weren't the bemedalled, time-serving +incompetents they are now." + +"Oh, don't be misled. The title of Marshal of France didn't mean so +much in Gilles's time as it did afterward in the reign of Francis I, and +nothing like what it has come to mean since Napoleon. + +"What was the conduct of Gilles de Rais toward Jeanne d'Arc? We have no +certain knowledge. M. Vallet de Viriville, without proof, accuses him of +treachery. M. l'abbe Bossard, on the contrary, claims--and alleges +plausible reasons for entertaining the opinion--that he was loyal to her +and watched over her devotedly. + +"What is certain is that Gilles's soul became saturated with mystical +ideas. His whole history proves it. + +"He was constantly in association with this extraordinary maid whose +adventures seemed to attest the possibility of divine intervention in +earthly affairs. He witnessed the miracle of a peasant girl dominating a +court of ruffians and bandits and arousing a cowardly king who was on +the point of flight. He witnessed the incredible episode of a virgin +bringing back to the fold such black rams as La Hire, Xaintrailles, +Beaumanoir, Chabannes, Dunois, and Gaucourt, and washing their old +fleeces whiter than snow. Undoubtedly Gilles also, under her +shepherding, docilely cropped the white grass of the gospel, took +communion the morning of a battle, and revered Jeanne as a saint. + +"He saw the Maid fulfil all her promises. She raised the siege of +Orleans, had the king consecrated at Rheims, and then declared that her +mission was accomplished and asked as a boon that she be permitted to +return home. + +"Now I should say that as a result of such an association Gilles's +mysticism began to soar. Henceforth we have to deal with a man who is +half-freebooter, half-monk. Moreover--" + +"Pardon the interruption, but I am not so sure that Jeanne d'Arc's +intervention was a good thing for France." + +"Why not?" + +"I will explain. You know that the defenders of Charles were for the +most part Mediterranean cut-throats, ferocious pillagers, execrated by +the very people they came to protect. The Hundred Years' War, in effect, +was a war of the South against the North. England at that epoch had not +got over the Conquest and was Norman in blood, language, and tradition. +Suppose Jeanne d'Arc had stayed with her mother and stuck to her +knitting. Charles VII would have been dispossessed and the war would +have come to an end. The Plantagenets would have reigned over England +and France, which, in primeval times before the Channel existed, formed +one territory occupied by one race, as you know. Thus there would have +been a single united and powerful kingdom of the North, reaching as far +as the province of Languedoc and embracing peoples whose tastes, +instincts, and customs were alike. On the other hand, the coronation of +a Valois at Rheims created a heterogeneous and preposterous France, +separating homogeneous elements, uniting the most incompatible +nationalities, races the most hostile to each other, and identifying +us--inseparably, alas!--with those stained-skinned, varnished-eyed +munchers of chocolate and raveners of garlic, who are not Frenchmen at +all, but Spaniards and Italians. In a word, if it hadn't been for Jeanne +d'Arc, France would not now belong to that line of histrionic, forensic, +perfidious chatterboxes, the precious Latin race--Devil take it!" + +Durtal raised his eyebrows. + +"My, my," he said, laughing. "Your remarks prove to me that you are +interested in 'our own, our native land.' I should never have suspected +it of you." + +"Of course you wouldn't," said Des Hermies, relighting his cigarette. +"As has so often been said, 'My own, my native land is wherever I happen +to feel at home.' Now I don't feel at home except with the people of the +North. But I interrupted you. Let's get back to the subject. What were +you saying?" + +"I forget. Oh, yes. I was saying that the Maid had completed her task. +Now we are confronted by a question to which there is seemingly no +answer. What did Gilles do when she was captured, how did he feel about +her death? We cannot tell. We know that he was lurking in the vicinity +of Rouen at the time of the trial, but it is too much to conclude from +that, like certain of his biographies, that he was plotting her rescue. + +"At any rate, after losing track of him completely, we find that he has +shut himself in at his castle of Tiffauges. + +"He is no longer the rough soldier, the uncouth fighting-man. At the +time when the misdeeds are about to begin, the artist and man of letters +develop in Gilles and, taking complete possession of him, incite him, +under the impulsion of a perverted mysticism, to the most sophisticated +of cruelties, the most delicate of crimes. + +"For he was almost alone in his time, this baron de Rais. In an age when +his peers were simple brutes, he sought the delicate delirium of art, +dreamed of a literature soul-searching and profound; he even composed a +treatise on the art of evoking demons; he gloried in the music of the +Church, and would have nothing about his that was not rare and difficult +to obtain. + +"He was an erudite Latinist, a brilliant conversationalist, a sure and +generous friend. He possessed a library extraordinary for an epoch when +nothing was read but theology and lives of saints. We have the +description of several of his manuscripts; Suetonius, Valerius Maximus, +and an Ovid on parchment bound in red leather, with vermeil clasp and +key. + +"These books were his passion. He carried them with him when he +travelled. He had attached to his household a painter named Thomas who +illuminated them with ornate letters and miniatures, and Gilles himself +painted the enamels which a specialist--discovered after an assiduous +search--set in the gold-inwrought bindings. Gilles's taste in +furnishings was elevated and bizarre. He revelled in abbatial stuffs, +voluptuous silks, in the sombre gilding of old brocade. He liked +knowingly spiced foods, ardent wines heavy with aromatics; he dreamed of +unknown gems, weird stones, uncanny metals. He was the Des Esseintes of +the fifteenth century! + +"All this was very expensive, less so, perhaps, than the luxurious court +which made Tiffauges a place like none other. + +"He had a guard of two hundred men, knights, captains, squires, pages, +and all these people had personal attendants who were magnificently +equipped at Gilles's expense. The luxury of his chapel and collegium was +madly extravagant. There was in residence at Tiffauges a complete +metropolitan clergy, deans, vicars, treasurers, canons, clerks, deacons, +scholasters, and choir boys. There is an inventory extant of the +surplices, stoles, and amices, and the fur choir hats with crowns of +squirrel and linings of vair. There are countless sacerdotal ornaments. +We find vermilion altar cloths, curtains of emerald silk, a cope of +velvet, crimson and violet with orpheys of cloth of gold, another of +rose damask, satin dalmatics for the deacons, baldachins figured with +hawks and falcons of Cyprus gold. We find plate, hammered chalices and +ciboria crusted with uncut jewels. There are reliquaries, among them a +silver head of Saint Honore. A mass of sparkling jewelleries which an +artist, installed in the chateau, cuts to order. + +"And anyone who came along was welcome. From all corners of France +caravans journeyed toward this chateau where the artist, the poet, the +scholar, found princely hospitality, cordial goodfellowship, gifts of +welcome and largesse at departure. + +"Already undermined by the demands which the war had made on it, his +fortune was giving way beneath these expenditures. Now he began to walk +the terrible ways of usury. He borrowed of the most unscrupulous +bourgeois, hypothecated his chateaux, alienated his lands. At times he +was reduced to asking advances on his religious ornaments, on his +jewels, on his books." + +"I am glad to see that the method of ruining oneself in the Middle Ages +did not differ sensibly from that of our days," said Des Hermies. +"However, our ancestors did not have Monte Carlo, the notaries, and the +Bourse." + +"And _did_ have sorcery and alchemy. A memorial addressed to the king by +the heirs of Gilles de Rais informs us that this immense fortune was +squandered in less than eight years. + +"Now it's the signories of Confolens, Chabanes, Chateaumorant, Lombert, +ceded to a captain for a ridiculous price; now it's the fief of Fontaine +Milon, of Angers, the fortress of Saint Etienne de Mer Morte acquired by +Guillaume Le Ferron for a song; again it's the chateaux of Blaison and +of Chemille forfeited to Guillaume de la Jumeliere who never has to pay +a sou. But look, there's a long list of castellanies and forests, salt +mines and farm lands," said Durtal, spreading out a great sheet of paper +on which he had copied the account of the purchases and sales. + +"Frightened by his mad course, the family of the Marshal supplicated the +king to intervene, and Charles VII,'sure,' as he said, 'of the +malgovernance of the Sire de Rais,' forbade him, in grand council, by +letters dated 'Amboise, 1436,' to sell or make over any fortress, any +chateau, any land. + +"This order simply hastened the ruin of the interdicted. The grand +skinflint, the master usurer of the time, Jean V, duke of Brittany, +refused to publish the edict in his states, but, underhandedly, notified +all those of his subjects who dealt with Gilles. No one now dared to buy +the Marshal's domains for fear of incurring the wrath of the king, so +Jean V remained the sole purchaser and fixed the prices. You may judge +how liberal his prices were. + +"That explains Gilles's hatred of his family who had solicited these +letters patent of the king, and why, as long as he lived, he had nothing +to do with his wife, nor with his daughter whom he consigned to a +dungeon at Pouzauges. + +"Now to return to the question which I put a while ago, how and with +what motives Gilles quitted the court. I think the facts which I have +outlined will partially explain. + +"It is evident that for quite a while, long before the Marshal retired +to his estates, Charles had been assailed by the complaints of Gilles's +wife and other relatives. Moreover, the courtiers must have execrated +the young man on account of his riches and luxuries; and the king, the +same king who abandoned Jeanne d'Arc when he considered that she could +no longer be useful to him, found an occasion to avenge himself on +Gilles for the favours Gilles had done him. When the king needed money +to finance his debaucheries or to raise troops he had not considered the +Marshal lavish. Now that the Marshal was ruined the king censured him +for his prodigality, held him at arm's length, and spared him no +reproach and no menace. + +"We may be sure Gilles had no reason to regret leaving this court, and +another thing is to be taken into consideration. He was doubtless sick +and tired of the nomadic existence of a soldier. He was doubtless +impatient to get back to a pacific atmosphere among books. Moreover, he +seems to have been completely dominated by the passion for alchemy, for +which he was ready to abandon all else. For it is worth noting that this +science, which threw him into demonomania when he hoped to stave off +inevitable ruin with it, he had loved for its own sake when he was rich. +It was in fact toward the year 1426, when his coffers bulged with gold, +that he attempted the 'great work' for the first time. + +"We shall find him, then, bent over his retorts in the chateau de +Tiffauges. That is the point to which I have brought my history, and now +I am about to begin on the series of crimes of magic and sadism." + +"But all this," said Des Hermies, "does not explain how, from a man of +piety, he was suddenly changed into a Satanist, from a placid scholar +into a violator of little children, a 'ripper' of boys and girls." + +"I have already told you that there are no documents to bind together +the two parts of this life so strangely divided, but in what I have been +narrating you can pick out some of the threads of the duality. To be +precise, this man, as I have just had you observe, was a true mystic. He +witnessed the most extraordinary events which history has ever shown. +Association with Jeanne d'Arc certainly stimulated his desires for the +divine. Now from lofty Mysticism to base Satanism there is but one step. +In the Beyond all things touch. He carried his zeal for prayer into the +territory of blasphemy. He was guided and controlled by that troop of +sacrilegious priests, transmuters of metals, and evokers of demons, by +whom he was surrounded at Tiffauges." + +"You think, then, that the Maid of Orleans was really responsible for +his career of evil?" + +"To a certain point. Consider. She roused an impetuous soul, ready for +anything, as well for orgies of saintliness as for ecstasies of crime. + +"There was no transition between the two phases of his being. The moment +Jeanne was dead he fell into the hands of sorcerers who were the most +learned of scoundrels and the most unscrupulous of scholars. These men +who frequented the chateau de Tiffauges were fervent Latinists, +marvellous conversationalists, possessors of forgotten arcana, guardians +of world-old secrets. Gilles was evidently more fitted to live with them +than with men like Dunois and La Hire. These magicians, whom all the +biographers agree to represent--wrongly, I think--as vulgar parasites +and base knaves, were, as I view them, the patricians of intellect of +the fifteenth century. Not having found places in the Church, where they +would certainly have accepted no position beneath that of cardinal or +pope, they could, in those troubled times of ignorance, but take refuge +in the patronage of a great lord like Gilles. And Gilles was, indeed, +the only one at that epoch who was intelligent enough and educated +enough to understand them. + +"To sum up: natural mysticism on one hand, and, on the other, daily +association with savants obsessed by Satanism. The sword of Damocles +hanging over his head, to be conjured away by the will of the Devil, +perhaps. An ardent, a mad curiosity concerning the forbidden sciences. +All this explains why, little by little, as the bonds uniting him to the +world of alchemists and sorcerers grow stronger, he throws himself into +the occult and is swept on by it into the most unthinkable crimes. + +"Then as to being a 'ripper' of children--and he didn't immediately +become one, no, Gilles did not violate and trucidate little boys until +after he became convinced of the vanity of alchemy--why, he does not +differ greatly from the other barons of his times. + +"He exceeds them in the magnitude of his debauches, in opulence of +murders, and that's all. It's a fact. Read Michelet. You will see that +the princes of this epoch were redoubtable butchers. There was a sire de +Giac who poisoned his wife, put her astride of his horse and rode at +breakneck speed for five leagues, until she died. There was another, +whose name I have forgotten, who collared his father, dragged him +barefoot through the snow, and calmly thrust him into a subterranean +prison and left him there until he died. And how many others! I have +tried, without success, to find whether in battles and forays the +Marshal committed any serious misdeeds. I have discovered nothing, +except that he had a pronounced taste for the gibbet; for he liked to +string up all the renegade French whom he surprised in the ranks of the +English or in the cities which were not very much devoted to the king. + +"We shall find his taste for this kind of torture manifesting itself +later on in the chateau de Tiffauges. + +"Now, in conclusion, add to all these factors a formidable pride, a +pride which incites him to say, during his trial, 'So potent was the +star under which I was born that I have done what no one in the world +has done nor ever can do.' + +"And assuredly, the Marquis de Sade is only a timid bourgeois, a +mediocre fantasist, beside him!" + +"Since it is difficult to be a saint," said Des Hermies, "there is +nothing for it but to be a Satanist. One of the two extremes. +'Execration of impotence, hatred of the mediocre,' that, perhaps, is one +of the more indulgent definitions of Diabolism." + +"Perhaps. One can take pride in going as far in crime as a saint in +virtue. And that expresses Gilles de Rais exactly." + +"All the same, it's a mean subject to handle." + +"It certainly is, but happily the documents are abundant. Satan was +terrible to the Middle Ages--" + +"And to the modern." + +"What do you mean?" + +That Satanism has come down in a straight, unbroken line from that age +to this." + +"Oh, no; you don't believe that at this very hour the devil is being +evoked and the black mass celebrated?" + +"Yes." + +"You are sure?" + +"Perfectly." + +"You amaze me. But, man! do you know that to witness such things would +aid me signally in my work? No joking, you believe in a contemporary +Satanistic manifestation? You have proofs?" + +"Yes, and of them we shall speak later, for today I am very busy. +Tomorrow evening, when we dine with Carhaix. Don't forget. I'll come by +for you. Meanwhile think over the phrase which you applied a moment ago +to the magicians: 'If they had entered the Church they would not have +consented to be anything but cardinals and popes,' and then just think +what kind of a clergy we have nowadays. The explanation of Satanism is +there, in great part, anyway, for without sacrilegious priests there is +no mature Satanism." + +"But what do these priests want?" + +"Everything!" exclaimed Des Hermies. + +"Hmmm. Like Gilles de Rais, who asked the demon for 'knowledge, power, +riches,' all that humanity covets, to be deeded to him by a title signed +with his own blood." + + + + +CHAPTER V + + +"Come right in and get warm. Ah, messieurs, you must not do that any +more," said Mme. Carhaix, seeing Durtal draw from his pocket some +bottles wrapped in paper, while Des Hermies placed on the table some +little packages tied with twine. "You mustn't spend your money on us." + +"Oh, but you see we enjoy doing it, Mme. Carhaix. And your husband?" + +"He is in the tower. Since morning he has been going from one tantrum +into another." + +"My, the cold is terrible today," said Durtal, "and I should think it +would be no fun up there." + +"Oh, he isn't grumbling for himself but for his bells. Take off your +things." + +They took off their overcoats and came up close to the stove. + +"It isn't what you would call hot in here," said Mme. Carhaix, "but to +thaw this place you would have to keep a fire going night and day." + +"Why don't you get a portable stove?" + +"Oh, heavens! that would asphyxiate us." + +"It wouldn't be very comfortable at any rate," said Des Hermies, "for +there is no chimney. You might get some joints of pipe and run them out +of the window, the way you have fixed this tubing. But, speaking of that +kind of apparatus, Durtal, doesn't it seem to you that those hideous +galvanized iron contraptions perfectly typify our utilitarian epoch? + +"Just think, the engineer, offended by any object that hasn't a +sinister or ignoble form, reveals himself entire in this invention. He +tells us, 'You want heat. You shall have heat--and nothing else.' +Anything agreeable to the eye is out of the question. No more snapping, +crackling wood fire, no more gentle, pervasive warmth. The useful +without the fantastic. Ah, the beautiful jets of flame darting out from +a red cave of coals and spurting up over a roaring log." + +"But there are lots of stoves where you can see the fire," objected +madame. + +"Yes, and then it's worse yet. Fire behind a grated window of mica. +Flame in prison. Depressing! Ah, those fine fires of faggots and dry +vine stocks out in the country. They smell good and they cast a golden +glow over everything. Modern life has set that in order. The luxury of +the poorest of peasants is impossible in Paris except for people who +have copious incomes." + +The bell-ringer entered. Every hair of his bristling moustache was +beaded with a globule of snow. With his knitted bonnet, his sheepskin +coat, his fur mittens and goloshes, he resembled a Samoyed, fresh from +the pole. + +"I won't shake hands," he said, "for I am covered with grease and oil. +What weather! Just think, I've been scouring the bells ever since early +this morning. I'm worried about them." + +"Why?" + +"Why! You know very well that frost contracts the metal and sometimes +cracks or breaks it. Some of these bitterly cold winters we have lost a +good many, because bells suffer worse than we do in bad weather.--Wife, +is there any hot water in the other room, so I can wash up?" + +"Can't we help you set the table?" Des Hermies proposed. + +But the good woman refused. "No, no, sit down. Dinner is ready." + +"Mighty appetizing," said Durtal, inhaling the odour of a peppery +_pot-au-feu_, perfumed with a symphony of vegetables, of which the +keynote was celery. + +"Everybody sit down," said Carhaix, reappearing with a clean blouse on, +his face shining of soap and water. + +They sat down. The glowing stove purred. Durtal felt the sudden +relaxation of a chilly soul dipped into a warm bath: at Carhaix's one +was so far from Paris, so remote from the epoch.... + +The lodge was poor, but cosy, comfortable, cordial. The very table, set +country style, the polished glasses, the covered dish of sweet butter, +the cider pitcher, the somewhat battered lamp casting reflections of +tarnished silver on the great cloth, contributed to the atmosphere of +home. + +"Next time I come I must stop at the English store and buy a jar of that +reliable orange marmalade," said Durtal to himself, for by common +consent with Des Hermies he never dined with the bell-ringer without +furnishing a share of the provisions. Carhaix set out a _pot-au-feu_ and +a simple salad and poured his cider. Not to be an expense to him, Des +Hermies and Durtal brought wine, coffee, liquor, desserts, and managed +so that their contributions would pay for the soup and the beef which +would have lasted for several days if the Carhaixes had eaten alone. + +"This time I did it!" said Mme. Carhaix triumphantly, serving to each in +turn a mahogany-colour bouillon whose iridescent surface was looped with +rings of topaz. + +It was succulent and unctuous, robust and yet delicate, flavoured as it +was with the broth of a whole flock of boiled chickens. The diners were +silent now, their noses in their plates, their faces brightened by steam +from the savoury soup, soup, two selected dishes, a salad, and a +dessert. + +"Now is the time to repeat the chestnut dear to Flaubert, 'You can't +dine like this in a restaurant,'" said Durtal. + +"Let's not malign the restaurants," said Des Hermies. "They afford a +very special delight to the person who has the instinct of the +inspector. I had an opportunity to gratify this instinct just the other +night. I was returning from a call on a patient, and I dropped into one +of these establishments where for the sum of three francs you are +entitled to soup, two selected dishes, a salad, and a dessert. + +"The restaurant, where I go as often as once a month, has an unvarying +clientele, hostile highbrows, officers in mufti, members of Parliament, +bureaucrats. + +"While laboriously gnawing my way through a redoubtable sole with sauce +au gratin, I examined the habitues seated all around me and I found them +singularly altered since my last visit. They had become bony or bloated; +their eyes were either hollow, with violet rings around them, or puffy, +with crimson pouches beneath; the fat people had become yellow and the +thin ones were turning green. + +"More deadly than the forgotten venefices of the days of the Avignon +papacy, the terrible preparations served in this place were slowly +poisoning its customers. + +"It was interested, as you may believe. I made myself the subject of a +course of toxicological research, and, studying my food as it went down, +I identified the frightful ingredients masking the mixtures of tannin +and powdered carbon with which the fish was embalmed; and I penetrated +the disguise of the marinated meats, painted with sauces the colour of +sewage; and I diagnosed the wine as being coloured with fuscin, perfumed +with furfurol, and enforced with molasses and plaster. + +"I have promised myself to return every month to register the slow but +sure progress of these people toward the tomb." + +"Oh!" cried Mme. Carhaix. + +"And you will claim," said Durtal, "that you aren't Satanic?" + +"See, Carhaix, he's at it already. He won't even give us time to get our +breath, but must be dogging us about Satanism. It's true I promised him +I'd try and get you to tell us something about it tonight. Yes," +continued Des Hermies, in response to Carhaix's look of astonishment, +"yesterday, Durtal, who is engaged, as you know, in writing a history of +Gilles de Rais, declared that he possessed all the information there was +about Diabolism in the Middle Ages. I asked him if he had any material +on the Satanism of the present day. He asked me what I was talking +about, and wouldn't believe that these practices are being carried on +right now." + +"But they are," replied Carhaix, becoming grave. "It is only too true." + +"Before we go any further, there is one question I'd like to put to Des +Hermies," said Durtal. "Can you, honestly, without joking, without +letting that saturnine smile play around the corner of your mouth, tell +me, in perfectly good faith, whether you do or do not believe in +Catholicism?" + +"He!" exclaimed the bell-ringer. "Why, he's worse than an unbeliever, +he's a heresiarch." + +"The fast is, if I were certain of anything, I would be inclined toward +Manicheism," said Des Hermies. "It's one of the oldest and it is _the_ +simplest of religions, and it best explains the abominable mess +everything is in at the present time. + +"The Principle of Good and the Principle of Evil, the God of Light and +the God of Darkness, two rivals, are fighting for our souls. That's at +least clear. Right now it is evident that the Evil God has the upper +hand and is reigning over the world as master. Now--and on this point, +Carhaix, who is distressed by these theories, can't reprehend me--I am +for the under dog. That's a generous and perfectly proper idea." + +"But Manicheism is impossible!" cried the bell-ringer. "Two infinities +cannot exist together." + +"But nothing can exist if you get to reasoning. The moment you argue the +Catholic dogma everything goes to pieces. The proof that two infinities +can coexist is that this idea passes beyond reason and enters the +category of those things referred to in Ecclesiasticus: 'Inquire not +into things higher than thou, for many things have shown themselves to +be above the sense of men.' + +"Manicheism, you see, must have had some good in it, because it was +bathed in blood. At the end of the twelfth century thousands of +Albigenses were roasted for practising this doctrine. Of course, I +can't say that the Manicheans didn't abuse their cult, mostly made up of +devil worship, because we know very well they did. + +"On this point I am not with them," he went on slowly, after a silence. +He was waiting till Mme. Carhaix, who had got up to remove the plates, +should go out of the room to fetch the beef. + +"While we are alone," he said, seeing her disappear through the stairway +door, "I can tell you what they did. An excellent man named Psellus has +revealed to us, in a book entitled _De operatione Daemonum_, the fact +that they tasted of the two excrements at the beginning of their +ceremonial, and that they mixed human semen with the host." + +"Horrible!" exclaimed Carhaix. + +"Oh, as they took both kinds of communion, they did better than that," +returned Des Hermies. "They cut children's throats and mixed the blood +with ashes, and this paste, dissolved in liquid, constituted the +Eucharistic wine." + +"You bring us right back to Satanism," said Durtal. + +"Why, yes, as you see, I haven't strayed off your subject." + +"I am sure Monsieur Des Hermies has been saying something awful," +murmured Mme. Carhaix as she came in, bearing a platter on which was a +piece of beef smothered in vegetables. + +"Oh, Madame," protested Des Hermies. + +They burst out laughing and Carhaix cut up the meat, while his wife +poured the cider and Durtal uncorked the bottle of anchovies. + +"I am afraid it's cooked too much," said the woman, who was a great deal +more interested in the beef than in other-world adventures, and she +added the famous maxim of housekeepers, "When the broth is good the beef +won't cut." + +The men protested that it wasn't stringy a bit, it was cooked just +right. + +"Have an anchovy and a little butter with your meat, Monsieur Durtal." + +"Wife, let's have some of the red cabbage that you preserved," said +Carhaix, whose pale face was lighted up while his great canine eyes were +becoming suspiciously moist. Visibly he was jubilant. He was at table +with friends, in his tower, safe from the cold. "But, empty your +glasses. You are not drinking," he said, holding up the cider pot. + +"Let's see, Des Hermies, you were claiming yesterday that Satanism has +pursued an uninterrupted course since the Middle Ages," said Durtal, +wishing to get back to the subject which haunted him. + +"Yes, and the documents are irrefutable. I'll put you into a position to +prove them whenever you wish. + +"At the end of the fifteenth century, that is to say at the time of +Gilles de Rais--to go no further back--Satanism had assumed the +proportions that you know. In the sixteenth it was worse yet. No need to +remind you, I think, of the demoniac pactions of Catherine de Medici and +of the Valois, of the trial of the monk Jean de Vaulx, of the +investigations of the Sprengers and the Lancres and those learned +inquisitors who had thousands of necromancers and sorcerers roasted +alive. All that is known, too well known. One case is not too well known +for me to cite here: that of the priest Benedictus who cohabited with +the she-devil Armellina and consecrated the hosts holding them upside +down. Here are the diabolical threads which bind that century to this. +In the seventeenth century, in which the sorcery trials continue, and in +which the 'possessed' of Loudun appear, the black religion nourishes, +but already it has been driven under cover. + +"I will cite you an example, one among many, if you like. + +"A certain abbe Guibourg made a specialty of these abominations. On a +table serving as tabernacle a woman lay down, naked or with her skirts +lifted up over her head, and with her arms outstretched. She held the +altar lights during the whole office. + +"Guibourg thus celebrated masses on the abdomen of Mme. de Montespan, of +Mme. d'Argenson, of Mme. de Saint-Pont. As a matter of fact these +masses were very frequent under the Grand Monarch. Numbers of women went +to them as in our times women flock to have their fortunes told with +cards. + +"The ritual of these ceremonies was sufficiently atrocious. Generally a +child was kidnapped and burnt in a furnace out in the country somewhere, +the ashes were saved and mixed with the blood of another child whose +throat had been cut, and of this mixture a paste was made resembling +that of the Manicheans of which I was speaking. Abbe Guibourg +officiated, consecrated the host, cut it into little pieces and mixed it +with this mixture of blood and ashes. That was the material of the +Sacrament." + +"What a horrible priest!" cried Mme. Carhaix, indignant. + +"Yes, he celebrated another kind of mass, too, that abbe did. It was +called--hang it--it's unpleasant to say--" + +"Say it, Monsieur des Hermies. When people have as great a hatred for +that sort of thing as we here, they need not blink any fact. It isn't +that kind of thing which is going to take me away from my prayers." + +"Nor me," added her husband. + +"Well, this sacrifice was called the Spermatic Mass." + +"Oh!" + +"Guibourg, wearing the alb, the stole, and the maniple, celebrated this +mass with the sole object of making pastes to conjure with. The archives +of the Bastille inform us that he acted thus at the request of a lady +named Des Oeillettes: + +"This woman, who was indisposed, gave some of her blood; the man who +accompanied her stood patiently beside the bed where the scene took +place, and Guibourg gathered up some of his semen into the chalice, then +added powdered blood and some flour, and after sacrilegious ceremonies +the Des Oeillettes woman departed bearing her paste." + +"My heavenly Saviour!" sighed the bell-ringer's wife, "what a lot of +filth." + +"But," said Durtal, "in the Middle Ages the mass was celebrated in a +different fashion. The altar then was the naked buttocks of a woman; in +the seventeenth century it was the abdomen, and now?" + +"Nowadays a woman is hardly ever used for an altar, but let us not +anticipate. In the eighteenth century we shall again find abbes--among +how many other monsters--who defile holy objects. One Canon Duer +occupied himself specially with black magic and the evocation of the +devil. He was finally executed as a sorcerer in the year of grace 1718. +There was another who believed in the Incarnation of the Holy Ghost as +the Paraclete, and who, in Lombary, which he stirred up to a feverish +pitch of excitement, ordained twelve apostles and twelve apostolines to +preach his gospel. This man, abbe Beccarelli, like all the other priests +of his ilk, abused both sexes, and he said mass without confessing +himself of his lecheries. As his cult grew he began to celebrate +travestied offices in which he distributed to his congregation +aphrodisiac pills presenting this peculiarity, that after having +swallowed them the men believed themselves changed into women and the +women into men. + +"The recipe for these hippomanes is lost," continued Des Hermies with +almost a sad smile. "To make a long story short, Beccarelli met with a +very miserable end. He was prosecuted for sacrilege and sentenced, in +1708, to row in the galleys for seven years." + +"These frightful stories seem to have taken away your appetite," said +Mme. Carhaix. "Come, Monsieur des Hermies, a little more salad?" + +"No, thanks. But now we've come to the cheese, I think it's time to open +the wine," and he uncapped one of the bottles which Durtal had brought. + +"It's a light Chinon wine, but not too weak. I discovered it in a little +shop down by the quay," said Durtal. + +"I see," he went on after a silence, "that the tradition of unspeakable +crimes has been maintained by worthy successors of Gilles de Rais. I see +that in all centuries there have been fallen priests who have dared +commit sins against the Holy Ghost. But at the present time it all seems +incredible. Surely nobody is cutting children's throats as in the days +of Bluebeard and of abbe Guibourg." + +"You mean that nobody is brought to justice for doing it. They don't +assassinate now, but they kill designated victims by methods unknown to +official science--ah, if the confessionals could speak!" cried the +bell-ringer. + +"But tell me, what class of people are these modern covenanters with the +Devil?" + +"Prelates, abbesses, mission superiors, confessors of communities; and +in Rome, the centre of present-day magic, they're the very highest +dignitaries," answered Des Hermies. "As for the laymen, they are +recruited from the wealthy class. That explains why these scandals are +hushed up if the police chance to discover them. + +"Then, let us assume that the sacrifices to the Devil are not preceded +by preliminary murders. Perhaps in some cases they aren't. The +worshippers probably content themselves with bleeding a foetus which had +been aborted as soon as it became matured to the point necessary. +Bloodletting is supererogatory anyway, and serves merely to whet the +appetite. The main business is to consecrate the host and put it to an +infamous use. The rest of the procedure varies. There is at present no +regular ritual for the black mass." + +"Well, then, is a priest absolutely essential to the celebration of +these offices?" + +"Certainly. Only a priest can operate the mystery of Transubstantiation. +I know there are certain occultists who claim to have been consecrated +by the Lord, as Saint Paul was, and who think they can consummate a +veritable sacrifice just like a real priest. Absurd! But even in default +of real masses with ordained celebrants, the people possessed by the +mania of sacrilege do none the less realize the sacred stupration of +which they dream. + +"Listen to this. In 1855 there existed at Paris an association composed +of women, for the most part. These women took communion several times a +day and retained the sacred wafer in their mouths to be spat out later +and trodden underfoot or soiled by disgusting contacts." + +"You are sure of it?" + +"Perfectly. These facts were revealed by a religious journal, _Les +annales de la saintete_, and the archbishop of Paris could not deny +them. I add that in 1874 women were likewise enrolled at Paris to +practise this odious commerce. They were paid so much for every wafer +they brought in. That explains why they presented themselves at the +sacred table of different churches every day." + +"And that is not the half of it! Look," said Carhaix, in his turn, +rising and taking from his bookshelf a blue brochurette. "Here is a +review, _La voix de la septaine_, dated 1843. It informs us that for +twenty-five years, at Agen, a Satanistic association regularly +celebrated black masses, and committed murder, and polluted three +thousand three hundred and twenty hosts! And Monsignor the Bishop of +Agen, who was a good and ardent prelate, never dared deny the +monstrosities committed in his diocese!" + +"Yes, we can say it among ourselves," Des Hermies returned, "in the +nineteenth century the number of foul-minded abbes has been legion. +Unhappily, though the documents are certain, they are difficult to +verify, for no ecclesiastic boasts of such misdeeds. The celebrants of +Deicidal masses dissemble and declare themselves devoted to Christ. They +even affirm that they defend Him by exorcising the possessed. + +"That's a good one. The 'possessed' are made so or kept so by the +priests themselves, who are thus assured of subjects and accomplices, +especially in the convents. All kinds of murderous and sadistic follies +can be covered with the antique and pious mantle of exorcism." + +"Let us be just," said Carhaix. "The Satanist would not be complete if +he were not an abominable hypocrite." + +"Hypocrisy and pride are perhaps the most characteristic vices of the +perverse priest," suggested Durtal. + +"But in the long run," Des Hermies went on, "in spite of the most +adroit precautions, everything comes out. Up to now I have spoken only +of local Satanistic associations, but there are others, more extensive, +which ravage the old world and the new, for Diabolism is quite up to +date in one respect. It is highly centralized and very capably +administered. There are committees, subcommittees, a sort of curia, +which rules America and Europe, like the curia of a pope. + +"The biggest of these societies founded as long ago as 1855 is the +society of the Re-Theurgistes-Optimates. Beneath an apparent unity it is +divided into two camps, one aspiring to destroy the universe and reign +over the ruins, the other thinking simply of imposing upon the world a +demoniac cult of which it shall be high priest. + +"This society has its seat in America. It was formerly directed by one +Longfellow, an adventurer, born in Scotland, who entitled himself grand +priest of the New Evocative Magism. For a long time it has had branches +in France, Italy, Germany, Russia, Austria, even Turkey. + +"It is at the present moment moribund, or perhaps quite dead, but +another has just been created. The object of this one is to elect an +antipope who will be the exterminating Antichrist. And those are only +two of them. How many others are there, more or less important +numerically, more or less secret, which, by common accord, at ten +o'clock the morning of the Feast of the Holy Sacrament, celebrate black +masses at Paris, Rome, Bruges, Constantinople, Nantes, Lyons, and in +Scotland--where sorcerers swarm! + +"Then, outside of these universal associations and local assemblies, +isolated cases abound, on which little light can be shed, and that with +great difficulty. Some years ago there died, in a state of penitence, a +certain comte de Lautree, who presented several churches with statues +which he had bewitched so as to satanize the faithful. At Bruges a +priest of my acquaintance contaminates the holy ciboria and uses them to +prepare spells and conjurements. Finally one may, among all these, cite +a clear case of possession. It is the case of Cantianille, who in 1865 +turned not only the city of Auxerre, but the whole diocese of Sens, +upside down. + +"This Cantianille, placed in a convent of Mont-Saint-Sulpice, was +violated, when she was barely fifteen years old, by a priest who +dedicated her to the Devil. This priest himself had been corrupted, in +early childhood, by an ecclesiastic belonging to a sect of possessed +which was created the very day Louis XVI was guillotined. + +"What happened in this convent, where many nuns, evidently mad with +hysteria, were associated in erotic devilry and sacrilegious rages with +Cantianille, reads for all the world like the procedure in the trials of +wizards of long ago, the histories of Gaufredy and Madeleine Palud, of +Urbain Grandier and Madeleine Bavent, or the Jesuit Girard and La +Cadiere, histories, by the way, in which much might be said about +hystero-epilepsy on one hand and about Diabolism on the other. At any +rate, Cantianille, after being sent away from the convent, was exorcised +by a certain priest of the diocese, abbe Thorey, who seems to have been +contaminated by his patient. Soon at Auxerre there were such scandalous +scenes, such frenzied outbursts of Diabolism, that the bishop had to +intervene. Cantianille was driven out of the country, abbe Thorey was +disciplined, and the affair went to Rome. + +"The curious thing about it is that the bishop, terrified by what he had +seen, requested to be dismissed, and retired to Fontainebleau, where he +died, still in terror, two years later." + +"My friends," said Carhaix, consulting his watch, "it is a quarter to +eight. I must be going up into the tower to sound the angelus. Don't +wait for me. Have your coffee. I shall rejoin you in ten minutes." + +He put on his Greenland costume, lighted a lantern, and opened the door. +A stream of glacial air poured in. White molecules whirled in the +blackness. + +"The wind is driving the snow in through the loopholes along the stair," +said the woman. "I am always afraid that Louis will take cold in his +chest this kind of weather. Oh, well, Monsieur des Hermies, here is the +coffee. I appoint you to the task of serving it. At this hour of day my +poor old limbs won't hold me up any longer. I must go lie down." + +"The fact is," sighed Des Hermies, when they had wished her good night, +"the fact is that mama Carhaix is rapidly getting old. I have vainly +tried to brace her up with tonics. They do no good. She has worn herself +out. She has climbed too many stairs in her life, poor woman!" + +"All the same, it's very curious, what you have told me," said Durtal. +"To sum up, the most important thing about Satanism is the black mass." + +"That and the witchcraft and incubacy and succubacy which I will tell +you about; or rather, I will get another more expert than I in these +matters to tell you about them. Sacrilegious mass, spells, and +succubacy. There you have the real quintessence of Satanism." + +"And these hosts consecrated in blasphemous offices, what use is made of +them when they are not simply destroyed?" + +"But I already told you. They are used to consummate infamous acts. +Listen," and Des Hermies took from the bell-ringers bookshelf the fifth +volume of the _Mystik_ of Goerres. "Here is the flower of them all: + + "'These priests, in their baseness, often go so far as to + celebrate the mass with great hosts which then they cut through + the middle and afterwards glue to a parchment, similarly cloven, + and use abominably to satisfy their passions.'" + +"Holy sodomy, in other words?" + +"Exactly." + +At this moment the bell, set in motion in the tower, boomed out. The +chamber in which Durtal and Des Hermies were sitting trembled and a +droning filled the air. It seemed that waves of sound came out of the +walls, unrolling in a spiral from the very rock, and that one was +transported, in a dream, into the inside of one of these shells which, +when held up to the ear, simulate the roar of rolling billows. Des +Hermies, accustomed to the mighty resonance of the bells at short range, +thought only of the coffee, which he had put on the stove to keep hot. + +Then the booming of the bell came more slowly. The humming departed from +the air. The window panes, the glass of the bookcase, the tumblers on +the table, ceased to rattle and gave off only a tenuous tinkling. + +A step was heard on the stair. Carhaix entered, covered with snow. + +"Cristi, boys, it blows!" He shook himself, threw his heavy outer +garments on a chair, and extinguished his lantern. "There were blinding +clouds of snow whirling in between the sounding-shutters. I can hardly +see. Dog's weather. The lady has gone to bed? Good. But you haven't +drunk your coffee?" he asked as he saw Durtal filling the glasses. + +Carhaix went up to the stove and poked the fire, then dried his eyes, +which the bitter cold had filled with tears, and drank a great draught +of coffee. + +"Now. That hits the spot. How far had you got with your lecture, Des +Hermies?" + +"I finished the rapid expose of Satanism, but I haven't yet spoken of +the genuine monster, the only real master that exists at the present +time, that defrocked abbe--" + +"Oh!" exclaimed Carhaix. "Take care. The mere name of that man brings +disaster." + +"Bah! Canon Docre--to utter his ineffable name--can do nothing to us. I +confess I cannot understand why he should inspire any terror. But never +mind. I should like for Durtal, before we hunt up the canon, to see your +friend Gevingey, who seems to be best and most intimately acquainted +with him. A conversation with Gevingey would considerably amplify my +contributions to the study of Satanism, especially as regards venefices +and succubacy. Let's see. Would you mind if we invited him here to +dine?" + +Carhaix scratched his head, then emptied the ashes of his pipe on his +thumbnail. + +"Well, you see, the fact is, we have had a slight disagreement." + +"What about?" + +"Oh, nothing very serious. I interrupted his experiments here one day. +But pour yourself some liqueur, Monsieur Durtal, and you, Des Hermies, +why, you aren't drinking at all," and while, lighting their cigarettes, +both sipped a few drops of almost proof cognac, Carhaix resumed, +"Gevingey, who, though an astrologer, is a good Christian and an honest +man--whom, indeed, I should be glad to see again--wished to consult my +bells. + +"That surprises you, but it's so. Bells formerly played quite an +important part in the forbidden science. The art of predicting the +future with their sounds is one of the least known and most disused +branches of the occult. Gevingey had dug up some documents, and wished +to verify them in the tower." + +"Why, what did he do?" + +"How do I know? He stood under the bell, at the risk of breaking his +bones--a man of his age on the scaffolding there! He was halfway into +the bell, the bell like a great hat, you see, coming clear down over his +hips. And he soliloquized aloud and listened to the repercussions of his +voice making the bronze vibrate. + +"He spoke to me also of the interpretation of dreams about bells. +According to him, whoever, in his sleep, sees bells swinging, is menaced +by an accident; if the bell chimes, it is presage of slander; if it +falls, ataxia is certain; if it breaks, it is assurance of afflictions +and miseries. Finally he added, I believe, that if the night birds fly +around a bell by moonlight one may be sure that sacrilegious robbery +will be committed in the church, or that the curate's life is in danger. + +"Be all that as it may, this business of touching the bells, getting up +into them--and you know they're consecrated--of attributing to them the +gift of prophecy, of involving them in the interpretation of dream--an +art formally forbidden in Leviticus--displeased me, and I demanded, +somewhat rudely, that he desist." + +"But you did not quarrel?" + +"No, and I confess I regret having been so hasty." + +"Well then, I will arrange it. I shall go see him--agreed?" said Des +Hermies. + +"By all means." + +"With that we must run along and give you a chance to get to bed, seeing +that you have to be up at dawn." + +"Oh, at half-past five for the six o'clock angelus, and then, if I want +to, I can go back to bed, for I don't have to ring again till a quarter +to eight, and then all I have to do is sound a couple of times for the +curate's mass. As you can see, I have a pretty easy thing of it." + +"Mmmm!" exclaimed Durtal, "if I had to get up so early!" + +"It's all a matter of habit. But before you go won't you have another +little drink? No? Really? Well, good night!" + +He lighted his lantern, and in single file, shivering, they descended +the glacial, pitch-dark, winding stair. