CHAPTER XXI - La Bas [DOWN THERE]

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Durtal had resolved not to answer Mme. Chantelouve's letters. Every day, since their rupture, she had sent him inflamed missive, hut, as he soon noticed, her Maenad cries were subsiding into plaints and reproaches. She now ac-cused 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 writ-ing unanswered letters, she admitted, in a last epistle, that all was over.

After agreeing with him that their temperaments were in-compatible, 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 con-ceded me a frank comradeship which would have per-mitted 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 complacent and paternal cuck-old, her husband! Well, he is the one most to be pitied now. Thanks to me, he had evenings of quiet. I restored his wife,

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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 myr-midons 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."

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"Oh," said Durtal, considering the old caricature, shriveled by bad air and "three-six," "hut 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 I-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, de-scend like a god from your clouds of dust, and come on over to tine 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?" point-ing 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 Baulanger and Jacques.

"Thank God, this will be over tomorrow."

"There is one resource left," said Des Herknies. "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; aichemic 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

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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 destruc-tion 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 mat-ter 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 visit-ing him, and out of curiosity I went along.

"They placed her in a chair. The ecclesiastic, little, ac-tive, 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 ox'. You must have had a quarrel with- a kinsman or kinswoman?'

"It was true. Poor Marie had been unjustly accused of

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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 the 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?"

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"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. lie 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 allegorites 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.

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Paris. Nicolas Bonfour 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, medieval 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 authprity, 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?"

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"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.

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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 Buiwer 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 ex-hausted, half dead."

"Evidently all is not rosy in that line of work," said Durtal. "But it is only spirits of Evil that can he 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 9r 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 spir-itist 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

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thing. No one dare confess that he satanizes. The Church, not duped by these hair-splitting distinctions, condemns Hack 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 I" said Des Hermies. "Faith is the breakwater of the soul, affording the only haven in which dismasted man can glide along in peace."

"I had to occupy myself with Gilles de Rais and the diabolism of the
Middle Ages to get contemporary diabolism revealed to me." j-k h
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