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + + +Next morning Durtal woke later than usual. Before he opened his eyes +there was a sudden flash of light in his brain, and troops of demon +worshippers, like the societies of which Des Hermies had spoken, went +defiling past him, dancing a saraband. "A swarm of lady acrobats hanging +head downward from trapezes and praying with joined feet!" he said, +yawning. He looked at the window. The panes were flowered with crystal +fleurs de lys and frost ferns. Then he quickly drew his arms back under +the covers and snuggled up luxuriously. + +"A fine day to stay at home and work," he said. "I will get up and light +a fire. Come now, a little courage--" and--instead of tossing the covers +aside he drew them up around his chin. + +"Ah, I know that you are not pleased to see me taking a morning off," he +said, addressing his cat, which was hunched up on the counterpane at his +feet, gazing at him fixedly, its eyes very black. + +This beast, though affectionate and fond of being caressed, was crabbed +and set in its ways. It would tolerate no whims, no departures from the +regular course of things. It understood that there was a fixed hour for +rising and for going to bed, and when it was displeased it allowed a +shade of annoyance to pass into its eyes, the sense of which its master +could not mistake. + +If he returned before eleven at night, the cat was waiting for him in +the vestibule, scratching the wood of the door, miaouing, even before +Durtal was in the hall; then it rolled its languorous green-golden eyes +at him, rubbed against his trouser leg, stood up on its hind feet like +a tiny rearing horse and affectionately wagged its head at him as he +approached. If eleven o'clock had passed it did not run along in front +of him, but would only, very grudgingly, rise when he came up, and then +it would arch its back and suffer no caresses. When he came later yet, +it would not budge, and would complain and groan if he took the liberty +of stroking its head or scratching its throat. + +This morning it had no patience with Durtal's laziness. It squatted on +its hunkers, and swelled up, then it approached stealthily and sat down +two steps away from its master's face, staring at him with an +atrociously false eye, signifying that the time had come for him to +abdicate and leave the warm place for a cold cat. + +Amused by its manoeuvres, Durtal did not move, but returned its stare. +The cat was enormous, common, and yet bizarre with its rusty coat +yellowish like old coke ashes and grey as the fuzz on a new broom, with +little white tufts like the fleece which flies up from the burnt-out +faggot. It was a genuine gutter cat, long-legged, with a wild-beast +head. It was regularly striped with waving lines of ebony, its paws were +encircled by black bracelets and its eyes lengthened by two great +zigzags of ink. + +"In spite of your kill-joy character and your single track mind you +testy, old bachelor, you are a very nice cat," said Durtal, in an +insinuating, wheedling tone. "Then too, for many years now, I have told +you what one tells no man. You are the drain pipe of my soul, you +inattentive and indulgent confessor. Never shocked, you vaguely approve +the mental misdeeds which I confess to you. You let me relieve myself +and you don't charge me anything for the service. Frankly, that is what +you are here for. I spoil you with care and attentions because you are +the spiritual vent of solitude and celibacy, but that doesn't prevent +you, with your spiteful way of looking at me, from being insufferable at +times, as you are today, for instance!" + +The cat continued to stare at him, its ears sticking straight up as if +they would catch the sense of his words from the inflections of his +voice. It understood, doubtless, that Durtal was not disposed to jump +out of bed, for it went back to its old place, but now turned its back +full on him. + +"Oh come," said Durtal, discouraged, looking at his watch, "I've simply +got to get up and go to work on Gilles de Rais," and with a bound he +sprang into his trousers. The cat, rising suddenly, galloped across the +counterpane and rolled itself up into the warm covers, without waiting +an instant longer. + +"How cold it is!" and Durtal slipped on a knit jacket and went into the +other room to start a fire. "I shall freeze!" he murmured. + +Fortunately his apartment was easy to heat. It consisted simply of a +hall, a tiny sitting-room, a minute bedroom, and a large enough +bathroom. It was on the fifth floor, facing a sufficiently airy court. +Rent, eight hundred francs. + +It was furnished without luxury. The little sitting-room Durtal had +converted into a study, hiding the walls behind black wood bookcases +crammed with books. In front of the window were a great table, a leather +armchair, and a few straight chairs. He had removed the glass from the +mantelpiece, and in the panel, just over the mantelshelf, which was +covered with an old fabric, he had nailed an antique painting on wood, +representing a hermit kneeling beside a cardinal's hat and purple cloak, +beneath a hut of boughs. The colours of the landscape background had +faded, the blues to grey, the whites to russet, the greens to black, and +time had darkened the shadows to a burnt-onion hue. Along the edges of +the picture, almost against the black oak frame, a continuous narrative +unfolded in unintelligible episodes, intruding one upon the other, +portraying Lilliputian figures, in houses of dwarfs. Here the Saint, +whose name Durtal had sought in vain, crossed a curly, wooden sea in a +sailboat; there he marched through a village as big as a fingernail; +then he disappeared into the shadows of the painting and was discovered +higher up in a grotto in the Orient, surrounded by dromedaries and +bales of merchandise; again he was lost from sight, and after another +game of hide-and-seek he emerged, smaller than ever, quite alone, with a +staff in his hand and a knapsack on his back, mounting toward a strange, +unfinished cathedral. + +It was a picture by an unknown painter, an old Dutchman, who had perhaps +visited certain of the Italian masters, for he had appropriated colours +and processes peculiar to them. + +The bedroom contained a big bed, a chest of drawers waist-high, and some +easy chairs. On the mantel were an antique clock and copper +candlesticks. On the wall there was a fine photograph of a Botticelli in +the Berlin museum, representing a plump and penitent Virgin who was like +a housewife in tears. She was surrounded by gentleman-, lady-, and +little-boy-angels. The languishing young men held spliced wax tapers +that were like bits of rope; the coquettish hoydens had flowers stuck in +their long hair; and the mischievous cherub-pages looked rapturously at +the infant Jesus, who stood beside the Virgin and held out his hands in +benediction. + +Then there was a print of Breughel, engraved by Cock, "The wise and the +foolish virgins": a little panel, cut in the middle by a corkscrew cloud +which was flanked at each side by angels with their sleeves rolled up +and their cheeks puffed out, sounding the trumpet, while in the middle +of the cloud another angel, bizarre and sacerdotal, with his navel +indicated beneath his languorously flowing robe, unrolled a banderole on +which was written the verse of the Gospel, "_Ecce sponsus venit, exite +obviam ei_." + +Beneath the cloud, at one side, sat the wise virgins, good Flemings, +with their lighted lamps, and sang canticles as they turned the spinning +wheel. At the other side were the foolish virgins with their empty +lamps. Four joyous gossips were holding hands and dancing in a ring on +the greensward, while the fifth played the bagpipe and beat time with +her foot. Above the cloud the five wise virgins, slender and ethereal +now, naked and charming, brandished flaming tapers and mounted toward a +Gothic church where Christ stood to welcome them; while on the other +side the foolish virgins, imperfectly draped, beat vainly on a closed +door with their dead torches. + +The blessed naivete of the Primitives, the homely touches in the scenes +of earth and of heaven! Durtal loved this old engraving. He saw in it a +union of the art of an Ostade purified and that of a Thierry Bouts. + +Waiting for his grate, in which the charcoal was crackling and peeling +and running like frying grease, to become red, he sat down in front of +his desk and ran over his notes. + +"Let's see," he said to himself, rolling a cigarette, "we had come to +the time when that excellent Gilles de Rais begins the quest of the +'great work.' It is easy to figure what knowledge he possessed about the +method of transmuting metals into gold. + +"Alchemy was already highly developed a century before he was born. The +writings of Albertus Magnus, Arnaud de Villeneuve, and Raymond Lully +were in the hands of the hermetics. The manuscripts of Nicolas Flamel +circulated, and there is no doubt that Gilles had acquired them, for he +was an avid collector of the rare. Let us add that at that epoch the +edict of Charles interdicting spagyric labours under pain of prison and +hanging, and the bull, _Spondent pariter quas non exhibent_, which Pope +John XXII fulminated against the alchemists, were still in vigour. These +treatises were, then, forbidden, and in consequence desirable. It is +certain that Gilles had long studied them, but from that to +understanding them is a far cry. + +"For they were written in an impossible jargon of allegories, twisted +and obscure metaphors, incoherent symbols, ambiguous parables, enigmas, +and ciphers. And here is an example." He took from one of the shelves of +the library a manuscript which was none other than the Asch-Mezareph, +the book of the Jew Abraham and of Nicolas Flamel, restored, translated, +and annotated by Eliphas Levi. This manuscript had been lent him by Des +Hermies, who had discovered it one day among some old papers. + +"In this is what claims to be the recipe for the philosopher's stone, +for the grand quintessential and tinctural essence. The figures are not +precisely clear," he said to himself, as he ran his eye over the pen +drawings, retouched in colour, representing, under the title of "_The +chemical coitus_" various bottles and flasks each containing a liquid +and imprisoning an allegorical creature. A green lion, with a crescent +moon over him, hung head downward. Doves were trying to fly out through +the neck of the bottle or to peck a way through the bottom. The liquid +was black and undulated with waves of carmine and gold, or white and +granulated with dots of ink, which sometimes took the shape of a frog or +a star. Sometimes the liquid was milky and troubled, sometimes flames +rose from it as if there were a film of alcohol over the surface. + +Eliphas Levi explained the symbolism of these bottled volatiles as fully +as he cared to, but abstained from giving the famous recipe for the +grand magisterium. He was keeping up the pleasantry of his other books, +in which, beginning with an air of solemnity, he affirmed his intention +of unveiling the old arcana, and, when the time came to fulfil his +promise, begged the question, alleging the excuse that he would perish +if he betrayed such burning secrets. The same excuse, which had done +duty through the ages, served in masking the perfect ignorance of the +cheap occultists of the present day. + +"As a matter of fact, the 'great work' is simple," said Durtal to +himself, folding up the manuscript of Nicolas Flamel. "The hermetic +philosophers discovered--and modern science, after long evading the +issue, no longer denies--that the metals are compounds, and that their +components are identical. They vary from each other according to the +different proportions of their elements. With the aid of an agent which +will displace these proportions one may transmute mercury, for example, +into silver, and lead into gold. + +"And this agent is the philosopher's stone: mercury--not the vulgar +mercury, which to the alchemists was but an aborted metallic sperm--but +the philosophers' mercury, called also the green lion, the serpent, the +milk of the Virgin, the pontic water. + +"Only the recipe for this mercury, or stone of the sages, has ever been +revealed--and it is this that the philosophers of the Middle Ages, the +Renaissance, all centuries, including our own, have sought so +frantically. + +"And in what has it not been sought?" said Durtal, thumbing his notes. +"In arsenic, in ordinary mercury, tin, salts of vitriol, saltpetre and +nitre; in the juices of spurge, poppy, and purslane; in the bellies of +starved toads; in human urine, in the menstrual fluid and the milk of +women." + +Now Gilles de Rais must have been completely baffled. Alone at +Tiffauges, without the aid of initiates, he was incapable of making +fruitful experiments. At that time Paris was the centre of the hermetic +science in France. The alchemists gathered under the vaults of Notre +Dame and studied the hieroglyphics which Nicolas Flamel, before he died, +had written on the walls of the charnal Des Innocents and on the portal +of Saint Jacques de la Boucherie, describing cabalistically the +preparation of the famous stone. + +The Marshal could not go to Paris because the English soldiers barred +the roads. There was only one thing to do. He wrote to the most +celebrated of the southern transmuters, and had them brought to +Tiffauges at great expense. + +"From documents which we posses we can see his supervising the +construction of the athanor, or alchemists' furnace, buying pelicans, +crucibles, and retorts. He turned one of the wings of his chateau into a +laboratory and shut himself up in it with Antonio di Palermo, Francois +Lombard, and 'Jean Petit, goldsmith of Paris,' all of whom busied +themselves night and day with the concoction of the 'great work.'" + +They were completely unsuccessful. At the end of their resources, these +hermetists disappeared, and there ensued at Tiffauges an incredible +coming-and-going of adepts and their helpers. They arrived from all +parts of Brittany, Poitou, and Maine, alone or escorted by promoters and +sorcerers. Gilles de Sille and Roger de Bricqueville, cousins and +friends of the Marshal, scurried about the country, beating up the game +and driving it in to Gilles de Rais, while a priest of his chapel, +Eustache Blanchet, went to Italy where workers in metals were legion. + +While waiting, Gilles de Rais, not to be discouraged, continued his +experiments, all of which missed fire. He finally came to believe that +the magicians were right after all, and that no discovery was possible +without the aid of Satan. + +And one night, with a sorcerer newly arrived from Poitiers, Jean de la +Riviere, he betakes himself to a forest in the vicinity of the chateau +de Tiffauges. With his servitors Henriet and Poitou, he remains on the +verge of the wood into which the sorcerer penetrates. The night is heavy +and there is no moon. Gilles becomes nervous, scrutinizing the shadows, +listening to the muted sounds of the nocturnal landscape; his +companions, terrified, huddle close together, trembling and whispering +at the slightest stirring of the air. Suddenly a cry of anguish is +raised. They hesitate, then they advance, groping in the darkness. In a +sudden flare of light they perceive de la Riviere trembling and deathly +pale, clutching the handle of his lantern convulsively. In a low voice +he recounts how the Devil has risen in the form of a leopard and rushed +past without looking at the evocator, without saying a word. + +The next day the sorcerer vanished, but another arrived. This was a +bungler named Du Mesnil. He required Gilles to sign with blood a deed +binding him to give the Devil all the Devil asked of him "except his +life and soul," but, although to aid the conjurements Gilles consented +to have the Office of the Damned sung in his chapel on All Saints' Day, +Satan did not appear. + +The Marshal was beginning to doubt the powers of his magicians, when +the outcome of a new endeavor convinced him that frequently the Devil +does appear. + +An evocator whose name has been lost held a seance with Gilles and de +Sille in a chamber at Tiffauges. + +On the ground he traces a great circle and commands his two companions +to step inside it. Sille refuses. Gripped by a terror which he cannot +explain, he begins to tremble all over. He goes to the window, opens it, +and stands ready for flight, murmuring exorcisms under his breath. +Gilles, bolder, stands in the middle of the circle, but at the first +conjurgations he too trembles and tries to make the sign of the cross. +The sorcerer orders him not to budge. At one moment he feels something +seize him by the neck. Panic-stricken, he vacillates, supplicating Our +Lady to save him. The evocator, furious, throws him out of the circle. +Gilles precipitates himself through the door, de Sille jumps out of the +window, they meet below and stand aghast. Howls are heard in the chamber +where the magician is operating. There is "a sound as of sword strokes +raining on a wooden billet," then groans, cries of distress, the appeals +of a man being assassinated. + +They stand rooted to the spot. When the clamour ceases they venture to +open the door and find the sorcerer lying; in pools of blood, his +forehead caved in, his body horribly mangled. + +They carry him out. Gilles, smitten with remorse, gives the man his own +bed, bandages him, and has him confessed. For several days the sorcerer +hovers between life and death but finally recovers and flees from the +castle. + +Gilles was despairing of obtaining from the Devil the recipe for the +sovereign magisterium, when Eustache Blanchet's return from Italy was +announced. Eustache brought the master of Florentine magic, the +irresistible evoker of demons and larvae, Francesco Prelati. + +This man struck awe into Gilles. Barely twenty-three years old, he was +one of the wittiest, the most erudite, and the most polished men of the +time. What had he done before he came to install himself at Tiffauges, +there to begin, with Gilles, the most frightful series of sins against +the Holy Ghost that has ever been known? His testimony in the criminal +trial of Gilles does not furnish us any very detailed information on his +own score. He was born in the diocese of Lucca, at Pistoia, and had been +ordained a priest by the Bishop of Arezzo. Some time after his entrance +into the priesthood, he had become the pupil of a thaumaturge of +Florence, Jean de Fontenelle, and had signed a pact with a demon named +Barron. From that moment onward, this insinuating and persuasive, +learned and charming abbe, must have given himself over to the most +abominable of sacrileges and the most murderous practices of black +magic. + +At any rate Gilles came completely under the influence of this man. The +extinguished furnaces were relighted, and that Stone of the Sages, which +Prelati had seen, flexible, frail, red and smelling of calcinated marine +salt, they sought together furiously, invoking Hell. + +Their incantations were all in vain. Gilles, disconsolate, redoubled +them, but they finally produced a dreadful result and Prelati narrowly +escaped with his life. + +One afternoon Eustache Blanchet, in a gallery of the chateau, perceives +the Marshal weeping bitterly. Plaints of supplication are heard through +the door of a chamber in which Prelati has been evoking the Devil. + +"The Demon is in there beating my poor Francis. I implore you, go in!" +cries Gilles, but Blanchet, frightened, refuses. Then Gilles makes up +his mind, in spite of his fear. He is advancing to force the door, when +it opens and Prelati staggers out and falls, bleeding, into his arms. +Prelati is able, with the support of his friends, to gain the chamber of +the Marshal, where he is put to bed, but he has sustained so merciless a +thrashing that he goes into delirium and his fever keeps mounting. +Gilles, in despair, stays beside him, cares for him, has him confessed, +and weeps for joy when Prelati is out of danger. + +"The fate of the unknown sorcerer and of Prelati, both getting +dangerously wounded in an empty room, under identical circumstances--I +tell you, it's a remarkable coincidence," said Durtal to himself. + +"And the documents which relate these facts are authentic. They are, +indeed, excerpts from the procedure in Gilles's trial. The confessions +of the accused and the depositions of the witnesses agree, and it is +impossible to think that Gilles and Prelati lied, for in confessing +these Satanic evocations they condemned themselves, by their own words, +to be burned alive. + +"If in addition they had declared that the Evil One had appeared to +them, that they had been visited by succubi; if they had affirmed that +they had heard voices, smelled odours, even touched a body; we might +conclude that they had had hallucinations similar to those of certain +Bicetre subjects, but as it was there could have been no misfunctioning +of the senses, no morbid visions, because the wounds, the marks of the +blows, the material fact, visible and tangible, are present for +testimony. + +"Imagine how thoroughly convinced of the reality of the Devil a mystic +like Gilles de Rais must have been after witnessing such scenes! + +"In spite of his discomfitures, he could not doubt--and Prelati, +half-killed, must have doubted even less--that if Satan pleased, they +should finally find this powder which would load them with riches and +even render them almost immortal--for at that epoch the philosopher's +stone passed not only for an agent in the transmutation of base metals, +such as tin, lead, copper, into noble metals like silver and gold, but +also for a panacea curing all ailments and prolonging life, without +infirmities, beyond the limits formerly assigned to the patriarchs. + +"Singular science," ruminated Durtal, raising the fender of his +fireplace and warming his feet, "in spite of the railleries of this +time, which, in the matter of discoveries but exhumes lost things, the +hermetic philosophy was not wholly vain. + +"The master of contemporary science, Dumas, recognizes, under the name +of isomery, the theories of the alchemists, and Berthelot declares, 'No +one can affirm _a priori_ that the fabrication of bodies reputed to be +simple is impossible.' Then there have been verified and certified +achievements. Besides Nicolas Flamel, who really seems to have succeeded +in the 'great work,' the chemist Van Helmont, in the eighteenth century, +received from an unknown man a quarter of a grain of philosopher's stone +and with it transformed eight ounces of mercury into gold. + +"At the same epoch, Helvetius, who combated the dogma of the spagyrics, +received from another unknown a powder of projection with which he +converted an ingot of lead into gold. Helvetius was not precisely a +charlatan, neither was Spinoza, who verified the experiment, a credulous +simpleton. + +"And what is to be thought of that mysterious man Alexander Sethon who, +under the name of the Cosmopolite, went all over Europe, operating +before princes, in public, transforming all metals into gold? This +alchemist, who seems to have had a sincere disdain for riches, as he +never kept the gold which he created, but lived in poverty and prayer, +was imprisoned by Christian II, Elector of Saxony, and endured martyrdom +like a saint. He suffered himself to be beaten with rods and pierced +with pointed stakes, and he refused to give up a secret which he +claimed, like Nicolas Flamel, to have received from God. + +"And to think that these researches are being carried on at the present +time! Only, most of the hermetics now deny medical and divine virtues to +the famous stone. They think simply that the grand magisterium is a +ferment, which, thrown into metals in fusion, produces a molecular +transformation similar to that which organic matter undergoes when +fermented with the aid of a leaven. + +"Des Hermies, who is well acquainted with the underworld of science, +maintains that more than forty alchemic furnaces are now alight in +France, and that in Hanover and Bavaria the adepts are more numerous +yet. + +"Have they rediscovered the incomparable secret of antiquity? In spite +of certain affirmations, it is hardly probable. Nobody need manufacture +artificially a metal whose origins are so unaccountable that a deposit +is likely to be found anywhere. For instance, in a law suit which took +place at Paris in the month of November, 1886, between M. Popp, +constructor of pneumatic city clocks, and financiers who had been +backing him, certain engineers and chemists of the School of Mines +declared that gold could be extracted from common silex, so that the +very walls sheltering us might be placers, and the mansards might be +loaded with nuggets! + +"At any rate," he continued, smiling, "these sciences are not +propitious." + +He was thinking of an old man who had installed an alchemic laboratory +on the fifth floor of a house in the rue Saint Jacques. This man, named +Auguste Redoutez, went every afternoon to the Bibliotheque Nationale and +pored over the works of Nicolas Flamel. Morning and evening he pursued +the quest of the "great work" in front of his furnace. + +The 16th of March the year before, he came out of the Bibliotheque with +a man who had been sitting at the same table with him, and as they +walked along together Redoutez declared that he was finally in +possession of the famous secret. Arriving in his laboratory, he threw +pieces of iron into a retort, made a projection, and obtained crystals +the colour of blood. The other examined the salts and made a flippant +remark. The alchemist, furious, threw himself upon him, struck him with +a hammer, and had to be overpowered and carried in a strait-jacket to +Saint Anne, pending investigation. + +"In the sixteenth century, in Luxemburg, initiates were roasted in iron +cages. The following century, in Germany, they were clothed in rags and +hanged on gilded gibbets. Now that they are tolerated and left in peace +they go mad. Decidedly, fate is against them," Durtal concluded. + +He rose and went to answer a ring at the door. He came back with a +letter which the concierge had brought. He opened it. + +"Why, what is this?" he exclaimed. His astonishment grew as he read: + + "Monsieur, + + "I am neither an adventuress nor a seeker of adventures, nor am + I a society woman grown weary of drawing-room conversation. Even + less am I moved by the vulgar curiosity to find out whether an + author is the same in the flesh as he is in his books. Indeed I + am none of the things which you may think I am, from my writing + to you this way. The fact is that I have just finished reading + your last book," + +"She has taken her time," murmured Durtal, "it appeared a year ago." + + "melancholy as an imprisoned soul vainly beating its wings + against the bars of its cage." + +"Oh, hell! What a compliment. Anyway, it rings false, like all of them." + + "And now, Monsieur, though I am convinced that it is always + folly and madness to try to realize a desire, will you permit + that a sister in lassitude meet you some evening in a place + which you shall designate, after which we shall return, each of + us, into our own interior, the interior of persons destined to + fall because they are out of line with their 'fellows'? Adieu, + Monsieur, be assured that I consider you a somebody in a century + of nobodies. + + "Not knowing whether this note will elicit a reply, I abstain + from making myself known. This evening a maid will call upon + your concierge and ask him if there is a letter for Mme. + Maubel." + +"Hmm!" said Durtal, folding up the letter. "I know her. She must be one +of these withered dames who are always trying to cash outlawed +kiss-tickets and soul-warrants in the lottery of love. Forty-five years +old at least. Her _clientele_ is composed of boys, who are always +satisfied if they don't have to pay, and men of letters, who are yet +more easily satisfied--for the ugliness of authors' mistresses is +proverbial. Unless this is simply a practical joke. But who would be +playing one on me--I don't know anybody--and why?" + +In any case, he would simply not reply. + +But in spite of himself he reopened the letter. + +"Well now, what do I risk? If this woman wants to sell me an over-ripe +heart, there is nothing forcing me to purchase it. I don't commit myself +to anything by going to an assignation. But where shall I meet her? +Here? No! Once she gets into my apartment complications arise, for it is +much more difficult to throw a woman out of your house than simply to +walk off and leave her at a street corner. Suppose I designated the +corner of the rue de Sevres and the rue de la Chaise, under the wall of +the Abbaye-au-Bois. It is solitary, and then, too, it is only a minute's +walk from here. Or no, I will begin vaguely, naming no meeting-place at +all. I shall solve that problem later, when I get her reply." + +He wrote a letter in which he spoke of his own spiritual lassitude and +declared that no good could come of an interview, for he no longer +sought happiness on earth. + +"I will add that I am in poor health. That is always a good one, and it +excuses a man from 'being a man' if necessary," he said to himself, +rolling a cigarette. + +"Well, that's done, and she won't get much encouragement out of it. Oh, +wait. I omitted something. To keep from giving her a hold on me I shall +do well to let her know that a serious and sustained liaison with me is +impossible 'for family reasons.' And that's enough for one time." + +He folded the letter and scrawled the address. + +Then he held the sealed envelope in his hand and reflected. + +"Of course I am a fool to answer her. Who knows what situations a thing +like this is going to lead to? I am well aware that whoever she be, a +woman is an incubator of sorrow and annoyance. If she is good she is +probably stupid, or perhaps she is an invalid, or perhaps she is so +disastrously fecund that she gets pregnant if you look at her. If she is +bad, one may expect to be dragged through every disgusting kind of +degradation. Oh, whatever you do, you're in for it." + +He regurgitated the memories of his youthful amours. Deception. +Disenchantment. How pitilessly base a woman is while she is young! + +" ... To be thinking of things like that now at my age! As if I had any +need of a woman now!" + +But in spite of all, his pseudonymous correspondent interested him. + +"Who knows? Perhaps she is good-looking, or at least not very +ill-looking. It doesn't cost me anything to find out." + +He re-read her letter. No misspelling. The handwriting not commercial. +Her ideas about his book were mediocre enough, but who would expect her +to be a critic? "Discreet scent of heliotrope," he added, sniffing the +envelope. + +"Oh, well, let's have our little fling." + +And as he went out to get some breakfast he left his reply with the +concierge. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + + +"If this continues I shall lose my mind," murmured Durtal as he sat in +front of his table reperusing the letters which he had been receiving +from that woman for the last week. She was an indefatigable +letter-writer, and since she had begun her advances he had not had time +to answer one letter before another arrived. + +"My!" he said, "let's try and see just where we do stand. After that +ungracious answer to her first note she immediately sends me this: + + "'Monsieur, + + "'This is a farewell. If I were weak enough to write you any + more letters they would become as tedious as the life I lead. + Anyway, have I not had the best part of you, in that hesitant + letter of yours which shook me out of my lethargy for an + instant? Like yourself, monsieur, I know, alas! that nothing + happens, and that our only certain joys are those we dream of. + So, in spite of my feverish desire to know you, I fear that you + were right in saying that a meeting would be for both of us the + source of regrets to which we ought not voluntarily expose + ourselves....' + +"Then what bears witness to the perfect futility of this exordium is the +way the missive ends: + + "'If you should take the fancy to write me, you can safely + address your letters "Mme. Maubel, rue Littre, general + delivery." I shall be passing the rue Littre post-office Monday. + If you wish to let matters remain just where they are--and thus + cause me a great deal of pain--will you not tell me so, + frankly?' + +"Whereupon I was simple-minded enough to compose an epistle as +ambiguous as the first, concealing my furtive advances under an apparent +reluctance, thus letting her know that I was securely hooked. As her +third note proves: + + "'Never accuse yourself, monsieur--I repress a tenderer name + which rises to my lips--of being unable to give me consolation. + Weary, disabused, as we are, and done with it all, let us + sometimes permit our souls to speak to each other--low, very + low--as I have spoken to you this night, for henceforth my + thought is going to follow you wherever you are.' + +"Four pages of the same tune," he said, turning the leaves, "but this is +better: + + "'Tonight, my unknown friend, one word only. I have passed a + horrible day, my nerves in revolt and crying out against the + petty sufferings they are subjected to every minute. A slamming + door, a harsh or squeaky voice floating up to me out of the + street.... Yet there are whole hours when I am so far from being + sensitive that if the house were burning I should not move. Am I + about to send you a page of comic lamentations? Ah, when one has + not the gift of rendering one's grief superbly and transforming + it into literary or musical passages which weep magnificently, + the best thing is to keep still about it. + + "'I bid you a silent goodnight. As on the first day, I am + harassed by the conflict of the desire to see you and the dread + of touching a dream lest it perish. Ah, yes, you spoke truly. + Miserable, miserable wretches that we are, our timorous souls + are so afraid of any reality that they dare not think a sympathy + which has taken possession of them capable of surviving an + interview with the person who gave it birth. Yet, in spite of + this fine casuistry, I simply must confess to you--no, no, + nothing. Guess if you can, and forgive me for this banal + letter. Or rather, read between the lines, and perhaps you will + find there a little bit of my heart and a great deal of what I + leave unsaid. + + "'A foolish letter with "I" written all over it. Who would + suspect that while I wrote it my sole thought was of You?'" + +"So far, so good. This woman at least piqued my curiosity. And what +peculiar ink," he thought. It was myrtle green, very thin, very pale. +With his finger-nail he detached some of the fine dust of rice powder, +perfumed with heliotrope, clinging to the seal of the letters. + +"She must be blonde," he went on, examining the tint of the powder, "for +it isn't the 'Rachel' shade that brunettes use. Now up to that point +everything had been going nicely, but then and there I spoiled it. Moved +by I know not what folly, I wrote her a yet more roundabout letter, +which, however, was very pressing. In attempting to fan her flame I +kindled myself--for a spectre--and at once I received this: + + "'What shall I do? I neither wish to see you, nor can I consent + to annihilate my overwhelming desire to meet you. Last night, in + spite of me, your name, which was burning me, sprang from my + lips. My husband, one of your admirers, it seems, appeared to be + somewhat humiliated by the preoccupation which, indeed, was + absorbing me and causing unbearable shivers to run all through + me. A common friend of yours and mine--for why should I not tell + you that you know me, if to have met socially is to "know" + anyone?--one of your friends, then, came up and said that + frankly he was very much taken with you. I was in a state of + such utter lack of self-control that I don't know what I should + have done had it not been for the unwitting assistance which + somebody gave me by pronouncing the name of a grotesque person + of whom I can never think without laughing. Adieu. You are + right. I tell myself that I will never write you again, and I go + and do it anyway. + + "'Your own--as I cannot be in reality without wounding us both.' + +"Then when I wrote a burning reply, this was brought by a maid on a dead +run: + + "'Ah, if I were not afraid, afraid!--and you know you are just + as much afraid as I am--how I should fly to you! No, you cannot + hear the thousand conversations with which my soul fatigues + yours.... Oh, in my miserable existence there are hours when + madness seizes me. Judge for yourself. The whole night I spent + appealing to you furiously. I wept with exasperation. This + morning my husband came into the room. My eyes were bloodshot. I + began to laugh crazily, and when I could speak I said to him, + "What would you think of a person who, questioned as to his + profession, replied, 'I am a chamber succubus'?" "Ah, my dear, + you are ill," said he. "Worse than you think," said I. + + "'But if I come to see you, what could we talk about, in the + state you yourself are in? Your letter has completely unbalanced + me. You arraign your malady with a certain brutality which makes + my body rejoice but alienates my soul a little. Ah, what if our + dreams could really come true! + + "'Ah, say a word, just one word, from out your own heart. Don't + be afraid that even one of your letters can possibly fall into + other hands than mine.' + +"So, so, so. This is getting to be no laughing matter," concluded +Durtal, folding up the letter. "The woman is married to a man who knows +me, it seems. What a situation! Let's see, now. Whom have I ever +visited?" He tried vainly to remember. No woman he had ever met at an +evening party would address such declarations to him. And that common +friend. "But I have no friends, except Des Hermies. I'd better try and +find out whom he has been seeing recently. But as a physician he meets +scores of people! And then, how can I explain to him? Tell him the +story? He will burst into a roar and disillusion me before I have got +halfway through the narrative." + +And Durtal became irritated, for within him a really incomprehensible +phenomenon was taking place. He was burning for this unknown woman. He +was positively obsessed by her. He who had renounced all carnal +relations years ago, who, when the barns of his senses were opened, +contented himself with driving the disgusting herd of sin to the +commercial shambles to be summarily knocked in the head by the butcher +girls of love, he, he! was getting himself to believe--in the teeth of +all experience, in the teeth of good judgment--that with a woman as +passionate as this one seemed to be, he would experience superhuman +sensations and novel abandon. + +And he imagined her as he would have her, blonde, firm of flesh, lithe, +feline, melancholy, capable of frenzies; and the picture of her brought +on such a tension of nerves that his teeth rattled. + +For a week, in the solitude in which he lived, he had dreamed of her and +had become thoroughly aroused and incapable of doing any work, even of +reading, for the image of this woman interposed itself between him and +the page. + +He tried suggesting to himself ignoble visions. He would imagine this +creature in moments of corporal distress and thus calm his desires with +unappetizing hallucinations; but the procedure which had formerly been +very effective when he desired a woman and could not have her now failed +utterly. He somehow could not imagine his unknown in quest of bismuth or +of linen. He could not see her otherwise than rebellious, melancholy, +dizzy with desire, kindling him with her eyes, inflaming him with her +pale hands. + +And his sensual resurrection was incredible--an aberrated Dog Star +flaming in a physical November, at a spiritual All Hallows. Tranquil, +dried up, safe from crises, without veritable desires, almost impotent, +or rather completely forgetful of sex for months at a time, he was +suddenly roused--and for an unreality!--by the mystery of mad letters. + +"Enough!" he cried, smiting the table a jarring blow. + +He clapped on his hat and went out, slamming the door behind him. + +"I know how to make my imagination behave!" and he rushed over to the +Latin Quarter to see a prostitute he knew. "I have been a good boy too +long," he murmured as he hurried down the street. "One can't stay on the +straight and narrow path for ever." + +He found the woman at home and had a miserable time. She was a buxom +brunette with festive eyes and the teeth of a wolf. An expert, she +could, in a few seconds, drain one's marrow, granulate the lungs, and +demolish the loins. + +She chid him for having been away so long, then cajoled him and kissed +him. He felt pathetic, listless, out of breath, out of place, for he had +no genuine desires. He finally flung himself on a couch and, enervated +to the point of crying, he went through the back-breaking motions +mechanically, like a dredge. + +Never had he so execrated the flesh, never had he felt such repugnance +and lassitude, as when he issued from that room. He strolled haphazard +down the rue Soufflot, and the image of the unknown obsessed him, more +irritating, more tenacious. + +"I begin to understand the superstition of the succubus. I must try some +bromo-exorcism. Tonight I will swallow a gram of bromide of potassium. +That will make my senses be good." + +But he realized that the trouble was not primarily physical, that really +it was only the consequence of an extraordinary state of mind. His love +for that which departed from the formula, for that projection _out of +the world_ which had recently cheered him in art, had deviated and +sought expression in a woman. She embodied his need to soar upward from +the terrestrial humdrum. + +"It is those precious unworldly studies, those cloister thoughts +picturing ecclesiastical and demoniac scenes, which have prepared me for +the present folly," he said to himself. His unsuspected, and hitherto +unexpressed, mysticism, which had determined his choice of subject for +his last work was now sending him out, in disorder, to seek new pains +and pleasures. + +As he walked along he recapitulated what he knew of the woman. She was +married, blonde, in easy circumstances because she had her own sleeping +quarters and a maid. She lived in the neighbourhood, because she went to +the rue Littre post-office for her mail. Her name, supposing she had +prefixed her own initial to the name of Maubel, was Henriette, Hortense, +Honorine, Hubertine, or Helene. What else? She must frequent the society +of artists, because she had met him, and for years he had not been in a +bourgeois drawing-room. She was some kind of a morbid Catholic, because +that word succubus was unknown to the profane. That was all. Then there +was her husband, who, gullible as he might be, must nevertheless suspect +their liaison, since, by her own confession, she dissembled her +obsession very badly. + +"This is what I get for letting myself be carried away. For I, too, +wrote at first to amuse myself with aphrodisiac statements. Then I ended +by becoming completely hysterical. We have taken turns fanning +smouldering ashes which now are blazing. It is too bad that we have both +become inflamed at the same time--for her case must be the same as mine, +to judge from the passionate letters she writes. What shall I do? Keep +on tantalizing myself for a chimera? No! I'll bring matters to a head, +see her, and if she is good-looking, sleep with her. I shall have peace, +anyway." + +He looked about him. Without knowing how he had got there he found +himself in the Jardin des Plantes. He oriented himself, remembered that +there was a cafe on the side facing the quay, and went to find it. + +He tried to control himself and write a letter at once ardent and firm, +but the pen shook in his fingers. He wrote at a gallop, confessed that +he regretted not having consented, at the outset, to the meeting she +proposed, and, attempting to check himself, declared, "We must see each +other. Think of the harm we are doing ourselves, teasing each other at a +distance. Think of the remedy we have at hand, my poor darling, I +implore you." + +He must indicate a place of meeting. He hesitated. "Let me think," he +said to himself. "I don't want her to alight at my place. Too dangerous. +Then the best thing to do would be to offer her a glass of port and a +biscuit and conduct her to Lavenue's, which is a hotel as well as a +cafe. I will reserve a room. That will be less disgusting than an +assignation house. Very well, then, let us put in place of the rue de la +Chaise the waiting-room of the Gare Montparnasse. Sometimes it is quite +empty. Well, that's done." He gummed the envelope and felt a kind of +relief. "Ah! I was forgetting. Garcon! The Bottin de Paris." + +He searched for the name Maubel, thinking that by some chance it might +be her own. Of course it was hardly probable, but she seemed so +imprudent that with her anything was to be expected. He might very +easily have met a Mme. Maubel and forgotten her. He found a Maube and a +Maubec, but no Maubel. "Of course, that proves nothing," he said, +closing the directory. He went out and threw his letter into the box. +"The joker in this is the husband. But hell, I am not likely to take his +wife away from him very long." + +He had an idea of going home, but he realized that he would do no work, +that alone he would relapse into daydream. "If I went up to Des +Hermies's place. Yes, today was his consultation day, it's an idea." + +He quickened his pace, came to the rue Madame, and rang at an entresol. +The housekeeper opened the door. + +"Ah, Monsieur Durtal, he is out, but he will be in soon. Will you wait?" + +"But you are sure he is coming back?" + +"Why, yes. He ought to be here now," she said, stirring the fire. + +As soon as she had retired Durtal sat down, then, becoming bored, he +went over and began browsing among the books which covered the wall as +in his own place. + +"Des Hermies certainly has some curious items," he murmured, opening a +very old book. Here's a treatise written centuries ago to suit my case +exactly. _Manuale exorcismorum_. Well, I'll be damned! It's a Plantin. +And what does this manual have to recommend in the treatment of the +possessed? + +"Hmmm. Contains some quaint counter-spells. Here are some for +energumens, for the bewitched; here are some against love-philtres and +against the plague; against spells cast on comestibles; some, even, to +keep butter and milk sweet. That isn't odd. The Devil entered into +everything in the good old days. And what can this be?" In his hand he +held two little volumes with crimson edges, bound in fawn-coloured calf. +He opened them and looked at the title, _The anatomy of the mass_, by +Pierre du Moulin, dated, Geneva, 1624. "Might prove interesting." He +went to warm his feet, and hastily skimmed through one of the volumes. +"Why!" he said, "it's mighty good." + +On the page which he was reading was a discussion of the priesthood. The +author affirmed that none might exercise the functions of the priesthood +if he was not sound in body, or if any of his members had been +amputated, and asking apropos of this, if a castrated man could be +ordained a priest, he answered his own question, "No, unless he carries +upon him, reduced to powder, the parts which are wanting." He added, +however, that Cardinal Tolet did not admit this interpretation, which +nevertheless had been universally adopted. + +Durtal, amused, read on. Now du Moulin was debating with himself the +point whether it was necessary to interdict abbes ravaged by lechery. +And in answer he cited himself the melancholy glose of Canon Maximianus, +who, in his Distinction 81, sighs, "It is commonly said that none ought +to be deposed from his charge for fornication, in view of the fact that +few can be found exempt from this vice." + +"Why! You here?" said Des Hermies, entering. "What are you reading? _The +anatomy of the mass?_ Oh, it's a poor thing, for Protestants. I am just +about distracted. Oh, my friend, what brutes those people are," and like +a man with a great weight on his chest he unburdened himself. + +"Yes, I have just come from a consultation with those whom the journals +characterize as 'princes of science.' For a quarter of an hour I have +had to listen to the most contradictory opinions. On one point, however, +all agreed: that my patient was a dead man. Finally they compromised and +decided that the poor wretch's torture should be needlessly prolonged by +a course of moxas. I timidly remarked that it would be simpler to send +for a confessor, and then assuage the sufferings of the dying man with +repeated injections of morphine. If you had seen their faces! They came +as near as anything to denouncing me as a tout for the priests. + +"And such is contemporary science. Everybody discovers a new or +forgotten disease, and trumpets a forgotten or a new remedy, and nobody +knows a thing! And then, too, what good does it do one not to be +hopelessly ignorant since there is so much sophistication going on in +pharmacy that no physician can be sure of having his prescriptions +filled to the letter? One example among many: at present, sirup of white +poppy, the diacodia of the old Codex, does not exist. It is manufactured +with laudanum and sirup of sugar, as if they were the same thing! + +"We have got so we no longer dose substances but prescribe ready-made +remedies and use those surprising specifics which fill up the fourth +pages of the journals. It's a compromise medicine, a democratic +medicine, one cure for all cases. It's scandalous, it's silly. + +"No, there is no use in talking. The old therapeutics based on +experience was better than this. At least it know that remedies ingested +in pill, powder, or bolus form were treacherous, so it prescribed them +only in the liquid state. Now, too, every physician specializes. The +oculists see only the eyes, and, to cure them, quite calmly poison the +body. With their pilocarpine they have ruined the health of how many +people for ever! Others treat cutaneous affections. They drive an eczema +inward on an old man who as soon as he is 'cured' becomes childish or +dangerous. There is no more solidarity. Allegiance to one party means +hostility to all others. Its a mess. Now my honourable confreres are +stumbling around, taking a fancy to medicaments which they don't even +know how to use. Take antipyrine, for example. It is one of the very few +really active products that the chemists have found in a long time. +Well, where is the doctor who knows that, applied in a compress with +iodide and cold Bondonneau spring water, antipyrine combats the +supposedly incurable ailment, cancer? And if that seems incredible, it +is true, nevertheless." + +"Honestly," said Durtal, "you believe that the old-time doctors came +nearer healing?" + +"Yes, because, miraculously, they know the effects of certain invariable +remedies prepared without fraud. Of course it is self-evident that when +old Pare eulogized 'sack medicine' and ordered his patients to carry +pulverized medicaments in a little sack whose form varied according to +the organ to be healed, assuming the form of a cap for the head, of a +bagpipe for the stomach, of an ox tongue for the spleen, he probably did +not obtain very signal results. His claim to have cured gastralgia by +appositions of powder of red rose, coral and mastic, wormwood and mint, +aniseed and nutmeg, is certainly not to be borne out, but he also had +other systems, and often he cured, because he possessed the science of +simples, which is now lost. + +"The present-day physicians shrug their shoulders when the name of +Ambrose Pare is mentioned. They used to pooh-pooh the idea of the +alchemists that gold had medicinal virtue. Their fine scorn does not now +prevent them from using alternate doses of the salts and of the filings +of this metal. They use concentrated arseniate of gold against anemia, +muriate against syphilis, cyanide against amenorrhea and scrofula, and +chloride of sodium and gold against old ulcers. No, I assure you, it is +disgusting to be a physician, for in spite of the fact that I am a +doctor of science and have extensive hospital experience I am quite +inferior to humble country herborists, solitaries, who know a great deal +more than I about what is useful to know--and I admit it." + +"And homeopathy?" + +"It has some good things about it and some bad ones. It also palliates +without curing. It sometimes represses maladies, but for grave and acute +cases it is impotent, just like this Mattei system, which, however, is +useful as an intermediary to stave off a crisis. With its blood-and +lymph-purifying products, its antiscrofoloso, its angiotico, its +anti-canceroso, it sometimes modifies morbid states in which other +methods are of no avail. For instance, it permits a patient whose +kidneys have been demoralized by iodide of potassium to gain time and +recuperate so that he can safely begin to drink iodide again! + +"I add that terrific shooting pains, which rebel even against chloroform +and morphine, often yield to an application of 'green electricity.' You +ask me, perhaps, of what ingredients this liquid electricity is made. I +answer that I know absolutely nothing about it. Mattei claims that he +has been able to fix in his globules and liquors the electrical +properties of certain plants, but he has never given out his recipe, +hence he can tell whatever stories suit him. What is curious, anyway, +is that this system, thought out by a Roman count, a Catholic, has its +most important following and propaganda among Protestant pastors, whose +original asininity becomes abysmal in the unbelievable homilies which +accompany their essays on healing. Indeed, considered seriously, these +systems are a lot of wind. The truth is that in the art of healing we +grope along at hazard. Nevertheless, with a little experience and a +great deal of nerve we can manage so as not too shockingly to depopulate +the cities. Enough of that, old man, and now where have you been keeping +yourself?" + +"Just what I was going to ask you. You haven't been to see me for over a +week." + +"Well, just now everybody in the world is ill and I am racing around all +the time. By the way, I've been attending Chantelouve, who has a pretty +serious attack of gout. He complains of your absence, and his wife, whom +I should not have taken for an admirer of your books, of your last novel +especially, speaks to me unceasingly of them and you. For a person +customarily so reserved, she seems to me to have become quite +enthusiastic about you, does Mme. Chantelouve. Why, what's the matter?" +he exclaimed, seeing how red Durtal had become. + +"Oh, nothing, but I've got to be going. Good night." + +"Why, aren't you feeling well?" + +"Oh, it's nothing, I assure you." + +"Oh, well," said Des Hermies, knowing better than to insist. "Look at +this," and took him into the kitchen and showed him a superb leg of +mutton hanging beside the window. "I hung it up in a draft so as to get +some of the crass freshness out of it. We'll eat it when we have the +astrologer Gevingey to dine with us at Carhaix's. As I am the only +person alive who knows how to boil a _gigot a l'Anglaise_, I am going to +be the cook, so I shan't come by for you. You will find me in the tower, +disguised as a scullery maid." + +Once outside, Durtal took a long breath. Well, well, his unknown was +Chantelouve's wife. Impossible! She had never paid the slightest +attention to him. She was silent and cold. Impossible! And yet, why had +she spoken that way to Des Hermies? But surely if she had wanted to see +him she would have come to his apartment, since they were acquaintances. +She would not have started this correspondence under a pseudonym-- + +"H. de Maubel!" he said suddenly, "why, Mme. Chantelouve's name is +Hyacinthe, a boy's name which suits her very well. She lives in the rue +Babneux not vary far from the rue Littre post-office. She is a blonde, +she has a maid, she is a fervent Catholic. She's the one." + +And he experienced, almost simultaneously, two absolutely distinct +sensations. + +Of disappointment, first, for his unknown pleased him better. Mme. +Chantelouve would never realize the ideal he had fashioned for himself, +the tantalizing features, the agile, wild animal body, the melancholy +and ardent bearing, which he had dreamed. Indeed, the mere fact of +knowing the unknown rendered her less desirable, more vulgar. +Accessibility killed the chimera. + +At the same time he experienced a lively relief. He might have been +dealing with a hideous old crone, and Hyacinthe, as he immediately began +to call her, was desirable. Thirty-three at most, not pretty, but +peculiar; blonde, slight and supple, with no hips, she seemed thin +because she was small-boned. The face, mediocre, spoiled by too big a +nose, but the lips incandescent, the teeth superb, her complexion ever +so faint a rose in the slightly bluish milk white of rice water a little +troubled. + +Then her real charm, the really deceptive enigma of her, was in her +eyes; ash-grey eyes which seemed uncertain, myopic, and which conveyed +an expression of resigned boredom. At certain moments the pupils glowed +like a gem of grey water and sparks of silver twinkled to the surface. +By turns they were dolent, forsaken, languorous, and haughty. He +remembered that those eyes had often brought his heart into his throat! + +In spite of circumstantial evidence, he reflected that those +impassioned letters did not correspond in any way to this woman in the +flesh. Never was woman more controlled, more adept in the lies of good +breeding. He remembered the Chantelouve at-homes. She seemed attentive, +made no contribution to the conversation, played the hostess smiling, +without animation. It was a kind of case of dual personality. In one +visible phase a society woman, prudent and reserved, in another +concealed phase a wild romantic, mad with passion, hysterical of body, +nymphomaniac of soul. It hardly seemed probable. + +"No," he said, "I am on the wrong track. It's merely by chance that Mme. +Chantelouve spoke of my books to Des Hermies, and I mustn't jump to the +conclusion that she is smitten with me and that she has been writing me +these hot letters. It isn't she, but who on earth is it?" + +He continued to revolve the question, without coming any nearer a +solution. Again he called before his eyes the image of this woman, and +admitted that she was really potently seductive, with a fresh, girlish +body, flexible, and without a lot of repugnant flesh--and mysterious, +with her concentrated air, her plaintive eyes, and even her coldness, +real or feigned. + +He summarized all that he really knew about her: simply that she was a +widow when she married Chantelouve, that she had no children, that her +first husband, a manufacturer of chasubles, had, for unknown reasons, +committed suicide. That was all. On the other hand, too, too much was +known about Chantelouve! + +Author of a history of Poland and the cabinets of the north; of a +history of Boniface VIII and his times; a life of the blessed Jeanne de +Valois, founder of the Annonciade; a biography of the Venerable Mother +Anne de Xaintonge, teacher of the Company of Saint Ursula; and other +books of the same kind, published by Lecoffre, Palme, Poussielgue, in +the inevitable shagreen or sheep bindings stamped with dendriform +patterns: Chantelouve was preparing his candidacy for the Academie des +Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, and hoped for the support of the party +of the Ducs. That was why he received influential hypocrites, provincial +Tartufes, and priests every week. He doubtless had to drive himself to +do this, because in spite of his slinking slyness he was jovial and +enjoyed a joke. On the other hand, he aspired to figure in the +literature that counts at Paris, and he expended a good deal of +ingenuity inveigling men of letters to his house on another evening +every week, to make them his aides, or at least keep them from openly +attacking him, so soon as his candidacy--an entirely clerical +affair--should be announced. It was probably to attract and placate his +adversaries that he had contrived these baroque gatherings to which, out +of curiosity as a matter of fact, the most utterly different kinds of +people came. + +He had other motives. It was said that he had no scruples about +exploiting his social acquaintances. Durtal had even noticed that at +each of the dinners given by Chantelouve a well-dressed stranger was +present, and the rumour went about that this guest was a wealthy +provincial to whom men of letters were exhibited like a wax-work +collection, and from whom, before or afterward, important sums were +borrowed. + +"It is undeniable that the Chantelouves have no income and that they +live in style. Catholic publishing houses and magazines pay even worse +than the secular, so in spite of his established reputation in the +clerical world, Chantelouve cannot possibly maintain such a standard of +living on his royalties. + +"There simply is no telling what these people are up to. That this +woman's home life is unhappy, and that she does not love the sneaky +sacristan to whom she is married, is quite possible, but what is her +real role in that household? Is she accessory to Chantelouve's pecuniary +dodges? If that is the case I don't see why she should pick on me. If +she is in connivance with her husband, she certainly ought to have sense +enough to seek an influential or wealthy lover, and she is perfectly +aware that I fulfil neither the one nor the other condition. Chantelouve +knows very well that I am incapable of paying for her gowns and thus +contributing to the upkeep of their establishment. I make about three +thousand livres, and I can hardly contrive to keep myself going. + +"So that is not her game. I don't know that I want to have anything to +do with their kind of people," he concluded, somewhat chilled by these +reflections. "But I am a big fool. What I know about them proves that my +unknown beloved is not Chantelouve's wife, and, all things considered, I +am glad she isn't." + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + + +Next day his ferment had subsided. The unknown never left him, but she +kept her distance. Her less certain features were effaced in mist, her +fascination became feebler, and she no longer was his sole +preoccupation. + +The idea, suddenly formed on a word of Des Hermies, that the unknown +must be Chantelouve's wife, had, in fashion, checked his fever. If it +was she--and his contrary conclusions of the evening before seemed +hardly valid when he took up one by one the arguments by which he had +arrived at them--then her reasons for wanting him were obscure, +dangerous, and he was on his guard, no longer letting himself go in +complete self-abandon. + +And yet, there was another phenomenon taking place within him. He had +never paid any especial attention to Hyacinthe Chantelouve, he had never +been in love with her. She interested him by the mystery of her person +and her life, but outside her drawing-room he had never given her a +thought. Now ruminating about her he began almost to desire her. + +Suddenly she benefited by the face of the unknown, for when Durtal +evoked her she came confused to his sight, her physiognomy mingled with +that which he had visualized when the first letters came. + +Though the sneaking scoundrelism of her husband displeased him, he did +not think her the less attractive, but his desires were no longer beyond +control. In spite of the distrust which she aroused, she might be an +interesting mistress, making up for her barefaced vices by her good +grace, but she was no longer the non-existent, the chimera raised in a +moment of uncertainty. + +On the other hand, if his conjectures were false, if it was not Mme. +Chantelouve who had written the letters, then the other, the unknown, +lost a little of her subtlety by the mere fact that she could be +incarnated in a creature whom he knew. Still remote, she became less so; +then her beauty deteriorated, because, in turn, she took on certain +features of Mme. Chantelouve, and if the latter had profited, the +former, on the contrary, lost by the confusion which Durtal had +established. + +In one as in the other case, whether she were Mme. Chantelouve or not, +he felt appeased, calmed. At heart he did not know, when he revolved the +adventure, whether he preferred his chimera, even diminished, or this +Hyacinthe, who at least, in her reality, was not a disenchanting frump, +wrinkled with age. He profited by the respite to get back to work, but +he had presumed too much upon his powers. When he tried to begin his +chapter on the crimes of Gilles de Rais he discovered that he was +incapable of sewing two sentences together. He wandered in pursuit of +the Marshal and caught up with him, but the prose in which he wished to +embody the man remained listless and lifeless, and he could think only +patchily. + +He threw down his pen and sank into an armchair. In revery he was +transported to Tiffauges, where Satan, who had refused so obstinately to +show himself, now became incarnate in the unwitting Marshal, to wallow +him, vociferating, in the joys of murder. + +"For this, basically, is what Satanism is," said Durtal to himself. "The +external semblance of the Demon is a minor matter. He has no need of +exhibiting himself in human or bestial form to attest his presence. For +him to prove himself, it is enough that he choose a domicile in souls +which he ulcerates and incites to inexplicable crimes. Then, he can hold +his victims by that hope which he breathes into them, that instead of +living in them as he does, and as they don't often know, he will obey +evocations, appear to them, and deal out, duly, legally, the advantages +he concedes in exchange for certain forfeits. Our very willingness to +make a pact with him must be able often to produce his infusion into us. + +"All the modern theories of the followers of Maudsley and Lombroso do +not, in fact, render the singular abuses of the Marshal comprehensible. +Nothing could be more just than to class him as a monomaniac, for he was +one, if by the word monomaniac we designate every man who is dominated +by a fixed idea. But so is every one of us, more or less, from the +business man, all whose thoughts converge on the one idea of gain, to +the artist absorbed in bringing his masterpiece into the world. But why +was the Marshal a monomaniac, how did he become one? That is what all +the Lombrosos in the world can't tell you. Encephalic lesions, adherence +of the _pia mater_ to the cerebrum, mean absolutely nothing in this +question. For they are simple resultants, effects derived from a cause +which ought to be explained, and which no materialist can explain. It is +easy to declare that a disturbance of the cerebral lobes produces +assassins and demonomaniacs. The famous alienists of our time claim that +analysis of the brain of an insane woman disclosed a lesion or a +deterioration of the grey matter. And suppose it did! It would still be +a question whether, in the case of a woman possessed with demonomania, +the lesion produced the demonomania, or the demonomania produced the +lesion.... Admitting that there was a lesion! The spiritual Comprachicos +have never resorted to cerebral surgery. They don't amputate the +lobes--supposed to be reliably identified--after carefully trepanning. +They simply act upon the pupil by inculcating ignoble ideas in him, +developing his bad instincts, pushing him little by little into the +paths of vice; and if this gymnastic of persuasion deteriorates the +cerebral tissues in the subject, that proves precisely that the lesion +is only the derivative and not the cause of the psychological state. + +"And then, and then, these doctrines which consist nowadays in +confounding the criminal with the insane, the demonomaniac with the mad, +have absolutely no foundation. Nine years ago a lad of fourteen, Felix +Lemaire, assassinated a little boy whom he did not know. He just wanted +to see the child suffer, just wanted to hear him cry. Felix slashed the +little fellow's stomach with a knife, turned the blade round and round +in the warm flesh, then slowly sawed his victim's head off. Felix +manifested no remorse, and in the ensuing investigation proved himself +to be intelligent and atrocious. Dr. Legrand Du Saule and other +specialists kept him under vigilant surveillance for months, and could +not discover the slightest pathological symptom. And he had had fairly +good rearing and certainly had not been corrupted by others. + +"His behaviour was like that of the conscious or unconscious +demonomaniacs who do evil for evil's sake. They are no more mad than the +rapt monk in his cell, than the man who does good for good's sake. +Anybody but a medical theorist can see that the desire for good and the +desire for evil simply form the two opposing poles of the soul. In the +fifteenth century these extremes were represented by Jeanne d'Arc and +the Marshal de Rais. Now there is no more reason for attributing madness +to Gilles than there is for attributing it to Jeanne d'Arc, whose +admirable excesses certainly have no connection with vesania and +delirium. + +"All the same, some frightful nights must have been passed in that +fortress," said Durtal. He was thinking of the chateau de Tiffauges, +which he had visited a year ago, believing that it would aid him in his +work to live in the country where Gilles had lived and to dig among the +ruins. + +He had established himself in the little hamlet which stretches along +the base of the abandoned donjon. He learned what a living thing the +legend of Bluebeard was in this isolated part of La Vendee on the border +of Brittany. + +"He was a young man who came to a bad end," said the young women. More +fearful, their grandmothers crossed themselves as they went along the +foot of the wall in the evening. The memory of the disembowelled +children persisted. The Marshal, known only by his surname, still had +power to terrify. + +Durtal had gone every day from the inn where he lodged to the chateau, +towering over the valleys of the Crume and of the Sevre, facing hills +excoriated with blocks of granite and overgrown with formidable oaks, +whose roots, protruding out of the ground, resembled monstrous nests of +frightened snakes. + +One might have believed oneself transported into the real Brittany. +There was the same melancholy, heavy sky, the same sun, which seemed +older than in other parts of the world and which but feebly gilded the +sorrowful, age-old forests and the mossy sandstone. There were the same +endless stretches of broken, rocky soil, pitted with ponds of rusty +water, dotted with scattered clumps of gorse and fruze copse, and +sprinkled with pink harebells and nameless yellow prairie flowers. + +One felt that this iron-grey sky; this starving soil, empurpled only +here and there by the bleeding flower of the buckwheat; that these +roads, bordered with stones placed one on top of the other, without +cement or plaster; that these paths, bordered with impenetrable hedges; +that these grudging plants; these inhospitable fields; these crippled +beggars, eaten with vermin, plastered with filth; that even the flocks, +undersized and wasted, the dumpy little cows, the black sheep whose blue +eyes had the cold, pale gleam that is in the eyes of the Slav or of the +tribade; had perpetuated their primordial state, preserving an identical +landscape through all the centuries. + +Except for an incongruous factory chimney further away on the bank of +the Sevre, the countryside of Tiffauges remained in perfect harmony with +the immense chateau, erect among its ruins. Within the close, still to +be traced by the ruins of the towers, was a whole plain, now converted +into a miserable truck garden. Cabbages, in long bluish lines, +impoverished carrots, consumptive navews, spread over this enormous +circle where iron mail had clanked in the tournament and where +processionals had slowly devolved, in the smoke of incense, to the +chanting of psalms. + +A thatched hut had been built in a corner. The peasant inhabitants, +returned to a state of savagery, no longer understood the meaning of +words, and could be roused out of their apathy only by the display of a +silver coin. Seizing the coin, they would hand over the keys. + +For hours one could browse around at ease among the ruins, and smoke and +daydream. Unfortunately, certain parts were inaccessible. The donjon was +still shut off, on the Tiffauges side, by a vast moat, at the bottom of +which mighty trees were growing. One would have had to pass over the +tops of the trees, growing to the very verge of the wall, to gain a +porch on the other side, for there was now no drawbridge. + +But quite accessible was another part which overhung the Sevre. There +the wings of the castle, overgrown with ivy and white-crested viburnum, +were intact. Spongy, dry as pumice stone, silvered with lichen and +gilded with moss, the towers rose entire, though from their crenelated +collarettes whole blocks were blown away on windy nights. + +Within, room succeeded glacial room, cut into the granite, surmounted +with vaulted roofs, and as close as the hold of a ship. Then by spiral +stairways one descended into similar chambers, joined by cellar +passageways into the walls of which were dug deep niches and lairs of +unknown utility. + +Beneath, those corridors, so narrow that two persons could not walk +along them abreast, descended at a gentle slope, and bifurcated so that +there was a labyrinth of lanes, leading to veritable cells, on the walls +of which the nitre scintillated in the light of the lantern like steel +mica or twinkling grains of sugar. In the cells above, in the dungeons +beneath, one stumbled over rifts of hard earth, in the centre or in a +corner of which yawned now the mouth of an unsealed oubliette, now a +well. + +Finally, at the summit of one of the towers, that at the left as one +entered, there was a roofed gallery running parallel to a circular +foothold cut from the rock. There, without doubt, the men-at-arms had +been stationed to fire on their assailants through wide loopholes +opening overhead and underfoot. In this gallery the voice, even the +lowest, followed the curving walls and could be heard all around the +circuit. + +Briefly, the exterior of the castle revealed a fortified place built to +stand long sieges, and the dismantled interior made one think of a +prison in which flesh, mildewed by the moisture, must rot in a few +months. Out in the open air again, one felt a sensation of well-being, +of relief, which one lost on traversing the ruins of the isolated chapel +and penetrating, by a cellar door, to the crypt below. + +This chapel, low, squat, its vaulted roof upheld by massive columns on +whose capitals lozenges and bishop's croziers were carved, dated from +the eleventh century. The altar stone survived intact. Brackish +daylight, which seemed to have been filtered through layers of horn, +came in at the openings, hardly lighting the shadowed, begrimed walls +and the earth floor, which too was pierced by the entrance to an +oubliette or by a well shaft. + +In the evening after dinner he had often climbed up on the embankment +and followed the cracked walls of the ruins. On bright nights one part +of the castle was thrown back into shadow, and the other, by contrast, +stood forth, washed in silver and blue, as if rubbed with mercurial +lusters, above the Sevre, along whose surface streaks of moonlight +darted like the backs of fishes. The silence was overpowering. After +nine o'clock not a dog, not a soul. He would return to the poor chamber +of the inn, where an old woman, in black, wearing the cornet head-dress +her ancestors wore in the sixteenth century, waited with a candle to bar +the door as soon as he returned. + +"All this," said Durtal to himself, "is the skeleton of a dead keep. To +reanimate it we must revisualize the opulent flesh which once covered +these bones of sandstone. Documents give us every detail. This carcass +was magnificently clad, and if we are to see Gilles in his own +environment, we must remember all the sumptuosity of fifteenth century +furnishing. + +"We must reclothe these walls with wainscots of Irish wood or with high +warp tapestries of gold and thread of Arras, so much sought after in +that epoch. Then this hard, black soil must be repaved with green and +yellow bricks or black and white flagstones. The vault must be starred +with gold and sown with crossbows on a field _azur_, and the Marshal's +cross, _sable_ on shield _or_, must be set shining there." + +Of themselves the furnishings returned, each to its own place. Here and +there were high-backed signorial chairs, thrones, and stools. Against +the walls were sideboards on whose carved panels were bas-reliefs +representing the Annunciation and the Adoration of the Magi. On top of +the sideboards, beneath lace canopies, stood the painted and gilded +statues of Saint Anne, Saint Marguerite, and Saint Catherine, so often +reproduced by the wood-carvers of the Middle Ages. There were +linen-chests, bound in iron, studded with great nails, and covered with +sowskin leather. Then there were coffers fastened by great metal clasps +and overlaid with leather or fabric on which fair faced angels, cut from +illuminated missal-backgrounds, had been mounted. There were great beds +reached by carpeted steps. There were tasselled pillows and counterpanes +heavily perfumed, and canopies and curtains embroidered with armories or +sprinkled with stars. + +So one must reconstruct the decorations of the other rooms, in which +nothing was standing but the walls and the high, basket-funneled +fireplaces, whose spacious hearths, wanting andirons, were still charred +from the old fires. One could easily imagine the dining-rooms and those +terrible repasts which Gilles deplored in his trial at Nantes. Gilles +admitted with tears that he had ordered his diet so as to kindle the +fury of his senses, and these reprobate menus can be easily reproduced. +When he was at table with Eustache Blanchet, Prelati, Gilles de Sille, +all his trusted companions, in the great room, the plates and the ewers +filled with water of medlar, rose, and melilote for washing the hands, +were placed on credences. Gilles ate beef-, salmon-, and bream-pies; +levert-and squab-tarts; roast heron, stork, crane, peacock, bustard, and +swan; venison in verjuice; Nantes lampreys; salads of briony, hops, +beard of judas, mallow; vehement dishes seasoned with marjoram and mace, +coriander and sage, peony and rosemary, basil and hyssop, grain of +paradise and ginger; perfumed, acidulous dishes, giving one a violent +thirst; heavy pastries; tarts of elder-flower and rape; rice with milk +of hazelnuts sprinkled with cinnamon; stuffy dishes necessitating +copious drafts of beer and fermented mulberry juice, of dry wine, or +wine aged to tannic bitterness, of heady hypocras charged with cinnamon, +with almonds, and with musk, of raging liquors clouded with golden +particles--mad drinks which spurred the guests in this womanless castle +to frenzies of lechery and made them, at the end of the meal, writhe in +monstrous dreams. + +"Remain the costumes to be restored," said Durtal to himself, and he +imagined Gilles and his friends, not in their damaskeened field harness, +but in their indoor costumes, their robes of peace. He visualized them +in harmony with the luxury of their surroundings. They wore glittering +vestments, pleated jackets, bellying out in a little flounced skirt at +the waist. The legs were encased in dark skin-tight hose. On their heads +were the artichoke chaperon hats like that of Charles VII in his +portrait in the Louvre. The torso was enveloped in silver-threaded +damask, which was crusted with jewelleries and bordered with marten. + +He thought of the costume of the women of the time, robes of precious +tentered stuffs, with tight sleeves, great collars thrown back over the +shoulders, cramping bodices, long trains lined with fur. And as he thus +dressed an imaginary manikin, hanging ropes of heavy stones, purplish +or milky crystals, cloudy uncut gems, over the slashed corsage, a woman +slipped in, filled the robe, swelled the bodice, and thrust her head +under the two-horned steeple-headdress. From behind the pendent lace +smiled the composite features of the unknown and of Mme. Chantelouve. +Delighted, he gazed at the apparition without ever perceiving whom he +had evoked, when his cat, jumping into his lap, distracted his thoughts +and brought him back to his room. + +"Well, well, she won't let me alone," and in spite of himself he began +to laugh at the thought of the unknown following him even to the chateau +de Tiffauges. "It's foolish to let my thoughts wander this way," he +said, drawing himself up, "but daydream is the only good thing in life. +Everything else is vulgar and empty. + +"No doubt about it, that was a singular epoch, the Middle Epoch of +ignorance and darkness, the history professors and Ages," he went on, +lighting a cigarette. "For some it's all white and for others utterly +black. No intermediate shade, atheists reiterate. Dolorous and exquisite +epoch, say the artists and the religious savants. + +"What is certain is that the immutable classes, the nobility, the +clergy, the bourgeoisie, the people, had loftier souls at that time. You +can prove it: society has done nothing but deteriorate in the four +centuries separating us from the Middle Ages. + +"True, a baron then was usually a formidable brute. He was a drunken and +lecherous bandit, a sanguinary and boisterous tyrant, but he was a child +in mind and spirit. The Church bullied him, and to deliver the Holy +Sepulchre he sacrificed his wealth, abandoned home, wife, and children, +and accepted unconscionable fatigues, extraordinary sufferings, +unheard-of dangers. + +"By pious heroism he redeemed the baseness of his morals. The race has +since become moderate. It has reduced, sometimes even done away with, +its instincts of carnage and rape, but it has replaced them by the +monomania of business, the passion for lucre. It has done worse. It has +sunk to such a state of abjectness as to be attracted by the doings of +the lowest of the low. The aristocracy disguises itself as a mountebank, +puts on tights and spangles, gives public trapeze performances, jumps +through hoops, and does weight-lifting stunts in the trampled tan-bark +ring! + +"The clergy, then a good example--if we except a few convents ravaged by +frenzied Satanism and lechery--launched itself into superhuman +transports and attained God. Saints swarmed, miracles multiplied, and +while still omnipotent the Church was gentle with the humble, it +consoled the afflicted, defended the little ones, and mourned or +rejoiced with the people of low estate. Today it hates the poor, and +mysticism dies in a clergy which checks ardent thoughts and preaches +sobriety of mind, continence of postulation, common sense in prayer, +bourgeoisie of the soul! Yet here and there, buried in cloisters far +from these lukewarm priests, there perhaps still are real saints who +weep, monks who pray, to the point of dying of sorrow and prayer, for +each of us. And they--with the demoniacs--are the sole connecting link +between that age and this. + +"The smug, sententious side of the bourgeoisie already existed in the +time of Charles VII. But cupidity was repressed by the confessor, and +the tradesman, just like the labourer, was maintained by the +corporations, which denounced overcharging and fraud, saw that decried +merchandise was destroyed, and fixed a fair price and a high standard of +excellence for commodities. Trades and professions were handed down from +father to son. The corporations assured work and pay. People were not, +as now, subject to the fluctuations of the market and the merciless +capitalistic exploitation. Great fortunes did not exist and everybody +had enough to live on. Sure of the future, unhurried, they created +marvels of art, whose secret remains for ever lost. + +"All the artisans who passed the three degrees of apprentice, +journeyman, and master, developed subtlety and became veritable artists. +They ennobled the simplest of iron work, the commonest faience, the most +ordinary chests and coffers. Those corporations, putting themselves +under the patronage of Saints--whose images, frequently besought, +figured on their banners--preserved through the centuries the honest +existence of the humble and notably raised the spiritual level of the +people whom they protected. + +"All that is decisively at an end. The bourgeoise has taken the place +forfeited by a wastrel nobility which now subsists only to set ignoble +fashions and whose sole contribution to our 'civilization' is the +establishment of gluttonous dining clubs, so-called gymnastic societies, +and pari-mutuel associations. Today the business man has but these aims, +to exploit the working man, manufacture shoddy, lie about the quality of +merchandise, and give short weight. + +"As for the people, they have been relieved of the indispensable fear of +hell, and notified, at the same time, that they are not to expect to be +recompensed, after death, for their sufferings here. So they scamp their +ill-paid work and take to drink. From time to time, when they have +ingurgitated too violent liquids, they revolt, and then they must be +slaughtered, for once let loose they would act as a crazed stampeded +herd. + +"Good God, what a mess! And to think that the nineteenth century takes +on airs and adulates itself. There is one word in the mouths of all. +Progress. Progress of whom? Progress of what? For this miserable century +hasn't invented anything great. + +"It has constructed nothing and destroyed everything. At the present +hour it glorifies itself in this electricity which it thinks it +discovered. But electricity was known and used in remotest antiquity, +and if the ancients could not explain its nature nor even its essence, +the moderns are just as incapable of identifying that force which +conveys the spark and carries the voice--acutely nasalized--along the +wire. This century thinks it discovered the terrible science of +hypnotism, which the priests and Brahmins in Egypt and India knew and +practised to the utmost. No, the only thing this century has invented +is the sophistication of products. Therein it is passed master. It has +even gone so far as to adulterate excrement. Yes, in 1888 the two houses +of parliament had to pass a law destined to suppress the falsification +of fertilizer. Now that's the limit." + +The doorbell rang. He opened the door and nearly fell over backward. + +Mme. Chantelouve was before him. + +Stupefied, he bowed, while Mme. Chantelouve, without a word, went +straight into the study. There she turned around, and Durtal, who had +followed, found himself face to face with her. + +"Won't you please sit down?" He advanced an armchair and hastened to +push back, with his foot, the edge of the carpet turned up by the cat. +He asked her to excuse the disorder. She made a vague gesture and +remained standing. + +In a calm but very low voice she said, "It is I who wrote you those mad +letters. I have come to drive away this bad fever and get it over with +in a quite frank way. As you yourself wrote, no liaison between us is +possible. Let us forget what has happened. And before I go, tell me that +you bear me no grudge." + +He cried out at this. He would not have it so. He had not been beside +himself when he wrote her those ardent pages, he was in perfectly good +faith, he loved her-- + +"You love me! Why, you didn't even know that those letters were from me. +You loved an unknown, a chimera. Well, admitting that you are telling +the truth, the chimera does not exist now, for here I am." + +"You are mistaken. I knew perfectly that it was Mme. Chantelouve hiding +behind the pseudonym of Mme. Maubel." And he half-explained to her, +without, of course, letting her know of his doubts, how he had lifted +her mask. + +"Ah!" She reflected, blinking her troubled eyes. "At any rate," she +said, again facing him squarely, "you could not have recognized me in +the first letters, to which you responded with cries of passion. Those +cries were not addressed to me." + +He contested this observation, and became entangled in the dates and +happenings and in the sequence of the notes. She at length lost the +thread of his remarks. The situation was so ridiculous that both were +silent. Then she sat down and burst out laughing. + +Her strident, shrill laugh, revealing magnificent, but short and pointed +teeth, in a mocking mouth, vexed him. + +"She has been playing with me," he said to himself, and dissatisfied +with the turn the conversation had taken, and furious at seeing this +woman so calm, so different from her burning letters, he asked, in a +tone of irritation, "Am I to know why you laugh?" + +"Pardon me. It's a trick my nerves play on me, sometimes in public +places. But never mind. Let us be reasonable and talk things over. You +tell me you love me--" + +"And I mean it." + +"Well, admitting that I too am not indifferent, where is this going to +lead us? Oh, you know so well, you poor dear, that you refused, right at +first, the meeting which I asked in a moment of madness--and you gave +well-thought-out reasons for refusing." + +"But I refused because I did not know then that you were the women in +the case! I have told you that it was several days later that Des +Hermies unwittingly revealed your identity to me. Did I hesitate as soon +as I knew? No! I immediately implored you to come." + +"That may be, but you admit that I'm right when I claim that you wrote +your first letters to another and not me." + +She was pensive for a moment. Durtal began to be prodigiously bored by +this discussion. He thought it more prudent not to answer, and was +seeking a change of subject that would put an end to the deadlock. + +She herself got him out of his difficulty. "Let us not discuss it any +more," she said, smiling, "we shall not get anywhere. You see, this is +the situation: I am married to a very nice man who loves me and whose +only crime is that he represents the rather insipid happiness which one +has right at hand. I started this correspondence with you, so I am to +blame, and believe me, on his account I suffer. You have work to do, +beautiful books to write. You don't need to have a crazy woman come +walking into your life. So, you see, the best thing is for us to remain +friends, but true friends, and go no further." + +"And it is the woman who wrote me such vivid letters, who now speaks to +me of reason, good sense, and God knows what!" + +"But be frank, now. You don't love me." + +"I don't?" + +He took her hands, gently. She made no resistance, but looking at him +squarely she said, "Listen. If you had loved me you would have come to +see me; and yet for months you haven't tried to find out whether I was +alive or dead." + +"But you understand that I could not hope to be welcomed by you on the +terms we now are on, and too, in your parlour there are guests, your +husband--I have never had you even a little bit to myself at your home." + +He pressed her hands more tightly and came closer to her. She regarded +him with her smoky eyes, in which he now saw that dolent, almost +dolorous expression which had captivated him. He completely lost control +of himself before this voluptuous and plaintive face, but with a firm +gesture she freed her hands. + +"Enough. Sit down, now, and let's talk of something else. Do you know +your apartment is charming? Which saint is that?" she asked, examining +the picture, over the mantel, of the monk on his knees beside a +cardinal's hat and cloak. + +"I do not know." + +"I will find out for you. I have the lives of all the saints at home. It +ought to be easy to find out about a cardinal who renounced the purple +to go live in a hut. Wait. I think Saint Peter Damian did, but I am not +sure. I have such a poor memory. Help me think." + +"But I don't know who he is!" + +She came closer to him and put her hand on his shoulder. + +"Are you angry at me?" + +"I should say I am! When I desire you frantically, when I've been +dreaming for a whole week about this meeting, you come here and tell me +that all is over between us, that you do not love me--" + +She became demure. "But if I did not love you, would I have come to you? +Understand, then, that reality kills a dream; that it is better for us +not to expose ourselves to fearful regrets. We are not children, you +see. No! Let me go. Do not squeeze me like that!" Very pale, she +struggled in his embrace. "I swear to you that I will go away and that +you shall never see me again if you do not let me loose." Her voice +became hard. She was almost hissing her words. He let go of her. "Sit +down there behind the table. Do that for me." And tapping the floor with +her heel, she said, in a tone of melancholy, "Then it is impossible to +be friends, only friends, with a man. But it would be very nice to come +and see you without having evil thoughts to fear, wouldn't it?" She was +silent. Then she added, "Yes, just to see each other--and if we did not +have any sublime things to say to each other, it is also very nice to +sit and say nothing!" + +Then she said, "My time is up. I must go home." + +"And leave me with no hope?" he exclaimed, kissing her gloved hands. + +She did not answer, but gently shook her head, then, as he looked +pleadingly at her, she said, "Listen. If you will promise to make no +demands on me and to be good, I will come here night after next at nine +o'clock." + +He promised whatever she wished. And as he raised his head from her +hands and as his lips brushed lightly over her breast, which seemed to +tighten, she disengaged her hands, caught his nervously, and, clenching +her teeth, offered her neck to his lips. Then she fled. + +"Oof!" he said, closing the door after her. He was at the same time +satisfied and vexed. + +Satisfied, because he found her enigmatic, changeful, charming. Now that +he was alone he recalled her to memory. He remembered her tight black +dress, her fur cloak, the warm collar of which had caressed him as he +was covering her neck with kisses. He remembered that she wore no +jewellery, except sparkling blue sapphire eardrops. He remembered the +wayward blonde hair escaping from under the dark green otter hat. +Holding his hands to his nostrils he sniffed again the sweet and distant +odour, cinnamon lost among stronger perfumes, which he had caught from +the contact of her long, fawn-coloured suede gloves, and he saw again +her moist, rodent teeth, her thin, bitten lips, and her troubled eyes, +of a grey and opaque lustre which could suddenly be transfigured with +radiance. "Oh, night after next it will be great to kiss all that!" + +Vexed also, both with himself and with her. He reproached himself with +having been brusque and reserved. He ought to have shown himself more +expansive and less restrained. But it was her fault, for she had abashed +him! The incongruity between the woman who cried with voluptuous +suffering in her letters and the woman he had seen, so thoroughly +mistress of herself in her coquetries, was truly too much! + +"However you look at them, these women are astonishing creatures," he +thought. "Here is one who accomplishes the most difficult thing you can +imagine: coming to a man's room after having written him excessive +letters. I, I act like a goose. I stand there ill at ease. She, in a +second, has the self-assurance of a person in her own home, or visiting +in a drawing-room. No awkwardness, pretty gestures, a few words, and +eyes which supply everything! She isn't very agreeable," he thought, +reminded of the curt tone she had used when disengaging herself, "and +yet she has her tender spots," he continued dreamily, remembering not +so much her words as certain inflections of her voice and a certain +bewildered look in her eyes. "I must go about it prudently that night," +he concluded, addressing his cat, which, never having seen a woman +before, had fled at the arrival of Mme. Chantelouve and taken refuge +under the bed, but had now advanced almost grovelling, to sniff the +chair where she had sat. + +"Come to think of it, she is an old hand, Mme. Hyacinthe! She would not +have a meeting in a cafe nor in the street. She scented from afar the +assignation house or the hotel. And though, from the mere fact of my not +inviting her here, she could not doubt that I did not want to introduce +her to my lodging, she came here deliberately. Then, this first denial, +come to think of it, is only a fine farce. If she were not seeking a +liaison she would not have visited me. No, she wanted me to beg her to +do what she wanted to do. Like all women, she wanted me to offer her +what she desired. I have been rolled. Her arrival has knocked the props +out from under my whole method. But what does it matter? She is no less +desirable," he concluded, happy to get rid of disagreeable reflections +and plunge back into the delirious vision which he retained of her. +"That night won't be exactly dreary," he thought, seeing again her eyes, +imagining them in surrender, deceptive and plaintive, as he would +disrobe her and make a body white and slender, warm and supple, emerge +from her tight skirt. "She has no children. That is an earnest promise +that her flesh is quite firm, even at thirty!" + +A whole draft of youth intoxicated him. Durtal, astonished, took a look +at himself in the mirror. His tired eyes brightened, his face seemed +more youthful, less worn. "Lucky I had just shaved," he said to himself. +But gradually, as he mused, he saw in this mirror, which he was so +little in the habit of consulting, his features droop and his eyes lose +their sparkle. His stature, which had seemed to increase in this +spiritual upheaval, diminished again. Sadness returned to his +thoughtful mien. "I haven't what you would call the physique of a lady's +man," he concluded. "What does she see in me? for she could very easily +find someone else with whom to be unfaithful to her husband. Enough of +these rambling thoughts. Let's cease to think them. To sum up the +situation: I love her with my head and not my heart. That's the +important thing. Under such conditions, whatever happens, a love affair +is brief, and I am almost certain to get out of it without committing +any follies." + + + + +CHAPTER IX + + +The next morning he woke, thinking of her, just as he had been doing +when he went to sleep. He tried to rationalize the episode and revolved +his conjectures over and over. Once again he put himself this question: +"Why, when I went to her house, did she not let me see that I pleased +her? Never a look, never a word to encourage me. Why this +correspondence, when it was so easy to insist on having me to dine, so +simple to prepare an occasion which would bring us together, either at +her home or elsewhere?" And he answered himself, "It would have been +usual and not at all diverting. She is perhaps skilled in these matters. +She knows that the unknown frightens a man's reason away, that the +unembodied puts the soul in ferment, and she wished to give me a fever +before trying an attack--to call her advances by their right name. + +"It must be admitted that if my conjectures are correct she is strangely +astute. At heart she is, perhaps, quite simply a crazy romantic or a +comedian. It amuses her to manufacture little adventures, to throw +tantalizing obstacles in the way of the realization of a vulgar desire. +And Chantelouve? He is probably aware of his wife's goings on, which +perhaps facilitate his career. Otherwise, how could she arrange to come +here at nine o'clock at night, instead of the morning or afternoon on +pretence of going shopping?" + +To this new question there could be no answer, and little by little he +ceased to interrogate himself on the point. He began to be obsessed by +the real woman as he had been by the imaginary creature. The latter had +completely vanished. He did not even remember her physiognomy now. Mme. +Chantelouve, just as she was in reality, without borrowing the other's +features, had complete possession of him and fired his brain and senses +to white heat. He began to desire her madly and to wish furiously for +tomorrow night. And if she did not come? He felt cold in the small of +his back at the idea that she might be unable to get away from home or +that she might wilfully stay away. + +"High time it was over and done with," he said, for this Saint Vitus' +dance went on not without certain diminution of force, which disturbed +him. In fact he feared, after the febrile agitation of his nights, to +reveal himself as a sorry paladin when the time came. "But why bother?" +he rejoined, as he started toward Carhaix's, where he was to dine with +the astrologer Gevingey and Des Hermies. + +"I shall be rid of my obsession awhile," he murmured, groping along in +the darkness of the tower. + +Des Hermies, hearing him come up the stair, opened the door, casting a +shaft of light into the spiral. Durtal, reaching the landing, saw his +friend in shirt sleeves and enveloped in an apron. + +"I am, as you see, in the heat of composition," and upon a stew-pan +boiling on the stove Des Hermies cast that brief and sure look which a +mechanic gives his machine, then he consulted, as if it were a +manometer, his watch, hanging to a nail. "Look," he said, raising the +pot lid. + +Durtal bent over and through a cloud of vapour he saw a coiled napkin +rising and falling with the little billows. "Where is the leg of +mutton?" + +"It, my friend, is sewn into that cloth so tightly that the air cannot +enter. It is cooking in this pretty, singing sauce, into which I have +thrown a handful of hay, some pods of garlic and slices of carrot and +onion, some grated nutmeg, and laurel and thyme. You will have many +compliments to make me if Gevingey doesn't keep us waiting too long, +because a _gigot a l'Anglaise_ won't stand being cooked to shreds." + +Carhaix's wife looked in. + +"Come in," she said. "My husband is here." + +Durtal found him dusting the books. They shook hands. Durtal, at random, +looked over some of the dusted books lying on the table. + +"Are these," he asked, "technical works about metals and bell-founding +or are they about the liturgy of bells?" + +"They are not about founding, though there is sometimes reference to the +founders, the 'sainterers' as they were called in the good old days. You +will discover here and there some details about alloys of red copper and +fine tin. You will even find, I believe, that the art of the 'sainterer' +has been in decline for three centuries, probably due to the fact that +the faithful no longer melt down their ornaments of precious metals, +thus modifying the alloy. Or is it because the founders no longer invoke +Saint Anthony the Eremite when the bronze is boiling in the furnace? I +do not know. It is true, at any rate, that bells are now made in carload +lots. Their voices are without personality. They are all the same. +They're like docile and indifferent hired girls when formerly they were +like those aged servants who became part of the family whose joys and +griefs they have shared. But what difference does that make to the +clergy and the congregation? At present these auxiliaries devoted to the +cult do not represent any symbol. And that explains the whole +difficulty. + +"You asked me, a few seconds ago, whether these books treated of bells +from the liturgical point of view. Yes, most of them give tabulated +explanations of the significance of the various component parts. The +interpretations are simple and offer little variety." + +"What are a few of them?" + +"I can sum them all up for you in a very few words. According to the +_Rational_ of Guillaume Durand, the hardness of the metal signifies the +force of the preacher. The percussion of the clapper on the sides +expresses the idea that the preacher must first scourge himself to +correct himself of his own vices before reproaching the vices of others. +The wooden frame represents the cross of Christ, and the cord, which +formerly served to set the bell swinging, allegorizes the science of the +Scriptures which flows from the mystery of the Cross itself. + +"The most ancient liturgists expound practically the same symbols. Jean +Beleth, who lived in 1200, declares also that the bell is the image of +the preacher, but adds that its motion to and fro, when it is set +swinging, teaches that the preacher must by turns elevate his language +and bring it down within reach of the crowd. For Hugo of Saint Victor +the clapper is the tongue of the officiating priest, which strikes the +two sides of the vase and announces thus, at the same time, the truth of +the two Testaments. Finally, if we consult Fortunatus Amalarius, perhaps +the most ancient of the liturgists, we find simply that the body of the +bell denotes the mouth of the preacher and the hammer his tongue." + +"But," said Durtal, somewhat disappointed, "it isn't--what shall I +say?--very profound." + +The door opened. + +"Why, how are you!" said Carhaix, shaking hands with Gevingey, and then +introducing him to Durtal. + +While the bell-ringer's wife finished setting the table, Durtal examined +the newcomer. He was a little man, wearing a soft black felt hat and +wrapped up like an omnibus conductor in a cape with a military collar of +blue cloth. + +His head was like an egg with the hollow downward. The skull, waxed as +if with siccatif, seemed to have grown up out of the hair, which was +hard and like filaments of dried coconut and hung down over his neck. +The nose was bony, and the nostrils opened like two hatchways, over a +toothless mouth which was hidden by a moustache grizzled like the goatee +springing from the short chin. At first glance one would have taken him +for an art-worker, a wood engraver or a glider of saints' images, but on +looking at him more closely, observing the eyes, round and grey, set +close to the nose, almost crossed, and studying his solemn voice and +obsequious manners, one asked oneself from what quite special kind of +sacristy the man had issued. + +He took off his things and appeared in a black frock coat of square, +boxlike cut. A fine gold chain, passed about his neck, lost itself in +the bulging pocket of an old vest. Durtal gasped when Gevingey, as soon +as he had seated himself, complacently put his hands on exhibition, +resting them on his knees. Enormous, freckled with blotches of orange, +and terminating in milk-white nails cut to the quick, the fingers were +covered with huge rings, the sets of which formed a phalanx. + +Seeing Durtal's gaze fixed on his fingers, he smiled. "You examine my +valuables, monsieur. They are of three metals, gold, platinum, and +silver. This ring bears a scorpion, the sign under which I was born. +That with its two accoupled triangles, one pointing downward and the +other upward, reproduces the image of the macrocosm, the seal of +Solomon, the grand pantacle. As for the little one you see here," he +went on, showing a lady's ring set with a tiny sapphire between two +roses, "that is a present from a person whose horoscope I was good +enough to cast." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, somewhat surprised at the man's self-satisfaction. + +"Dinner is ready," said the bell-ringer's wife. + +Des Hermies, doffing his apron, appeared in his tight cheviot garments. +He was not so pale as usual, his cheeks being red from the heat of the +stove. He set the chairs around. + +Carhaix served the broth, and everyone was silent, taking spoonfuls of +the cooler broth at the edge of the bowl. Then madame brought Des +Hermies the famous leg of mutton to cut. It was a magnificent red, and +large drops flowed beneath the knife. Everybody ecstasized when tasting +this robust meat, aromatic with a puree of turnips sweetened with caper +sauce. + +Des Hermies bowed under a storm of compliments. Carhaix filled the +glasses, and, somewhat confused in the presence of Gevingey, paid the +astrologer effusive attention to make him forget their former +ill-feeling. Des Hermies assisted in this good work, and wishing also to +be useful to Durtal, brought the conversation around to the subject of +horoscopes. + +Then Gevingey mounted the rostrum. In a tone of satisfaction he spoke of +his vast labours, of the six months a horoscope required, of the +surprise of laymen when he declared that such work was not paid for by +the price he asked, five hundred francs. + +"But you see I cannot give my science for nothing," he said. "And now +people doubt astrology, which was revered in antiquity. Also in the +Middle Ages, when it was almost sacred. For instance, messieurs, look at +the portal of Notre Dame. The three doors which archeologists--not +initiated into the symbolism of Christianity and the occult--designate +by the names of the door of Judgment, the door of the Virgin, and the +door of Saint Marcel or Saint Anne, really represent Mysticism, +Astrology, and Alchemy, the three great sciences of the Middle Ages. +Today you find people who say, 'Are you quite sure that the stars have +an influence on the destiny of man?' But, messieurs, without entering +here into details reserved for the adept, in what way is this spiritual +influence stranger than that corporal influence which certain planets, +the moon, for example, exercise on the organs of men and women? + +"You are a physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, and you are not unaware that +the doctors Gillespin, Jackson, and Balfour, of Jamaica, have +established the influence of the constellations on human health in the +West Indies. At every change of the moon the number of sick people +augments. The acute crises of fever coincide with the phases of our +satellite. Finally, there are _lunatics_. Go out in the country and +ascertain at what periods madness becomes epidemic. But does this serve +to convince the incredulous?" he asked sorrowfully, contemplating his +rings. + +"It seems to me, on the contrary, that astrology is picking up," said +Durtal. "There are now two astrologers casting horoscopes in the next +column to the secret remedies on the fourth page of the newspapers." + +"And it's a shame! Those people don't even know the first thing about +the science. They are simply tricksters who hope thus to pick up some +money. What's the use of speaking of them when they _don't even exist_! +Really it must be admitted that only in England and America is there +anybody who knows how to establish the genethliac theme and construct a +horoscope." + +"I am very much afraid," said Des Hermies, "that not only these +so-called astrologers, but also all the mages, theosophists, occultists, +and cabalists of the present day, know absolutely nothing--those with +whom I am acquainted are indubitably, incontestably, ignorant imbeciles. +And that is the pure truth, messieurs. These people are, for the most +part, down-and-out journalists or broken spendthrifts seeking to exploit +the taste of a public weary of positivism. They plagiarize Eliphas Levi, +steal from Fabre d'Olivet, and write treatises of which they themselves +are incapable of making head or tail. It's a real pity, when you come to +think of it." + +"The more so as they discredit sciences which certainly contain verities +omitted in their jumble," said Durtal. + +"Then another lamentable thing," said Des Hermies, "is that in addition +to the dupes and simpletons, these little sects harbour some frightful +charlatans and windbags." + +"Peladan, among others. Who does not know that shoddy mage, +commercialized to his fingertips?" cried Durtal. + +"Oh, yes, that fellow--" + +"Briefly, messieurs," resumed Gevingey, "all these people are incapable +of obtaining in practise any effect whatever. The only man in this +century who, without being either a saint or a diabolist, has penetrated +the mysteries, is William Crookes." And as Durtal, who appeared to doubt +the apparitions sworn to by this Englishman, declared that no theory +could explain them, Gevingey perorated, "Permit me, messieurs. We have +the choice between two diverse, and I venture to say, very clear-cut +doctrines. Either the apparition is formed by the fluid disengaged by +the medium in trance to combine with the fluid of the persons present; +or else there are in the air immaterial beings, elementals as they are +called, which manifest themselves under very nearly determinable +conditions; or else, and this is the theory of pure spiritism, the +phenomena are produced by souls evoked from the dead." + +"I know it," Durtal said, "and that horrifies me. I know also the Hindu +dogma of the migrations of souls after death. These disembodied souls +stray until they are reincarnated or until they attain, from avatar to +avatar, to complete purity. Well, I think it's quite enough to live +once. I'd prefer nothingness, a hole in the ground, to all those +metamorphoses. It's more consoling to me. As for the evocation of the +dead, the mere thought that the butcher on the corner can force the soul +of Hugo, Balzac, Baudelaire, to converse with him, would put me beside +myself, if I believed it. Ah, no. Materialism, abject as it is, is less +vile than that." + +"Spiritism," said Carhaix, "is only a new name for the ancient +necromancy condemned and cursed by the Church." + +Gevingey looked at his rings, then emptied his glass. + +"In any case," he returned, "you will admit that these theories can be +upheld, especially that of the elementals, which, setting Satanism +aside, seems the most veridic, and certainly is the most clear. Space is +peopled by microbes. Is it more surprising that space should also be +crammed with spirits and larvae? Water and vinegar are alive with +animalcules. The microscope shows them to us. Now why should not the +air, inaccessible to the sight and to the instruments of man, swarm, +like the other elements, with beings more or less corporeal, embryos +more or less mature?" + +"That is probably why cats suddenly look upward and gaze curiously into +space at something that is passing and that we can't see," said the +bell-ringer's wife. + +"No, thanks," said Gevingey to Des Hermies, who was offering him another +helping of egg-and-dandelion salad. + +"My friends," said the bell-ringer, "you forget only one doctrine, that +of the Church, which attributes all these inexplicable phenomena to +Satan. Catholicism has known them for a long time. It did not need to +wait for the first manifestations of the spirits--which were produced, I +believe, in 1847, in the United States, through the Fox family--before +decreeing that spirit rapping came from the Devil. You will find in +Saint Augustine the proof, for he had to send a priest to put an end to +noises and overturning of objects and furniture, in the diocese of +Hippo, analogous to those which Spiritism points out. At the time of +Theodoric also, Saint Caesaraeus ridded a house of lemurs haunting it. You +see, there are only the City of God and the City of the Devil. Now, +since God is above these cheap manipulations, the occultists and +spiritists satanize more or less, whether they wish to or not." + +"Nevertheless, Spiritism has accomplished one important thing. It has +violated the threshold of the unknown, broken the doors of the +sanctuary. It has brought about in the extranatural a revolution similar +to that which was effected in the terrestrial order in France in 1789. +It has democratized evocation and opened a whole new vista. Only, it has +lacked initiates to lead it, and, proceeding at random without science, +it has agitated good and bad spirits together. In Spiritism you will +find a jumble of everything. It is the hash of mystery, if I may be +permitted the expression." + +"The saddest thing about it," said Des Hermies, laughing, "is that at a +seance one never sees a thing! I know that experiments have been +successful, but those which I have witnessed--well, the experimenters +seemed to take a long shot and miss." + +"That is not surprising," said the astrologer, spreading some firm +candied orange jelly on a piece of bread, "the first law to observe in +magism and Spiritism is to send away the unbelievers, because very often +their fluid is antagonistic to that of the clairvoyant or the medium." + +"Then how can there be any assurance of the reality of the phenomena?" +thought Durtal. + +Carhaix rose. "I shall be back in ten minutes." He put on his greatcoat, +and soon the sound of his steps was lost in the tower. + +"True," murmured Durtal, consulting his watch. "It's a quarter to +eight." + +There was a moment of silence in the room. As all refused to have any +more dessert, Mme. Carhaix took up the tablecloth and spread an oilcloth +in its place. + +The astrologer played with his rings, turning them about; Durtal was +rolling a pellet of crumbled bread between his fingers; Des Hermies, +leaning over to one side, pulled from his patch pocket his embossed +Japanese pouch and made a cigarette. + +Then when the bell-ringer's wife had bidden them good night and retired +to her room, Des Hermies got the kettle and the coffee pot. + +"Want any help?" Durtal proposed. + +"You can get the little glasses and uncork the liqueur bottles, if you +will." + +As he opened the cupboard, Durtal swayed, dizzy from the strokes of the +bells which shook the walls and filled the room with clamour. + +"If there are spirits in this room, they must be getting knocked to +pieces," he said, setting the liqueur glasses on the table. + +"Bells drive phantoms and spectres away," Gevingey answered, doctorally, +filling his pipe. + +"Here," said Des Hermies, "will you pour hot water slowly into the +filter? I've got to feed the stove. It's getting chilly here. My feet +are freezing." + +Carhaix returned, blowing out his lantern. "The bell was in good voice, +this clear, dry night," and he took off his mountaineer cap and his +overcoat. + +"What do you think of him?" Des Hermies asked Durtal in a very low +voice, and pointed at the astrologer, now lost in a cloud of pipe smoke. + +"In repose he looks like an old owl, and when he speaks he makes me +think of a melancholy and discursive schoolmaster." + +"Only one," said Des Hermies to Carhaix, who was holding a lump of sugar +over Des Hermies's coffee cup. + +"I hear, monsieur, that you are occupied with a history of Gilles de +Rais," said Gevingey to Durtal. + +"Yes, for the time being I am up to my eyes in Satanism with that man." + +"And," said Des Hermies, "we were just going to appeal to your extensive +knowledge. You only can enlighten my friend on one of the most obscure +questions of Diabolism." + +"Which one?" + +"That of incubacy and succubacy." + +Gevingey did not answer at once. "That is a much graver question than +Spiritism," he said at last, "and grave in a different way. But monsieur +already knows something about it?" + +"Only that opinions differ. Del Rio and Bodin, for instance, consider +the incubi as masculine demons which couple with women and the succubi +as demons who consummate the carnal act with men. + +"According to their theories the incubi take the semen lost by men in +dream and make use of it. So that two questions arise: first, can a +child be born of such a union? The possibility of this kind of +procreation has been upheld by the Church doctors, who affirm, even, +that children of such commerce are heavier than others and can drain +three nurses without taking on flesh. The second question is whether the +demon who copulates with the mother or the man whose semen has been +taken is the father of the child. To which Saint Thomas answers, with +more or less subtle arguments, that the real father is not the incubus +but the man." + +"For Sinistrari d'Ameno," observed Durtal, "the incubi and succubi are +not precisely demons, but animal spirits, intermediate between the demon +and the angel, a sort of satyr or faun, such as were revered in the time +of paganism, a sort of imp, such as were exorcised in the Middle Ages. +Sinistrari adds that they do not need to pollute a sleeping man, since +they possess genitals and are endowed with prolificacy." + +"Well, there is nothing further," said Gevingey. "Goerres, so learned, so +precise, in his _Mystik_ passes rapidly over this question, even +neglects it, and the Church, you know, is completely silent, for the +Church does not like to treat this subject and views askance the priest +who does occupy himself with it." + +"I beg your pardon," said Carhaix, always ready to defend the Church. +"The Church has never hesitated to declare itself on this detestable +subject. The existence of succubi and incubi is certified by Saint +Augustine, Saint Thomas, Saint Bonaventure, Denys le Chartreux, Pope +Innocent VIII, and how many others! The question is resolutely settled +for every Catholic. It also figures in the lives of some of the saints, +if I am not mistaken. Yes, in the legend of Saint Hippolyte, Jacques de +Voragine tells how a priest, tempted by a naked succubus, cast his stole +at its head and it suddenly became the corpse of some dead woman whom +the Devil had animated to seduce him." + +"Yes," said Gevingey, whose eyes twinkled. "The Church recognizes +succubacy, I grant. But let me speak, and you will see that my +observations are not uncalled for. + +"You know very well, messieurs," addressing Des Hermies and Durtal, +"what the books teach, but within a hundred years everything has +changed, and if the facts I am are unknown to the many members of the +clergy, and you will not find them cited in any book whatever. + +"At present it is less frequently demons than bodies raised from the +dead which fill the indispensable role of incubus and succubus. In other +words, formerly the living being subject to succubacy was known to be +possessed. Now that vampirism, by the evocation of the dead, is joined +to demonism, the victim is worse than possessed. The Church did not know +what to do. Either it must keep silent or reveal the possibility of the +evocation of the dead, already forbidden by Moses, and this admission +was dangerous, for it popularized the knowledge of acts that are easier +to produce now than formerly, since without knowing it Spiritism has +traced the way. + +"So the Church has kept silent. And Rome is not unaware of the frightful +advance incubacy has made in the cloisters in our days." + +"That proves that continence is hard to bear in solitude," said Des +Hermies. + +"It merely proves that the soul is feeble and that people have forgotten +how to pray," said Carhaix. + +"However that may be, messieurs, to instruct you completely in this +matter, I must divide the creatures smitten with incubacy or succubacy +into two classes. The first is composed of persons who have directly and +voluntarily given themselves over to the demoniac action of the spirits. +These persons are quite rare and they all die by suicide or some other +form of violent death. The second is composed of persons on whom the +visitation of spirits has been imposed by a spell. These are very +numerous, especially in the convents dominated by the demoniac +societies. Ordinarily these victims end in madness. The psychopathic +hospitals are crowded with them. The doctors and the majority of the +priests do not know the cause of their madness, but the cases are +curable. A thaumaturge of my acquaintance has saved a good many of the +bewitched who without his aid would be howling under hydrotherapeutic +douches. There are certain fumigations, certain exsufflations, certain +commandments written on a sheet of virgin parchment thrice blessed and +worn like an amulet which almost always succeed in delivering the +patient." + +"I want to ask you," said Des Hermies, "does a woman receive the visit +of the incubus while she is asleep or while she is awake?" + +"A distinction must be made. If the woman is not the victim of a spell, +if she voluntarily consorts with the impure spirit, she is always awake +when the carnal act takes place. If, on the other hand, the woman is the +victim of sorcery, the sin is committed either while she is asleep or +while she is awake, but in the latter case she is in a cataleptic state +which prevents her from defending herself. The most powerful of +present-day exorcists, the man who has gone most thoroughly into this +matter, one Johannes, Doctor of Theology, told me that he had saved nuns +who had been ridden without respite for two, three, even four days by +incubi!" + +"I know that priest," remarked Des Hermies. + +"And the act is consummated in the same manner as the normal human act?" + +"Yes and no. Here the dirtiness of the details makes me hesitate," said +Gevingey, becoming slightly red. "What I can tell you is more than +strange. Know, then, that the organ of the incubus is bifurcated and at +the same time penetrates both vases. Formerly it extended, and while one +branch of the fork acted in the licit channels, the other at the same +time reached up to the lower part of the face. You may imagine, +gentlemen, how life must be shortened by operations which are multiplied +through all the senses." + +"And you are sure that these are facts?" + +"Absolutely." + +"But come now, you have proofs?" + +Gevingey was silent, then, "The subject is so grave and I have gone so +far that I had better go the rest of the way. I am not mad nor the +victim of hallucination. Well, messieurs, I slept one time in the room +of the most redoubtable master Satanism now can claim." + +"Canon Docre," Des Hermies interposed. + +"Yes, and my sleep was fitful. It was broad daylight. I swear to you +that the succubus came, irritant and palpable and most tenacious. +Happily, I remembered the formula of deliverance, which kept me-- + +"So I ran that very day to Doctor Johannes, of whom I have spoken. He +immediately and forever, I hope, liberated me from the spell." + +"If I did not fear to be indiscreet, I would ask you what kind of thing +this succubus was, whose attack you repulsed." + +"Why, it was like any naked woman," said the astrologer hesitantly. + +"Curious, now, if it had demanded its little gifts, its little gloves--" +said Durtal, biting his lips. + +"And do you know what has become of the terrible Docre?" Des Hermies +inquired. + +"No, thank God. They say he is in the south, somewhere around Nimes, +where he formerly resided." + +"But what does this abbe do?" inquired Durtal. + +"What does he do? He evokes the Devil, and he feeds white mice on the +hosts which he consecrates. His frenzy for sacrilege is such that he had +the image of Christ tattooed on his heels so that he could always step +on the Saviour!" + +"Well," murmured Carhaix, whose militant moustache bristled while his +great eyes flamed, "if that abominable priest were here, I swear to you +that I would respect his feet, but that I would throw him downstairs +head first." + +"And the black mass?" inquired Des Hermies. + +"He celebrates it with foul men and women. He is openly accused of +having influenced people to make wills in his favor and of causing +inexplicable death. Unfortunately, there are no laws to repress +sacrilege, and how can you prosecute a man who sends maladies from a +distance and kills slowly in such a way that at the autopsy no traces of +poison appear?" + +"The modern Gilles de Rais!" exclaimed Durtal. + +"Yes, less savage, less frank, more hypocritically cruel. He does not +cut throats. He probably limits himself to 'sendings' or to causing +suicide by suggestion," said Des Hermies, "for he is, I believe, a +master hypnotist." + +"Could he insinuate into a victim the idea to drink, regularly, in +graduated doses, a toxin which he would designate, and which would +simulate the phases of a malady?" asked Durtal. + +"Nothing simpler. 'Open window burglars' that the physicians of the +present day are, they recognize perfectly the ability of a more skilful +man to pull off such jobs. The experiments of Beaunis, Liegois, Liebaut, +and Bernheim are conclusive: you can even get a person assassinated by +another to whom you suggest, without his knowledge, the will to the +crime." + +"I was thinking of something, myself," said Carhaix, who had been +reflecting and not listening to this discussion of hypnotism. "Of the +Inquisition. It certainly had its reason for being. It is the only agent +that could deal with this fallen priest whom the Church has swept out." + +"And remember," said Des Hermies, with his crooked smile playing around +the corner of his mouth, "that the ferocity of the Inquisition has been +greatly exaggerated. No doubt the benevolent Bodin speaks of driving +long needles between the nails and the flesh of the sorcerers' fingers. +'An excellent gehenna,' says he. He eulogizes equally the torture by +fire, which he characterizes as 'an exquisite death.' But he wishes only +to turn the magicians away from their detestable practises and save +their souls. Then Del Rio declares that 'the question' must not be +applied to demoniacs after they have eaten, for fear they will vomit. He +worried about their stomachs, this worthy man. Wasn't it also he who +decreed that the torture must not be repeated twice in the same day, so +as to give fear and pain a chance to calm down? Admit that the good +Jesuit was not devoid of delicacy!" + +"Docre," Gevingey went on, not paying any attention to the words of Des +Hermies, "is the only individual who has rediscovered the ancient +secrets and who obtains results in practise. He is rather more powerful, +I would have you believe, than all those fools and quacks of whom we +have been speaking. And they know the terrible canon, for he has sent +many of them serious attacks of ophthalmia which the oculists cannot +cure. So they tremble when the name Docre is pronounced in their +presence." + +"But how did a priest fall so low?" + +"I can't say. If you wish ampler information about him," said Gevingey, +addressing Des Hermies, "question your friend Chantelouve." + +"Chantelouve!" cried Durtal. + +"Yes, he and his wife used to be quite intimate with Canon Docre, but I +hope for their sakes that they have long since ceased to have dealings +with the monster." + +Durtal listened no more. Mme. Chantelouve knew Canon Docre! Ah, was she +Satanic, too? No, she certainly did not act like a possessed. "Surely +this astrologer is cracked," he thought. She! And he called her image +before him, and thought that tomorrow night she would probably give +herself to him. Ah, those strange eyes of hers, those dark clouds +suddenly cloven by radiant light! + +She came now and took complete possession of him, as before he had +ascended to the tower. "But if I didn't love you would I have come to +you?" That sentence which she had spoken, with a caressing inflection of +the voice, he heard again, and again he saw her mocking and tender face. + +"Ah, you are dreaming," said Des Hermies, tapping him on the shoulder. +"We have to go. It's striking ten." + +When they were in the street they said good night to Gevingey, who lived +on the other side of the river. Then they walked along a little way. + +"Well," said Des Hermies, "are you interested in my astrologer?" + +"He is slightly mad, isn't he?" + +"Slightly? Humph." + +"Well, his stories are incredible." + +"Everything is incredible," said Des Hermies placidly, turning up the +collar of his overcoat. "However, I will admit that Gevingey astounds me +when he asserts that he was visited by a succubus. His good faith is not +to be doubted, for I know him to be a man who means what he says, though +he is vain and doctorial. I know, too, that at La Salpetriere such +occurrences are not rare. Women smitten with hystero-epilepsy see +phantoms beside them in broad daylight and mate with them in a +cataleptic state, and every night couch with visions that must be +exactly like the fluid creatures of incubacy. But these women are +hystero-epileptics, and Gevingey isn't, for I am his physician. Then, +what can be believed and what can be proved? The materialists have taken +the trouble to revise the accounts of the sorcery trials of old. They +have found in the possession-cases of the Ursulines of Loudun and the +nuns of Poitiers, in the history, even, of the convulsionists of Saint +Medard, the symptoms of major hysteria, the same contractions of the +whole system, the same muscular dissolutions, the same lethargies, even, +finally, the famous arc of the circle. And what does this demonstrate, +that these demonomaniacs were hystero-epileptics? Certainly. The +observations of Dr. Richet, expert in such matters, are conclusive, but +wherein do they invalidate possession? From the fact that the patients +of La Salpetriere are not possessed, though they are hysterical, does it +follow that others, smitten with the same malady as they, are not +possessed? It would have to be demonstrated also that all demonopathics +are hysterical, and that is false, for there are women of sound mind and +perfectly good sense who are demonopathic without knowing it. And +admitting that the last point is controvertible, there remains this +unanswerable question: is a woman possessed because she is hysterical, +or is she hysterical because she is possessed? Only the Church can +answer. Science cannot. + +"No, come to think it over, the effrontery of the positivists is +appalling. They decree that Satanism does not exist. They lay everything +at the account of major hysteria, and they don't even know what this +frightful malady is and what are its causes. No doubt Charcot determines +very well the phases of the attack, notes the nonsensical and passional +attitudes, the contortionistic movements; he discovers hysterogenic +zones and can, by skilfully manipulating the ovaries, arrest or +accelerate the crises, but as for foreseeing them and learning the +sources and the motives and curing them, that's another thing. Science +goes all to pieces on the question of this inexplicable, stupefying +malady, which, consequently, is subject to the most diversified +interpretations, not one of which can be declared exact. For the soul +enters into this, the soul in conflict with the body, the soul +overthrown in the demoralization of the nerves. You see, old man, all +this is as dark as a bottle of ink. Mystery is everywhere and reason +cannot see its way." + +"Mmmm," said Durtal, who was now in front of his door. "Since anything +can be maintained and nothing is certain, succubacy has it. Basically it +is more literary--and cleaner--than positivism." + + + + +CHAPTER X + + +The day was long and hard to kill. Waking at dawn, full of thoughts of +Mme. Chantelouve, he could not stay in one place, and kept inventing +excuses for going out. He had no cakes, bonbons, and exotic liqueurs, +and one must not be without all the little essentials when expecting a +visit from a woman. He went by the longest route to the avenue de +l'Opera to buy fine essences of cedar and of that alkermes which makes +the person tasting it think he is in an Oriental pharmaceutic +laboratory. "The idea is," he said, "not so much to treat Hyacinthe as +to astound her by giving her a sip of an unknown elixir." + +He came back laden with packages, then went out again, and in the street +was assailed by an immense ennui. After an interminable tour of the +quays he finally tumbled into a beer hall. He fell on a bench and opened +a newspaper. + +What was he thinking as he sat, not reading but just looking at the +police news? Nothing, not even of her. From having revolved the same +matter over and over again and again his mind had reached a deadlock and +refused to function. Durtal merely found himself very tired, very +drowsy, as one in a warm bath after a night of travel. + +"I must go home pretty soon," he said when he could collect himself a +little, "for Pere Rateau certainly has not cleaned house in the thorough +fashion which I commanded, and of course I don't want the furniture to +be covered with dust. Six o'clock. Suppose I dine, after a fashion, in +some not too unreliable place." + +He remembered a nearby restaurant where he had eaten before without a +great deal of dread. He chewed his way laboriously through an extremely +dead fish, then through a piece of meat, flabby and cold; then he found +a very few lentils, stiff with insecticide, beneath a great deal of +sauce; finally he savoured some ancient prunes, whose juice smelt of +mould and was at the same time aquatic and sepulchral. + +Back in his apartment, he lighted fires in his bedroom and in his study, +then he inspected everything. He was not mistaken. The concierge had +upset the place with the same brutality, the same haste, as customarily. +However, he must have tried to wash the windows, because the glass was +streaked with finger marks. + +Durtal effaced the imprints with a damp cloth, smoothed out the folds in +the carpet, drew the curtains, and put the bookcases in order after +dusting them with a napkin. Everywhere he found grains of tobacco, +trodden cigarette ashes, pencil sharpenings, pen points eaten with rust. +He also found cocoons of cat fur and crumpled bits of rough draft +manuscript which had been whirled into all corners by the furious +sweeping. + +He finally could not help asking himself why he had so long tolerated +the fuzzy filth which obscured and incrusted his household. While he +dusted, his indignation against Rateau increased mightily. "Look at +that," he said, perceiving his wax candles grown as yellow as tallow +ones. He changed them. "That's better." He arranged his desk into +studied disarray. Notebooks, and books with paper-cutters in them for +book-marks, he laid in careful disorder. "Symbol of work," he said, +smiling, as he placed an old folio, open, on a chair. Then he passed +into his bedroom. With a wet sponge he freshened up the marble of the +dresser, then he smoothed the bed cover, straightened his photographs +and engravings, and went into the bathroom. Here he paused, +disheartened. In a bamboo rack over the wash-bowl there was a chaos of +phials. Resolutely he grabbed the perfume bottles, scoured the bottoms +and necks with emery, rubbed the labels with gum elastic and bread +crumbs, then he soaped the tub, dipped the combs and brushes in an +ammoniac solution, got his vapourizer to working and sprayed the room +with Persian lilac, washed the linoleum, and scoured the seat and the +pipes. Seized with a mania for cleanliness, he polished, scrubbed, +scraped, moistened, and dried, with great sweeping strokes of the arm. +He was no longer vexed at the concierge; he was even sorry the old +villain had not left him more to do. + +Then he shaved, touched up his moustache, and proceeded to make an +elaborate toilet, asking himself, as he dressed, whether he had better +wear button shoes or slippers. He decided that shoes were less familiar +and more dignified but resolved to wear a flowing tie and a blouse, +thinking that this artistic negligee would please a woman. + +"All ready," he said, after a last stroke of the brush. He made the turn +of the other rooms, poked the fires, and fed the cat, which was running +about in alarm, sniffing all the cleaned objects and doubtless thinking +that those he rubbed against every day without paying any attention to +them had been replaced by new ones. + +"Oh, the 'little essentials' I am forgetting!" Durtal put the teakettle +on the hob and placed cups, teapot, sugar bowl, cakes, bonbons, and tiny +liqueur glasses on an old lacquered "waiter" so as to have everything on +hand when it was time to serve. + +"Now I'm through. I've given the place a thorough cleaning. Let her +come," he said to himself, realigning some books whose backs stuck out +further than the others on the shelves. "Everything in good shape. +Except the chimney of the lamp. Where it bulges, there are caramel +specks and blobs of soot, but I can't get the thing out; I don't want to +burn my fingers; and anyway, with the shade lowered a bit she won't +notice. + +"Well, how shall I proceed when she does come?" he asked himself, +sinking into an armchair. "She enters. Good. I take her hands. I kiss +them. Then I bring her into this room. I have her sit down beside the +fire, in this chair. I station myself, facing her, on this stool. +Advancing a little, touching her knees, I can seize her. I make her bend +over. I am supporting her whole weight. I bring her lips to mine and I +am saved! + +"--Or rather lost. For then the bother begins. I can't bear to think of +getting her into the bedroom. Undressing and going to bed! That part is +appalling unless you know each other very well. And when you are just +becoming acquainted! The nice way is to have a cosy little supper for +two. The wine has an ungodly kick to it. She immediately passes out, and +when she comes to she is lying in bed under a shower of kisses. As we +can't do it that way we shall have to avoid mutual embarrassment by +making a show of passion. If I speed up the tempo and pretend to be in a +frenzy perhaps we shall not have time to think about the miserable +details. So I must possess her here, in this very spot, and she must +think I have lost my head when she succumbs. + +"It's hard to arrange in this room, because there isn't any divan. The +best way would be to throw her down on the carpet. She can put her hands +over her eyes, as they always do. I shall take good care to turn down +the lamp before she rises. + +"Well, I had better prepare a cushion for her head." He found one and +slid it under the chair. "And I had better not wear suspenders, for they +often cause ridiculous delays." He took them off and put on a belt. "But +then there is that damned question of the skirts! I admire the novelists +who can get a virgin unharnessed from her corsets and deflowered in the +winking of an eye--as if it were possible! How annoying to have to fight +one's way through all those starched entanglements! I do hope Mme. +Chantelouve will be considerate and avoid those ridiculous difficulties +as much as possible--for her own sake." + +He consulted his watch. "Half-past eight. I mustn't expect her for +nearly an hour, because, like all women, she will come late. What kind +of an excuse will she make to Chantelouve, to get away tonight? Well, +that is none of my business. Hmmm. This water heater beside the fire +looks like the invitation to the toilet, but no, the tea things handy +banish any gross idea." + +And if Hyacinthe did not come? + +"She will come," he said to himself, suddenly moved. "What motive would +she have for staying away? She knows that she cannot inflame me more +than I am inflamed." Then, jumping from phase to phase of the same old +question, "This will turn out badly, of course," he decided. "Once I am +satisfied, disenchantment is inevitable. Oh, well, so much the better, +for with this romance going on I cannot work." + +"Miserable me! relapsing--only in mind, alas!--to the age of twenty. I +am waiting for a woman. I who have scorned the doings of lovers for +years and years. I look at my watch every five minutes, and I listen, in +spite of myself, thinking it is her step I hear on the stair. + +"No, there is no getting around it. The little blue flower, the +perennial of the soul, is difficult to extirpate, and it keeps growing +up again. It does not show itself for twenty years, and then all of a +sudden, you know not why nor how, it sprouts, and then forth comes a +burst of blossoms. My God! I am getting foolish." + +He jumped from his chair. There was a gentle ring. "Not nine o'clock +yet. It isn't she," he murmured, opening the door. + +He squeezed her hands and thanked her for being so punctual. + +She said she was not feeling well. "I came only because I didn't want to +keep you waiting in vain." + +His heart sank. + +"I have a fearful headache," she said, passing her gloved hands over her +forehead. + +He took her furs and motioned her to the armchair. Prepared to follow +his plan of attack, he sat down on the stool, but she refused the +armchair and took a seat beside the table. Rising, he bent over her and +caught hold of her fingers. + +"Your hand is burning," she said. + +"Yes, a bit of fever, because I get so little sleep. If you knew how +much I have thought about you! Now I have you here, all to myself," and +he spoke of that persistent odour of cinnamon, faint, distant, expiring +amid the less definite odours which her gloves exhaled, "well," and he +sniffed her fingers, "you will leave some of yourself here when you go +away." + +She rose, sighing. "I see you have a cat. What is his name?" + +"Mouche." + +She called to the cat, which fled precipitately. + +"Mouche! Mouche!" Durtal called, but Mouche took refuge under the bed +and refused to come out. "You see he is rather bashful. He has never +seen a woman." + +"Oh, would you try to make me think you have never received a woman +here?" + +He swore that he never had, that she was the first.... + +"And you were not really anxious that this--first--should come?" + +He blushed. "Why do you say that?" + +She made a vague gesture. "I want to tease you," she said, sitting down +in the armchair. "To tell you the truth, I do not know why I like to ask +you such presumptuous questions." + +He had sat down in front of her. So now, at last, the scene was set as +he wished and he must begin the attack. His knee touched hers. + +"You know," he said, "that you cannot presume here. You have claims +on--" + +"No, I haven't and I want none." + +"Why?" + +"Because.... Listen," and her voice became grave and firm. "The more I +reflect, the more inclined I am to ask you, for heaven's sake, not to +destroy our dream. And then.... Do you want me to be frank, so frank +that I shall doubtless seem a monster of selfishness? Well, personally, +I do not wish to spoil the--the--what shall I say?--the extreme +happiness our relation gives me. I know I explain badly and confusedly, +but this is the way it is: I possess you when and how I please, just as, +for a long time, I have possessed Byron, Baudelaire, Gerard de Nerval, +those I love--" + +"You mean ...?" + +"That I have only to desire them, to desire you, before I go to +sleep...." + +"And?" + +"And you would be inferior to my chimera, to the Durtal I adore, whose +caresses make my nights delirious!" + +He looked at her in stupefaction. She had that dolent, troubled look in +her eyes. She even seemed not to see him, but to be looking into space. +He hesitated.... In a sudden flash of thought he saw the scenes of +incubacy of which Gevingey had spoken. "We shall untangle all this +later," he thought within himself, "meanwhile--" He took her gently by +the arms, drew her to him and abruptly kissed her mouth. + +She rebounded as if she had had an electric shock. She struggled to +rise. He strained her to him and embraced her furiously, then with a +strange gurgling cry she threw her head back and caught his leg between +both of hers. + +He emitted a howl of rage, for he felt her haunches move. He understood +now--or thought he understood! She wanted a miserly pleasure, a sort of +solitary vice.... + +He pushed her away. She remained there, quite pale, choking, her eyes +closed, her hands outstretched like those of a frightened child. Then +Durtal's wrath vanished. With a little cry he came up to her and caught +her again, but she struggled, crying, "No! I beseech you, let me go." + +He held her crushed against his body and attempted to make her yield. + +"I implore you, let me go." + +Her accent was so despairing that he relinquished her. Then he debated +with himself whether to throw her brutally on the floor and violate her. +But her bewildered eyes frightened him. + +She was panting and her arms hung limp at her sides as she leaned, very +pale, against the bookcase. + +"Ah!" he said, marching up and down, knocking into the furniture, "I +must really love you, if in spite of your supplications and refusals--" + +She joined her hands to keep him away. + +"Good God!" he said, exasperated, "what are you made of?" + +She came to herself, and, offended, she said to him, "Monsieur, I too +suffer. Spare me," and pell-mell she spoke of her husband, of her +confessor, and became so incoherent that Durtal was frightened. She was +silent, then in a singing voice she said, "Tell me, you will come to my +house tomorrow night, won't you?" + +"But I suffer too!" + +She seemed not to hear him. In her smoky eyes, far, far back, there +seemed to be a twinkle of feeble light. She murmured, in the cadence of +a canticle, "Tell me, dear, you will come tomorrow night, won't you?" + +"Yes," he said at last. + +Then she readjusted herself and without saying a word quitted the room. +In silence he accompanied her to the entrance. She opened the door, +turned around, took his hand and very lightly brushed it with her lips. + +He stood there stupidly, not knowing what to make of her behaviour. + +"What does she mean?" he exclaimed, returning to the room, putting the +furniture back in place and smoothing the disordered carpet. "Heavens, I +wish I could as easily restore order to my brain. Let me think, if I +can. What is she after? Because, of course, she has something in view. +She does not want our relation to culminate in the act itself. Does she +really fear disillusion, as she claims? Is she really thinking how +grotesque the amorous somersaults are? Or is she, as I believe, a +melancholy and terrible player-around-the-edges, thinking only of +herself? Well, her obscene selfishness is one of those complicated sins +that have to be shriven by the very highest confessor. She's a plain +teaser! + +"I don't know. Incubacy enters into this. She admits--so placidly!--that +in dream she cohabits at will with dead or living beings. Is she +Satanizing, and is this some of the work of Canon Docre? He's a friend +of hers. + +"So many riddles impossible to solve. What is the meaning of this +unexpected invitation for tomorrow night? Does she wish to yield nowhere +except in her own home? Does she feel more at ease there, or does she +think the propinquity of her husband will render the sin more piquant? +Does she loathe Chantelouve, and is this a meditated vengeance, or does +she count on the fear of danger to spur our senses? + +"After all, I think it is probably a final coquetry, an appetizer before +the repast. And women are so funny anyway! She probably thinks these +delays and subterfuges are necessary to differentiate her from a +cocotte. Or perhaps there is a physical necessity for stalling me off +another day." + +He sought other reasons but could find none. + +"Deep down in my heart," he said, vexed in spite of himself by this +rebuff, "I know I have been an imbecile. I ought to have acted the cave +man and paid no attention to her supplications and lies. I ought to have +taken violent possession of her lips and breast. Then it would be +finished, whereas now I must begin at the beginning again, and God damn +her! I have other things to do. + +"Who knows whether she isn't laughing at me this very moment? Perhaps +she wanted me to be more violent and bold--but no, her soul-sick voice +was not feigned, her poor eyes did not simulate bewilderment, and then +what would she have meant by that _respectful_ kiss--for there was an +impalpable shade of respect and gratitude in that kiss which she planted +on my hand!" + +She was too much for him. "Meanwhile, in this hurly-burly I have +forgotten my refreshments. Suppose I take off my shoes, now that I am +alone, for my feet are swollen from parading up and down the room. +Suppose I do better yet and go to bed, for I am incapable of working or +reading," and he drew back the covers. + +"Decidedly, nothing happens the way one foresees it, yet my plan of +attack wasn't badly thought out," he said, crawling in. With a sigh he +blew out the lamp, and the cat, reassured, passed over him, lighter than +a breath, and curled up without a sound. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + + +Contrary to his expectations, he slept all night, with clenched fists, +and woke next morning quite calm, even gay. The scene of the night +before, which ought to have exacerbated his senses, produced exactly the +opposite effect. The truth is that Durtal was not of those who are +attracted by difficulties. He always made one hardy effort to surmount +them, then when that failed he would withdraw, with no desire to renew +the combat. If Mme. Chantelouve thought to entice him by delays, she had +miscalculated. This morning, already, he was weary of the comedy. + +His reflections began to be slightly tinged with bitterness. He was +angry at the woman for having wished to keep him in suspense, and he was +angry at himself for having permitted her to make a fool of him. Then +certain expressions, the impertinence of which had not struck him at +first, chilled him now. "Her nervous trick of laughing, which sometimes +caught her in public places," then her declaration that she did not need +his permission, nor even his person, in order to possess him, seemed to +him unbecoming, to say the least, and uncalled for, as he had not run +after her nor indeed made any advances to her at all. + +"I will fix you," he said, "when I get some hold over you." + +But in the calm awakening of this morning the spell of the woman had +relaxed. Resolutely he thought, "Keep two dates with her. This one +tonight at her house. It won't count, because nothing can be done. For I +intend neither to allow myself to be assaulted nor to attempt an +assault. I certainly have no desire to be caught by Chantelouve _in +flagrante delicto_, and probably get into a shooting scrape and be haled +into police court. Have her here once. If she does not yield then, why, +the matter is closed. She can go and tickle somebody else." + +And he made a hearty breakfast, and sat down to his writing table and +ran over the scattered notes for his book. + +"I had got," he said, glancing at his last chapter, "to where the +alchemic experiments and diabolic evocations have proved unavailing. +Prelati, Blanchet, all the sorcerers and sorcerers' helpers whom the +Marshal has about him, admit that to bring Satan to him Gilles must make +over his soul and body to the Devil or commit crimes. + +"Gilles refuses to alienate his existence and sell his soul, but he +contemplates murder without any horror. This man, so brave on the +battlefield, so courageous when he accompanied Jeanne d'Arc, trembles +before the Devil and is afraid when he thinks of eternity and of Christ. +The same is true of his accomplices. He has made them swear on the +Testament to keep the secret of the confounding turpitudes which the +chateau conceals, and he can be sure that not one will violate the oath, +for, in the Middle Ages, the most reckless of freebooters would not +commit the inexpiable sin of deceiving God. + +"At the same time that his alchemists abandon their unfruitful furnaces, +Gilles begins a course of systematic gluttony, and his flesh, set on +fire by the essences of inordinate potations and spiced dishes, seethes +in tumultuous eruption. + +"Now, there are no women in the chateau. Gilles appears to have despised +the sex ever since leaving the court. After experience of the ribalds of +the camps and frequentation, with Xaintrailles and La Hire, of the +prostitutes of Charles VII, it seems that a dislike for the feminine +form came over him. Like others whose ideal of concupiscence is +deteriorated and deviated, he certainly comes to be disgusted by the +delicacy of the grain of the skin of women and by that odour of +femininity which all sodomists abhor. + +"He depraves the choir boys who are under his authority. He chose them +in the first place, these little psaltry ministrants, for their beauty, +and 'beautiful as angels' they are. They are the only ones he loves, the +only ones he spares in his murderous transports. + +"But soon infantile pollution seems to him an insipid delicacy. The law +of Satanism which demands that the elect of Evil, once started, must go +the whole way, is once more fulfilled. Gilles's soul must become +thoroughly cankered, a red tabernacle, that in it the Very Low may dwell +at ease. + +"The litanies of lust arise in an atmosphere that is like the wind over +a slaughter house. The first victim is a very small boy whose name we do +not know. Gilles disembowels him, and, cutting off the hands and tearing +out the eyes and heart, carries these members into Prelati's chamber. +The two men offer them, with passionate objurgations, to the Devil, who +holds his peace. Gilles, confounded, flees. Prelati rolls up the poor +remains in linen and, trembling, goes out at night to bury them in +consecrated ground beside a chapel dedicated to Saint Vincent. + +"Gilles preserves the blood of this child to write formulas of evocation +and conjurements. It manures a horrible crop. Not long afterward the +Marshal reaps the most abundant harvest of crimes that has ever been +sown. + +"From 1432 to 1440, that is to say during the eight years between the +Marshal's retreat and his death, the inhabitants of Anjou, Poitou, and +Brittany walk the highways wringing their hands. All the children +disappear. Shepherd boys are abducted from the fields. Little girls +coming out of school, little boys who have gone to play ball in the +lanes or at the edge of the wood, return no more. + +"In the course of an investigation ordered by the duke of Brittany, the +scribes of Jean Touscheronde, duke's commissioner in these matters, +compile interminable lists of lost children. + +"Lost, at la Rochebernart, the child of the woman Peronne, 'a child who +did go to school and who did apply himself to his book with exceeding +diligence.' + +"Lost, at Saint Etienne de Montluc, the son of Guillaume Brice, 'and +this was a poor man and sought alms.' + +"Lost, at Machecoul, the son of Georget le Barbier, 'who was seen, a +certain day, knocking apples from a tree behind the hotel Rondeau, and +who since hath not been seen.' + +"Lost, at Thonaye, the child of Mathelin Thouars, 'and he had been heard +to cry and lament and the said child was about twelve years of age.' + +"At Machecoul, again, the day of Pentecost, mother and father Sergent +leave their eight-year-old boy at home, and when they return from the +fields 'they did not find the said child of eight years of age, +wherefore they marvelled and were exceeding grieved.' + +"At Chantelou, it is Pierre Badieu, mercer of the parish, who says that +a year or thereabouts ago, he saw, in the domain de Rais, 'two little +children of the age of nine who were brothers and the children of Robin +Pavot of the aforesaid place, and since that time neither have they been +seen neither doth any know what hath become of them.' + +"At Nantes, it is Jeanne Darel who deposes that 'on the day of the feast +of the Holy Father, her true child named Olivier did stray from her, +being of the age of seven and eight years, and since the day of the +feast of the Holy Father neither did she see him nor hear tidings.' + +"And the account of the investigation goes on, revealing hundreds of +names, describing the grief of the mothers who interrogate passersby on +the highway, and telling of the keening of the families from whose very +homes children have been spirited away when the elders went to the +fields to hoe or to sow the hemp. These phrases, like a desolate +refrain, recur again and again, at the end of every deposition: 'They +were seen complaining dolorously,' 'Exceedingly they did lament.' +Wherever the bloodthirsty Gilles dwells the women weep. + +"At first the frantic people tell themselves that evil fairies and +malicious genii are dispersing the generation, but little by little +terrible suspicions are aroused. As soon as the Marshal quits a place, +as he goes from the chateau de Tiffauges to the chateau de Champtoce, +and from there to the castle of La Suze or to Nantes, he leaves behind +him a wake of tears. He traverses a countryside and in the morning +children are missing. Trembling, the peasant realizes also that wherever +Prelati, Roger de Bricqueville, Gilles de Sille, any of the Marshal's +intimates, have shown themselves, little boys have disappeared. Finally, +the peasant learns to look with horror upon an old woman, Perrine +Martin, who wanders around, clad in grey, her face covered--as is that +of Gilles de Sille--with a black stamin. She accosts children, and her +speech is so seductive, her face, when she raises her veil, so benign, +that all follow her to the edge of a wood, where men carry them off, +gagged, in sacks. And the frightened people call this purveyor of flesh, +this ogress, 'La Mefrraye,' from the name of a bird of prey. + +"These emissaries spread out, covering all the villages and hamlets, +tracking the children down at the orders of the Chief Huntsman, the sire +de Bricqueville. Not content with these beaters, Gilles takes to +standing at a window of the chateau, and when young mendicants, +attracted by the renown of his bounty, ask an alms, he runs an +appraising eye over them, has any who excite his lust brought in and +thrown into an underground prison and kept there until, being in +appetite, he is pleased to order a carnal supper. + +"How many children did he disembowel after deflowering them? He himself +did not know, so many were the rapes he had consummated and the murders +he had committed. The texts of the times enumerate between, seven and +eight hundred, but the estimate is inaccurate and seems +overconservative. Entire regions were devastated. The hamlet of +Tiffauges had no more young men. La Suze was without male posterity. At +Champtoce the whole foundation room of a tower was filled with corpses. +A witness cited in the inquest, Guillaume Hylairet, declared also, "that +one hight Du Jardin hath heard say that there was found in the said +castle a wine pipe full of dead little children.' + +"Even today traces of these assassinations linger. Two years ago at +Tiffauges a physician discovered an oubliette and brought forth piles of +skulls and bones. + +"Gilles confessed to frightful holocausts, and his friends confirmed the +atrocious details. + +"At dusk, when their senses are phosphorescent, enkindled by +inflammatory spiced beverages and by 'high' venison, Gilles and his +friends retire to a distant chamber of the chateau. The little boys are +brought from their cellar prisons to this room. They are disrobed and +gagged. The Marshal fondles them and forces them. Then he hacks them to +pieces with a dagger, taking great pleasure in slowly dismembering them. +At other times he slashes the boy's chest and drinks the breath from the +lungs; sometimes he opens the stomach also, smells it, enlarges the +incision with his hands, and seats himself in it. Then while he +macerates the warm entrails in mud, he turns half around and looks over +his shoulder to contemplate the supreme convulsions, the last spasms. He +himself says afterwards, 'I was happier in the enjoyment of tortures, +tears, fright, and blood, than in any other pleasure.' + +"Then he becomes weary of these fecal joys. An unpublished passage in +his trial proceedings informs us that 'The said sire heated himself with +little boys, sometimes also with little girls, with whom he had congress +in the belly, saying that he had more pleasure and less pain than acting +in nature.' After which, he slowly saws their throats, cuts them to +pieces, and the corpses, the linen and the clothing, are put in the +fireplace, where a smudge fire of logs and leaves is burning, and the +ashes are thrown into the latrine, or scattered to the winds from the +top of a tower, or buried in the moats and mounds. + +"Soon his furies become aggravated. Until now he has appeased the rage +of his senses with living or moribund beings. He wearies of stuprating +palpitant flesh and becomes a lover of the dead. A passionate artist, he +kisses, with cries of enthusiasm, the well-made limbs of his victims. He +establishes sepulchral beauty contests, and whichever of the truncated +heads receives the prize he raises by the hair and passionately kisses +the cold lips. + +"Vampirism satisfies him for months. He pollutes dead children, +appeasing the fever of his desires in the blood smeared chill of the +tomb. He even goes so far--one day when his supply of children is +exhausted--as to disembowel a pregnant woman and sport with the foetus. +After these excesses he falls into horrible states of coma, similar to +those heavy lethargies which overpowered Sergeant Bertrand after his +violations of the grave. But if that leaden sleep is one of the known +phases of ordinary vampirism, if Gilles de Rais was merely a sexual +pervert, we must admit that he distinguished himself from the most +delirious sadists, the most exquisite virtuosi in pain and murder, by a +detail which seems extrahuman, it is so horrible. + +"As these terrifying atrocities, these monstrous outrages, no longer +suffice him, he corrodes them with the essence of a rare sin. It is no +longer the resolute, sagacious cruelty of the wild beast playing with +the body of a victim. His ferocity does not remain merely carnal; it +becomes spiritual. He wishes to make the child suffer both in body and +soul. By a thoroughly Satanic cheat he deceives gratitude, dupes +affection, and desecrates love. At a leap he passes the bounds of human +infamy and lands plump in the darkest depth of Evil. + +"He contrives this: One of the unfortunate children is brought into his +chamber, and hanged, by Bricqueville, Prelati, and de Sille, to a hook +fixed into the wall. Just at the moment when the child is suffocating, +Gilles orders him to be taken down and the rope untied. With some +precaution, he takes the child on his knees, revives him, caresses him, +rocks him, dries his tears, and pointing to the accomplices, says, +'These men are bad, but you see they obey me. Do not be afraid. I will +save your life and take you back to your mother,' and while the little +one, wild with joy, kisses him and at that moment loves him, Gilles +gently makes an incision in the back of the neck, rendering the child +'languishing,' to follow Gilles's own expression, and when the head, not +quite detached, bows, Gilles kneads the body, turns it about, and +violates it, bellowing. + +"After these abominable pastimes he may well believe that the art of the +charnalist has beneath his fingers expressed its last drop of pus, and +in a vaunting cry he says to his troop of parasites, "There is no man on +earth who dare do as I have done.' + +"But if in Love and Well-doing the infinite is approachable for certain +souls, the out-of-the-world possibilities of Evil are limited. In his +excesses of stupration and murder the Marshal cannot go beyond a fixed +point. In vain he may dream of unique violations, of more ingenious slow +tortures, but human imagination has a limit and he has already reached +it--even passed it, with diabolic aid. Insatiable he seethes--there is +nothing material in which to express his ideal. He can verify that axiom +of demonographers, that the Evil One dupes all persons who give +themselves, or are willing to give themselves, to him. + +"As he can descend no further, he tries returning on the way by which he +has come, but now remorse overtakes him, overwhelms him, and wrenches +him without respite. His nights are nights of expiation. Besieged by +phantoms, he howls like a wounded beast. He is found rushing along the +solitary corridors of the chateau. He weeps, throws himself on his +knees, swears to God that he will do penance. He promises to found pious +institutions. He does establish, at Machecoul, a boys' academy in honour +of the Holy Innocents. He speaks of shutting himself up in a cloister, +of going to Jerusalem, begging his bread on the way. + +"But in this fickle and aberrated mind ideas superpose themselves on +each other, then pass away, and those which disappear leave their shadow +on those which follow. Abruptly, even while weeping with distress, he +precipitates himself into new debauches and, raving with delirium, hurls +himself upon the child brought to him, gouges out the eyes, runs his +finger around the bloody, milky socket, then he seizes a spiked club and +crushes the skull. And while the gurgling blood runs over him, he +stands, smeared with spattered brains, and grinds his teeth and laughs. +Like a hunted beast he flees into the wood, while his henchmen remove +the crimson stains from the ground and dispose prudently of the corpse +and the reeking garments. + +"He wanders in the forests surrounding Tiffauges, dark, impenetrable +forests like those which Brittany still can show at Carnoet. He sobs as +he walks along. He attempts to thrust aside the phantoms which accost +him. Then he looks about him and beholds obscenity in the shapes of the +aged trees. It seems that nature perverts itself before him, that his +very presence depraves it. For the first time he understands the +motionless lubricity of trees. He discovers priapi in the branches. + +"Here a tree appears to him as a living being, standing on its +root-tressed head, its limbs waving in the air and spread wide apart, +subdivided and re-subdivided into haunches, which again are divided and +re-subdivided. Here between two limbs another branch is jammed, in a +stationary fornication which is reproduced in diminished scale from +bough to twig to the top of the tree. There it seems the trunk is a +phallus which mounts and disappears into a skirt of leaves or which, on +the contrary, issues from a green clout and plunges into the glossy +belly of the earth. + +"Frightful images rise before him. He sees the skin of little boys, the +lucid white skin, vellum-like, in the pale, smooth bark of the slender +beeches. He recognizes the pachydermatous skin of the beggar boys in the +dark and wrinkled envelope of the old oaks. Beside the bifurcations of +the branches there are yawning holes, puckered orifices in the bark, +simulating emunctoria, or the protruding anus of a beast. In the joints +of the branches there are other visions, elbows, armpits furred with +grey lichens. Even in the trunks there are incisions which spread out +into great lips beneath tufts of brown, velvety moss. + +"Everywhere obscene forms rise from the ground and spring, disordered, +into a firmament which satanizes. The clouds swell into breasts, divide +into buttocks, bulge as if with fecundity, scattering a train of spawn +through space. They accord with the sombre bulging of the foliage, in +which now there are only images of giant or dwarf hips, feminine +triangles, great V's, mouths of Sodom, glowing cicatrices, humid vents. +This landscape of abomination changes. Gilles now sees on the trunks +frightful cancers and horrible wens. He observes exostoses and ulcers, +membranous sores, tubercular chancres, atrocious caries. It is an +arboreal lazaret, a venereal clinic. + +"And there, at a detour of the forest aisle, stands a mottled red beech. + +"Amid the sanguinary falling leaves he feels that he has been spattered +by a shower of blood. He goes into a rage. He conceives the delusion +that beneath the bark lives a wood nymph, and he would feel with his +hands the palpitant flesh of the goddess, he would trucidate the Dryad, +violate her in a place unknown to the follies of men. + +"He is jealous of the woodman who can murder, can massacre, the trees, +and he raves. Tensely he listens and hears in the soughing wind a +response to his cries of desire. Overwhelmed, he resumes his walk, +weeping, until he arrives at the chateau and sinks to his bed exhausted, +an inert mass. + +"The phantoms take more definite shape, now that he sleeps. The lubric +enlacements of the branches, dilated crevices and cleft mosses, the +coupling of the diverse beings of the wood, disappear; the tears of the +leaves whipped by the wind are dried; the white abscesses of the clouds +are resorbed into the grey of the sky; and--in an awful silence--the +incubi and succubi pass. + +"The corpses of his victims, reduced to ashes and scattered, return to +the larva state and attack his lower parts. He writhes, with the blood +bursting his veins. He rebounds in a somersault, then he crawls to the +crucifix, like a wolf, on all fours, and howling, strains his lips to +the feet of the Christ. + +"A sudden reaction overwhelms him. He trembles before the image whose +convulsed face looks down on him. He adjures Christ to have pity, +supplicates Him to spare a sinner, and sobs and weeps, and when, +incapable of further effort, he whimpers, he hears, terrified, in his +own voice, the lamentations of the children crying for their mothers and +pleading for mercy." + + * * * * * + +And Durtal, coming slowly out of the vision he had conjured up, closed +his notebook and remarked, "Rather petty, my own spiritual conflict +regarding a woman whose sin--like my own, to be sure--is commonplace and +bourgeois." + + + + +CHAPTER XII + + +"Easy to find an excuse for this visit, though it will seem strange to +Chantelouve, whom I have neglected for months," said Durtal on his way +toward the rue Bagneux. "Supposing he is home this evening--and he +probably isn't, because surely Hyacinthe will have seen to that--I can +tell him that I have learned of his illness through Des Hermies and that +I have come to see how he is getting along." + +He paused on the stoop of the building in which Chantelouve lived. At +each side and over the door were these antique lamps with reflectors, +surmounted by a sort of casque of sheet iron painted green. There was an +old iron balustrade, very wide, and the steps, with wooden sides, were +paved with red tile. About this house there was a sepulchral and also +clerical odour, yet there was also something homelike--though a little +too imposing--about it such as is not to be found in the cardboard +houses they build nowadays. You could see at a glance that it did not +harbour the apartment house promiscuities: decent, respectable couples +with kept women for neighbours. The house pleased him, and he considered +Hyacinthe the more desirable for her substantial environment. + +He rang at a first-floor apartment. A maid led him through a long hall +into a sitting-room. He noticed, at a glance, that nothing had changed +since his last visit. It was the same vast, high-ceilinged room with +windows reaching to heaven. There was the huge fireplace; on the +mantelpiece the same reproduction, reduced, in bronze, of Fremiet's +Jeanne d'Arc, between the two globe lamps of Japanese porcelain. He +recognized the grand piano, the table loaded with albums, the divan, the +chairs in the style of Louis XV with tapestried covers. In front of +every window there were imitation Chinese vases, mounted on tripods of +imitation ebony and containing sickly palms. On the walls were religious +pictures, without expression, and a portrait of Chantelouve in his +youth, three-quarter length, his hand resting on a pile of his works. An +ancient Russian icon in nielloed silver and one of these Christs in +carved wood, executed in the seventeenth century by Bogard de Nancy, in +an antique frame of gilded wood backed with velvet, were the only things +that slightly relieved the banality of the decoration. The rest of the +furniture looked like that of a bourgeois household fixed up for Lent, +or for a charity dance or for a visit from the priest. A great fire +blazed on the hearth. The room was lighted by a very high lamp with a +wide shade of pink lace-- + +"Stinks of the sacristy!" Durtal was saying to himself at the moment the +door opened. + +Mme. Chantelouve entered, the lines of her figure advantageously +displayed by a wrapper of white swanskin, which gave off a fragrance of +frangipane. She pressed Durtal's hand and sat down facing him, and he +perceived under the wrap her indigo silk stockings in little patent +leather bootines with straps across the insteps. + +They talked about the weather. She complained of the way the winter hung +on, and declared that although the furnace seemed to be working all +right she was always shivering, was always frozen to death. She told him +to feel her hands, which indeed were cold, then she seemed worried about +his health. + +"You look pale," she said. + +"You might at least say that I _am_ pale," he replied. + +She did not answer immediately, then, "Yesterday I saw how much you +desire me," she said. "But why, why, want to go so far?" + +He made a gesture, indicating vague annoyance. + +"How funny you are!" she went on. "I was re-reading one of your books +today, and I noticed this phrase, 'The only women you can continue to +love are those you lose.' Now admit that you were right when you wrote +that." + +"It all depends. I wasn't in love then." + +She shrugged her shoulders. "Well," she said, "I must tell my husband +you are here." + +Durtal remained silent, wondering what role Chantelouve actually played +in this triangle. + +Chantelouve returned with his wife. He was in his dressing-gown and had +a pen in his mouth. He took it out and put it on the table, and after +assuring Durtal that his health was completely restored, he complained +of overwhelming labours. "I have had to quit giving dinners and +receptions," he said, "I can't even go visiting. I am in harness every +day at my desk." + +And when Durtal asked him the nature of these labours, he confessed to a +whole series of unsigned volumes on the lives of the saints, to be +turned out by the gross by a Tours firm for exportation. + +"Yes," said his wife, laughing, "and these are _sadly neglected_ saints +whose biographies he is preparing." + +And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, Chantelouve, also laughing, +said, "It was their persons that were _sadly neglected_. The subjects +are chosen for me, and it does seem as if the publisher enjoyed making +me eulogize frowziness. I have to describe Blessed Saints most of whom +were deplorably unkempt: Labre, who was so lousy and ill-smelling as to +disgust the beasts in the stables; Saint Cunegonde who 'through +humility' neglected her body; Saint Oportune who never used water and +who washed her bed only with her tears; Saint Silvia who never removed +the grime from her face; Saint Radegonde who never changed her hair +shirt and who slept on a cinder pile; and how many others, around whose +heads I must draw a golden halo!" + +"There are worse than those," said Durtal. "Read the life of Marie +Alacoque. You will see that she, to mortify herself, licked up with her +tongue the dejections of one sick person and sucked an abscess from the +toe of another." + +"I know, but I must admit that I am less touched than revolted by these +tales." + +"I prefer Saint Lucius the martyr," said Mme. Chantelouve. "His body was +so transparent that he could see through his chest the vileness of his +heart. His kind of 'vileness' at least we can stand. But I must admit +that this utter disregard of cleanliness makes me suspicious of the +monasteries and renders your beloved Middle Ages odious to me." + +"Pardon me, my dear," said her husband, "you are greatly mistaken. The +Middle Ages were not, as you believe, an epoch of uncleanliness. People +frequented the baths assiduously. At Paris, for example, where these +establishments were numerous, the 'stove-keepers' went about the city +announcing that the water was hot. It is not until the Renaissance that +uncleanliness becomes rife in France. When you think that that delicious +Reine Margot kept her body macerated with perfumes but as grimy as the +inside of a stovepipe! and that Henri Quatre plumed himself on having +'reeking feet and a fine armpit.'" + +"My dear, for heaven's sake," said madame, "spare us the details." + +While Chantelouve was speaking, Durtal was watching him. He was small +and rotund, with a bay window which his arms would not have gone around. +He had rubicund cheeks, long hair very much pomaded, trailing in the +back and drawn up in crescents along his temples. He had pink cotton in +his ears. He was smooth shaven and looked like a pious but convivial +notary. But his quick, calculating eye belied his jovial and sugary +mien. One divined in his look the cool, unscrupulous man of affairs, +capable, for all his honeyed ways, of doing one a bad turn. + +"He must be aching to throw me into the street," said Durtal to +himself, "because he certainly knows all about his wife's goings-on." + +But if Chantelouve wished to be rid of his guest he did not show it. +With his legs crossed and his hands folded one over the other, in the +attitude of a priest, he appeared to be mightily interested in Durtal's +work. Inclining a little, listening as if in a theatre, he said, "Yes, I +know the material on the subject. I read a book some time ago about +Gilles de Rais which seemed to me well handled. It was by abbe Bossard." + +"It is the most complete and reliable of the biographies of the +Marshal." + +"But," Chantelouve went on, "there is one point which I never have been +able to understand. I have never been able to explain to myself why the +name Bluebeard should have been attached to the Marshal, whose history +certainly has no relation to the tale of the good Perrault." + +"As a matter of fact the real Bluebeard was not Gilles de Rais, but +probably a Breton king, Comor, a fragment of whose castle, dating from +the sixth century, is still standing, on the confines of the forest of +Carnoet. The legend is simple. The king asked Guerock, count of Vannes, +for the hand of his daughter, Triphine. Guerock refused, because he had +heard that the king maintained himself in a constant state of +widowerhood by cutting his wives' throats. Finally Saint Gildas promised +Guerock to return his daughter to him safe and sound when he should +reclaim her, and the union was celebrated. + +"Some months later Triphine learned that Comor did indeed kill his +consorts as soon as they became pregnant. She was big with child, so she +fled, but her husband pursued her and cut her throat. The weeping father +commanded Saint Gildas to keep his promise, and the Saint resuscitated +Triphine. + +"As you see, this legend comes much nearer than the history of our +Bluebeard to the told tale arranged by the ingenious Perrault. Now, why +and how the name Bluebeard passed from King Comor to the Marshal de +Rais, I cannot tell. You know what pranks oral tradition can play." + +"But with your Gilles de Rais you must have to plunge into Satanism +right up to the hilt," said Chantelouve after a silence. + +"Yes, and it would really be more interesting if these scenes were not +so remote. What would have a timely appeal would be a study of the +Diabolism of the present day." + +"No doubt," said Chantelouve, pleasantly. + +"For," Durtal went on, looking at him intently, "unheard-of things are +going on right now. I have heard tell of sacrilegious priests, of a +certain canon who has revived the sabbats of the Middle Ages." + +Chantelouve did not betray himself by so much as a flicker of the +eyelids. Calmly he uncrossed his legs and looking up at the ceiling he +said, "Alas, certain scabby wethers succeed in stealing into the fold, +but they are so rare as hardly to be worth thinking about." And he +deftly changed the subject by speaking of a book he had just read about +the Fronde. + +Durtal, somewhat embarrassed, said nothing. He understood that +Chantelouve refused to speak of his relations with Canon Docre. + +"My dear," said Mme. Chantelouve, addressing her husband, "you have +forgotten to turn up your lamp wick. It is smoking. I can smell it from +here, even through the closed door." + +She was most evidently conveying him a dismissal. Chantelouve rose and, +with a vaguely malicious smile, excused himself as being obliged to +continue his work. He shook hands with Durtal, begged him not to stay +away so long in future, and gathering up the skirts of his dressing-gown +he left the room. + +She followed him with her eyes, then rose, in her turn, ran to the +door, assured herself with a glance that it was closed, then returned to +Durtal, who was leaning against the mantel. Without a word she took his +head between her hands, pressed her lips to his mouth and opened it. + +He grunted furiously. + +She looked at him with indolent and filmy eyes, and he saw sparks of +silver dart to their surface. He held her in his arms. She was swooning +but vigilantly listening. Gently she disengaged herself, sighing, while +he, embarrassed, sat down at a little distance from her, clenching and +unclenching his hands. + +They spoke of banal things: she boasting of her maid, who would go +through fire for her, he responding only by gestures of approbation and +surprise. + +Then suddenly she passed her hands over her forehead. "Ah!" she said, "I +suffer cruelly when I think that he is there working. No, it would cost +me too much remorse. What I say is foolish, but if he were a different +man, a man who went out more and made conquests, it would not be so +bad." + +He was irritated by the inconsequentiality of her plaints. Finally, +feeling completely safe, he came closer to her and said, "You spoke of +remorse, but whether we embark or whether we stand on the bank, isn't +our guilt exactly the same?" + +"Yes, I know. My confessor talks to me like that--only more +severely--but I think you are both wrong." + +He could not help laughing, and he said to himself, "Remorse is perhaps +the condiment which keeps passion from being too unappetizing to the +blase." Then aloud he jestingly, "Speaking of confessors, if I were a +casuist it seems to me I would try to invent new sins. I am not a +casuist, and yet, having looked about a bit, I believe I _have_ found a +new sin." + +"You?" she said, laughing in turn. "Can I commit it?" + +He scrutinized her features. She had the expression of a greedy child. + +"You alone can answer that. Now I must admit that the sin is not +absolutely new, for it fits into the known category of lust. But it has +been neglected since pagan days, and was never well defined in any +case." + +"Do not keep me in suspense. What is this sin?" + +"It isn't easy to explain. Nevertheless I will try. Lust, I believe, can +be classified into: ordinary sin, sin against nature, bestiality, and +let us add _demoniality_ and sacrilege. Well, there is, in addition to +these, what I shall call Pygmalionism, which embraces at the same time +cerebral onanism and incest. + +"Imagine an artist falling in love with his child, his creation: with an +Herodiade, a Judith, a Helen, a Jeanne d'Arc, whom he has either +described or painted, and evoking her, and finally possessing her in +dream. + +"Well, this love is worse than normal incest. In the latter sin the +guilty one commits only a half-offence, because his daughter is not born +solely of his substance, but also of the flesh of another. Thus, +logically, in incest there is a quasi-natural side, almost licit, +because part of another person has entered into the engendering of the +_corpus delicti_; while in Pygmalionism the father violates the child of +his soul, of that which alone is purely and really his, which alone he +can impregnate without the aid of another. The offence is, then, entire +and complete. Now, is there not also disdain of nature, of the work of +God, since the subject of the sin is no longer--as even in bestiality--a +palpable and living creature, but an unreal being created by a +projection of the desecrated talent, a being almost celestial, since, by +genius, by artistry, it often becomes immortal? + +"Let us go further, if you wish. Suppose that an artist depicts a saint +and becomes enamoured of her. Thus we have complications of crime +against nature and of sacrilege. An enormity!" + +"Which, perhaps, is exquisite!" + +He was taken aback by the word she had used. She rose, opened the door, +and called her husband. "Dear," she said, "Durtal has discovered a new +sin!" + +"Surely not," said Chantelouve, his figure framed in the doorway. "The +book of sins is an edition _ne varietur_. New sins cannot be invented, +but old ones may be kept from falling into oblivion. Well, what is this +sin of his?" + +Durtal explained the theory. + +"But it is simply a refined expression of succubacy. The consort is not +one's work become animate, but a succubus which by night takes that +form." + +"Admit, at any rate, that this cerebral hermaphrodism, self-fecundation, +is a distinguished vice at least--being the privilege of the artist--a +vice reserved for the elect, inaccessible to the mob." + +"If you like exclusive obscenity--" laughed Chantelouve. "But I must get +back to the lives of the saints; the atmosphere is fresher and more +benign. So excuse me, Durtal. I leave it to my wife to continue this +Marivaux conversation about Satanism with you." + +He said it in the simplest, most debonair fashion to be imagined, but +with just the slightest trace of irony. + +Which Durtal perceived. "It must be quite late," he thought, when the +door closed after Chantelouve. He consulted his watch. Nearly eleven. He +rose to take leave. + +"When shall I see you?" he murmured, very low. + +"Your apartment tomorrow night at nine." + +He looked at her with beseeching eyes. She understood, but wished to +tease him. She kissed him maternally on the forehead, then consulted his +eyes again. The expression of supplication must have remained unchanged, +for she responded to their imploration by a long kiss which closed them, +then came down to his lips, drinking their dolorous emotion. + +Then she rang and told her maid to light Durtal through the hall. He +descended, satisfied that she had engaged herself to yield tomorrow +night. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + + +He began again, as on the other evening, to clean house and establish a +methodical disorder. He slipped a cushion under the false disarray of +the armchair, then he made roaring fires to have the rooms good and warm +when she came. + +But he was without impatience. That silent promise which he had +obtained, that Mme. Chantelouve would not leave him panting this night, +moderated him. Now that his uncertainty was at an end, he no longer +vibrated with the almost painful acuity which hitherto her malignant +delays had provoked. He soothed himself by poking the fire. His mind was +still full of her, but plethoric, content. When his thoughts stirred at +all it was, at the very most, to revolve the question, "How shall I go +about it, when the time comes, so as not to be ridiculous?" This +question, which had so harassed him the other night, left him troubled +but inert. He did not try to solve it, but decided to leave everything +to chance, since the best planned strategy was almost always abortive. + +Then he revolted against himself, accused himself of stagnation, and +walked up and down to shake himself out of a torpor which might have +been attributed to the hot fire. Well, well, was it because he had had +to wait so long that his desires had left him, or at least quit +bothering him--no, they had not, why, he was yearning now for the moment +when he might crush that woman! He thought he had the explanation of his +lack of enthusiasm in the stage fright inseparable from any beginning. +"It will not be really exquisite tonight until after the newness wears +off and the grotesque with it. After I know her I shall be able to +consort with her again without feeling solicitous about her and +conscious of myself. I wish we were on that happy basis now." + +The cat, sitting on the table, cocked up its ears, gazed at the door +with its black eyes, and fled. The bell rang and Durtal went to let her +in. + +Her costume pleased him. He took off her furs. Her skirt was of a plum +colour so dark that it was almost black, the material thick and supple, +outlining her figure, squeezing her arms, making an hourglass of her +waist, accentuating the curve of her hips and the bulge of her corset. + +"You are charming," he said, kissing her wrists, and he was pleased to +find that his lips had accelerated her pulse. She did not speak, could +hardly breathe. She was agitated and very pale. + +He sat down facing her. She looked at him with her mysterious, half +sleepy eyes. He felt that he was falling in love all over again. He +forgot his reasonings and his fears, and took acute pleasure in +penetrating the mystery of these eyes and studying the vague smile of +this dolorous mouth. + +He enlaced her fingers in his, and for the first time, in a low voice, +he called her Hyacinthe. + +She listened, her breast heaving, her hands in a fever. Then in a +supplicating voice, "I implore you," she said, "let us have none of +that. Only desire is good. Oh, I am rational, I mean what I say. I +thought it all out on the way here. I left him very sad tonight. If you +knew how I feel--I went to church today and was afraid and hid myself +when I saw my confessor--" + +These plaints he had heard before, and he said to himself, "You may sing +whatever tune you want to, but you shall dance tonight." Aloud he +answered in monosyllables as he continued to take possession of her. + +He rose, thinking she would do the same, or that if she remained seated +he could better reach her lips by bending over her. + +"Your lips, your lips--the kiss you gave me last night--" he murmured, +as his face came close to hers. She put up her lips and stood, and they +embraced, but as his hands went seeking she recoiled. + +"Think how ridiculous it all is," she said in a low voice, "to undress, +put on night clothes--and that silly scene, getting into bed!" + +He avoided declaring, but attempted, by an embrace which bent her over +backward, to make her understand that she could spare herself those +embarrassments. Tacitly, in his own turn, feeling her body stiffen under +his fingers, he understood that she absolutely would not give herself in +the room here, in front of the fire. + +"Oh well," she said, disengaging herself, "if you will have it!" + +He made way to allow her to go into the other room, and seeing that she +desired to be alone he drew the portiere. + +Sitting before the fire he reflected. Perhaps he ought to have pulled +down the bed covers, and not left her the task, but without doubt the +action would have been too direct, too obvious a hint. Ah! and that +water heater! He took it and, keeping away from the bedroom door, went +to the bathroom, placed the heater on the toilet table, and then, +swiftly, he set out the rice powder box, the perfumes, the combs, and, +returning into his study, he listened. + +She was making as little noise as possible, walking on tiptoe as if in +the presence of the dead. She blew out the candles, doubtless wishing no +more light than the rosy glow of the hearth. + +He felt positively annihilated. The irritating impression of the lips +and eyes of Hyacinthe was far from him now. She was nothing but a woman, +like any other, undressing in a man's room. Memories of similar scenes +overwhelmed him. He remembered girls who like her had crept about on the +carpet so as not to be heard, and who had stopped short, ashamed, for a +whole second, if they bumped against the water pitcher. And then, what +good was this going to do him? Now that she was yielding he no longer +desired her! Disillusion had come even before possession, not waiting, +as usual, till afterward. He was distressed to the point of tears. + +The frightened cat glided under the curtain, ran from one room to the +other, and finally came back to his master and jumped onto his knees. +Caressing him, Durtal said to himself, "Decidedly, she was right when +she refused. It will be grotesque, atrocious. I was wrong to insist, but +no, it's her fault, too. She must have wanted to do this or she wouldn't +have come. What a fool to think she could aggravate passion by delay. +She is fearfully clumsy. A moment ago when I was embracing her and +really was aroused, it would perhaps have been delicious, but now! And +what do I look like? A young bridegroom waiting--or a green country boy. +Oh God, how stupid! Well," he said, straining his ears and hearing no +sound from the other room, "she's in bed. I must go in. + +"I suppose it took her all this time to unharness herself from her +corset. She was a fool to wear one," he concluded, when, drawing the +curtain, he stepped into the other room. + +Mme. Chantelouve was buried under the thick coverlet, her mouth +half-open and her eyes closed; but he saw that she was peering at him +through the fringe of her blonde eyelashes. He sat down on the edge of +the bed. She huddled up, drawing the cover over her chin. + +"Cold, dear?" + +"No," and she opened wide her eyes, which flashed sparks. + +He undressed, casting a rapid glance at Hyacinthe's face. It was hidden +in the darkness, but was sometimes revealed by a flare of the red hot +fire, as a stick, half consumed and smouldering, would suddenly burst +into flame. Swiftly he slipped between the covers. He clasped a corpse; +a body so cold that it froze him, but the woman's lips were burning as +she silently gnawed his features. He lay stupified in the grip of this +body wound around his own, supple as the ... and hard! He could not +move; he could not speak for the shower of kisses traveling over his +face. Finally, he succeeded in disengaging himself, and, with his free +arm he sought her; then suddenly, while she devoured his lips he felt a +nervous inhibition, and, naturally, without profit, he withdrew. + +"I detest you!" she exclaimed. + +"Why?" + +"I detest you!" + +He wanted to cry out, "And I you!" He was exasperated, and would have +given all he owned to get her to dress and go home. + +The fire was burning low, unflickering. Appeased, now, he sat up and +looked into the darkness. He would have liked to get up and find another +nightshirt, because the one he had on was tearing and getting in his +way. But Hyacinthe was lying on top of it--then he reflected that the +bed was deranged and the thought affected him, because he liked to be +snug in winter, and knowing himself incapable of respreading the covers, +he foresaw a cold night. + +Once more, he was enlaced; the gripe of the woman's on his own was +renewed; rational, this time, he attended to her and crushed her with +mighty caresses. In a changed voice, lower, more guttural, she uttered +ignoble things and silly cries which gave him pain--"My dear!--oh, +hon!--oh I can't stand it!"--aroused nevertheless, he took this body +which creaked as it writhed, and he experienced the extraordinary +sensation of a spasmodic burning within a swaddle of ice-packs. + +He finally jumped over her, out of bed, and lighted the candles. On the +dresser the cat sat motionless, considering Durtal and Mme. Chantelouve +alternately. Durtal saw an inexpressible mockery in those black eyes +and, irritated, chased the beast away. + +He put some more wood on the fire, dressed, and started to leave the +room. Hyacinthe called him gently, in her usual voice. He approached the +bed. She threw her arms around his neck and hung there, kissing him +hungrily. Then sinking back and putting her arms under the cover, she +said, "The deed is done. Now will you love me any better?" + +He did not have the heart to answer. Ah yes, his disillusion was +complete. The satiety following justified his lack of appetite +preceding. She revolted him, horrified him. Was it possible to have so +desired a woman, only to come to--that? He had idealized her in his +transports, he had dreamed in her eyes--he knew not what! He had wished +to exalt himself with her, to rise higher than the delirious ravenings +of the senses, to soar out of the world into joys supernal and +unexplored. And his dream had been shattered. He remained fettered to +earth. Was there no means of escaping out of one's self, out of earthly +limitations, and attaining an upper ether where the soul, ravished, +would glory in its giddy flight? + +Ah, the lesson was hard and decisive. For having one time hoped so much, +what regrets, what a tumble! Decidedly, Reality does not pardon him who +despises her; she avenges herself by shattering the dream and trampling +it and casting the fragments into a cesspool. + +"Don't be vexed, dear, because it is taking me so long," said Mme. +Chantelouve behind the curtain. + +He thought crudely, "I wish you would get to hell out of here," and +aloud he asked politely if she had need of his services. + +"She was so mysterious, so enticing," he resumed to himself. "Her eyes, +remote, deep as space, and reflecting cemeteries and festivals at the +same time. And she has shown herself up for all she is, within an hour. +I have seen a new Hyacinthe, talking like a silly little milliner in +heat. All the nastinesses of women unite in her to exasperate me." + +After a thoughtful silence he concluded, "I must be young indeed to have +lost my head the way I did." + +As if echoing his thought, Mme. Chantelouve, coming out through the +portiere, laughed nervously and said, "A woman of my age doing a mad +thing like that!" She looked at him, and though he forced a smile she +understood. + +"You will sleep tonight," she said, sadly, alluding to Durtal's former +complaints of sleeplessness on her account. + +He begged her to sit down and warm herself, but she said she was not +cold. + +"Why, in spite of the warmth of the room you were cold as ice!" + +"Oh, I am always that way. Winter and summer my flesh is chilly." + +He thought that in August this frigid body might be agreeable, but now! + +He offered her some bonbons, which she refused, then she said she would +take a sip of the alkermes, which he poured into a tiny silver goblet. +She took just a drop, and amicably they discussed the taste of this +preparation, in which she recognized an aroma of clove, tempered by +flower of cinnamon moistened with distillate of rose water. + +Then he became silent. + +"My poor dear," she said, "how I should love him if he were more +confiding and not always on his guard." + +He asked her to explain herself. + +"Why, I mean that you can't forget yourself and simply let yourself be +loved. Alas, you were reasoning all the time--" + +"I was not!" + +She kissed him tenderly. "You see I love you, anyway." And he was +surprised to see how sad and moved she looked, and he observed a sort of +frightened gratitude in her eyes. + +"She is easily satisfied," he said to himself. + +"What are you thinking about?" + +"You!" + +She sighed. Then, "What time is it?" + +"Half past ten." + +"I must go. He is waiting for me. No, don't say anything--" + +She passed her hands over her cheeks. He seized her gently by the waist +and kissed her, holding her thus enlaced until they were at the door. + +"You will come again soon, won't you?" + +"Yes.... Yes." + +He returned to the fireside. + +"Oof! it's done," he thought, in a whirl of confused emotions. His +vanity was satisfied, his selfesteem was no longer bleeding, he had +attained his ends and possessed this woman. Moreover, her spell over him +had lost its force. He was regaining his entire liberty of mind, but who +could tell what trouble this liaison had yet in store for him? Then, in +spite of everything, he softened. + +After all, what could he reproach her with? She loved as well as she +could. She was, indeed, ardent and plaintive. Even this dualism of a +mistress who was a low cocotte in bed and a fine lady when dressed--or +no, too intelligent to be called a fine lady--was a delectable pimento. +Her carnal appetites were excessive and bizarre. What, then, was the +matter with him? + +And at last he quite justly accused himself. It was his own fault if +everything was spoiled. He lacked appetite. He was not really tormented +except by a cerebral erethism. He was used up in body, filed away in +soul, inept at love, weary of tendernesses even before he received them +and disgusted when he had. His heart was dead and could not be revived. +And his mania for thinking, thinking! previsualizing an incident so +vividly that actual enactment was an anticlimax--but probably would not +be if his mind would leave him alone and not be always jeering at his +efforts. For a man in his state of spiritual impoverishment all, save +art, was but a recreation more or less boring, a diversion more or less +vain. "Ah, poor woman, I am afraid she is going to get pretty sick of +me. If only she would consent to come no more! But no, she doesn't +deserve to be treated in that fashion," and, seized by pity, he swore to +himself that the next time she visited him he would caress her and try +to persuade her that the disillusion which he had so ill concealed did +not exist. + +He tried to spread up the bed, get the tousled blankets together, and +plump the pillows, then he lay down. + +He put out his lamp. In the darkness his distress increased. With death +in his heart he said to himself, "Yes, I was right in declaring that the +only women you can continue to love are those you lose. + +"To learn, three years later, when the woman is inaccessible, chaste and +married, dead, perhaps, or out of France--to learn that she loved you, +though you had not dared believe it while she was near you, ah, that's +the dream! These real and intangible loves, these loves made up of +melancholy and distant regrets, are the only ones that count. Because +there is no flesh in them, no earthly leaven. + +"To love at a distance and without hope; never to possess; to dream +chastely of pale charms and impossible kisses extinguished on the waxen +brow of death: ah, that is something like it. A delicious straying away +from the world, and never the return. As only the unreal is not ignoble +and empty, existence must be admitted to be abominable. Yes, imagination +is the only good thing which heaven vouchsafes to the skeptic and +pessimist, alarmed by the eternal abjectness of life." + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + + +From this scene he had learned an alarming lesson: that the flesh +domineers the soul and refuses to admit any schism. The flesh decisively +does not intend that one shall get along without it and indulge in +out-of-the-world pleasures which it can partake only on condition that +it keep quiet. For the first time, reviewing these turpitudes, he really +understood the meaning of that now obsolete word _chastity_, and he +savoured it in all its pristine freshness. Just as a man who has drunk +too deeply the night before thinks, the morning after, of drinking +nothing but mineral water in future, so he dreamed, today, of pure +affection far from a bed. + +He was still ruminating these thoughts when Des Hermies entered. + +They spoke of amorous misadventures. Astonished at once by Durtal's +languor and the ascetic tone of his remarks, Des Hermies exclaimed, "Ah, +we had a gay old time last night?" + +With the most decisive bad grace Durtal shook his head. + +"Then," replied Des Hermies, "you are superior and inhuman. To love +without hope, immaculately, would be perfect if it did not induct such +brainstorms. There is no excuse for chastity, unless one has a pious end +in view, or unless the senses are failing, and if they are one had best +see a doctor, who will solve the question more or less unsatisfactorily. +To tell the truth, everything on earth culminates in the act you +reprove. The heart, which is supposed to be the noble part of man, has +the same form as the penis, which is the so-called ignoble part of man. +There's symbolism in that similarity, because every love which is of +the heart soon extends to the organ resembling it. The human +imagination, the moment it tries to create artificially animated beings, +involuntarily reproduces in them the movements of animals propagating. +Look at the machines, the action of the piston and the cylinder; Romeos +of steel and Juliets of cast iron. Nor do the loftier expressions of the +human intellect get away from the advance and withdrawal copied by the +machines. One must bow to nature's law if one is neither impotent nor a +saint. Now you are neither the one nor the other, I think, but if, from +inconceivable motives, you desire to live in temporary continence, +follow the prescription of an occultist of the sixteenth century, the +Neapolitan Piperno. He affirms that whoever eats vervain cannot approach +a woman for seven days. Buy a jar, and let's try it." + +Durtal laughed. "There is perhaps a middle course: never consummate the +carnal act with her you love, and, to keep yourself quiet, frequent +those you do not love. Thus, in a certain measure, you would conjure +away possible disgust." + +"No, one would never get it out of one's head that with the woman of +whom one was enamoured one would experience carnal delights absolutely +different from those which one feels with the others, so your method +also would end badly. And too, the women who would not be indifferent to +one, have not charity and discretion enough to admire the wisdom of this +selfishness, for of course that's what it is. But what say, now, to +putting on your shoes? It's almost six o'clock and Mama Carhaix's beef +can't wait." + +It had already been taken out of the pot and couched on a platter amid +vegetables when they arrived. Carhaix, sprawling in an armchair, was +reading his breviary. + +"What's going on in the world?" he asked, closing his book. + +"Nothing. Politics doesn't interest us, and General Boulanger's +American tricks of publicity weary you as much as they do us, I suppose. +The other newspaper stories are just a little more shocking or dull than +usual.--Look out, you'll burn your mouth," as Durtal was preparing to +take a spoonful of soup. + +"In fact," said Durtal, grimacing, "this marrowy soup, so artistically +golden, is like liquid fire. But speaking of the news, what do you mean +by saying there is nothing of pressing importance? And the trial of that +astonishing abbe Boudes going on before the Assizes of Aveyron! After +trying to poison his curate through the sacramental wine, and committing +such other crimes as abortion, rape, flagrant misconduct, forgery, +qualified theft and usury, he ended by appropriating the money put in +the coin boxes for the souls in purgatory, and pawning the ciborium, +chalice, all the holy vessels. That case is worth following." + +Carhaix raised his eyes to heaven. + +"If he is not sent to jail, there will be one more priest for Paris," +said Des Hermies. + +"How's that?" + +"Why, all the ecclesiastics who get in bad in the provinces, or who have +a serious falling out with the bishop, are sent here where they will be +less in view, lost in the crowd, as it were. They form a part of that +corporation known as 'scratch priests.'" + +"What are they?" + +"Priests loosely attached to a parish. You know that in addition to a +curate, ministrants, vicars, and regular clergy, there are in every +church adjunct priests, supply priests. Those are the ones I am talking +about. They do the heavy work, celebrate the morning masses when +everybody is asleep and the late masses when everybody is doing. It is +they who get up at night to take the sacrament to the poor, and who sit +up with the corpses of the devout rich and catch cold standing under the +dripping church porches at funerals, and get sunstroke or pneumonia in +the cemetery. They do all the dirty work. For a five or ten franc fee +they act as substitutes for colleagues who have good livings and are +tired of service. They are men under a cloud for the most part. Churches +take them on, ready to fire them at a moment's notice, and keep strict +watch over them while waiting for them to be interdicted or to have +their _celebret_ taken away. I simply mean that the provincial parishes +excavate on the city the priests who for one reason or another have +ceased to please." + +"But what do the curates and other titulary abbes _do_, if they unload +their duties onto the backs of others?" + +"They do the elegant, easy work, which requires no effort, no charity. +They shrive society women who come to confession in their most stunning +gowns; they teach proper little prigs the catechism, and preach, and +play the limelight roles in the gala ceremonials which are got up to +pander to the tastes of the faithful. At Paris, not counting the scratch +priests, the clergy is divided thus: Man-of-the-world priests in easy +circumstances: these are placed at la Madeleine and Saint Roch where the +congregations are wealthy. They are wined and dined, they pass their +lives in drawing-rooms, and comfort only elegant souls. Other priests +who are good desk clerks, for the most part, but who have neither the +education nor the fortune necessary to participate in the +inconsequentialities of the idle rich. They live more in seclusion and +visit only among the middle class. They console themselves for their +unfashionableness by playing cards with each other and uttering crude +commonplaces at the table." + +"Now, Des Hermies," said Carhaix, "you are going too far. I claim to +know the clerical world myself, and there are, even in Paris, honest men +who do their duty. They are covered with opprobrium and spat on. Every +Tom, Dick, and Harry accuses them of the foulest vices. But after all, +it must be said that the abbe Boudes and the Canon Docres are +exceptions, thank God! and outside of Paris there are veritable saints, +especially among the country clergy." + +"It's a fact that Satanic priests are relatively rare, and the +lecheries of the clergy and the knaveries of the episcopate are +evidently exaggerated by an ignoble press. But that isn't what I have +against them. If only they were gamblers and libertines! But they're +lukewarm, mediocre, lazy, imbeciles. That is their sin against the Holy +Ghost, the only sin which the All Merciful does not pardon." + +"They are of their time," said Durtal. "You wouldn't expect to find the +soul of the Middle Ages inculcated by the milk-and-water seminaries." + +"Then," Carhaix observed, "our friend forgets that there are impeccable +monastic orders, the Carthusians, for instance." + +"Yes, and the Trappists and the Franciscans. But they are cloistered +orders which live in shelter from an infamous century. Take, on the +other hand, the order of Saint Dominic, which exists for the fashionable +world. That is the order which produces jewelled dudes like Monsabre and +Didon. Enough said." + +"They are the hussars of religion, the jaunty lancers, the spick and +span and primped-up Zouaves, while the good Capuchins are the humble +poilus of the soul," said Durtal. + +"If only they loved bells," sighed Carhaix, shaking his head. "Well, +pass the Coulommiers," he said to his wife, who was taking up the salad +bowl and the plates. + +In silence they ate this Brie-type cheese. Des Hermies filled the +glasses. + +"Tell me," Durtal asked Des Hermies, "do you know whether a woman who +receives visits from the incubi necessarily has a cold body? In other +words, is a cold body a presumable symptom of incubacy, as of old the +inability to shed tears served the Inquisition as proof positive to +convict witches?" + +"Yes, I can answer you. Formerly women smitten with incubacy had frigid +flesh even in the month of August. The books of the specialists bear +witness. But now the majority of the creatures who voluntarily or +involuntarily summon or receive the amorous larvae have, on the contrary, +a skin that is burning and dry to the touch. This transformation is not +yet general, but tends to become so. I remember very well that Dr. +Johannes, he of whom Gevingey told you, was often obliged, at the moment +when he attempted to deliver the patient, to bring the body back to +normal temperature with lotions of dilute hydriodate of potassium." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, who was thinking of Mme. Chantelouve. + +"You don't know what has become of Dr. Johannes?" asked Carhaix. + +"He is living very much in retirement at Lyons. He continues, I believe, +to cure venefices, and he preaches the blessed coming of the Paraclete." + +"For heaven's sake, who is this doctor?" asked Durtal. + +"He is a very intelligent and learned priest. He was superior of a +community, and he directed, here in Paris, the only review which ever +was really mystical. He was a theologian much consulted, a recognized +master of divine jurisprudence; then he had distressing quarrels with +the papal Curia at Rome and with the Cardinal-Archbishop of Paris. His +exorcisms and his battles against the incubi, especially in the female +convents, ruined him. + +"Ah, I remember the last time I saw him, as if it were yesterday. I met +him in the rue Grenelle coming out of the Archbishop's house, the day he +quitted the Church, after a scene which he told me all about. Again I +can see that priest walking with me along the deserted boulevard des +Invalides. He was pale, and his defeated but impressive voice trembled. +He had been summoned and commanded to explain his actions in the case of +an epileptic woman whom he claimed to have cured with the aid of a +relic, the seamless robe of Christ preserved at Argenteuil. The +Cardinal, assisted by two grand vicars, listened to him, standing. + +"When he had likewise furnished the information which they demanded +about his cures of witch spells, Cardinal Guibert said, 'You had best go +to La Trappe.' + +"And I remember word for word his reply, 'If I have violated the laws +of the Church, I am ready to undergo the penalty of my fault. If you +think me culpable, pass a canonical judgment and I will execute it, I +swear on my sacerdotal honour; but I wish a formal sentence, for, in +law, nobody is bound to condemn himself: "_Nemo se tradere tenetur_," +says the Corpus Juris Canonici.' + +"There was a copy of his review on the table. The Cardinal pointed to a +page and asked, 'Did you write that?' + +"'Yes, Eminence.' + +"'Infamous doctrines!' and he went from his office into the next room, +crying, 'Out of my sight!' + +"Then Johannes advanced as far as the threshold of the other room, and +falling on his knees, he said, 'Eminence, I had no intention of +offending. If I have done so, I beg forgiveness.' + +"The Cardinal cried more loudly, 'Out of my sight before I call for +assistance!' + +"Johannes rose and left. + +"'All my old ties are broken,' he said, as he parted from me. He was so +sad that I had not the heart to question him further." + +There was a silence. Carhaix went up to his tower to ring a peal. His +wife removed the dessert dishes and the cloth. Des Hermies prepared the +coffee. Durtal, pensive, rolled his cigarette. + +Carhaix, when he returned, as if enveloped in a fog of sounds, +exclaimed, "A while ago, Des Hermies, you were speaking of the +Franciscans. Do you know that that order, to live up to its professions +of poverty, was supposed not to possess even a bell? True, this rule has +been relaxed somewhat. It was too severe! Now they have a bell, but only +one." + +"Just like most other abbeys, then." + +"No, because all communities have at least three, in honour of the holy +and triple Hypostasis." + +"Do you mean to say that the number of bells a monastery or church can +have is limited by rule?" + +"Formerly it was. There was a pious hierarchy of ringing: the bells of a +convent could not sound when the bells of a church pealed. They were the +vassals, and, respectful and submissive as became their rank, they were +silent when the Suzerain spoke to the multitudes. These principles of +procedure, consecrated, in 1590, by a canon of the Council of Toulouse +and confirmed by two decrees of the Congress of Rites, are no longer +followed. The rulings of San Carlo Borromeo, who decreed that a church +should have from five to seven bells, a boy's academy three, and a +parochial school two, are abolished. Today churches have more or fewer +bells as they are more or less rich.... Oh, well, why worry? Where are +the little glasses?" + +His wife brought them, shook hands with the guests, and retired. + +Then while Carhaix was pouring the cognac, Des Hermies said in a low +voice, "I did not want to speak before her, because these matters +distress and frighten her, but I received a singular visit this morning +from Gevingey, who is running over to Lyons to see Dr. Johannes. He +claims to have been bewitched by Canon Docre, who, it seems, is making a +flying visit to Paris. What have been their relations? I don't know. +Anyway, Gevingey is in a deplorable state." + +"Just what seems to be the matter with him?" asked Durtal. + +"I positively do not know. I made a careful auscultation and examined +him thoroughly. He complains of needles pricking him around the heart. I +observed nervous trouble and nothing else. What I am most worried about +is a state of enfeeblement inexplicable in a man who is neither +cancerous nor diabetical." + +"Ah," said Carhaix, "I suppose people are not betwitched now with wax +images and needles, with the 'Manei' or the 'Dagyde' as it was called in +the good old days." + +"No, those practises are now out of date and almost everywhere fallen +into disuse. Gevingey who took me completely into his confidence this +morning, told me what extraordinary recipes the frightful canon uses. +These are, it seems, the unrevealed secrets of modern magic." + +"Ah, that's what interests me," exclaimed Durtal. + +"Of course I limit myself to repeating what was told me," resumed Des +Hermies, lighting his cigarette. "Well, Docre keeps white mice in cages, +and he takes them along when he travels. He feeds them on consecrated +hosts and on pastes impregnated with poisons skilfully dosed. When these +unhappy beasts are saturated, he takes them, holds them over a chalice, +and with a very sharp instrument he pricks them here and there. The +blood flows into the vase and he uses it, in a way which I shall explain +in a moment, to strike his enemies with death. Formerly he operated on +chickens and guinea pigs, but he used the grease, not the blood, of +these animals, become thus execrated and venomous tabernacles. + +"Formerly he also used a recipe discovered by the Satanic society of the +Re-Theurgistes-Optimates, of which I have spoken before, and he prepared +a hash composed of flour, meat, Eucharist bread, mercury, animal semen, +human blood, acetate of morphine and aspic oil. + +"Latterly, and according to Gevingey this abomination is more perilous +yet, he stuffs fishes with communion bread and with toxins skilfully +graduated. These toxins are chosen from those which produce madness or +lockjaw when absorbed through the pores. Then, when these fishes are +thoroughly permeated with the substances sealed by sacrilege, Docre +takes them out of the water, lets them rot, distills them, and expresses +from them an essential oil one drop of which will produce madness. This +drop, it appears, is applied externally, by touching the hair, as in +Balzac's _Thirteen_." + +"Hmmm," said Durtal, "I am afraid that a drop of this oil long ago fell +on the scalp of poor old Gevingey." + +"What is interesting about this story is not the outlandishness of these +diabolical pharmacopoeia so much as the psychology of the persons who +invent and manipulate them. Think. This is happening at the present day, +and it is the priests who have invented philtres unknown to the +sorcerers of the Middle Ages." + +"The priests, no! A priest. And what a priest!" remarked Carhaix. + +"Gevingey is very precise. He affirms that others use them. Bewitchment +by veniniferous blood of mice took place in 1879 at Chalons-sur-Marne in +a demoniac circle--to which the canon belonged, it is true. In 1883, in +Savoy, the oil of which I have spoken was prepared in a group of +defrocked abbes. As you see, Docre is not the only one who practises +this abominable science. It is known in the convents; some laymen, even, +have an inkling of it." + +"But now, admitting that these preparations are real and that they are +active, you have not explained how one can poison a man with them either +from a distance or near at hand." + +"Yes, that's another matter. One has a choice of two methods to reach +the enemy one is aiming at. The first and least used is this: the +magician employs a voyant, a woman who is known in that world as 'a +flying spirit'; she is a somnambulist, who, put into a hypnotic state, +can betake herself, in spirit, wherever one wishes her to go. It is then +possible to have her transmit the magic poisons to a person whom one +designates, hundreds of leagues away. Those who are stricken in this +manner have seen no one, and they go mad or die without suspecting the +venefice. But these voyants are not only rare, they are also unreliable, +because other persons can likewise fix them in a cataleptic state and +extract confessions from them. So you see why persons like Docre have +recourse to the second method, which is surer. It consists in evoking, +just as in Spiritism, the soul of a dead person and sending it to strike +the victim with the prepared spell. The result is the same but the +vehicle is different. There," concluded Des Hermies, "reported with +painstaking exactness, are the confidences which our friend Gevingey +made me this morning." + +"And Dr. Johannes cures people poisoned in this manner?" asked Carhaix. + +"Yes, Dr. Johannes--to my knowledge--has made inexplicable cures." + +"But with what?" + +"Gevingey tells me, in this connection, that the doctor celebrates a +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek. I haven't the faintest idea what +this sacrifice is, but Gevingey will perhaps enlighten us if he returns +cured." + +"In spite of all, I should not be displeased, once in my life to get a +good look at Canon Docre," said Durtal. + +"Not I! He is the incarnation of the Accursed on earth!" cried Carhaix, +assisting his friends to put on their overcoats. + +He lighted his lantern, and while they were descending the stair, as +Durtal complained of the cold, Des Hermies burst into a laugh. + +"If your family had known the magical secrets of the plants, you would +not shiver this way," he said. "It was learned in the sixteenth century +that a child might be immune to heat or cold all his life if his hands +were rubbed with juice of absinth before the twelfth month of his life +had passed. That, you see, is a tempting prescription, less dangerous +than those which Canon Docre abuses." + +Once below, after Carhaix had closed the door of his tower, they +hastened their steps, for the north wind swept the square. + +"After all," said Des Hermies, "Satanism aside--and yet Satanism also is +a phase of religion--admit that, for two miscreants of our sort, we hold +singularly pious conversations. I hope they will be counted in our +favour up above." + +"No merit on our part," replied Durtal, "for what else is there to talk +about? Conversations which do not treat of religion or art are so base +and vain." + + + + +CHAPTER XV + + +The memory of these frightful magisteria kept racing through his head +next day, and, while smoking cigarettes beside the fire, Durtal thought +of Docre and Johannes fighting across Gevingey's back, smiting and +parrying with incantations and exorcisms. + +"In the Christian symbolism," he said to himself, "the fish is one of +the representations of Christ. Doubtless the Canon thinks to aggravate +his sacrileges by feeding fishes on genuine hosts. His is the reverse of +the system of the mediaeval witches who chose a vile beast dedicated to +the Devil to submit the body of the Saviour to the processes of +digestion. How real is the pretended power which the deicide chemists +are alleged to wield? What faith can we put in the tales of evoked larvae +killing a designated person to order with corrosive oil and blood virus? +None, unless one is extremely credulous, and even a bit mad. + +"And yet, come to think of it, we find today, unexplained and surviving +under other names, the mysteries which were so long reckoned the product +of mediaeval imagination and superstition. At the charity hospital Dr. +Louis transfers maladies from one hypnotized person to another. Wherein +is that less miraculous than evocation of demons, than spells cast by +magicians or pastors? A larva, a flying spirit, is not, indeed, more +extraordinary than a microbe coming from afar and poisoning one without +one's knowledge, and the atmosphere can certainly convey spirits as well +as bacilli. Certainly the ether carries, untransformed, emanations, +effluences, electricity, for instance, or the fluids of a magnet which +sends to a distant subject an order to traverse all Paris to rejoin it. +Science has no call to contest these phenomena. On the other hand, Dr. +Brown-Sequard rejuvenates infirm old men and revitalizes the impotent +with distillations from the parts of rabbits and cavies. Were not the +elixirs of life and the love philtres which the witches sold to the +senile and impotent composed of similar or analogous substances? Human +semen entered almost always, in the Middle Ages, into the compounding of +these mixtures. Now, hasn't Dr. Brown-Sequard, after repeated +experiments, recently demonstrated the virtues of semen taken from one +man and instilled into another? + +"Finally, the apparitions, doppelgaenger, bilocations--to speak thus of +the spirits--that terrified antiquity, have not ceased to manifest +themselves. It would be difficult to prove that the experiments carried +on for three years by Dr. Crookes in the presence of witnesses were +cheats. If he has been able to photograph visible and tangible spectres, +we must recognize the veracity of the mediaeval thaumaturges. Incredible, +of course--and wasn't hypnotism, possession of one soul by another which +could dedicate it to crime--incredible only ten years ago? + +"We are groping in shadow, that is sure. But Des Hermies hit the +bull's-eye when he remarked, 'It is less important to know whether the +modern pharmaceutic sacrileges are potent, than to study the motives of +the Satanists and fallen priests who prepare them.' + +"Ah, if there were some way of getting acquainted with Canon Docre, of +insinuating oneself into his confidence, perhaps one would attain clear +insight into these questions. I learned long ago that there are no +people interesting to know except saints, scoundrels, and cranks. They +are the only persons whose conversation amounts to anything. Persons of +good sense are necessarily dull, because they revolve over and over +again the tedious topics of everyday life. They are the crowd, more or +less intelligent, but they are the crowd, and they give me a pain. Yes, +but who will put me in touch with this monstrous priest?" and, as he +poked the fire, Durtal said to himself, "Chantelouve, if he would, but +he won't. There remains his wife, who used to be well acquainted with +Docre. I must interrogate her and find out whether she still corresponds +with him and sees him." + +The entrance of Mme. Chantelouve into his reflections saddened him. He +took out his watch and murmured, "What a bore. She will come again, and +again I shall have to--if only there were any possibility of convincing +her of the futility of the carnal somersaults! In any case, she can't be +very well pleased, because, to her frantic letter soliciting a meeting, +I responded three days later by a brief, dry note, inviting her to come +here this evening. It certainly was lacking in lyricism, too much so, +perhaps." + +He rose and went into his bedroom to make sure that the fire was burning +brightly, then he returned and sat down, without even arranging his room +as he had the other times. Now that he no longer cared for this woman, +gallantry and self-consciousness had fled. He awaited her without +impatience, his slippers on his feet. + +"To tell the truth, I have had nothing pleasant from Hyacinthe except +that kiss we exchanged when her husband was only a few feet away. I +certainly shall not again find her lips a-flame and fragrant. Here her +kiss is insipid." + +Mme. Chantelouve rang earlier than usual. + +"Well," she said, sitting down. "You wrote me a nice letter." + +"How's that?" + +"Confess frankly that you are through with me." + +He denied this, but she shook her head. + +"Well," he said, "what have you to reproach me with? Having written you +only a short note? But there was someone here, I was busy and I didn't +have time to assemble pretty speeches. Not having set a date sooner? I +told you our relation necessitates precautions, and we can't see each +other very often. I think I gave you clearly to understand my +motives--" + +"I am so stupid that I probably did not understand them. You spoke to me +of 'family reasons,' I believe." + +"Yes." + +"Rather vague." + +"Well, I couldn't go into detail and tell you that--" + +He stopped, asking himself whether the time had come to break decisively +with her, but he remembered that he wanted her aid in getting +information about Docre. + +"That what? Tell me." + +He shook his head, hesitating, not to tell her a lie, but to insult and +humiliate her. + +"Well," he went on, "since you force me to do it, I will confess, at +whatever cost, that I have had a mistress for several years--I add that +our relations are now purely amical--" + +"Very well," she interrupted, "your family reasons are sufficient." + +"And then," he pursued, in a lower tone, "if you wish to know all, +well--I have a child by her." + +"A child! Oh, you poor dear." She rose. "Then there is nothing for me to +do but withdraw." + +But he seized her hands, and, at the same time satisfied with the +success of his deception and ashamed of his brutality, he begged her to +stay awhile. She refused. Then he drew her to him, kissed her hair, and +cajoled her. Her troubled eyes looked deep into his. + +"Ah, then!" she said. "No, let me undress." + +"Not for the world!" + +"Yes!" + +"Oh, the scene of the other night beginning all over again," he +murmured, sinking, overwhelmed, into a chair. He felt borne down, +burdened by an unspeakable weariness. + +He undressed beside the fire and warmed himself while waiting for her to +get to bed. When they were in bed she enveloped him with her supple, +cold limbs. + +"Now is it true that I am to come here no more?" + +He did not answer, but understood that she had no intention of going +away and that he had to do with a person of the staying kind. + +"Tell me." + +He buried his head in her breast to keep from having to answer. + +"Tell me in my lips." + +He beset her furiously, to make her keep silent, then he lay disabused, +weary, happy that it was over. When they lay down again she put her arm +about his neck and ran her tongue around in his mouth like an auger, but +he paid little heed to caresses and remained feeble and pathetic. Then +she bent over, reached him, and he groaned. + +"Ah!" she exclaimed suddenly, rising, "at last I have heard you cry!" + +He lay, broken in body and spirit, incapable of thinking two thoughts in +sequence. His brain seemed to whir, undone, in his skull. + +He collected himself, however, rose and went into the other room to +dress and let her do the same. + +Through the drawn portiere separating the two rooms he saw a little +pinhole of light which came from the wax candle placed on the mantel +opposite the curtain. Hyacinthe, going back and forth, would momentarily +intercept this light, then it would flash out again. + +"Ah," she said, "my poor darling, you have a child." + +"The shot struck home," said he to himself, and aloud, "Yes, a little +girl." + +"How old?" + +"She will soon be six," and he described her as flaxen-haired, lively, +but in very frail health, requiring multiple precautions and constant +care. + +"You must have very sad evenings," said Mme. Chantelouve, in a voice of +emotion, from behind the curtain. + +"Oh yes! If I were to die tomorrow, what would become of those two +unfortunates?" + +His imagination took wing. He began himself to believe the mother and +her. His voice trembled. Tears very nearly came to his eyes. + +"He is unhappy, my darling is," she said, raising the curtain and +returning, clothed, into the room. "And that is why he looks so sad, +even when he smiles!" + +He looked at her. Surely at that moment her affection was not feigned. +She really clung to him. Why, oh, why, had she had to have those rages +of lust? If it had not been for those they could probably have been good +comrades, sin moderately together, and love each other better than if +they wallowed in the sty of the senses. But no, such a relation was +impossible with her, he concluded, seeing those sulphurous eyes, that +ravenous, despoiling mouth. + +She had sat down in front of his writing table and was playing with a +penholder. "Were you working when I came in? Where are you in your +history of Gilles de Rais?" + +"I am getting along, but I am hampered. To make a good study of the +Satanism of the Middle Ages one ought to get really into the +environment, or at least fabricate a similar environment, by becoming +acquainted with the practitioners of Satanism all about us--for the +psychology is the same, though the operations differ." And looking her +straight in the eye, thinking the story of the child had softened her, +he hazarded all on a cast, "Ah! if your husband would give me the +information he has about Canon Docre!" + +She stood motionless, but her eyes clouded over. She did not answer. + +"True," he said, "Chantelouve, suspecting our liaison--" + +She interrupted him. "My husband has no concern with the relations which +may exist between you and me. He evidently suffers when I go out, as +tonight, for he knows where I am going; but I admit no right of control +either on his part or mine. He is free, and I am free, to go wherever we +please. I must keep house for him, watch out for his interests, take +care of him, love him like a devoted companion, and that I do, with all +my heart. As to being responsible for my acts, they're none of his +business, no more his than anybody else's." + +She spoke in a crisp, incisive tone. + +"The devil;" said Durtal. "You certainly reduce the importance of the +role of husband." + +"I know that my ideas are not the ideas of the world I live in, and they +appear not to be yours. In my first marriage they were a source of +trouble and disaster--but I have an iron will and I bend the people who +love me. In addition, I despise deceit, so when a few years after +marriage I became smitten on a man I quite frankly told my husband and +confessed my fault." + +"Dare I ask you in what spirit he received this confidence?" + +"He was so grieved that in one night his hair turned white. He could not +bear what he called--wrongly, I think--my treason, and he killed +himself." + +"Ah!" said Durtal, dumbfounded by the placid and resolute air of this +woman, "but suppose he had strangled you first?" + +She shrugged her shoulders and picked a cat hair off her skirt. + +"The result," he resumed after a silence, "being that you are now almost +free, that your second husband tolerates--" + +"Let us not discuss my second husband. He is an excellent man who +deserves a better wife. I have absolutely no reason to speak of +Chantelouve otherwise than with praise, and then--oh, let's talk of +something else, for I have had sufficient botheration on this subject +from my confessor, who interdicts me from the Holy Table." + +He contemplated her, and saw yet another Hyacinthe, a hard, pertinacious +woman whom he had not known. Not a sign nor an accent of emotion, +nothing, while she was describing the suicide of her first husband--she +did not even seem to imagine that she had a crime on her conscience. She +remained pitiless, and yet, a moment ago, when she was commiserating him +because of his fictitious parenthood, he had thought she was trembling. +"After all, perhaps she is acting a part--like myself." + +He remained awed by the turn the conversation had taken. He sought, +mentally, a way of getting back to the subject from which Hyacinthe had +diverted him, of the Satanism of Canon Docre. + +"Well, let us think of that no more," she said, coming very near. She +smiled, and was once more the Hyacinthe he knew. + +"But if on my account you can no longer take communion--" + +She interrupted him. "Would you be sorry if I did not love you?" and she +kissed his eyes. He squeezed her politely in his arms, but he felt her +trembling, and from motives of prudence he got away. + +"Is he so inexorable, your confessor?" + +"He is an incorruptible man, of the old school. I chose him expressly." + +"If I were a woman it seems to me I should take, on the contrary, a +confessor who was pliable and caressible and who would not violently +pillory my dainty little sins. I would have him indulgent, oiling the +hinges of confession, enticing forth with beguiling gestures the +misdeeds that hung back. It is true there would be risk of seducing a +confessor who perhaps would be defenceless--" + +"And that would be incest, because the priest is a spiritual father, and +it would also be sacrilege, because the priest is consecrated.--Oh," +speaking to herself, "I was mad, mad--" suddenly carried away. + +He observed her; sparks glinted in the myopic eyes of this extraordinary +woman. Evidently he had just stumbled, unwittingly, onto a guilty secret +of hers. + +"Well," and he smiled, "do you still commit infidelities to me with a +false me?" + +"I do not understand." + +"Do you receive, at night, the visit of the incubus which resembles +me?" + +"No. Since I have been able to possess you in the flesh I have no need +to evoke your image." + +"What a downright Satanist you are!" + +"Maybe. I have been so constantly associated with priests." + +"You're a great one," he said, bowing. "Now listen to me, and do me a +great favour. You know Canon Docre?" + +"I should say!" + +"Well, what in the world is this man, about whom I hear so much?" + +"From whom?" + +"Gevingey and Des Hermies." + +"Ah, you consult the astrologer! Yes, he met the Canon in my own house, +but I didn't know that Docre was acquainted with Des Hermies, who didn't +attend our receptions in those days" + +"Des Hermies has never seen Docre. He knows him, as I do, only by +hearsay, from Gevingey. Now, briefly, how much truth is there in the +stories of the sacrileges of which this priest is accused?" + +"I don't know. Docre is a gentleman, learned and well bred. He was even +the confessor of royalty, and he would certainly have become a bishop if +he had not quitted the priesthood. I have heard a great deal of evil +spoken about him, but, especially in the clerical world, people are so +fond of saying all sorts of things." + +"But you knew him personally." + +"Yes, I even had him for a confessor." + +"Then it isn't possible that you don't know what to make of him?" + +"Very possible, indeed presumable. Look here, you have been beating +around the bush a long time. Exactly what do you want to know?" + +"Everything you care to tell me. Is he young or old, handsome or ugly, +rich or poor?" + +"He is forty years old, very fastidious of his person, and he spends a +lot of money." + +"Do you believe that he indulges in sorcery, that he celebrates the +black mass?" + +"It is quite possible." + +"Pardon me for dunning you, for extorting information from you as if +with forceps--suppose I were to ask you a really personal question--this +faculty of incubacy ...?" + +"Why, certainly I got it from him. I hope you are satisfied." + +"Yes and no. Thanks for your kindness in telling me--I know I am abusing +your good nature--but one more question. Do you know of any way whereby +I may see Canon Docre in person?" + +"He is at Nimes." + +"Pardon me. For the moment, he is in Paris." + +"Ah, you know that! Well, if I knew of a way, I would not tell you, be +sure. It would not be good for you to get to seeing too much of this +priest." + +"You admit, then, that he is dangerous?" + +"I do not admit nor deny. I tell you simply that you have nothing to do +with him." + +"Yes I have. I want to get material for my book from him." + +"Get it from somebody else. Besides," she said, putting on her hat in +front of the glass, "my husband got a bad scare and broke with that man +and refuses to receive him." + +"That is no reason why--" + +"What do you mean?" + +"Oh, nothing." He repressed the remark: "Why you should not see him." + +She did not insist. She was poking her hair under her veil. "Heavens! +what a fright I look!" + +He took her hands and kissed them. "When shall I see you again?" + +"I thought I wasn't to come here any more." + +"Oh, now, you know I love you as a good friend. Tell me, when will you +come again?" + +"Tomorrow night, unless it is inconvenient for you." + +"Not at all." + +"Then, _au revoir_." + +Their lips met. + +"And above all, don't think about Canon Docre," she said, turning and +shaking her finger at him threateningly as she went out. + +"Devil take you and your reticence," he said to himself, closing the +door after her. + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + + +"When I think," said Durtal to himself the next morning, "that in bed, +at the moment when the most pertinacious will succumbs, I held firm and +refused to yield to the instances of Hyacinthe wishing to establish a +footing here, and that after the carnal decline, at that instant when +annihilated man recovers--alas!--his reason, I supplicated her, myself, +to continue her visits, why, I simply cannot understand myself. Deep +down, I have not got over my firm resolution of breaking with her, but I +could not dismiss her like a cocotte. And," to justify his +inconsistency, "I hoped to get some information about the canon. Oh, on +that subject I am not through with her. She's got to make up her mind to +speak out and quit answering me by monosyllables and guarded phrases as +she did yesterday. + +"Indeed, what can she have been up to with that abbe who was her +confessor and who, by her own admission, launched her into incubacy? She +has been his mistress, that is certain. And how many other of these +priests she has gone around with have been her lovers also? For she +confessed, in a cry, that those are the men she loves. Ah, if one went +about much in the clerical world one would doubtless learn remarkable +things concerning her and her husband. It is strange, all the same that +Chantelouve, who plays a singular role in that household, has acquired a +deplorable reputation, and she hasn't. Never have I heard anybody speak +of her dodges--but, oh, what a fool I am! It isn't strange. Her husband +doesn't confine himself to religious and polite circles. He hobnobs with +men of letters, and in consequence exposes himself to every sort of +slander, while she, if she takes a lover, chooses him out of a pious +society in which not one of us would ever be received. And then, abbes +are discreet. But how explain her infatuation with me? By the simple +fact that she is surfeited of priests and a layman serves as a change of +diet. + +"Just the same, she is quite singular, and the more I see her the less I +understand her. There are in her three distinct beings. + +"First the woman seated or standing up, whom I knew in her drawing-room, +reserved, almost haughty, who becomes a good companion in private, +affectionate and even tender. + +"Then the woman in bed, completely changed in voice and bearing, a +harlot spitting mud, losing all shame. + +"Third and last, the pitiless vixen, the thorough Satanist, whom I +perceived yesterday. + +"What is the binding-alloy that amalgamates all these beings of hers? I +can't say. Hypocrisy, no doubt. No. I don't think so, for she is often +of a disconcerting frankness--in moments, it is true, of forgetfulness +and unguardedness. Seriously, what is the use of trying to understand +the character of this pious harlot? And to be candid with myself, what I +wish ideally will never be realized; she does not ask me to take her to +swell places, does not force me to dine with her, exacts no revenue: she +isn't trying to compromise and blackmail me. I shan't find a +better--but, oh, Lord! I now prefer to find no one at all. It suits me +perfectly to entrust my carnal business to mercenary agents. For my +twenty francs I shall receive more considerate treatment. There is no +getting around it, only professionals know how to cook up a delicious +sensual dish. + +"Odd," he said to himself after a reflective silence, "but, all +proportions duly observed, Gilles de Rais divides himself like her, into +three different persons. + +"First, the brave and honest fighting man. + +"Then the refined and artistic criminal. + +"Finally the repentant sinner, the mystic. + +"He is a mass of contradictions and excesses. Viewing his life as a +whole one finds each of his vices compensated by a contradictory virtue, +but there is no key characteristic which reconciles them. + +"He is of an overweening arrogance, but when contrition takes possession +of him, he falls on his knees in front of the people of low estate, and +has the tears, the humility of a saint. + +"His ferocity passes the limits of the human scale, and yet he is +generous and sincerely devoted to his friends, whom he cares for like a +brother when the Demon has mauled them. + +"Impetuous in his desires, and nevertheless patient; brave in battle, a +coward confronting eternity; he is despotic and violent, yet he is putty +in the hands of his flatterers. He is now in the clouds, now in the +abyss, never on the trodden plain, the lowlands of the soul. His +confessions do not throw any light on his invariable tendency to +extremes. When asked who suggested to him the idea of such crimes, he +answers, 'No one. The thought came to me only from myself, from my +reveries, my daily pleasures, my taste for debauchery.' And he arraigns +his indolence and constantly asserts that delicate repasts and strong +drink have helped uncage the wild animal in him. + +"Unresponsive to mediocre passions, he is carried away alternately by +good as well as evil, and he bounds from spiritual pole to spiritual +pole. He dies at the age of thirty-six, but he has completely exhausted +the possibilities of joy and grief. He has adored death, loved as a +vampire, kissed inimitable expressions of suffering and terror, and has, +himself, been racked by implacable remorse, insatiable fear. He has +nothing more to try, nothing more to learn, here below. + +"Let's see," said Durtal, running over his notes. "I left him at the +moment when the expiation begins. As I had written in one of my +preceding chapters, the inhabitants of the region dominated by the +chateaux of the Marshal know now who the inconceivable monster is who +carries children off and cuts their throats. But no one dare speak. +When, at a turn in the road, the tall figure of the butcher is seen +approaching, all flee, huddle behind the hedges, or shut themselves up +in the cottages. + +"And Gilles passes, haughty and sombre, in the solitude of villages +where no one dares venture abroad. Impunity seems assured him, for what +peasant would be mad enough to attack a master who could have him +gibbeted at a word? + +"Again, if the humble give up the idea of bringing Gilles de Rais to +justice, his peers have no intention of combating him for the benefit of +peasants whom they disdain, and his liege, the duke of Brittany, Jean V, +burdens him with favours and blandishments in order to extort his lands +from him at a low price. + +"A single power can rise and, above feudal complicities, above earthly +interest, avenge the oppressed and the weak. The Church. And it is the +Church in fact, in the person of Jean de Malestroit, which rises up +before the monster and fells him. + +"Jean de Malestroit, Bishop of Nantes, belongs to an illustrious line. +He is a near kinsman of Jean V, and his incomparable piety, his +infallible Christian wisdom, and his enthusiastic charity, make him +venerated, even by the duke. + +"The wailing of Gilles's decimated flock reaches his ears. In silence he +begins an investigation and, setting spies upon the Marshal, waits only +for an opportune moment to begin the combat. And Gilles suddenly commits +an inexplicable crime which permits the Bishop to march forthwith upon +him and smite him. + +"To recuperate his shattered fortune, Gilles has sold his signorie of +Saint Etienne de Mer Morte to a subject of Jean V, Guillaume le Ferron, +who delegates his brother, Jean le Ferron, to take possession of the +domain. + +"Some days later the Marshal gathers the two hundred men of his military +household and at their head marches on Saint Etienne. There, the day of +Pentecost, when the assembled people are hearing mass, he precipitates +himself, sword in hand, into the church, sweeps aside the faithful, +throwing them into tumult, and, before the dumbfounded priest, threatens +to cleave Jean le Ferron, who is praying. The ceremony is broken off, +the congregation take flight. Gilles drags le Ferron, pleading for +mercy, to the chateau, orders that the drawbridge be let down, and by +force occupies the place, while his prisoner is carried away to +Tiffauges and thrown into an underground dungeon. + +"Gilles has, at one and the same time, violated the unwritten law of +Brittany forbidding any baron to raise troops without the consent of the +duke, and committed double sacrilege in profaning a chapel and seizing +Jean le Ferron, who is a tonsured clerk of the Church. + +"The Bishop learns of this outrage and prevails upon the reluctant Jean +V to march against the rebel. Then, while one army advances on Saint +Etienne, which Gilles abandons to take refuge with his little band in +the fortified manor of Machecoul, another army lays siege to Tiffauges. + +"During this time the priest hastens his redoubled investigations. He +delegates commissioners and procurators in all the villages where +children have disappeared. He himself quits his palace at Nantes, +travels about the countryside, and takes the depositions of the bereft. +The people at last speak, and on their knees beseech the Bishop to +protect them. Enraged by the atrocities which they reveal, he swears +that justice shall be done. + +"It takes a month to hear all the reports. By letters-patent Jean de +Malestroit establishes publicly the '_infamatio_' of Gilles, then, when +all the forms of canonic procedure have been gone through with, he +launches the mandate of arrest. + +"In this writ of warrant, given at Nantes the 13th day of September in +the year of Our Lord 1440, the Bishop notes all the crimes imputed to +the Marshal, then, in an energetic style, he commands his diocese to +march against the assassin and dislodge him. 'Thus we do enjoin you, +each and all, individually, by these presents, that ye cite immediately +and peremptorily, without counting any man upon his neighbor, without +discharging the burden any man upon his neighbour, that ye cite before +us or before the Official of our cathedral church, for Monday of the +feast of Exaltation of the Holy Cross, the 19th of September, Gilles, +noble baron de Rais, subject to our puissance and to our jurisdiction; +and we do ourselves cite him by these presents to appear before our bar +to answer for the crimes which weigh upon him. Execute these orders, and +do each of you cause them to be executed.' + +"And the next day the captain-at-arms, Jean Labbe, acting in the name of +the duke, and Robin Guillaumet, notary, acting in the name of the +Bishop, present themselves, escorted by a small troop, before the +chateau of Machecoul. + +"What sudden change of heart does the Marshal now experience? Too feeble +to hold his own in the open field, he can nevertheless defend himself +behind the sheltering ramparts--yet he surrenders. + +"Roger de Bricqueville and Gilles de Sille, his trusted councillors, +have taken flight. He remains alone with Prelati, who also attempts, in +vain, to escape. He, like Gilles, is loaded with chains. Robin +Guillaumet searches the fortress from top to bottom. He discovers bloody +clothes, imperfectly calcinated ashes which Prelati has not had time to +throw into the latrines. Amid universal maledictions and cries of horror +Gilles and his servitors are conducted to Nimes and incarcerated in the +chateau de la Tour Neuve. + +"Now this part is not very clear," said Durtal to himself. "Remembering +what a daredevil the Marshal had been, how can we reconcile ourselves to +the idea that he could give himself up to certain death and torture +without striking a blow? + +"'Was he softened, weakened by his nights of debauchery, terrified by +the audacity of his own sacrileges, ravaged and torn by remorse? Was he +tired of living as he did, and did he give himself up, as so many +murderers do, because he was irresistibly attracted to punishment? +Nobody knows. Did he think himself above the law because of his lofty +rank? Or did he hope to disarm the duke by playing upon his venality, +offering him a ransom of manors and farm land? + +"One answer is as plausible as another. He may also have known how +hesitant Jean V had been, for fear of rousing the wrath of the nobility +of his duchy, about yielding to the objurgations of the Bishop and +raising troops for the pursuit and arrest. + +"Well, there is no document which answers these questions. An author can +take some liberties here and set down his own conjectures. But that +curious trial is going to give me some trouble. + +"As soon as Gilles and his accomplices are incarcerated, two tribunals +are organized, one ecclesiastical to judge the crimes coming under the +jurisdiction of the Church, the other civil to judge those on which the +state must pass. + +"To tell the truth, the civil tribunal, which is present at the +ecclesiastical hearings, effaces itself completely. As a matter of form +it makes a brief cross-examination--but it pronounces the sentence of +death, which the Church cannot permit itself to utter, according to the +old adage, '_Ecclesia abhorret a sanguine_.' + +"The ecclesiastical trial lasts five weeks, the civil, forty-eight +hours. It seems that, to hide behind the robes of the Bishop, the duke +of Brittany has voluntarily subordinated the role of civil justice, +which ordinarily stands up for its rights against the encroachments of +the ecclesiastical court. + +"Jean de Malestroit presides over the hearings. He chooses for +assistants the Bishops of Mans, of Saint Brieuc, and of Saint Lo, then +in addition he surrounds himself with a troop of jurists who work in +relays in the interminable sessions of the trial. Some of the more +important are Guillaume de Montigne, advocate of the secular court; +Jean Blanchet, bachelor of laws; Guillaume Groyguet and Robert de la +Riviere, licentiates _in utroque jure_, and Herve Levi, senescal of +Quimper. Pierre de l'Hospital, chancellor of Brittany, who is to preside +over the civil hearings after the canonic judgment, assists Jean de +Malestroit. + +"The public prosecutor is Guillaume Chapeiron, curate of Saint Nicolas, +an eloquent and subtile man. Adjunct to him, to relieve him of the +fatigue of the readings, are Geoffroy Pipraire, dean of Sainte Marie, +and Jacques de Pentcoetdic, Official of the Church of Nantes. + +"In connection with the episcopal jurisdiction, the Church has called in +the assistance of the extraordinary tribunal of the Inquisition, for the +repression of the crime of heresy, then comprehending perjury, +blasphemy, sacrilege, all the crimes of magic. + +"It sits at the side of Jean de Malestroit in the redoubtable and +learned person of Jean Blouyn of the order of Saint Dominic, delegated +by the Grand Inquisitor of France, Guillaume Merici, to the functions of +Vice Inquisitor of the city and diocese of Nantes. + +"The tribunal constituted, the trial opens the first thing in the +morning, because judges and witnesses, in accordance with the custom of +the times, must proceed fasting to the giving and hearing of evidence. +The testimony of the parents of the victims is heard, and Robin +Guillaumet, acting sergeant-at-arms, the man who arrested the Marshal at +Machecoul, reads the citation bidding Gilles de Rais appear. He is +brought in and declares disdainfully that he does not recognize the +competence of the Tribunal, but, as canonic procedure demands, the +Prosecutor at once 'in order that by this means the correction of +sorcery be not prevented,' petitions for and obtains from the tribunal a +ruling that this objection be quashed as being null in law and +'frivolous.' He begins to read to the accused the counts on which he is +to be tried. Gilles cries out that the Prosecutor is a liar and a +traitor. Then Guillaume Chapeiron extends his hand toward the crucifix, +swears that he is telling the truth, and challenges the Marshal to take +the same oath. But this man, who has recoiled from no sacrilege, is +troubled. He refuses to perjure himself before God, and the session ends +with Gilles still vociferating outrageous denunciations of the +Prosecutor. + +"The preliminaries completed, a few days later, the public hearings +begin. The act of indictment is read aloud to the accused, in front of +an audience who shudder when Chapeiron indefatigably enumerates the +crimes one by one, and formally accuses the Marshal of having practised +sorcery and magic, of having polluted and slain little children, of +having violated the immunities of Holy Church at Saint Etienne de Mer +Morte. + +"Then after a silence he resumes his discourse, and making no account of +the murders, but dwelling only on the crimes of which the punishment, +foreseen by canonic law, can be fixed by the Church, he demands that +Gilles be smitten with double excommunication, first as an evoker of +demons, a heretic, apostate and renegade, second as a sodomist and +perpetrator of sacrilege. + +"Gilles, who has listened to this incisive and scathing indictment, +completely loses control of himself. He insults the judges, calls them +simonists and ribalds, and refuses to answer the questions put to him. +The Prosecutor and advocates are unmoved; they invite him to present his +defence. + +"Again he denounces them, insults them, but when called upon to refute +them he remains silent. + +"The Bishop and Vice Inquisitor declare him in contempt and pronounce +against him the sentence of excommunication, which is soon made public. +They decide in addition that the hearing shall be continued next day--" + +A ring of the doorbell interrupted Durtal's perusal of his notes. Des +Hermies entered. + +"I have just seen Carhaix. He is ill," he said. + +"That so? What seems to be the matter?" + +"Nothing very serious. A slight attack of bronchitis. He'll be up in a +few days if he will consent to keep quiet." + +"I must go see him tomorrow," said Durtal. + +"And what are you doing?" enquired Des Hermies. "Working hard?" + +"Why, yes. I am digging into the trial of the noble baron de Rais. It +will be as tedious to read as to write!" + +"And you don't know yet when you will finish your volume?" + +"No," answered Durtal, stretching. "As a matter of fact I wish it might +never be finished. What will become of me when it is? I'll have to look +around for another subject, and, when I find one, do all the drudgery of +planning and then getting the introductory chapter written--the mean +part of any literary work is getting started. I shall pass mortal hours +doing nothing. Really, when I think it over, literature has only one +excuse for existing; it saves the person who makes it from the +disgustingness of life." + +"And, charitably, it lessens the distress of us few who still love art." + +"Few indeed!" + +"And the number keeps diminishing. The new generation no longer +interests itself in anything except gambling and jockeys." + +"Yes, you're quite right. The men can't spare from gambling the time to +read, so it is only the society women who buy books and pass judgment on +them. It is to The Lady, as Schopenhauer called her, to the little +goose, as I should characterize her, that we are indebted for these +shoals of lukewarm and mucilaginous novels which nowadays get puffed." + +"You think, then, that we are in for a pretty literature. Naturally you +can't please women by enunciating vigorous ideas in a crisp style." + +"But," Durtal went on, after a silence, "it is perhaps best that the +case should be as it is. The rare artists who remain have no business to +be thinking about the public. The artist lives and works far from the +drawing-room, far from the clamour of the little fellows who fix up the +custom-made literature. The only legitimate source of vexation to an +author is to see his work, when printed, exposed to the contaminating +curiosity of the crowd." + +"That is," said Des Hermies, "a veritable prostitution. To advertise a +thing for sale is to accept the degrading familiarities of the first +comer." + +"But our impenitent pride--and also our need of the miserable sous--make +it impossible for us to keep our manuscripts sheltered from the asses. +Art ought to be--like one's beloved--out of reach, out of the world. Art +and prayer are the only decent ejaculations of the soul. So when one of +my books appears, I let go of it with horror. I get as far as possible +from the environment in which it may be supposed to circulate. I care +very little about a book of mine until years afterward, when it has +disappeared from all the shop windows and is out of print. Briefly, I am +in no hurry to finish the history of Gilles de Rais, which, +unfortunately, is getting finished in spite of me. I don't give a damn +how it is received." + +"Are you doing anything this evening?" + +"No. Why?" + +"Shall we dine together?" + +"Certainly." + +And while Durtal was putting on his shoes, Des Hermies remarked, "To me +the striking thing about the so-called literary world of this epoch is +its cheap hypocrisy. What a lot of laziness, for instance, that word +dilettante has served to cover." + +"Yes, it's a great old alibi. But it is confounding to see that the +critic who today decrees himself the title of dilettante accepts it as a +term of praise and does not even suspect that he is slapping himself. +The whole thing can be resolved into syllogism: + +"The dilettante has no personal temperament, since he objects to nothing +and likes everything. + +"Whoever has no personal temperament has no talent." + +"Then," rejoined Des Hermies, putting on his hat, "an author who boasts +of being a dilettante, confesses by that very thing that he is no +author?" + +"Exactly." + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + + +Toward the end of the afternoon Durtal quit work and went up to the +towers of Saint Sulpice. + +He found Carhaix in bed in a chamber connecting with the one in which +they were in the habit of dining. These rooms were very similar, with +their walls or unpapered stone, and with their vaulted ceilings, only, +the bedroom was darker. The window opened its half-wheel not on the +place Saint Sulpice but on the rear of the church, whose roof prevented +any light from getting in. This cell was furnished with an iron bed, +whose springs shrieked, with two cane chairs, and with a table that had +a shabby covering of green baize. On the bare wall was a crucifix of no +value, with a dry palm over it. That was all. Carhaix was sitting up in +bed reading, with books and papers piled all around him. His eyes were +more watery and his face paler than usual. His beard, which had not been +shaved for several days, grew in grey clumps on his hollow cheeks, but +his poor features were radiant with an affectionate, affable smile. + +To Durtal's questions he replied, "It is nothing. Des Hermies gives me +permission to get up tomorrow. But what a frightful medicine!" and he +showed Durtal a potion of which he had to take a teaspoonful every hour. + +"What is it he's making you take?" + +But the bell-ringer did not know. Doubtless to spare him the expense, +Des Hermies himself always brought the bottle. + +"Isn't it tiresome lying in bed?" + +"I should say! I am obliged to entrust my bells to an assistant who is +no good. Ah, if you heard him ring! It makes me shudder, it sets my +teeth on edge." + +"Now you mustn't work yourself up," said his wife. "In two days you will +be able to ring your bells yourself." + +But he went on complaining. "You two don't understand. My bells are used +to being well treated. They're like domestic animals, those instruments, +and they obey only their master. Now they won't harmonize, they jangle. +I can hardly recognize their voices." + +"What are you reading?" asked Durtal, wishing to change a subject which +he judged to be dangerous. + +"Books about bells! Ah, Monsieur Durtal, I have some inscriptions here +of truly rare beauty. Listen," and he opened a worm-bored book, "listen +to this motto printed in raised letters on the bronze robe of the great +bell of Schaffhausen, 'I call the living, I mourn the dead, I break the +thunder.' And this other which figured on an old bell in the belfry of +Ghent, 'My name is Roland. When I toll, there is a fire; when I peal, +there is a tempest in Flanders.'" + +"Yes," Durtal agreed, "there is a certain vigour about that one." + +"Ah," said Carhaix, seeming not to have heard the other's remark, "it's +ridiculous. Now the rich have their names and titles inscribed on the +bells which they give to the churches, but they have so many qualities +and titles that there is no room for a motto. Truly, humility is a +forgotten virtue in our day." + +"If that were the only forgotten virtue!" sighed Durtal. + +"Ah!" replied Carhaix, not to be turned from his favourite subject, "and +if this were the only abuse! But bells now rust from inactivity. The +metal is no longer hammer-hardened and is not vibrant. Formerly these +magnificent auxiliaries of the ritual sang without cease. The canonical +hours were sounded, Matins and Laudes before daybreak, Prime at dawn, +Tierce at nine o'clock, Sexte at noon, Nones at three, and then Vespers +and Compline. Now we announce the curate's mass, ring three angeluses, +morning, noon, and evening, occasionally a Salute, and on certain days +launch a few peals for prescribed ceremonies. And that's all. It's only +in the convents where the bells do not sleep, for these, at least, the +night offices are kept up." + +"You mustn't talk about that," said his wife, straightening the pillows +at his back. "If you keep working yourself up, you will never get well." + +"Quite right," he said, resigned, "but what would you have? I shall +still be a man with a grievance, whom nothing can pacify," and he smiled +at his wife who was bringing him a spoonful of the potion to swallow. + +The doorbell rang. Mme. Carhaix went to answer it and a hilarious and +red-faced priest entered, crying in a great voice, "It's Jacob's ladder, +that stairway! I climbed and climbed and climbed, and I'm all out of +breath," and he sank, puffing, into an armchair. + +"Well, my friend," he said at last, coming into the bedroom, "I learned +from the beadle that you were ill, and I came to see how you were +getting on." + +Durtal examined him. An irrepressible gaiety exuded from this sanguine, +smooth-shaven face, blue from the razor. Carhaix introduced them. They +exchanged a look, of distrust on the priest's side, of coldness on +Durtal's. + +Durtal felt embarrassed and in the way, while the honest pair were +effusively and with excessive humility thanking the abbe for coming up +to see them. It was evident that for this pair, who were not ignorant of +the sacrileges and scandalous self-indulgences of the clergy, an +ecclesiastic was a man elect, a man so superior that as soon as he +arrived nobody else counted. + +Durtal took his leave, and as he went downstairs he thought, "That +jubilant priest sickens me. Indeed, a gay priest, physician, or man of +letters must have an infamous soul, because they are the ones who see +clearly into human misery and console it, or heal it, or depict it. If +after that they can act the clown--they are unspeakable! Though I'll +admit that thoughtless persons deplore the sadness of the novel of +observation and its resemblance to the life it represents. These people +would have it jovial, smart, highly coloured, aiding them, in their base +selfishness, to forget the hag-ridden existences of their brothers. + +"Truly, Carhaix and his wife are peculiar. They bow under the paternal +despotism of the priests--and there are moments when that same despotism +must be no joke--and revere them and adore them. But then these two are +simple believers, with humble, unsmirched souls. I don't know the priest +who was there, but he is rotund and rubicund, he shakes in his fat and +seems bursting with joy. Despite the example of Saint Francis of Assisi, +who was gay--spoiling him for me--I have difficulty in persuading myself +that this abbe is an elevated being. It's all right to say that the best +thing for him is to be mediocre; to ask how, if he were otherwise, he +would make his flock understand him; and add that if he really had +superior gifts he would be hated by his colleagues and persecuted by his +bishop." + +While conversing thus disjointedly with himself Durtal had reached the +base of the tower. He stopped under the porch. "I intended to stay +longer up there," thought he. "It's only half-past five. I must kill at +least half an hour before dinner." + +The weather was almost mild. The clouds had been swept away. He lighted +a cigarette and strolled about the square, musing. Looking up he hunted +for the bell-ringer's window and recognized it. Of the windows which +opened over the portico it alone had a curtain. + +"What an abominable construction," he thought, contemplating the church. +"Think. That cube flanked by two towers presumes to invite comparison +with the facade of Notre Dame. What a jumble," he continued, examining +the details. "From the foundation to the first story are Ionic columns +with volutes, then from the base of the tower to the summit are +Corinthian columns with acanthus leaves. What significance can this +salmagundi of pagan orders have on a Christian church? And as a rebuke +to the over-ornamented bell tower there stands the other tower +unfinished, looking like an abandoned grain elevator, but the less +hideous of the two, at that. + +"And it took five or six architects to erect this indigent heap of +stones. Yet Servandoni and Oppenord and their ilk were the real major +prophets, the ... zekiels of building. Their work is the work of seers +looking beyond the eighteenth century to the day of transportation by +steam. For Saint Sulpice is not a church, it's a railway station! + +"And the interior of the edifice is not more religious nor artistic than +the exterior. The only thing in it that pleases me is good Carhaix's +aerial cave." Then he looked about him. "This square is very ugly, but +how provincial and homelike it is! Surely nothing could equal the +hideousness of that seminary, which exhales the rancid, frozen odour of +a hospital. The fountain with its polygonal basins, its saucepan urns, +its lion-headed spouts, its niches with prelates in them, is no +masterpiece. Neither is the city hall, whose administrative style is a +cinder in the eye. But on this square, as in the neighbouring streets, +Servandoni, Garanciere, and Ferrou, one respires an atmosphere +compounded of benign silence and mild humidity. You think of a +clothes-press that hasn't been open for years, and, somehow, of incense. +This square is in perfect harmony with the houses in the decayed streets +around here, with the shops where religious paraphernalia are sold, the +image and ciborium factories, the Catholic bookstores with books whose +covers are the colour of apple seeds, macadam, nutmeg, bluing. + +"Yes, it's dilapidated and quiet." + +The square was then almost deserted. A few women were going up the +church steps, met by mendicants who murmured paternosters as they +rattled their tin cups. An ecclesiastic, carrying under his arm a book +bound in black cloth, saluted white-eyed women. A few dogs were running +about. Children were chasing each other or jumping rope. The enormous +chocolate-coloured la Villette omnibus and the little honey-yellow bus +of the Auteuil line went past, almost empty. Hackmen were standing +beside their hacks on the sidewalk, or in a group around a comfort +station, talking. There were no crowds, no noise, and the great trees +gave the square the appearance of the silent mall of a little town. + +"Well," said Durtal, considering the church again, "I really must go up +to the top of the tower some clear day." Then he shook his head. "What +for? A bird's-eye view of Paris would have been interesting in the +Middle Ages, but now! I should see, as from a hill top, other heights, a +network of grey streets, the whiter arteries of the boulevards, the +green plaques of gardens and squares, and, away in the distance, files +of houses like lines of dominoes stood up on end, the black dots being +windows. + +"And then the edifices emerging from this jumble of roofs, Notre Dame, +la Sainte Chapelle, Saint Severin, Saint Etienne du Mont, the Tour Saint +Jacques, are put out of countenance by the deplorable mass of newer +edifices. And I am not at all eager to contemplate that specimen of the +art of the maker of toilet articles which l'Opera is, nor that bridge +arch, l'arc de la Triomphe, nor that hollow chandelier, the Tour Eiffel! +It's enough to see them separately, from the ground, as you turn a +street corner. Well, I must go and dine, for I have an engagement with +Hyacinthe and I must be back before eight." + +He went to a neighbouring wine shop where the dining-room, depopulated +at six o'clock, permitted one to ruminate in tranquillity, while eating +fairly sanitary food and drinking not too dangerously coloured wines. He +was thinking of Mme. Chantelouve, but more of Docre. The mystery of this +priest haunted him. What could be going on in the soul of a man who had +had the figure of Christ tattooed on his heels the better to trample +Him? + +What hate the act revealed! Did Docre hate God for not having given him +the blessed ecstasies of a saint, or more humanly for not having raised +him to the highest ecclesiastical dignities? Evidently the spite of this +priest was inordinate and his pride unlimited. He seemed not displeased +to be an object of terror and loathing, for thus he was somebody. Then, +for a thorough-paced scoundrel, as this man seemed to be, what delight +to make his enemies languish in slow torment by casting spells on them +with perfect impunity. + +"And sacrilege carries one out of oneself in furious transports, in +voluptuous delirium, which nothing can equal. Since the Middle Ages it +has been the coward's crime, for human justice does not prosecute it, +and one can commit it with impunity, but it is the most extreme of +excesses for a believer, and Docre believes in Christ, or he wouldn't +hate Him so. + +"A monster! And what ignoble relations he must have had with +Chantelouve's wife! Now, how shall I make her speak up? She gave me +quite clearly to understand, the other day, that she refused to explain +herself on this topic. Meanwhile, as I have not intention of submitting +to her young girl follies tonight, I will tell her that I am not feeling +well, and that absolute rest and quiet are necessary." + +He did so, an hour later when she came in. + +She proposed a cup of tea, and when he refused, she embraced him and +nursed him like a baby. Then withdrawing a little, "You work too hard. +You need some relaxation. Come now, to pass the time you might court me +a little, because up to now I have done it all. No? That idea does not +amuse him. Let us try something else. Shall we play hide-and-seek with +the cat? He shrugs his shoulders. Well, since there is nothing to change +your grouchy expression, let us talk. What has become of your friend Des +Hermies?" + +"Nothing in particular." + +"And his experiments with Mattei medicine?" + +"I don't know whether he continues to prosecute them or not." + +"Well, I see that the conversational possibilities of that topic are +exhausted. You know your replies are not very encouraging, dear." + +"But," he said, "everybody sometimes gets so he doesn't answer questions +at great length. I even know a young woman who becomes excessively +laconic when interrogated on a certain subject." + +"Of a canon, for instance." + +"Precisely." + +She crossed her legs, very coolly. "That young woman undoubtedly had +reasons for keeping still. But perhaps that young woman is really eager +to oblige the person who cross-examines her; perhaps, since she last saw +him, she has gone to a great deal of trouble to satisfy his curiosity." + +"Look here, Hyacinthe darling, explain yourself," he said, squeezing her +hands, an expression of joy on his face. + +"If I have made your mouth water so as not to have a grouchy face in +front of my eyes, I have succeeded remarkably." + +He kept still, wondering whether she was making fun of him or whether +she really was ready to tell him what he wanted to know. + +"Listen," she said. "I hold firmly by my decision of the other night. I +will not permit you to become acquainted with Canon Docre. But at a +settled time I can arrange, without your forming any relations with him, +to have you be present at the ceremony you most desire to know about." + +"The Black Mass?" + +"Yes. Within a week Docre will have left Paris. If once, in my company, +you see him, you will never see him afterward. Keep your evenings free +all this week. When the time comes I will notify you. But you may thank +me, dear, because to be useful to you I am disobeying the commands of my +confessor, whom I dare not see now, so I am damning myself." + +He kissed her, then, "Seriously, that man is really a monster?" + +"I fear so. In any case I would not wish anybody the misfortune of +having him for an enemy." + +"I should say not, if he poisons people by magic, as he seems to have +done Gevingey." + +"And he probably has. I should not like to be in the astrologer's +shoes." + +"You believe in Docre's potency, then. Tell me, how does he operate, +with the blood of mice, with broths, or with oil?" + +"So you know about that! He does employ these substances. In fact, he is +one of the very few persons who know how to manage them without +poisoning themselves. It's as dangerous as working with explosives. +Frequently, though, when attacking defenceless persons, he uses simpler +recipes. He distils extracts of poison and adds sulphuric acid to fester +the wound, then he dips in this compound the point of a lancet with +which he has his victim pricked by a flying spirit or a larva. It is +ordinary, well-known magic, that of Rosicrucians and tyros." + +Durtal burst out laughing. "But, my dear, to hear you, one would think +death could be sent to a distance like a letter." + +"Well, isn't cholera transmitted by letters? Ask the sanitary corps. +Don't they disinfect all mail in the time of epidemics?" + +"I don't contradict that, but the case is not the same." + +"It is too, because it is the question of transmission, invisibility, +distance, which astonishes you." + +"What astonishes me more than that is to hear of the Rosicrucians +actively satanizing. I confess that I had never considered them as +anything more than harmless suckers and funereal fakes." + +"But all societies are composed of suckers and the wily leaders who +exploit them. That's the case of the Rosicrucians. Yes, their leaders +privately attempt crime. One does not need to be erudite or intelligent +to practise the ritual of spells. At any rate, and I affirm this, there +is among them a former man of letters whom I know. He lives with a +married woman, and they pass the time, he and she, trying to kill the +husband by sorcery." + +"Well, it has its advantages over divorce, that system has." + +She pouted. "I shan't say another word. I think you are making fun of +me. You don't believe in anything--" + +"Indeed. I was not laughing at you. I haven't very precise ideas on this +subject. I admit that at first blush all this seems improbable, to say +the least. But when I think that all the efforts of modern science do +but confirm the discoveries of the magic of other days, I keep my mouth +shut. It is true," he went on after a silence,--"to cite only one +fact--that people can no longer laugh at the stories of women being +changed into cats in the Middle Ages. Recently there was brought to M. +Charcot a little girl who suddenly got down on her hands and knees and +ran and jumped around, scratching and spitting and arching her back. So +that metamorphosis is possible. No, one cannot too often repeat it, the +truth is that we know nothing and have no right to deny anything. But to +return to your Rosicrucians. Using purely chemical formulae, they get +along without sacrilege?" + +"That is as much as to say that their venefices--supposing they know how +to prepare them well enough to accomplish their purpose, though I doubt +that--are easy to defeat. Yet I don't mean to say that this group, one +member of which is an ordained priest, does not make use of contaminated +Eucharists at need." + +"Another nice priest! But since you are so well informed, do you know +how spells are conjured away?" + +"Yes and no. I know that when the poisons are sealed by sacrilege, when +the operation is performed by a master, Docre or one of the princes of +magic at Rome, it is not at all easy--nor healthy--to attempt to apply +an antidote. Though I have heard of a certain abbe at Lyons who, +practically alone, is succeeding right now in these difficult cures." + +"Dr. Johannes!" + +"You know him!" + +"No. But Gevingey, who has gone to seek his medical aid, has told me of +him." + +"Well, I don't know how he goes about it, but I know that spells which +are not complicated with sacrilege are usually evaded by the law of +return. The blow is sent back to him who struck it. There are, at the +present time, two churches, one in Belgium, the other in France, where, +when one prays before a statue of the Virgin, the spell which has been +cast on one flies off and goes and strikes one's adversary." + +"Rats!" + +"One of these churches is at Tougres, eighteen kilometres from Liege, +and the name of it is Notre Dame de Retour. The other is the church of +l'Epine, 'the thorn,' a little village near Chalons. This church was +built long ago to conjure away the spells produced with the aid of the +thorns which grew in that country and served to pierce images cut in the +shape of hearts." + +"Near Chalons," said Durtal, digging in his memory, "it does seem to me +now that Des Hermies, speaking of bewitchment by the blood of white +mice, pointed out that village as the habitation of certain diabolic +circles." + +"Yes, that country in all times has been a hotbed of Satanism." + +"You are mighty well up on these matters. Is it Docre who transmitted +this knowledge to you?" + +"Yes, I owe him the little I am able to pass on to you. He took a fancy +to me and even wanted to make me his pupil. I refused, and am glad now I +did, for I am much more wary than I was then of being constantly in a +state of mortal sin." + +"Have you ever attended the Black Mass?" + +"Yes. And I warn you in advance that you will regret having seen such +terrible things. It is a memory that persists and horrifies, +even--especially--when one does not personally take part in the +offices." + +He looked at her. She was pale, and her filmed eyes blinked rapidly. + +"It's your own wish," she continued. "You will have no complaint if the +spectacle terrifies you or wrings your heart." + +He was almost dumbfounded to see how sad she was and with what +difficulty she spoke. + +"Really. This Docre, where did he come from, what did he do formerly, +how did he happen to become a master Satanist?" + +"I don't know very much about him. I know he was a supply priest in +Paris, then confessor of a queen in exile. There were terrible stories +about him, which, thanks to his influential patronage, were hushed up +under the Empire. He was interned at La Trappe, then driven out of the +priesthood, excommunicated by Rome. I learned in addition that he had +several times been accused of poisoning, but had always been acquitted +because the tribunals had never been able to get any evidence. Today he +lives I don't know how, but at ease, and he travels a good deal with a +woman who serves as voyant. To all the world he is a scoundrel, but he +is learned and perverse, and then he is so charming." + +"Oh," he said, "how changed your eyes and voice are! Admit that you are +in love with him." + +"No, not now. But why should I not tell you that we were mad about each +other at one time?" + +"And now?" + +"It is over. I swear it is. We have remained friends and nothing more." + +"But then you often went to see him. What kind of a place did he have? +At least it was curious and heterodoxically arranged?" + +"No, it was quite ordinary, but very comfortable and clean. He had a +chemical laboratory and an immense library. The only curious book he +showed me was an office of the Black Mass on parchment. There were +admirable illuminations, and the binding was made of the tanned skin of +a child who had died unbaptized. Stamped into the cover, in the shape of +a fleuron, was a great host consecrated in a Black Mass." + +"What did the manuscript say?" + +"I did not read it." + +They were silent. Then she took his hands. + +"Now you are yourself again. I knew I should cure you of your bad +humour. Admit that I am awfully good-natured not to have got angry at +you." + +"Got angry? What about?" + +"Because it is not very flattering to a woman to be able to entertain a +man only by telling him about another one." + +"Oh, no, it isn't that way at all," he said, kissing her eyes tenderly. + +"Let me go now," she said, very low, "this enervates me, and I must get +home. It's late." + +She sighed and fled, leaving him amazed and wondering in what weird +activities the life of that woman had been passed. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + + +The day after that on which he had spewed such furious vituperation over +the Tribunal, Gilles de Rais appeared again before his judges. He +presented himself with bowed head and clasped hands. He had once more +jumped from one extreme to the other. A few hours had sufficed to break +the spirit of the energumen, who now declared that he recognized the +authority of the magistrates and begged forgiveness for having insulted +them. + +They affirmed that for the love of Our Lord they forgot his +imprecations, and, at his prayer, the Bishop and the Inquisitor revoked +the sentence of excommunication which they had passed on him the day +before. + +This hearing was, in addition, taken up with the arraignment of Prelati +and his accomplices. Then, authorized by the ecclesiastical text which +says that a confession cannot be regarded as sufficient if it is "dubia, +vaga, generalis illativa, jocosa," the Prosecutor asserted that to +certify the sincerity of his confessions Gilles must be subjected to the +"canonic question," that is, to torture. + +The Marshal besought the Bishop to wait until the next day, and claiming +the right of confessing immediately to such judges as the Tribunal were +pleased to designate, he swore that he would thereafter repeat his +confession before the public and the court. + +Jean de Malestroit granted this request, and the Bishop of Saint Brieuc +and Pierre de l'Hospital were appointed to hear Gilles in his cell. When +he had finished the recital of his debauches and murders they ordered +Prelati to be brought to them. + +At sight of him Gilles burst into tears and when, after the +interrogatory, preparations were made to conduct the Italian back to his +dungeon, Gilles embraced him, saying, "Farewell, Francis my friend, we +shall never see each other again in this world. I pray God to give you +good patience and I hope in Him that we may meet again in great joy in +Paradise. Pray God for me and I shall pray for you." + +And Gilles was left alone to meditate on his crimes which he was to +confess publicly at the hearing next day. That day was the impressive +day of the trial. The room in which the Tribunal sat was crammed, and +there were multitudes sitting on the stairs, standing in the corridors, +filling the neighbouring courts, blocking the streets and lanes. From +twenty miles around the peasants were come to see the memorable beast +whose very name, before his capture, had served to close the doors those +evenings when in universal trembling the women dared not weep aloud. + +This meeting of the Tribunal was to be conducted with the most minute +observance of all the forms. All the assize judges, who in a long +hearing generally had their places filled by proxies, were present. + +The courtroom, massive, obscure, upheld by heavy Roman pillars, had been +rejuvenated. The wall, ogival, threw to cathedral height the arches of +its vaulted ceiling, which were joined together, like the sides of an +abbatial mitre, in a point. The room was lighted by sickly daylight +which was filtered through small panes between heavy leads. The azure of +the ceiling was darkened to navy blue, and the golden stars, at that +height, were as the heads of steel pins. In the shadows of the vaults +appeared the ermine of the ducal arms, dimly seen in escutcheons which +were like great dice with black dots. + +Suddenly the trumpets blared, the room was lighted up, and the Bishops +entered. Their mitres of cloth of gold flamed like the lightning. About +their necks were brilliant collars with orphreys crusted, as were the +robes, with carbuncles. In silent processional the Bishops advanced, +weighted down by their rigid copes, which fell in a flare from their +shoulders and were like golden bells split in the back. In their hands +they carried the crozier from which hung the maniple, a sort of green +veil. + +At each step they glowed like coals blown upon. Themselves were +sufficient to light the room, as they reanimated with their jewels the +pale sun of a rainy October day and scattered a new lustre to all parts +of the room, over the mute audience. + +Outshone by the shimmer of the orphreys and the stones, the costumes of +the other judges appeared darker and discordant. The black vestments of +secular justice, the white and black robe of Jean Blouyn, the silk +symars, the red woollen mantles, the scarlet chaperons lined with fur, +seemed faded and common. + +The Bishops seated themselves in the front row, surrounding Jean de +Malestroit, who from a raised seat dominated the court. + +Under the escort of the men-at-arms Gilles entered. He was broken and +haggard and had aged twenty years in one night. His eyes burned behind +seared lids. His cheeks shook. Upon injunction he began the recital of +his crimes. + +In a laboured voice, choked by tears, he recounted his abductions of +children, his hideous tactics, his infernal stimulations, his impetuous +murders, his implacable violations. Obsessed by the vision of his +victims, he described their agonies drawn out or hastened, their cries, +the rattle in their throats. He confessed to having wallowed in the +elastic warmth of their intestines. He confessed that he had ripped out +their hearts through wounds enlarged and opening like ripe fruit. And +with the eyes of a somnambulist he looked down at his fingers and shook +them as if blood were dripping from them. + +The thunder-struck audience kept a mournful silence which was lacerated +suddenly by a few short cries, and the attendants, at a run, carried +out fainting women, mad with horror. + +He seemed to see nothing, to hear nothing. He continued to tell off the +frightful rosary of his crimes. Then his voice became raucous. He was +coming to the sepulchral violations, and now to the torture of the +little children whom he had cajoled in order to cut their throats as he +kissed them. + +He divulged every detail. The account was so formidable, so atrocious, +that beneath their golden caps the bishops blanched. These priests, +tempered in the fires of confessional, these judges who in that time of +demonomania and murder had never heard more terrifying confessions, +these prelates whom no depravity had ever astonished, made the sign of +the Cross, and Jean de Malestroit rose and for very shame veiled the +face of the Christ. + +Then all lowered their heads, and without a word they listened. The +Marshal, bathed in sweat, his face downcast, looked now at the crucifix +whose invisible head and bristling crown of thorns gave their shapes to +the veil. + +He finished his narrative and broke down completely. Till now he had +stood erect, speaking as if in a daze, recounting to himself, aloud, the +memory of his ineradicable crimes. But at the end of the story his +forces abandoned him. He fell on his knees and, shaken by terrific sobs, +he cried, "O God, O my Redeemer, I beseech mercy and pardon!" Then the +ferocious and haughty baron, the first of his caste no doubt, humiliated +himself. He turned toward the people and said, weeping, "Ye, the parents +of those whom I have so cruelly put to death, give, ah give me, the +succour of your pious prayers!" + +Then in its white splendour the soul of the Middle Ages burst forth +radiant. + +Jean de Malestroit left his seat and raised the accused, who was beating +the flagstones with his despairing forehead. The judge in de Malestroit +disappeared, the priest alone remained. He embraced the sinner who was +repenting and lamenting his fault. + +A shudder overran the audience when Jean de Malestroit, with Gilles's +head on his breast, said to him, "Pray that the just and rightful wrath +of the Most High be averted, weep that your tears may wash out the blood +lust from your being!" + +And with one accord everybody in the room knelt down and prayed for the +assassin. When the orisons were hushed there was an instant of wild +terror and commotion. Driven beyond human limits of horror and pity, the +crowd tossed and surged. The judges of the Tribunal, silent, enervated, +reconquered themselves. + +With a gesture, brushing away his tears, the Prosecutor arrested the +proceedings. He said that the crimes were "clear and apparent," that the +proofs were manifest, that the court would now "in its conscience and +soul" chastise the culprit, and he demanded that the day of passing +judgment be fixed. The Tribunal designated the day after the next. + +And that day the Official of the church of Nantes, Jacques de +Pentcoetdic, read in succession the two sentences. The first, passed by +the Bishop and the Inquisitor for the acts coming under their common +jurisdiction, began thus: + +"The Holy Name of Christ invoked, we, Jean, Bishop of Nantes, and +Brother Jean Blouyn, bachelor in our Holy Scriptures, of the order of +the preaching friars of Nantes, and delegate of the Inquisitor of +heresies for the city and diocese of Nantes, in session of the Tribunal +and having before our eyes God alone--" + +And after enumerating the crimes it concluded: + +"We pronounce, decide, and declare, that thou, Gilles de Rais, cited +unto our Tribunal, art heinously guilty of heresy, apostasy, and +evocation of demons; that for these crimes thou hast incurred the +sentence of excommunication and all other penalties determined by the +law." + +The second judgment, rendered by the Bishop alone, on the crimes of +sodomy, sacrilege, and violation of the immunities of the Church, which +more particularly concerned his authority, ended in the same +conclusions and in the pronunciation, in almost identical form, of the +same penalty. + +Gilles listened with bowed head to the reading of these judgments. When +it was over the Bishop and the Inquisitor said to him, "Will you, now +that you detest your errors, your evocations, and your crimes, be +reincorporated into the Church our Mother?" + +And upon the ardent prayers of the Marshal they relieved him of all +excommunication and admitted him to participate in the sacraments. The +justice of God was satisfied, the crime was recognized, punished, but +effaced by contrition and penitence. Only human justice remained. + +The Bishop and the Inquisitor remanded the culprit to the secular court, +which, holding against him the abductions and the murders, pronounced +the penalty of death and attainder. Prelati and the other accomplices +were at the same time condemned to be hanged and burned alive. + +"Cry to God mercy," said Pierre de l'Hospital, who presided over the +civil hearings, "and dispose yourself to die in good state with a great +repentance for having committed such crimes." + +The recommendation was unnecessary. Gilles now faced death without fear. +He hoped, humbly, avidly, in the mercy of the Saviour. He cried out +fervently for the terrestrial expiation, the stake, to redeem him from +the eternal flames after his death. + +Far from his chateaux, in his dungeon, alone, he had opened himself and +viewed the cloaca which had so long been fed by the residual waters +escaped from the abattoirs of Tiffauges and Machecoul. He had sobbed in +despair of ever draining this stagnant pool. And thunder-smitten by +grace, in a cry of horror and joy, he had suddenly seen his soul +overflow and sweep away the dank fen before a torrential current of +prayer and ecstasy. The butcher of Sodom had destroyed himself, the +companion of Jeanne d'Arc had reappeared, the mystic whose soul poured +out to God, in bursts of adoration, in floods of tears. + +Then he thought of his friends and wished that they also might die in a +state of grace. He asked the Bishop of Nantes that they might be +executed not before nor after him, but at the same time. He carried his +point that he was the most guilty and that he must instruct them in +saving their souls and assist them at the moment when they should mount +the scaffold. Jean de Malestroit granted the supplication. + +"What is curious," said Durtal, interrupting his writing to light a +cigarette, "is that--" + +A gentle ring. Mme. Chantelouve entered. + +She declared that she could stay only two minutes. She had a carriage +waiting below. "Tonight," she said, "I will call for you at nine. First +write me a letter in practically these terms," and she handed him a +paper. He unfolded it and read this declaration: + + "I certify that all that I have said and written about the Black + Mass, about the priest who celebrated it, about the place where + I claimed to have witnessed it, about the persons alleged to + have been there, is pure invention. I affirm that I imagined all + these incidents, that, in consequence, all that I have narrated + is false." + +"Docre's?" he asked, studying the handwriting, minute, pointed, twisted, +aggressive. + +"Yes, and he wants this declaration, not dated, to be made in the form +of a letter from you to a person consulting you on the subject." + +"Your canon distrusts me." + +"Of course. You write books." + +"It doesn't please me infinitely to sign that," murmured Durtal. "What +if I refuse?" + +"You will not go to the Black Mass." + +His curiosity overcame his reluctance. He wrote and signed the letter +and Mme. Chantelouve put it in her card-case. + +"And in what street is the ceremony to take place?" + +"In the rue Olivier de Serres." + +"Where is that?" + +"Near the rue de Vaugirard, away up." + +"Is that where Docre lives?" + +"No, we are going to a private house which belongs to a lady he knows. +Now, if you'll be so good, put off your cross-examination to some other +time, because I am in an awful hurry. At nine o'clock. Don't forget. Be +all ready." + +He had hardly time to kiss her and she was gone. + +"Well," said he, "I already had data on incubacy and poisoning by +spells. There remained only the Black Mass, to make me thoroughly +acquainted with Satanism as it is practised in our day. And I am to see +it! I'll be damned if I thought there were such undercurrents in Paris. +And how circumstances hang together and lead to each other! I had to +occupy myself with Gilles de Rais and the diabolism of the Middle Ages +to get contemporary diabolism revealed to me." And he thought of Docre +again. "What a sharper that priest is! Among the occultists who maunder +today in the universal decomposition of ideas he is the only one who +interests me. + +"The others, the mages, the theosophists, the cabalists, the spiritists, +the hermetics, the Rosicrucians, remind me, when they are not mere +thieves, of children playing and scuffling in a cellar. And if one +descend lower yet, into the hole-in-the-wall places of the pythonesses, +clairvoyants, and mediums, what does one find except agencies of +prostitution and gambling? All these pretended peddlers of the future +are extremely nasty; that's the only thing in the occult of which one +can be sure." + +Des Hermies interrupted the course of these reflections by ringing and +walking in. He came to announce that Gevingey had returned and that they +were all to dine at Carhaix's the night after next. + +"Is Carhaix's bronchitis cured?" + +"Yes, completely." + +Preoccupied with the idea of the Black Mass, Durtal could not keep +silent. He let out the fact that he was to witness the ceremony--and, +confronted by Des Hermies's stare of stupefaction, he added that he had +promised secrecy and that he could not, for the present, tell him more. + +"You're the lucky one!" said Des Hermies. "Is it too much to ask you the +name of the abbe who is to officiate?" + +"Not at all. Canon Docre." + +"Ah!" and the other was silent. He was evidently trying to divine by +what manipulations his friend had been able to get in touch with the +renegade. + +"Some time ago you told me," Durtal said, "that in the Middle Ages the +Black Mass was said on the naked buttocks of a woman, that in the +seventeenth century it was celebrated on the abdomen, and now?" + +"I believe that it takes place before an altar as in church. Indeed it +was sometimes celebrated thus at the end of the fifteenth century in +Biscay. It is true that the Devil then officiated in person. Clothed in +rent and soiled episcopal habits, he gave communion with round pieces of +shoe leather for hosts, saying, 'This is my body.' And he gave these +disgusting wafers to the faithful to eat after they had kissed his left +hand and his breech. I hope that you will not be obliged to render such +base homage to your canon." + +Durtal laughed. "No, I don't think he requires a pretend like that. But +look here, aren't you of the decided opinion that the creatures who so +piously, infamously, follow these offices are a bit mad?" + +"Mad? Why? The cult of the Demon is no more insane than that of God. One +is rotten and the other resplendent, that is all. By your reckoning all +people who worship any god whatever would be demented. No. The +affiliates of Satanism are mystics of a vile order, but they are +mystics. Now, it is highly probable that their exaltations into the +extra-terrestrial of Evil coincide with the rages of their frenzied +senses, for lechery is the wet nurse of Demonism. Medicine classes, +rightly or wrongly, the hunger for ordure in the unknown categories of +neurosis, and well it may, for nobody knows anything about neuroses +except that everybody has them. It is quite certain that in this, more +than in any previous century, the nerves quiver at the least shock. For +instance, recall the newspaper accounts of executions of criminals. We +learn that the executioner goes about his work timidly, that he is on +the point of fainting, that he has nervous prostration when he +decapitates a man. Then compare this nervous wreck with the invincible +torturers of the olden time. They would thrust your arm into a sleeve of +moistened parchment which when set on fire would draw up and in a +leisurely fashion reduce your flesh to dust. Or they would drive wedges +into your thighs and split the bones. They would crush your thumbs in +the thumbscrew. Or they would singe all the hair off your epidermis with +a poker, or roll up the skin from your abdomen and leave you with a kind +of apron. They would drag you at the cart's tail, give you the +strappado, roast you, drench you with ignited alcohol, and through it +all preserve an impassive countenance and tranquil nerves not to be +shaken by any cry or plaint. Only, as these exercises were somewhat +fatiguing, the torturers, after the operation, were ravenously hungry +and required a deal of drink. They were sanguinaries of a mental +stability not to be shaken, while now! But to return to your companions +in sacrilege. This evening, if they are not maniacs, you will find +them--doubt it not--repulsive lechers. Observe them closely. I am sure +that to them the invocation of Beelzebub is a prelibation of carnality. +Don't be afraid, because, Lord! in this group there won't be any to make +you imitate the martyr of whom Jacques de Voragine speaks in his history +of Saint Paul the Eremite. You know that legend?" + +"No." + +"Well, to refresh your soul I will tell you. This martyr, who was very +young, was stretched out, his hands and feet bound, on a bed, then a +superb specimen of femininity was brought in, who tried to force him. As +he was burning and was about to sin, he bit off his tongue and spat it +in the face of the woman, "and thus pain drove out temptation," says the +good de Voragine." + +"My heroism would not carry me so far as that, I confess. But must you +go so soon?" + +"Yes, I have a pressing engagement." + +"What a queer age," said Durtal, conducting him to the door. "It is just +at the moment when positivism is at its zenith that mysticism rises +again and the follies of the occult begin." + +"Oh, but it's always been that way. The tail ends of all centuries are +alike. They're always periods of vacillation and uncertainty. When +materialism is rotten-ripe magic takes root. This phenomenon reappears +every hundred years. Not to go further back, look at the decline of the +last century. Alongside of the rationalists and atheists you find +Saint-Germain, Cagliostro, Saint-Martin, Gabalis, Cazotte, the +Rosicrucian societies, the infernal circles, as now. With that, good-bye +and good luck." + +"Yes," said Durtal, closing the door, "but Cagliostro and his ilk had a +certain audacity, and perhaps a little knowledge, while the mages of our +time--what inept fakes!" + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + + +In a fiacre they went up the rue de Vaugirard. Mme. Chantelouve was as +in a shell and spoke not a word. Durtal looked closely at her when, as +they passed a street lamp, a shaft of light played over her veil a +moment, then winked out. She seemed agitated and nervous beneath her +reserve. He took her hand. She did not withdraw it. He could feel the +chill of it through her glove, and her blonde hair tonight seemed +disordered, dry, and not so fine as usual. + +"Nearly there?" + +But in a low voice full of anguish she said, "Do not speak." + +Bored by this taciturn, almost hostile tete-a-tete, he began to examine +the route through the windows of the cab. The street stretched out +interminable, already deserted, so badly paved that at every step the +cab springs creaked. The lamp-posts were beginning to be further and +further apart. The cab was approaching the ramparts. + +"Singular itinerary," he murmured, troubled by the woman's cold, +inscrutable reserve. + +Abruptly the vehicle turned up a dark street, swung around, and stopped. + +Hyacinthe got out. Waiting for the cabman to give him his change, Durtal +inspected the lay of the land. They were in a sort of blind alley. Low +houses, in which there was not a sign of life, bordered a lane that had +no sidewalk. The pavement was like billows. Turning around, when the cab +drove away, he found himself confronted by a long high wall above which +dry leaves rustled in the shadows. A little door with a square grating +in it was cut into the thick unlighted wall, which was seamed with +fissures. Suddenly, further away, a ray of light shot out of a show +window, and, doubtless attracted by the sound of the cab wheels, a man +wearing the black apron of a wineshop keeper lounged through the shop +door and spat on the threshold. + +"This is the place," said Mme. Chantelouve. + +She rang. The grating opened. She raised her veil. A shaft of lantern +light struck her full in the face, the door opened noiselessly, and they +penetrated into a garden. + +"Good evening, madame." + +"Good evening, Marie. In the chapel?" + +"Yes. Does madame wish me to guide her?" + +"No, thanks." + +The woman with the lantern scrutinized Durtal. He perceived, beneath a +hood, wisps of grey hair falling in disorder over a wrinkled old face, +but she did not give him time to examine her and returned to a tent +beside the wall serving her as a lodge. + +He followed Hyacinthe, who traversed the dark lanes, between rows of +palms, to the entrance of a building. She opened the doors as if she +were quite at home, and her heels clicked resolutely on the flagstones. + +"Be careful," she said, going through a vestibule. "There are three +steps." + +They came out into a court and stopped before an old house. She rang. A +little man advanced, hiding his features, and greeted her in an +affected, sing-song voice. She passed, saluting him, and Durtal brushed +a fly-blown face, the eyes liquid, gummy, the cheeks plastered with +cosmetics, the lips painted. + +"I have stumbled into a lair of sodomists.--You didn't tell me that I +was to be thrown into such company," he said to Hyacinthe, overtaking +her at the turning of a corridor lighted by a lamp. + +"Did you expect to meet saints here?" + +She shrugged her shoulders and opened a door. They were in a chapel +with a low ceiling crossed by beams gaudily painted with coal-tar +pigment. The windows were hidden by great curtains. The walls were +cracked and dingy. Durtal recoiled after a few steps. Gusts of humid, +mouldy air and of that indescribable new-stove acridity poured out of +the registers to mingle with an irritating odour of alkali, resin, and +burnt herbs. He was choking, his temples throbbing. + +He advanced groping, attempting to accustom his eyes to the +half-darkness. The chapel was vaguely lighted by sanctuary lamps +suspended from chandeliers of gilded bronze with pink glass pendants. +Hyacinthe made him a sign to sit down, then she went over to a group of +people sitting on divans in a dark corner. Rather vexed at being left +here, away from the centre of activity, Durtal noticed that there were +many women and few men present, but his efforts to discover their +features were unavailing. As here and there a lamp swayed, he +occasionally caught sight of a Junonian brunette, then of a +smooth-shaven, melancholy man. He observed that the women were not +chattering to each other. Their conversation seemed awed and grave. Not +a laugh, not a raised voice, was heard, but an irresolute, furtive +whispering, unaccompanied by gesture. + +"Hmm," he said to himself. "It doesn't look as if Satan made his +faithful happy." + +A choir boy, clad in red, advanced to the end of the chapel and lighted +a stand of candles. Then the altar became visible. It was an ordinary +church altar on a tabernacle above which stood an infamous, derisive +Christ. The head had been raised and the neck lengthened, and wrinkles, +painted in the cheeks, transformed the grieving face to a bestial one +twisted into a mean laugh. He was naked, and where the loincloth should +have been, there was a virile member projecting from a bush of +horsehair. In front of the tabernacle the chalice, covered with a pall, +was placed. The choir boy folded the altar cloth, wiggled his haunches, +stood tiptoe on one foot and flipped his arms as if to fly away like a +cherub, on pretext of reaching up to light the black tapers whose odour +of coal tar and pitch was now added to the pestilential smell of the +stuffy room. + +Durtal recognized beneath the red robe the "fairy" who had guarded the +chapel entrance, and he understood the role reserved for this man, whose +sacrilegious nastiness was substituted for the purity of childhood +acceptable to the Church. + +Then another choir boy, more hideous yet, exhibited himself. Hollow +chested, racked by coughs, withered, made up with white grease paint and +vivid carmine, he hobbled about humming. He approached the tripods +flanking the altar, stirred the smouldering incense pots and threw in +leaves and chunks of resin. + +Durtal was beginning to feel uncomfortable when Hyacinthe rejoined him. +She excused herself for having left him by himself so long, invited him +to change his place, and conducted him to a seat far in the rear, behind +all the rows of chairs. + +"This is a real chapel, isn't it?" he asked. + +"Yes. This house, this church, the garden that we crossed, are the +remains of an old Ursuline convent. For a long time this chapel was used +to store hay. The house belonged to a livery-stable keeper, who sold it +to that woman," and she pointed out a stout brunette of whom Durtal +before had caught a fleeting glimpse. + +"Is she married?" + +"No. She is a former nun who was debauched long ago by Docre." + +"Ah. And those gentlemen who seem to be hiding in the darkest places?" + +"They are Satanists. There is one of them who was a professor in the +School of Medicine. In his home he has an oratorium where he prays to a +statue of Venus Astarte mounted on an altar." + +"No!" + +"I mean it. He is getting old, and his demoniac orisons increase tenfold +his forces, which he is using up with creatures of that sort," and with +a gesture she indicated the choir boys. + +"You guarantee the truth of this story?" + +"You will find it narrated at great length in a religious journal. _Les +annales de la saintete_. And though his identity was made pretty patent +in the article, the man did not dare prosecute the editors.--What's the +matter with you?" she asked, looking at him closely. + +"I'm strangling. The odour from those incense burners is unbearable." + +"You will get used to it in a few seconds." + +"But what do they burn that smells like that?" + +"Asphalt from the street, leaves of henbane, datura, dried nightshade, +and myrrh. These are perfumes delightful to Satan, our master." She +spoke in that changed, guttural voice which had been hers at times when +in bed with him. He looked her squarely in the face. She was pale, the +lips pressed tight, the pluvious eyes blinking rapidly. + +"Here he comes!" she murmured suddenly, while women in front of them +scurried about or knelt in front of the chairs. + +Preceded by the two choir boys the canon entered, wearing a scarlet +bonnet from which two buffalo horns of red cloth protruded. Durtal +examined him as he marched toward the altar. He was tall, but not well +built, his bulging chest being out of proportion to the rest of his +body. His peeled forehead made one continuous line with his straight +nose. The lips and cheeks bristled with that kind of hard, clumpy beard +which old priests have who have always shaved themselves. The features +were round and insinuating, the eyes, like apple pips, close together, +phosphorescent. As a whole his face was evil and sly, but energetic, and +the hard, fixed eyes were not the furtive, shifty orbs that Durtal had +imagined. + +The canon solemnly knelt before the altar, then mounted the steps and +began to say mass. Durtal saw then that he had nothing on beneath his +sacrificial habit. His black socks and his flesh bulging over the +garters, attached high up on his legs, were plainly visible. The +chasuble had the shape of an ordinary chasuble but was of the dark red +colour of dried blood, and in the middle, in a triangle around which was +an embroidered border of colchicum, savin, sorrel, and spurge, was the +figure of a black billy-goat presenting his horns. + +Docre made the genuflexions, the full-or half-length inclinations +specified by the ritual. The kneeling choir boys sang the Latin +responses in a crystalline voice which trilled on the ultimate syllables +of the words. + +"But it's a simple low mass," said Durtal to Mme. Chantelouve. + +She shook her head. Indeed, at that moment the choir boys passed behind +the altar and one of them brought back copper chafing-dishes, the other, +censers, which they distributed to the congregation. All the women +enveloped themselves in the smoke. Some held their heads right over the +chafing-dishes and inhaled deeply, then, fainting, unlaced themselves, +heaving raucous sighs. + +The sacrifice ceased. The priest descended the steps backward, knelt on +the last one, and in a sharp, tripidant voice cried: + +"Master of Slanders, Dispenser of the benefits of crime, Administrator +of sumptuous sins and great vices, Satan, thee we adore, reasonable God, +just God! + +"Superadmirable legate of false trances, thou receivest our beseeching +tears; thou savest the honour of families by aborting wombs impregnated +in the forgetfulness of the good orgasm; thou dost suggest to the mother +the hastening of untimely birth, and thine obstetrics spares the +still-born children the anguish of maturity, the contamination of +original sin. + +"Mainstay of the despairing Poor, Cordial of the Vanquished, it is thou +who endowest them with hypocrisy, ingratitude, and stiff-neckedness, +that they may defend themselves against the children of God, the Rich. + +"Suzerain of Resentment, Accountant of Humiliations, Treasurer of old +Hatreds, thou alone dost fertilize the brain of man whom injustice has +crushed; thou breathest into him the idea of meditated vengeance, sure +misdeeds; thou incitest him to murder; thou givest him the abundant joy +of accomplished reprisals and permittest him to taste the intoxicating +draught of the tears of which he is the cause. + +"Hope of Virility, Anguish of the Empty Womb, thou dost not demand the +bootless offering of chaste loins, thou dost not sing the praises of +Lenten follies; thou alone receivest the carnal supplications and +petitions of poor and avaricious families. Thou determinest the mother +to sell her daughter, to give her son; thou aidest sterile and reprobate +loves; Guardian of strident Neuroses, Leaden Tower of Hysteria, bloody +Vase of Rape! + +"Master, thy faithful servants, on their knees, implore thee and +supplicate thee to satisfy them when they wish the torture of all those +who love them and aid them; they supplicate thee to assure them the joy +of delectable misdeeds unknown to justice, spells whose unknown origin +baffles the reason of man; they ask, finally, glory, riches, power, of +thee, King of the Disinherited, Son who art to overthrow the inexorable +Father!" + +Then Docre rose, and erect, with arms outstretched, vociferated in a +ringing voice of hate: + +"And thou, thou whom, in my quality of priest, I force, whether thou +wilt or no, to descend into this host, to incarnate thyself in this +bread, Jesus, Artisan of Hoaxes, Bandit of Homage, Robber of Affection, +hear! Since the day when thou didst issue from the complaisant bowels of +a Virgin, thou hast failed all thine engagements, belied all thy +promises. Centuries have wept, awaiting thee, fugitive God, mute God! +Thou wast to redeem man and thou hast not, thou wast to appear in thy +glory, and thou sleepest. Go, lie, say to the wretch who appeals to +thee, 'Hope, be patient, suffer; the hospital of souls will receive +thee; the angels will assist thee; Heaven opens to thee.' Impostor! thou +knowest well that the angels, disgusted at thine inertness, abandon +thee! Thou wast to be the Interpreter of our plaints, the Chamberlain of +our tears; thou wast to convey them to the Father and thou hast not done +so, for this intercession would disturb thine eternal sleep of happy +satiety. + +"Thou hast forgotten the poverty thou didst preach, enamoured vassal of +Banks! Thou hast seen the weak crushed beneath the press of profit; thou +hast heard the death rattle of the timid, paralyzed by famine, of women +disembowelled for a bit of bread, and thou hast caused the Chancery of +thy Simoniacs, thy commercial representatives, thy Popes, to answer by +dilatory excuses and evasive promises, sacristy Shyster, huckster God! + +"Master, whose inconceivable ferocity engenders life and inflicts it on +the innocent whom thou darest damn--in the name of what original +sin?--whom thou darest punish--by the virtue of what covenants?--we +would have thee confess thine impudent cheats, thine inexpiable crimes! +We would drive deeper the nails into thy hands, press down the crown of +thorns upon thy brow, bring blood and water from the dry wounds of thy +sides. + +"And that we can and will do by violating the quietude of thy body, +Profaner of ample vices, Abstractor of stupid purities, cursed Nazarene, +do-nothing King, coward God!" "Amen!" trilled the soprano voices of the +choir boys. + +Durtal listened in amazement to this torrent of blasphemies and insults. +The foulness of the priest stupefied him. A silence succeeded the +litany. The chapel was foggy with the smoke of the censers. The women, +hitherto taciturn, flustered now, as, remounting the altar, the canon +turned toward them and blessed them with his left hand in a sweeping +gesture. And suddenly the choir boys tinkled the prayer bells. + +It was a signal. The women fell to the carpet and writhed. One of them +seemed to be worked by a spring. She threw herself prone and waved her +legs in the air. Another, suddenly struck by a hideous strabism, +clucked, then becoming tongue-tied stood with her mouth open, the tongue +turned back, the tip cleaving to the palate. Another, inflated, livid, +her pupils dilated, lolled her head back over her shoulders, then jerked +it brusquely erect and belaboured herself, tearing her breast with her +nails. Another, sprawling on her back, undid her skirts, drew forth a +rag, enormous, meteorized; then her face twisted into a horrible +grimace, and her tongue, which she could not control, stuck out, bitten +at the edges, harrowed by red teeth, from a bloody mouth. + +Suddenly Durtal rose, and now he heard and saw Docre distinctly. + +Docre contemplated the Christ surmounting the tabernacle, and with arms +spread wide apart he spewed forth frightful insults, and, at the end of +his forces, muttered the billingsgate of a drunken cabman. One of the +choir boys knelt before him with his back toward the altar. A shudder +ran around the priest's spine. In a solemn but jerky voice he said, +"_Hoc est enim corpus meum_," then, instead of kneeling, after the +consecration, before the precious Body, he faced the congregation, and +appeared tumefied, haggard, dripping with sweat. He staggered between +the two choir boys, who, raising the chasuble, displayed his naked +belly. Docre made a few passes and the host sailed, tainted and soiled, +over the steps. + +Durtal felt himself shudder. A whirlwind of hysteria shook the room. +While the choir boys sprinkled holy water on the pontiff's nakedness, +women rushed upon the Eucharist and, grovelling in front of the altar, +clawed from the bread humid particles and drank and ate divine ordure. + +Another woman, curled up over a crucifix, emitted a rending laugh, then +cried to Docre, "Father, father!" A crone tore her hair, leapt, whirled +around and around as on a pivot and fell over beside a young girl who, +huddled to the wall, was writhing in convulsions, frothing at the mouth, +weeping, and spitting out frightful blasphemies. And Durtal, terrified, +saw through the fog the red horns of Docre, who, seated now, frothing +with rage, was chewing up sacramental wafers, taking them out of his +mouth, wiping himself with them, and distributing them to the women, who +ground them underfoot, howling, or fell over each other struggling to +get hold of them and violate them. + +The place was simply a madhouse, a monstrous pandemonium of prostitutes +and maniacs. Now, while the choir boys gave themselves to the men, and +while the woman who owned the chapel, mounted the altar caught hold of +the phallus of the Christ with one hand and with the other held a +chalice between "His" naked legs, a little girl, who hitherto had not +budged, suddenly bent over forward and howled, howled like a dog. +Overcome with disgust, nearly asphyxiated, Durtal wanted to flee. He +looked for Hyacinthe. She was no longer at his side. He finally caught +sight of her close to the canon and, stepping over the writhing bodies +on the floor, he went to her. With quivering nostrils she was inhaling +the effluvia of the perfumes and of the couples. + +"The sabbatic odour!" she said to him between clenched teeth, in a +strangled voice. + +"Here, let's get out of this!" + +She seemed to wake, hesitated a moment, then without answering she +followed him. He elbowed his way through the crowd, jostling women whose +protruding teeth were ready to bite. He pushed Mme. Chantelouve to the +door, crossed the court, traversed the vestibule, and, finding the +portress' lodge empty, he drew the cord and found himself in the street. + +There he stopped and drew the fresh air deep into his lungs. Hyacinthe, +motionless, dizzy, huddled to the wall away from him. + +He looked at her. "Confess that you would like to go in there again." + +"No," she said with an effort. "These scenes shatter me. I am in a daze. +I must have a glass of water." + +And she went up the street, leaning on him, straight to the wine shop, +which was open. It was an ignoble lair, a little room with tables and +wooden benches, a zinc counter, cheap bar fixtures, and blue-stained +wooden pitchers; in the ceiling a U-shaped gas bracket. Two +pick-and-shovel labourers were playing cards. They turned around and +laughed. The proprietor took the excessively short-stemmed pipe from his +mouth and spat into the sawdust. He seemed not at all surprised to see +this fashionably gowned woman in his dive. Durtal, who was watching him, +thought he surprised an understanding look exchanged by the proprietor +and the woman. + +The proprietor lighted a candle and mumbled into Durtal's ear, +"Monsieur, you can't drink here with these people watching. I'll take +you to a room where you can be alone." + +"Hmmm," said Durtal to Hyacinthe, who was penetrating the mysteries of a +spiral staircase, "A lot of fuss for a glass of water!" + +But she had already entered a musty room. The paper was peeling from the +walls, which were nearly covered with pictures torn out of illustrated +weeklies and tacked up with hairpins. The floor was all in pieces. There +were a wooden bed without any curtains, a chamber pot with a piece +broken out of the side, a wash bowl and two chairs. + +The man brought a decanter of gin, a large one of water, some sugar, and +glasses, then went downstairs. + +Her eyes were sombre, mad. She enlaced Durtal. + +"No!" he shouted, furious at having fallen into this trap. "I've had +enough of that. It's late. Your husband is waiting for you. It's time +for you to go back to him--" + +She did not even hear him. + +"I want you," she said, and she took him treacherously and obliged him +to desire her. She disrobed, threw her skirts on the floor, opened wide +the abominable couch, and raising her chemise in the back she rubbed +her spine up and down over the coarse grain of the sheets. A look of +swooning ecstasy was in her eyes and a smile of joy on her lips. + +She seized him, and, with ghoulish fury, dragged him into obscenities of +whose existence he had never dreamed. Suddenly, when he was able to +escape, he shuddered, for he perceived that the bed was strewn with +fragments of hosts. + +"Oh, you fill me with horror! Dress, and let's get out of here." + +While, with a faraway look in her eyes, she was silently putting on +her clothes, he sat down on a chair. The fetidness of the room +nauseated him. Then, too--he was not absolutely convinced of +Transubstantiation--he did not believe very firmly that the Saviour +resided in that soiled bread--but--In spite of himself, the sacrilege he +had involuntarily participated in saddened him. + +"Suppose it were true," he said to himself, "that the Presence were +real, as Hyacinthe and that miserable priest attest--No, decidedly, I +have had enough. I am through. The occasion is timely for me to break +with this creature whom from our very first interview I have only +tolerated, and I'm going to seize the opportunity." + +Below, in the dive, he had to face the knowing smiles of the labourers. +He paid, and without waiting for his change, he fled. They reached the +rue de Vaugirard and he hailed a cab. + +As they were whirled along they sat lost in their thoughts, not looking +at each other. + +"Soon?" asked Mme. Chantelouve, in an almost timid tone when he left her +at her door. + +"No," he answered. "We have nothing in common. You wish everything and I +wish nothing. Better break. We might drag out our relation, but it would +finally terminate in recrimination and bitterness. Oh, and then--after +what happened this evening, no! Understand me? No!" + +And he gave the cabman his address and huddled himself into the furthest +corner of the fiacre. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + + +"He doesn't lead a humdrum life, that canon!" said Des Hermies, when +Durtal had related to him the details of the Black Mass. "It's a +veritable seraglio of hystero-epileptics and erotomaniacs that he has +formed for himself. But his vices lack warmth. Certainly, in the matter +of contumelious blasphemies, of sacrilegious atrocities, and sensual +excitation, this priest may seem to have exceeded the limits, to be +almost unique. But the bloody and investuous side of the old sabbats is +wanting. Docre is, we must admit, greatly inferior to Gilles de Rais. +His works are incomplete, insipid; weak, if I may say so." + +"I like that. You know it isn't easy to procure children whom one may +disembowel with impunity. The parents would raise a row and the police +would interfere." + +"Yes, and it is to difficulties of this sort that we must evidently +attribute the bloodless celebration of the Black Mass. But I am thinking +just now of the women you described, the ones that put their heads over +the chafing-dishes to drink in the smoke of the burning resin. They +employ the procedure of the Aissaouas, who hold their heads over the +braseros whenever the catalepsy necessary to their orgies is slow in +coming. As for the other phenomena you cite, they are known in the +hospitals, and except as symptoms of the demoniac effluence they teach +us nothing new. Now another thing. Not a word of this to Carhaix, +because he would be quite capable of closing his door in your face if he +knew you had been present at an office in honour of Satan." + +They went downstairs from Durtal's apartment and walked along toward the +tower of Saint Sulpice. + +"I didn't bring anything to eat, because you said you would look after +that," said Durtal, "but this morning I sent Mme. Carhaix--in lieu of +desserts and wine--some real Dutch gingerbread, and a couple of rather +surprising liqueurs, an elixir of life which we shall take, by way of +appetizer, before the repast, and a flask of creme de celeri. I have +discovered an honest distiller." + +"Impossible!" + +"You shall see. This elixir of life is manufactured from Socotra aloes, +little cardamom, saffron, myrrh, and a heap of other aromatics. It's +inhumanly bitter, but it's exquisite." + +"I am anxious to taste it. The least we can do is fete Gevingey a little +on his deliverance." + +"Have you seen him?" + +"Yes. He's looking fine. We'll make him tell us about his cure." + +"I keep wondering what he lives on." + +"On what his astrological skill brings him." + +"Then there are rich people who have their horoscopes cast?" + +"We must hope so. To tell you the truth, I think Gevingey is not in very +easy circumstances. Under the Empire he was astrologer to the Empress, +who was very superstitious and had faith--as did Napoleon, for that +matter--in predictions and fortune telling, but since the fall of the +Empire I think Gevingey's situation has changed a good deal for the +worse. Nevertheless he passes for being the only man in France who has +preserved the secrets of Cornelius Agrippa, Cremona, Ruggieri, Gauric, +Sinibald the Swordsman, and Tritemius." + +While discoursing they had climbed the stair and arrived at the +bell-ringer's door. + +The astrologer was already there and the table was set. All grimaced a +bit as they tasted the black and active liqueur which Durtal poured. + +Joyous to have all her family about her, Mama Carhaix brought the rich +soup. She filled the plates. + +When a dish of vegetables was passed and Durtal chose a leek, Des +Hermies said, laughing, "Look out! Porta, a thaumaturge of the late +sixteenth century, informs us that this plant, long considered an emblem +of virility, perturbs the quietude of the most chaste." + +"Don't listen to him," said the bell-ringer's wife. "And you, Monsieur +Gevingey, some carrots?" + +Durtal looked at the astrologer. His head still looked like a +sugar-loaf, his hair was the same faded, dirty brown of hydroquinine or +ipecac powders, his bird eyes had the same startled look, his enormous +hands were covered with the same phalanx of rings, he had the same +obsequious and imposing manner, and sacerdotal tone, but he was +freshened up considerably, the wrinkles had gone out of his skin, and +his eyes were brighter, since his visit to Lyons. + +Durtal congratulated him on the happy result of the treatment. + +"It was high time, monsieur, I was putting myself under the care of Dr. +Johannes, for I was nearly gone. Not possessing a shred of the gift of +voyance and knowing no extralucid cataleptic who could inform me of the +clandestine preparations of Canon Docre, I could not possibly defend +myself by using the laws of countersign and of the shock in return." + +"But," said Des Hermies, "admitting that you could, through the +intermediation of a flying spirit, have been aware of the operations of +the priest, how could you have parried them?" + +"The law of countersigns consists, when you know in advance the day and +hour of the attack, in going away from home, thus throwing the spell off +the track and neutralizing it, or in saying an hour beforehand, 'Here I +am. Strike!' The last method is calculated to scatter the fluids to the +wind and paralyze the powers of the assailant. In magic, any act known +and made public is lost. As for the shock in return, one must also know +beforehand of the attempt if one is to cast back the spells on the +person sending them before one is struck by them. + +"I was certain to perish. A day had passed since I was bewitched. Two +days more and I should have been ready for the cemetery." + +"How's that?" + +"Every individual struck by magic has three days in which to take +measures. That time past, the ill is incurable. So when Docre announced +to me that he condemned me to death by his own authority and when, two +hours later, on returning home, I felt desperately ill, I lost no time +packing my grip and starting for Lyons." + +"And there?" asked Durtal. + +"There I saw Dr. Johannes. I told him of Docre's threat and of my +illness. He said to me simply. 'That priest can dress the most virulent +poisons in the most frightful sacrileges. The fight will be bitter, but +I shall conquer,' and he immediately called in a woman who lives in his +house, a voyant. + +"He hypnotized her and she, at his injunction, explained the nature of +the sorcery of which I was the victim. She reconstructed the scene. She +literally saw me being poisoned by food and drink mixed with menstrual +fluid that had been reinforced with macerated sacramental wafers and +drugs skilfully dosed. That sort of spell is so terrible that aside from +Dr. Johannes no thaumaturge in France dare try to cure it. + +"So the doctor finally said to me, 'Your cure can be obtained only +through an invincible power. We must lose no time. We must at once +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek.' + +"He raised an altar, composed of a table and a wooden tabernacle. It was +shaped like a little house surmounted by a cross and encircled, under +the pediment, by the dial-like figure of the tetragram. He brought the +silver chalice, the unleavened bread and the wine. He donned his +sacerdotal habits, put on his finger the ring which has received the +supreme benedictions, then he began to read from a special missal the +prayers of the sacrifice. + +"Almost at once the voyant cried, 'Here are the spirits evoked for the +spell. These are they which have carried the venefice, obedient to the +command of the master of black magic, Canon Docre!' + +"I was sitting beside the altar. Dr. Johannes placed his left hand on my +head and raising toward heaven his right he besought the Archangel +Michael to assist him, and adjured the glorious legions of the +invincible seraphim to dominate, to enchain, the spirits of Evil. + +"I was already feeling greatly relieved. The sensation of internal +gnawing which tortured me in Paris was diminishing. Dr. Johannes +continued to recite his orisons, then when the moment came for the +deprecatory prayer, he took my hand, laid it on the altar, and three +times chanted: + +"'May the projects and the designs of the worker of iniquity, who has +made enchantment against you, be brought to naught; may any influence +obtained by Satanic means, any attack directed against you, be null and +void of effect; may all the maledictions of your enemy be transformed +into benedictions from the highest summits of the eternal hills; may his +fluids of death be transmuted into ferments of life; finally, may the +Archangels of Judgment and Chastisement decide the fate of the miserable +priest who has put his trust in the works of Darkness and Evil.' + +"'You,' he said to me, 'are delivered. Heaven has cured you. May your +heart therefore repay the living God and Jesus Christ, through the +glorious Mary, with the most ardent devotion.' + +"He offered me unleavened bread and wine. I was saved. You who are a +physician, Monsieur Des Hermies, can bear witness that human science was +impotent to aid me--and now look at me!" + +"Yes," Des Hermies replied, "without discussing the means, I certify the +cure, and, I admit, it is not the first time that to my knowledge +similar results have been obtained.--No thanks," to Mme. Carhaix, who +was inviting him to take another helping from a plate of sausages with +horseradish in creamed peas. "But," said Durtal, "permit me to ask you +several questions. Certain details interest me. What were the sacerdotal +ornaments of Dr. Johannes?" + +"His costume was a long robe of vermilion cashmere caught up at the +waist by a red and white sash. Above this robe he had a white mantle of +the same stuff, cut, over the chest, in the form of a cross upside +down." + +"Cross upside down?" + +"Yes, this cross, reversed like the figure of the Hanged Man in the +old-fashioned Tarot card deck, signifies that the priest Melchisedek +must die in the Old Man--that is, man affected by original sin--and live +again the Christ, to be powerful with the power of the Incarnate Word +which died for us." + +Carhaix seemed ill at ease. His fanatical and suspicious Catholicism +refused to countenance any save the prescribed ceremonies. He made no +further contribution to the conversation, and in significant silence +filled the glasses, seasoned the salad, and passed the plates. + +"What sort of a ring was that you spoke of?" + +"It is a symbolic ring of pure gold. It has the image of a serpent, +whose head, in relief, set with a ruby, is connected by a fine chain +with a tiny circlet which fastens the jaws of the reptile." + +"What I should like awfully to know is the origin and the aim of this +sacrifice. What has Melchisedek to do with your affair?" + +"Ah," said the astrologer, "Melchisedek is one of the most mysterious of +all the figures in the Holy Bible. He was king of Salem, sacrificer to +the Most High God. He blessed Abraham and Abraham gave him tithes of the +spoil of the vanquished kings of Sodom and Gomorrah. That is the story +in Genesis 14:18-20. But Saint Paul cites him also, in Hebrews 7, and in +the third verse of that chapter says that Melchisedek, 'without father, +without mother, without descent, having neither beginning of day, nor +end of life, but made like unto the Son of God, abideth, a priest +continually.' In Hebrews 5:6 Paul, quoting Psalm 110:4, says Jesus is +called 'a priest forever after the order of Melchisedek.' + +"All this, you see, is obscure enough. Some exegetes recognize in him +the prophetic figure of the Saviour, others, that of Saint Joseph, and +all admit that the sacrifice of Melchisedek offering to Abraham the +blood and wine of which he had first made oblation to the Lord +prefigures, to follow the expression of Isidore of Damietta, the +archetype of the divine mysteries, otherwise known as the holy mass." + +"Very well," said Des Hermies, "but all that Scripture does not explain +the alexipharmacal virtues which Dr. Johannes attributes to the +sacrifice." + +"You are asking more than I can answer. Only Dr. Johannes could tell +you. This much I can say. Theology teaches us that the mass, as it is +celebrated, is the re-enaction of the Sacrifice of Calvary, but the +sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek is not that. It is, in some sort, +the future mass, the glorious office which will be known during the +earthly reign of the divine Paraclete. This sacrifice is offered to God +by man regenerated, redeemed by the infusion of the Love of the Holy +Ghost. Now, the hominal being whose heart has thus been purified and +sanctified is invincible, and the enchantments of hell cannot prevail +against him if he makes use of this sacrifice to dissipate the Spirits +of Evil. That explains to you the potency of Dr. Johannes, whose heart +unites, in this ceremony, with the divine heart of Jesus." + +"Your exposition is not very clear," Carhaix mildly objected. + +"Then it must be supposed that Johannes is a man amended ahead of time, +an apostle animated by the Holy Ghost?" + +"And so he is," said the astrologer, firmly assured. + +"Will you please pass the gingerbread?" Carhaix requested. + +"Here's the way to fix it," said Durtal. "First cut a slice very thin, +then take a slice of ordinary bread, equally thin, butter them and put +them together. Now tell me if this sandwich hasn't the exquisite taste +of fresh walnuts." + +"Well," said Des Hermies, pursuing his cross-examination, "aside from +that, what has Dr. Johannes been doing in this long time since I last +saw him?" + +"He leads what ought to be a peaceful life. He lives with friends who +revere and adore him. With them he rests from the tribulations of all +sorts--save one--that he has been subjected to. He would be perfectly +happy if he did not have to repulse the attacks launched at him almost +daily by the tonsured magicians of Rome." + +"Why do they attack him?" + +"A thorough explanation would take a long time. Johannes is commissioned +by Heaven to break up the venomous practises of Satanism and to preach +the coming of the glorified Christ and the divine Paraclete. Now the +diabolical Curia which holds the Vatican in its clutches has every +reason of self-interest for putting out of the way a man whose prayers +fetter their conjurements and neutralize their spells." + +"Ah!" exclaimed Durtal, "and would it be too much to ask you how this +former priest foresees and checks these astonishing assaults?" + +"No indeed. The doctor can tell by the flight and cry of certain birds. +Falcons and male sparrow-hawks are his sentinels. If they fly toward him +or away from him, to East or West, whether they emit a single cry or +many; these are omens, letting him know the hour of the combat so that +he can be on guard. Thus he told me one day, the sparrow-hawks are +easily influenced by the spirits, and he uses them as the hypnotist +makes use of somnambulism, as the spiritist makes use of tables and +slates." + +"They are the telegraph wires for magic despatches." + +"Yes. And of course you know that the method is not new. Indeed, its +origin is lost in the darkness of the ages. Ornithomancy is world-old. +One finds traces of it in the Holy Bible, and the Zohar asserts that one +may receive numerous notifications if one knows how to observe the +flight and distinguish the cries of birds." + +"But," said Durtal, "why is the sparrow-hawk chosen in preference to +other birds?" + +"Well, it has always been, since remotest antiquity, the harbinger of +charms. In Egypt the god with the head of a hawk was the one who +possessed the science of the hieroglyphics. Formerly in that country the +hierogrammatists swallowed the heart and blood of the hawk to prepare +themselves for the magic rites. Even today African chiefs put a hawk +feather in their hair, and this bird is sacred in India." + +"How does your friend go about it," asked Mme. Carhaix, "raising and +housing birds of prey?--because that is what they are." + +"He does not raise them nor house them. They nest in the high bluffs +along the Saone, near Lyons. They come and see him in time of need." + +Durtal, looking around this cozy dining-room and recalling the +extraordinary conversations which had been held here, was thinking, "How +far we are from the language and the ideas of modern times.--All that +takes us back to the Middle Ages," he said, finishing his thought aloud. + +"Happily!" exclaimed Carhaix, who was rising to go and ring his bells. + +"Yes," said Des Hermies, "and what is mighty strange in this day of +crass materialism is the idea of battles fought in space, over the +cities, between a priest of Lyons and prelates of Rome." + +"And between this priest and the Rosicrusians and Canon Docre." + +Durtal remembered that Mme. Chantelouve had assured him that the chiefs +of the Rosicrucians were making frantic efforts to establish connections +with the devil and prepare spells. + +"You think that the Rosicrucians are satanizing?" + +"They would like to, but they don't know how. They are limited to +reproducing, mechanically, the few fluidic and veniniferous operations +revealed to them by the three brahmins who visited Paris a few years +ago." + +"I am thankful, myself," said Mme. Carhaix, as she took leave of the +company, "that I am not mixed up in any of this frightful business, and +that I can pray and live in peace." + +Then while Des Hermies, as usual, prepared the coffee and Durtal brought +the liqueur glasses, Gevingey filled his pipe, and when the sound of the +bells died away--dispersed and as if absorbed by the pores of the +wall--he blew out a great cloud of smoke and said, "I passed some +delightful days with the family with whom Dr. Johannes is living. After +the shocks which I had received, it was a privilege without equal to +complete my convalescence in that sweet atmosphere of Christian Love. +And, too, Johannes is of all men I have ever met the most learned in the +occult sciences. No one, except his antithesis, the abominable Docre, +has penetrated so far into the arcana of Satanism. One may even say that +in France these two are the only ones who have crossed the terrestrial +threshold and obtained, each in his field, sure results. But in addition +to the charm of his conversation and the scope of his knowledge--for +even on the subject in which I excel, that of astrology, he surprised +me--Johannes delighted me with the beauty of his vision of the future +transformation of peoples. He is really, I swear, the prophet whose +earthly mission of suffering and glory has been authorized by the Most +High." + +"I don't doubt it," said Durtal, smiling, "but his theory of the +Paraclete is, if I am not mistaken, the very ancient heresy of Montanus +which the Church has formally condemned." + +"All depends on the manner in which the coming of the Paraclete is +conceived," interjected the bell-ringer, returning at that moment. "It +is also the orthodox doctrine of Saint Irenaeus, Saint Justin, Scotus +Erigena, Amaury of Chartres, Saint Doucine, and that admirable mystic, +Joachim of Floris. This was the belief throughout the Middle Ages, and I +admit that it obsesses me and fills me with joy, that it responds to the +most ardent of my yearnings. Indeed," he said, sitting down and crossing +his legs, "if the third kingdom is an illusion, what consolation is left +for Christians in face of the general disintegration of a world which +charity requires us not to hate?" + +"I am furthermore obliged to admit," said Des Hermies, "that in spite of +the blood shed on Golgotha, I personally feel as if my ransom had not +been quite effected." + +"There are three kingdoms," the astrologer resumed, pressing down the +ashes of his pipe with his finger. "Of the Old Testament, that of the +Father, the kingdom of fear. Of the New Testament, that of the Son, the +kingdom of expiation. Of the Johannite Gospel, that of the Holy Ghost, +the kingdom of redemption and love. They are the past, present and +future; winter, spring and summer. The first, says Joachim of Floris, +gives us the blade, the second, the leaf, and the third, the ear. Two of +the Persons of the Trinity have shown themselves. Logically the Third +must appear." + +"Yes, and the Biblical texts abound, conclusive, explicit, irrefutable," +said Carhaix. "All the prophets, Isaiah, Ezekiel, Daniel, Zachariah, +Malachi, speak of it.' The Acts of the Apostles is very precise on this +point. In the first chapter you will read these lines, 'This same Jesus, +which is taken up from you into heaven shall so come in like manner as +ye have seen him go into heaven.' Saint John also announces the tidings +in the Apocalypse, which is the gospel of the second coming of Christ, +'Christ shall come and reign a thousand years.' Saint Paul is +inexhaustible in revelations of this nature. In the epistle to Timothy +he invokes the Lord 'who shall judge the quick and the dead at his +appearance and his kingdom.' In the second epistle to the Thessalonians +he writes, 'And then shall that Wicked be revealed, whom the Lord shall +consume with the Spirit of his mouth, and shall destroy with the +brightness of his coming.' Now, he declares that the Antichrist is not +yet, so the coming which he prophesies is not that already realized by +the birth of the Saviour at Bethlehem. In the Gospel according to Saint +Matthew, Jesus responds to Caiaphas, who asks Him if He is the Christ, +Son of God, 'Thou hast said, and nevertheless I say unto you, Hereafter +shall ye see the Son of man sitting on the right hand of power and +coming in the clouds of heaven.' And in another verse He says to His +apostles, 'Watch, therefore, for ye know not what hour your Lord doth +come.' + +"And there are other texts I could put my finger on. No, there is no use +in talking, the partisans of the glorious kingdom are supported with +certitude by inspired passages, and can, under certain conditions and +without fear of heresy, uphold this doctrine, which, Saint Jerome +attests, was in the fourth century a dogma of faith recognized by all. +But what say we taste a bit of this creme de celeri which Monsieur +Durtal praises so highly?" + +It was a thick liqueur, sirupy like anisette, but even sweeter and more +feminine, only, when one had swallowed this inert semi-liquid, there +lingered in the roots of the papillae a faint taste of celery. + +"It isn't bad," said the astrologer, "but there's no life to it," and he +poured into his glass a stiff tot of rum. + +"Come to think of it," said Durtal, "the third kingdom is also announced +in the words of the Paternoster, 'Thy kingdom come.'" + +"Certainly," said the bell-ringer. + +"But you see," interjected Gevingey, "heresy would gain the upper hand +and the whole belief would be turned into nonsense and absurdity if we +admitted, as certain Paracletists do, an authentic fleshly incarnation. +For instance, remember Fareinism, which has been rife, since the +eighteenth century, in Fareins, a village of the Doubs, where Jansenism +took refuge when driven out of Paris after the closing of the cemetery +of Saint Medard. There a priest, Francois Bonjour, reproduced the +'convulsionist' orgies which, under the Regency, desecrated the tomb of +Deacon Paris. Then Bonjour had an affair with a woman and she claimed to +be big with the prophet Elijah, who, according to the Apocalypse, is to +precede the last arrival of Christ. This child came into the world, then +there was a second who was none other than the Paraclete. The latter did +business as a woolen merchant in Paris, was a colonel in the National +Guard under Louis-Philippe, and died in easy circumstances in 1866. A +tradesman Paraclete, a Redeemer with epaulettes and gold braid! + +"In 1886 one Dame Brochard of Vouvray affirmed to whoever would listen +that Jesus was reincarnate in her. In 1889 a pious madman named David +published at Angers a brochure entitled _The Voice of God_, in which he +assumed the modest appellation of 'only Messiah of the Creator Holy +Ghost,' and informed the world that he was a sewer contractor and wore a +beard a yard and a half long. At the present moment his throne is not +empty for want of successors. An engineer named Pierre Jean rode all +over the Mediterranean provinces on horseback announcing that he was the +Holy Ghost. In Paris, Berard, an omnibus conductor on the +Pantheon-Courcelles line, likewise asserts that he incorporates the +Paraclete, while a magazine article avers that the hope of Redemption +has dawned in the person of the poet Jhouney. Finally, in America, from +time to time, women claim to be Messiahs, and they recruit adherents +among persons worked up to fever pitch by Advent revivals." + +"They are no worse than the people who deny God and Creation," said +Carhaix. "God is immanent in His creatures. He is their Life principle, +the source of movement, the foundation of existence, says Saint Paul. He +has His personal existence, being the 'I AM,' as Moses says. + +"The Holy Ghost, through Christ in glory, will be immanent in all +beings. He will be the principle which transforms and regenerates them, +but there is no need for him to be incarnate. The Holy Ghost proceeds +from the Father through the Son. He is sent to act, not to materialize +himself. It is downright madness to maintain the contrary, thus falling +into the heresies of the Gnostics and the Fratricelli, into the errors +of Dulcin de Novare and his wife Marguerite, into the filth of abbe +Beccarelli, and the abominations of Segarelli of Parma, who, on pretext +of becoming a child the better to symbolize the simple, naif love of the +Paraclete, had himself diapered and slept on the breast of a nurse." + +"But," said Durtal, "you haven't made yourself quite clear to me. If I +understand you, the Holy Ghost will act by an infusion into us. He will +transmute us, renovate our souls by a sort of 'passive purgation'--to +drop into the theological vernacular." + +"Yes, he will purify us soul and body." + +"How will he purify our bodies?" + +"The action of the Paraclete," the astrologer struck in, "will extend to +the principle of generation. The divine life will sanctify the organs +which henceforth can procreate only elect creatures, exempt from +original sin, creatures whom it will not be necessary to test in the +fires of humiliation, as the Holy Bible says. This was the doctrine of +the prophet Vintras, that extraordinary unlettered man who wrote such +impressive and ardent pages. The doctrine has been continued and +amplified, since Vintras's death, by his successor, Dr. Johannes." + +"Then there is to be Paradise on earth," said Des Hermies. + +"Yes, the kingdom of liberty, goodness, and love." + +"You've got me all mixed up," said Durtal. "Now you announce the +arrival of the Holy Ghost, now the glorious advent of Christ. Are these +kingdoms identical or is one to follow the other?" + +"There is a distinction," answered Gevingey, "between the coming of the +Paraclete and the victorious return of Christ. They occur in the order +named. First a society must be recreated, embraced by the third +Hypostasis, by Love, in order that Jesus may descend, as He has +promised, from the clouds and reign over the people formed in His +image." + +"What role is the Pope to play?" + +"Ah, that is one of the most curious points of the Johannite doctrine. +Time, since the first appearance of the Messiah, is divided, as you +know, into two periods, the period of the Victim, of the expiant +Saviour, the period in which we now are, and the other, that which we +await, the period of Christ bathed in the spittle of mockery but radiant +with the superadorable splendour of His person. Well, there is a +different pope for each of these eras. The Scriptures announce these two +sovereign pontificates--and so do my horoscopes, for that matter. + +"It is an axiom of theology that the spirit of Peter lives in his +successors. It will live in them, more or less hidden, until the +longed-for expansion of the Holy Ghost. Then John, who has been held in +reserve, as the Gospel says, will begin his ministry of love and will +live in the souls of the new popes." + +"I don't understand the utility of a pope when Jesus is to be visible," +said Des Hermies. + +"To tell the truth, there is no use in having one, and the papacy is to +exist only during the epoch reserved for the effluence of the divine +Paraclete. The day on which, in a shower of meteors, Jesus appears, the +pontificate of Rome ceases." + +"Without going more deeply into questions which we could discuss the +rest of our lives," said Durtal, "I marvel at the placidity of the +Utopian who imagines that man is perfectible. There is no denying that +the human creature is born selfish, abusive, vile. Just look around you +and see. Society cynical and ferocious, the humble heckled and pillaged +by the rich traffickers in necessities. Everywhere the triumph of the +mediocre and unscrupulous, everywhere the apotheosis of crooked politics +and finance. And you think you can make any progress against a stream +like that? No, man has never changed. His soul was corrupt in the days +of Genesis and is not less rotten at present. Only the form of his sins +varies. Progress is the hypocrisy which refines the vices." + +"All the more reason," Carhaix rejoined, "why society--if it is as you +have described it--should fall to pieces. I, too, think it is putrefied, +its bones ulcerated, its flesh dropping off. It can neither be poulticed +nor cured, it must be interred and a new one born. And who but God can +accomplish such a miracle?" + +"If we admit," said Des Hermies, "that the infamousness of the times is +transitory, it is self-evident that only the intervention of a God can +wash it away; for neither socialism nor any other chimera of the +ignorant and hate-filled workers will modify human nature and reform the +peoples. These tasks are above human forces." + +"And the time awaited by Johannes is at hand," Gevingey proclaimed. +"Here are some of the manifest proofs. Raymond Lully asserted that the +end of the old world would be announced by the diffusion of the +doctrines of Antichrist. He defined these doctrines. They are +materialism and the monstrous revival of magic. This prediction applies +to our age, I think. On the other hand, the good tidings was to be +realized, according to Our Lord, as reported by Saint Matthew, 'When ye +shall see the abomination of desolation ... stand in the holy place.' +And isn't it standing in the holy place now? Look at our timorous, +skeptical Pope, lukewarm and politic, our episcopate of simonists and +cowards, our flabby, indulgent clergy. See how they are ravaged by +Satanism, then tell me if the Church can fall any lower." + +"The promises are explicit and cannot fail," and with his elbows on the +table, his chin in his hands, and his eyes to heaven, the bell-ringer +murmured, "Our father--thy kingdom come!" + +"It's getting late," said Des Hermies, "time we were going." + +While they were putting on their coats, Carhaix questioned Durtal. "What +do you hope for if you have no faith in the coming of Christ?" + +"I hope for nothing at all." + +"I pity you. Really, you believe in no future amelioration?" + +"I believe, alas, that a dotard Heaven maunders over an exhausted +Earth." + +The bell-ringer raised his hands and sadly shook his head. + +When they had left Gevingey, Des Hermies, after walking in silence for +some time, said, "You are not astonished that all the events spoken of +tonight happened at Lyons." And as Durtal looked at him inquiringly, he +continued, "You see I am well acquainted with Lyons. People's brains +there are as foggy as the streets when the morning mists roll up from +the Rhone. That city looks magnificent to travellers who like the long +avenues, wide boulevards, green grass, and penitentiary architecture of +modern cities. But Lyons is also the refuge of mysticism, the haven of +preternatural ideas and doubtful creeds. That's where Vintras died, the +one in whom, it seems, the soul of the prophet Elijah was incarnate. +That's where Naundorff found his last partisans. That is where +enchantment is rampant, because in the suburb of La Guillotiere you can +have a person bewitched for a louis. Add that it is likewise, in spite +of its swarms of radicals and anarchists, an opulent market for a dour +Protestant Catholicism; a Jansenist factory, richly productive of +bourgeois bigotry. + +"Lyons is celebrated for delicatessen, silk, and churches. At the top of +every hill--and there's a hill every block--is a chapel or a convent, +and Notre Dame de Fourviere dominates them all. From a distance this +pile looks like an eighteenth century dresser turned upside down, but +the interior, which is in process of completion, is amazing. You ought +to go and take a look at it some day. You will see the most +extraordinary jumble of Assyrian, Roman, Gothic, and God knows what, +jacked together by Bossan, the only architect for a century who has +known how to create a cathedral interior. The nave glitters with inlays +and marble, with bronze and gold. Statues of angels diversify the rows +of columns and break up, with impressive grace, the known harmonies of +line. It's Asiatic and barbarous, and reminds one of the architecture +shown in Gustave Moreau's Herodiade. + +"And there is an endless stream of pilgrims. They strike bargains with +Our Lady. They pray for an extension of markets, new outlets for +sausages and silks. They consult her on ways and means of getting rid of +spoiled vegetables and pushing off their shoddy. In the centre of the +city, in the church of Saint Boniface, I found a placard requesting the +faithful, out of respect for the holy place, not to give alms. It was +not seemly, you see, that the commercial orisons be disturbed by the +ridiculous plaints of the indigent." + +"Well," said Durtal, "it's a strange thing, but democracy is the most +implacable of the enemies of the poor. The Revolution, which, you would +think, ought to have protected them, proved for them the most cruel of +regimes. I will show you some day a decree of the Year II, pronouncing +penalties not only for those who begged but for those who gave." + +"And yet democracy is the panacea which is going to cure every ill," +said Des Hermies, laughing. And he pointed to enormous posters +everywhere in which General Boulanger peremptorily demanded that the +people of Paris vote for him in the coming election. + +Durtal shrugged his shoulders. "Quite true. The people are very sick. +Carhaix and Gevingey are perhaps right in maintaining that no human +agency is powerful enough to effect a cure." + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + + +Durtal had resolved not to answer Mme. Chantelouve's letters. Every day, +since their rupture, she had sent him an inflamed missive, but, as he +soon noticed, her Maenad cries were subsiding into plaints and +reproaches. She now accused him of ingratitude, and repented having +listened to him and having permitted him to participate in sacrileges +for which she would have to answer before the heavenly tribunal. She +pleaded to see him once more. Then she was silent for a while week. +Finally, tired, no doubt, of writing unanswered letters, she admitted, +in a last epistle, that all was over. + +After agreeing with him that their temperaments were incompatible, she +ended: + + "Thanks for the trig little love, ruled like music-paper, that + you gave me. My heart cannot be so straitly measured, it + requires more latitude--" + +"Her heart!" he laughed, then he continued to read: + + "I understand that it is not your earthly mission to satisfy my + heart but you might at least have conceded me a frank + comradeship which would have permitted me to leave my sex at + home and to come and spend an evening with you now and then. + This, seemingly, so simple, you have rendered impossible. + Farewell forever. I have only to renew my pact with Solitude, to + which I have tried to be unfaithful--" + +"With solitude! and that complaisant and paternal cuckold, her husband! +Well, he is the one most to be pitied now. Thanks to me, he had evenings +of quiet. I restored his wife, pliant and satisfied. He profited by my +fatigues, that sacristan. Ah, when I think of it, his sly, hypocritical +eyes, when he looked at me, told me a great deal. + +"Well, the little romance is over. It's a good thing to have your heart +on strike. In my brain I still have a house of ill fame, which sometimes +catches fire, but the hired myrmidons will stamp out the blaze in a +hurry. + +"When I was young and ardent the women laughed at me. Now that I am old +and stale I laugh at them. That's more in my character, old fellow," he +said to the cat, which, with ears pricked up, was listening to the +soliloquy. "Truly, Gilles de Rais is a great deal more interesting than +Mme. Chantelouve. Unfortunately, my relations with him are also drawing +to a close. Only a few more pages and the book is done. Oh, Lord! Here +comes Rateau to knock my house to pieces." + +Sure enough, the concierge entered, made an excuse for being late, took +off his vest, and cast a look of defiance at the furniture. Then he +hurled himself at the bed, grappled with the mattress, got a half-Nelson +on it, and balancing himself, turning half around, hurled it onto the +springs. + +Durtal, followed by his cat, went into the other room, but suddenly +Rateau ceased wrestling and came and stood before Durtal. + +"Monsieur, do you know what has happened?" he blubbered. + +"Why, no." + +"My wife has left me." + +"Left you! but she must be over sixty." + +Rateau raised his eyes to heaven. + +"And she ran off with another man?" + +Rateau, disconsolate, let the feather duster fall from his listless +hand. + +"The devil! Then, in spite of her age, your wife had needs which you +were unable to satisfy?" + +The concierge shook his head and finally succeeded in saying, "It was +the other way around." + +"Oh," said Durtal, considering the old caricature, shrivelled by bad air +and "three-six," "but if she is tired of that sort of thing, why did she +run off with a man?" + +Rateau made a grimace of pitying contempt, "Oh, he's impotent. Good for +nothing--" + +"Ah!" + +"It's my job I'm sore about. The landlord won't keep a concierge that +hasn't a wife." + +"Dear Lord," thought Durtal, "how hast thou answered my prayers!--Come +on, let's go over to your place," he said to Des Hermies, who, finding +Rateau's key in the door, had walked in. + +"Righto! since your housecleaning isn't done yet, descend like a god +from your clouds of dust, and come on over to the house." + +On the way Durtal recounted his concierge's conjugal misadventure. + +"Oh!" said Des Hermies, "many a woman would be happy to wreathe with +laurel the occiput of so combustible a sexagenarian.--Look at that! +Isn't it revolting?" pointing to the walls covered with posters. + +It was a veritable debauch of placards. Everywhere on lurid coloured +paper in box car letters were the names of Boulanger and Jacques. + +"Thank God, this will be over tomorrow." + +"There is one resource left," said Des Hermies. "To escape the horrors +of present day life never raise your eyes. Look down at the sidewalk +always, preserving the attitude of timid modesty. When you look only at +the pavement you see the reflections of the sky signs in all sorts of +fantastic shapes; alchemic symbols, talismanic characters, bizarre +pantacles with suns, hammers, and anchors, and you can imagine yourself +right in the midst of the Middle Ages." + +"Yes, but to keep from seeing the disenchanting crowd you would have to +wear a long-vizored cap like a jockey and blinkers like a horse." + +Des Hermies sighed. "Come in," he said, opening the door. They went in +and sitting down in easy chairs they lighted their cigarettes. + +"I haven't got over that conversation we had with Gevingey the other +night at Carhaix's," said Durtal. "Strange man, that Dr. Johannes. I +can't keep from thinking about him. Look here, do you sincerely believe +in his miraculous cures?" + +"I am obliged to. I didn't tell you all about him, for a physician can't +lightly make these dangerous admissions. But you may as well know that +this priest heals hopeless cases. + +"I got acquainted with him when he was still a member of the Parisian +clergy. It came about by one of those miracles of his which I don't +pretend to understand. + +"My mother's maid had a granddaughter who was paralyzed in her arms and +legs and suffered death and destruction in her chest and howled when you +touched her there. She had been in this condition two years. It had come +on in one night, how produced nobody knows. She was sent away from the +Lyons hospitals as incurable. She came to Paris, underwent treatment at +La Salpetriere, and was discharged when nobody could find out what was +the matter with her nor what medication would give her any relief. One +day she spoke to me of this abbe Johannes, who, she said, had cured +persons in as bad shape as she. I did not believe a word, but hearing +that the priest refused to take any money for his services I did not +dissuade her from visiting him, and out of curiosity I went along. + +"They placed her in a chair. The ecclesiastic, little, active, +energetic, took her hand and applied to it, one after the other, three +precious stones. Then he said coolly, 'Mademoiselle, you are the victim +of consanguineal sorcery.' + +"I could hardly keep from laughing. + +"'Remember,' he said,'two years back, for that is when your paralytic +stroke came on. You must have had a quarrel with a kinsman or +kinswoman?' + +"It was true. Poor Marie had been unjustly accused of the theft of a +watch which was an heirloom belonging to an aunt of hers. The aunt had +sworn vengeance. + +"'Your aunt lives in Lyons?' + +"She nodded. + +"'Nothing astonishing about that,' continued the priest. 'In Lyons, +among the lower orders, there are witch doctors who know a little about +the witchcraft practised in the country. But be reassured. These people +are not powerful. They know little more than the A B C's of the art. +Then, mademoiselle, you wish to be cured?' + +"And after she replied that she did, he said gently, 'That is all. You +may go.' + +"He did not touch her, did not prescribe any remedy. I came away +persuaded that he was a mountebank. But when, three days later, the girl +was able to raise her arms, and all her pain had left her, and when, at +the end of a week, she could walk, I had to yield in face of the +evidence. I went back to see him, had occasion to do him a service; and +thus our relations began." + +"But what are his methods?" + +"He opens, like the curate of Ars, with prayer. Then he evokes the +militant archangels, then he breaks the magic circles and +chases--'classes,' as he says--the spirits of Evil. I know very well +that this is confounding. Whenever I speak of this man's potency to my +confreres they smile with a superior air or serve up to me the specious +arguments which they have fabricated to explain the cures wrought by +Christ and the Virgin. The method they have imagined consists in +striking the patient's imagination, suggesting to him the will to be +cured, persuading him that he is well, hypnotizing him in a waking +state--so to speak. This done--say they--the twisted legs straighten, +the sores disappear, the consumption-torn lungs are patched up, the +cancers become benign pimples, and the blind eyes see. This procedure +they attribute to miracle workers to explain away the supernatural--why +don't they use the method themselves if it is so simple?" + +"But haven't they tried?" + +"After a fashion. I was present myself at an experiment attempted by Dr. +Luys. Ah, it was inspiring! At the charity hospital there was a poor +girl paralyzed in both legs. She was put to sleep and commanded to rise. +She struggled in vain. Then two interns held her up in a standing +posture, but her lifeless legs bent useless under her weight. Need I +tell you that she could not walk, and that after they had held her up +and pushed her along a few steps, they put her to bed again, having +obtained no result whatever." + +"But Dr. Johannes does not cure all sufferers, without discrimination?" + +"No. He will not meddle with any ailments which are not the result of +spells. He says he can do nothing with natural ills, which are the +province of the physician. He is a specialist in Satanic affections. He +has most to do with the possessed whose neuroses have proved obdurate to +hydrotherapeutic treatment." + +"What does he do with the precious stones you mentioned?" + +"First, before answering your question, I must explain the significance +and virtue of these stones. I shall be telling you nothing new when I +say that Aristotle, Pliny, all the sages of antiquity, attributed +medical and divine virtues to them. According to the pagans, agate and +carnelian stimulate, topaz consoles, jasper cures languor, hyacinth +drives away insomnia, turquoise prevents falls or lightens the shock, +amethyst combats drunkenness. + +"Catholic symbolism, in its turn, takes over the precious stones and +sees in them emblems of the Christian virtues. Then, sapphire represents +the lofty aspirations of the soul, chalcedony charity, sard and onyx +candor, beryl allegorizes theological science, hyacinthe humility, while +the ruby appeases wrath, and emerald 'lapidifies' incorruptible faith. + +"Now in magic," Des Hermies rose and took from a shelf a very small +volume bound like a prayer book. He showed Durtal the title: _Natural +magic, or: The secrets and miracles of nature, in four volumes, by +Giambattista Porta of Naples. Paris. Nicolas Bonjour, rue Neuve Nostre +Dame at the sign Saint Nicolas_. 1584. + +"Natural magic," said Des Hermies, "which was merely the medicine of the +time, ascribes a new meaning to gems. Listen to this. After first +celebrating an unknown stone, the Alectorius, which renders its +possessor invincible if it has been taken out of the stomach of a cock +caponized four years before or if it has been ripped out of the +ventricle of a hen, Porta informs us that chalcedony wins law suits, +that carnelian stops bloody flux 'and is exceeding useful to women who +are sick of their flower,' that hyacinth protects against lightning and +keeps away pestilence and poison, that topaz quells 'lunatic' passions, +that turquoise is of advantage against melancholy, quartan fever, and +heart failure. He attests finally that sapphire preserves courage and +keeps the members vigorous, while emerald, hung about one's neck, keeps +away Saint John's evil and breaks when the wearer is unchaste. + +"You see, antique philosophy, mediaeval Christianity, and sixteenth +century magic do not agree on the specific virtues of every stone. +Almost in every case the significations, more or less far-fetched, +differ. Dr. Johannes has revised these beliefs, adopted and rejected +great numbers of them, finally he has, on his own authority, admitted +new acceptations. According to him, amethyst does cure drunkenness; but +moral drunkenness, pride; ruby relieves sex pressure; beryl fortifies +the will; sapphire elevates the thoughts and turns them toward God. + +"In brief, he believes that every stone corresponds to a species of +malady, and also to a class of sins; and he affirms that when we have +chemically got possession of the active principle of gems we shall have +not only antidotes but preventatives. While waiting for this chimerical +dream to be realized and for our medicine to become the mock of lapidary +chemists, he uses precious stones to formulate diagnoses of illnesses +produced by sorcery." + +"How?" + +"He claims that when such or such a stone is placed in the hand or on +the affected part of the bewitched a fluid escapes from the stone into +his hands, and that by examining this fluid he can tell what is the +matter. In this connection he told me that a woman whom he did not know +came to him one day to consult him about a malady, pronounced incurable, +from which she had suffered since childhood. He could not get any +precise answers to his questions. He saw no signs of venefice. After +trying out his whole array of stones he placed in her hand lapis lazuli, +which, he says, corresponds to the sin of incest. He examined the stone. + +"'Your malady,' he said, 'is the consequence of an act of incest.' + +"'Well,' she said, 'I did not come here to confessional,' but she +finally admitted that her father had violated her before she attained +the age of puberty. + +"That, of course, is against reason and contrary to all accepted ideas, +but there is no getting around the fact that this priest cures patients +whom we physicians have given up for lost." + +"Such as the only astrologer Paris now can boast, the astounding +Gevingey, who would have been dead without his aid. I wonder how +Gevingey came to cast the Empress Eugenie's horoscope." + +"Oh, I told you. Under the Empire the Tuileries was a hotbed of magic. +Home, the American, was revered as the equal of a god. In addition to +spiritualistic seances he evoked demons at court. One evocation had +fatal consequences. A certain marquis, whose wife had died, implored +Home to let him see her again. Home took him to a room, put him in bed, +and left him. What ensued? What dreadful phantom rose from the tomb? Was +the story of Ligeia re-enacted? At any rate, the marquis was found dead +at the foot of the bed. This story has recently been reported by Le +Figaro from unimpeachable documents. + +"You see it won't do to play with the world spirits of Evil. I used to +know a rich bachelor who had a mania for the occult sciences. He was +president of a theosophic society and he even wrote a little book on the +esoteric doctrine, in the Isis series. Well, he could not, like the +Peladan and Papus tribe, be content with knowing nothing, so he went to +Scotland, where Diabolism is rampant. There he got in touch with the man +who, if you stake him, will initiate you into the Satanic arcana. My +friend made the experiment. Did he see him whom Bulwer Lytton in +_Zanoni_ calls 'the dweller of the threshold'? I don't know, but certain +it is that he fainted from horror and returned to France exhausted, half +dead." + +"Evidently all is not rosy in that line of work," said Durtal. "But it +is only spirits of Evil that can be evoked?" + +"Do you suppose that the Angels, who, of earth, obey only the saints, +would ever consent to take orders from the first comer?" + +"But there must be an intermediate order of angels, who are neither +celestial nor infernal, who, for instance, commit the well-known +asininities in the spiritist seances." + +"A priest told me one day that the neuter larvae inhabit an invisible, +neutral territory, something like a little island, which is beseiged on +all sides by the good and evil spirits. The larvae cannot long hold out +and are soon forced into one or the other camp. Now, because it is these +larvae they evoke, the occultists, who cannot, of course, draw down the +angels, always get the ones who have joined the party of Evil, so +unconsciously and probably involuntarily the spiritist is always +diabolizing." + +"Yes, and if one admits the disgusting idea that an imbecile medium can +bring back the dead, one must, in reason, recognize the stamp of Satan +on these practises." + +"However viewed, Spiritism is an abomination." + +"So you don't believe in theurgy, white magic?" + +"It's a joke. Only a Rosicrucian who wants to hide his more repulsive +essays at black magic ever hints at such a thing. No one dare confess +that he satanizes. The Church, not duped by these hair-splitting +distinctions, condemns black and white magic indifferently." + +"Well," said Durtal, lighting a cigarette, after a silence, "this is a +better topic of conversation than politics or the races, but where does +it get us? Half of these doctrines are absurd, the other half so +mysterious as to produce only bewilderment. Shall we grant Satanism? +Well, gross as it is, it seems a sure thing. And if it is, and one is +consistent, one must also grant Catholicism--for Buddhism and the like +are not big enough to be substituted for the religion of Christ." + +"All right. Believe." + +"I can't. There are so many discouraging and revolting dogmas in +Christianity--" + +"I am uncertain about a good many things, myself," said Des Hermies, +"and yet there are moments when I feel that the obstacles are giving +way, that I almost believe. Of one thing I _am_ sure. The supernatural +does exist, Christian or not. To deny it is to deny evidence--and who +wants to be a materialist, one of these silly freethinkers?" + +"It is mighty tiresome to be vacillating forever. How I envy Carhaix his +robust faith!" + +"You don't want much!" said Des Hermies. "Faith is the breakwater of the +soul, affording the only haven in which dismasted man can glide along in +peace." + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + + +"You like that?" asked Mme. Carhaix. "For a change I served the broth +yesterday and kept the beef for tonight. So we'll have vermicelli soup, +a salad of cold meat with pickled herring and celery, some nice mashed +potatoes _au gratin_, and a dessert. And then you shall taste the new +cider we just got." + +"Oh!" and "Ah!" exclaimed Des Hermies and Durtal, who, while waiting for +dinner, were sipping the elixir of life. "Do you know, Mme. Carhaix, +your cooking tempts us to the sin of gluttony--If you keep on you will +make perfect pigs of us." + +"Oh, you are joking. I wonder what is keeping Louis." + +"Somebody is coming upstairs," said Durtal, hearing the creaking of +shoes in the tower. + +"No, it isn't his step," and she went and opened the door. "It's +Monsieur Gevingey." + +And indeed, clad in his blue cape, with his soft black hat on his head, +the astrologer entered, made a bow, like an actor taking a curtain call, +nibbed his great knuckles against his massive rings, and asked where the +bell-ringer was. + +"He is at the carpenter's. The oak beams holding up the big bell are +cracked and Louis is afraid they will break down." + +"Any news of the election?" and Gevingey took out his pipe and filled +it. + +"No. In this quarter we shan't know the results until nearly ten +o'clock. There's no doubt about the outcome, though, because Paris is +strong for this democratic stuff. General Boulanger will win hands +down." + +"This certainly is the age of universal imbecility." + +Carhaix entered and apologized for being so late. While his wife brought +in the soup he took off his goloshes and said, in answer to his friends' +questions, "Yes; the dampness had rusted the frets and warped the beams. +It was time for the carpenter to intervene. He finally promised that he +would be here tomorrow and bring his men without fail. Well, I am mighty +glad to get back. In the streets everything whirls in front of my eyes. +I am dizzy. I don't know what to do. The only places where I am at home +are the belfry and this room. Here, wife, let me do that," and he pushed +her aside and began to stir the salad. + +"How good it smells!" said Durtal, drinking in the incisive tang of the +herring. "Do you know what this perfume suggests? A basket funnelled +fireplace, twigs of juniper snapping in it, in a ground-floor room +opening on to a great harbour. It seems to me there is a sort of salt +water halo around these little rings of gold and rusted +iron.--Exquisite," he said as he tasted the salad. + +"We'll make it again for you, Monsieur Durtal," said Mme. Carhaix, "you +are not hard to please." + +"Alas!" said her husband, "his palate isn't, but his soul is. When I +think of his despairing aphorisms of the other night! However, we are +praying God to enlighten him. I'll tell you," he said to his wife, "we +will invoke Saint Nolasque and Saint Theodulus, who are always +represented with bells. They sort of belong to the family, and they will +certainly be glad to intercede for people who revere them and their +emblems." + +"It would take a stunning miracle to convince Durtal," said Des Hermies. + +"Bells have been known to perform them," said the astrologer. "I +remember to have read, though I forget where, that angels tolled the +knell when Saint Isidro of Madrid was dying." + +"And there are many other cases," said Carhaix. "Of their own accord +the bells chimed when Saint Sigisbert chanted the De Profundis over the +corpse of the martyr Placidus, and when the body of Saint Ennemond, +Bishop of Lyons, was thrown by his murderers into a boat without oars or +sails, the bells rang out, though nobody set them in motion, as the boat +passed down the Saone." + +"Do you know what I think?" asked Des Hermies, looking at Carhaix. "I +think you ought to prepare a compendium of hagiography or a really +informative work on heraldry." + +"What makes you think that?" + +"Well, you are, thank God, remote from this epoch and fond of things +which it knows nothing about or execrates, and a work of that kind would +take you still further away. My good friend, you are the man forever +unintelligible to the coming generations. To ring bells because you love +them, to give yourself over to the abandoned study of feudal art or +monasticism would make you complete--take you clear out of Paris, out of +the world, back into the Middle Ages." + +"Alas," said Carhaix, "I am only a poor ignorant man. But the type you +speak of does exist. In Switzerland, I believe, a bell-ringer has for +years been collecting material for a heraldic memorial. I should think," +he continued, laughing, "that his avocation would interfere with his +vocation." + +"And do you think," said Gevingey bitterly, "that the profession of +astrologer is less decried, less neglected?" + +"How do you like our cider?" asked the bell-ringer's wife. "Do you find +it a bit raw?" + +"No, it's tart if you sip it, but sweet if you take a good mouthful," +answered Durtal. + +"Wife, serve the potatoes. Don't wait for me. I delayed so long getting +my business done that it's time for the angelus. Don't bother about me. +Go on eating. I shall catch up with you when I get back." + +And as her husband lighted his lantern and left the room the woman +brought in on a plate what looked to be a cake covered with golden brown +caramel icing. + +"Mashed potatoes, I thought you said!" + +"_Au gratin_. Browned in the oven. Taste it. I put in everything that +ought to make it very good." + +All exclaimed over it. + +Then it became impossible to hear oneself. Tonight the bell boomed out +with unusual clarity and power. Durtal tried to analyze the sound which +seemed to rock the room. There was a sort of flux and reflux of sound. +First, the formidable shock of the clapper against the vase, then a sort +of crushing and scattering of the sounds as if ground fine with the +pestle, then a rounding of the reverberation; then the recoil of the +clapper, adding, in the bronze mortar, other sonorous vibrations which +it ground up and cast out and dispersed through the sounding shutters. + +Then the bell strokes came further apart. Now there was only the +whirring as of a spinning wheel; a few crumbs were slow about falling. +And now Carhaix returned. + +"It's a two-sided age," said Gevingey, pensive. "People believe nothing, +yet gobble everything. Every day a new science is invented. Nobody reads +that admirable Paracelsus who rediscovered all that had ever been found +and created everything that had not. Say now to your congress of +scientists that, according to this great master, life is a drop of the +essence of the stars, that each of our organs corresponds to a planet +and depends upon it; that we are, in consequence, a foreshortening of +the divine sphere. Tell them--and this, experience attests--that every +man born under the sign of Saturn is melancholy and pituitous, taciturn +and solitary, poor and vain; that that sluggish star predisposes to +superstition and fraud, directs epilepsies and varices, hemorrhoids and +leprosies; that it is, alas! the great purveyor to hospital and +prison--and the scientists will shrug their shoulders and laugh at you. +The glorified pedants and homiletic asses!" + +"Paracelsus," said Des Hermies, "was one of the most extraordinary +practitioners of occult medicine. He knew the now forgotten mysteries of +the blood, the still unknown medical effects of light. Professing--as +did also the cabalists, for that matter--that the human being is +composed of three parts, a material body, a soul, and a perispirit +called also an astral body, he attended this last especially and +produced reactions on the carnal envelope by procedures which are either +incomprehensible or fallen into disuse. He cared for wounds by treating +not the tissues, but the blood which came out of them. However, we are +assured that he healed certain ailments." + +"Thanks to his profound knowledge of astrology," said Gevingey. + +"But if the study of the sidereal influence is so important," said +Durtal, "why don't you take pupils?" + +"I can't get them. Where will you unearth people willing to study twenty +years without glory or profit? Because, to be able to establish a +horoscope one must be an astronomer of the first order, know mathematics +from top to bottom, and one must have put in long hours tussling with +the obscure Latin of the old masters. Besides, you must have the +vocation and the faith, and they are lost." + +"Just the way it is with bell ringing," said Carhaix. + +"No, you see, messieurs," Gevingey went on, "the day when the grand +sciences of the Middle Ages fell foul of the systematic and hostile +indifference of an impious people was the death-day of the soul in +France. All we can do now is fold our arms and listen to the wild +vagaries of society, which by turns shrieks with farcical joy and bitter +grief." + +"We must not despair. A better time is coming," said Mme. Carhaix in a +conciliating tone, and before she retired she shook hands with all her +guests. + +"The people," said Des Hermies, pouring the water into the coffee-pot, +"instead of being ameliorated with time, grow, from century to century, +more avaricious, abject, and stupid. Remember the Siege, the Commune; +the unreasonable infatuations, the tumultuous hatreds, all the dementia +of a deteriorated, malnourished people in arms. They certainly cannot +compare with the naif and tender-hearted plebes of the Middle Ages. Tell +us, Durtal, how the people acted when Gilles de Rais was conducted to +the stake." + +"Yes, tell us," said Carhaix, his great eyes made watery by the smoke of +his pipe. + +"Well, you know, as a consequence of unheard-of crimes, the Marshal de +Rais was condemned to be hanged and burned alive. After the sentence was +passed, when he was brought back to his dungeon, he addressed a last +appeal to the Bishop, Jean de Malestroit, beseeching the Bishop to +intercede for him with the fathers and mothers of the children Gilles +had so ferociously violated and put to death, to be present when he +suffered. + +"The people whose hearts he had lacerated wept with pity. They now saw +in this demoniac noble only a poor man who lamented his crimes and was +about to confront the Divine Wrath. The day of execution, by nine +o'clock they were marching through the city in processional. They +chanted psalms in the streets and took vows in the churches to fast +three days in order to help assure the repose of the Marshal's soul." + +"Pretty far, as you see, from American lynch law," said Des Hermies. + +"Then," resumed Durtal, "at eleven they went to the prison to get Gilles +de Rais and accompanied him to the prairie of Las Biesse, where tall +stakes stood, surmounted by gibbets. + +"The Marshal supported his accomplices, embraced them, adjured them to +have 'great displeasure and contrition of their ill deeds' and, beating +his breast, he supplicated the Virgin to spare them, while the clergy, +the peasants, and the people joined in the psalmody, intoning the +sinister and imploring strophes of the chant for the departed: + + "'Nos timemus diem judicii + Quia mali et nobis conscii. + Sed tu, Mater summi concilii, + Para nobis locum refugii, + O Maria. + + "'Tunc iratus Judex--'" + +"Hurrah for Boulanger!" + +The noise as of a stormy sea mounted from the Place Saint Sulpice, and a +hubbub of cries floated up to the tower room. "Boulange--Lange--" Then +an enormous, raucous voice, the voice of an oyster woman, a push-cart +peddler, rose, dominating all others, howling, "Hurrah for Boulanger!" + +"The people are cheering the election returns in front of the city +hall," said Carhaix disdainfully. + +They looked at each other. + +"The people of today!" exclaimed Des Hermies. + +"Ah," grumbled Gevingey, "they wouldn't acclaim a sage, an artist, that +way, even--if such were conceivable now--a saint." + +"And they did in the Middle Ages." + +"Well, they were more naif and not so stupid then," said Des Hermies. +"And as Gevingey says, where now are the saints who directed them? You +cannot too often repeat it, the spiritual councillors of today have +tainted hearts, dysenteric souls, and slovenly minds. Or they are worse. +They corrupt their flock. They are of the Docre order and Satanize." + +"To think that a century of positivism and atheism has been able to +overthrow everything but Satanism, and it cannot make Satanism yield an +inch." + +"Easily explained!" cried Carhaix. "Satan is forgotten by the great +majority. Now it was Father Ravignan, I believe, who proved that the +wiliest thing the Devil can do is to get people to deny his existence." + +"Oh, God!" murmured Durtal forlornly, "what whirlwinds of ordure I see +on the horizon!" + +"No," said Carhaix, "don't say that. On earth all is dead and +decomposed. But in heaven! Ah, I admit that the Paraclete is keeping us +waiting. But the texts announcing his coming are inspired. The future is +certain. There will be light," and with bowed head he prayed fervently. + +Des Hermies rose and paced the room. "All that is very well," he +groaned, "but this century laughs the glorified Christ to scorn. It +contaminates the supernatural and vomits on the Beyond. Well, how can we +hope that in the future the offspring of the fetid tradesmen of today +will be decent? Brought up as they are, what will they do in Life?" + +"They will do," replied Durtal, "as their fathers and mothers do now. +They will stuff their guts and crowd out their souls through their +alimentary canals." + + + + +FINIS + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of La-bas, by J. K. 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