The Occult Detective Megapack: 29 Classic Stories
Page 90
“I could swear it, mon père.”
“Then bring him to the chapel in the morning. If he will make confession and declare sincere repentance, then submit himself to holy baptism, I’ll do what you request. It’s rather mediaeval, but—I’d hate to think that I’m so modern that I would not take a chance to save two souls.”
* * * *
The penitential service in the Chapel of the Intercession was a brief but most impressive one. Only Balderson, I and de Grandin occupied the pews, with Doctor Bentley in his stole and cassock, but without his surplice, at the little altar:
“…we have followed too much the devices and desires of our own hearts, we have offended against Thy holy laws…remember not, Lord, our offenses nor the offenses of our forefathers, neither take Thou vengeance of our sins…we acknowledge and bewail our manifold sins and wickednesses; the memory of them is grievous unto us, the burden of them is intolerable…”
After absolution followed the short service ordered for the baptism of adults; then we set out for Shadow Lawns.
Now Doctor Bentley wore his full canonicals, and his surplice glinted almost whiter than the snow that wrapped the mounded graves as he paused beside an unmarked hillock in the Nurmi family plot.
Slowly he began in that low, full voice with which he fills a great church to its farthest corner: “I am the resurrection and the life, saith the Lord; he that believeth in me, though he were dead, yet shall he live.…”
It was one of those still winter days, quieter than an afternoon in August, for no chirp of bird or whir of insect sounded, no breath of breeze disturbed the evergreens; yet as he read the opening sentence of the office for the burial of the dead, a low wail sounded in the copse of yew and hemlock on the hill, as though a sudden wind moaned in the branches, and I stiffened as a scent was borne across the snow-capped grave mounds. Incense! Yet not exactly incense, either. There was an undertone of fetor in it, a faint, distinctly charnel smell. Balderson was trembling, and despite myself I flinched, but Doctor Bentley and de Grandin gave no sign of recognition.
“Thou knowest, Lord, the secrets of our hearts, shut not Thy merciful ears to our prayer, but spare us, Lord most holy…” intoned the clergyman.
“Amen,” said Jules de Grandin firmly as the prayer concluded.
The Æolian wailing in the evergreens died to a sobbing, low clamation as Doctor Bentley traced in sand a cross upon the snow-capped grave, declaring: “Unto Almighty God we commend the soul of our departed sister, and we commit her body to the ground: earth to earth, ashes to ashes, dust to dust, in the sure and certain hope of the Resurrection into eternal life.…”
And now there was no odor of corruption in the ghostly perfume, but the clean, inspiring scent of frankincense, redolent of worship at a thousand consecrated altars.
As the last amen was said and Doctor Bentley turned away I could have sworn I heard a gentle slapping sound and saw the blond hairs of de Grandin’s small mustache bend inward, as though a pair of lips invisible to me had kissed him on the mouth.
* * * *
Doctor Bentley dined with us that night, and over coffee and liqueurs we discussed the case.
“It was a fine thing you did,” the cleric told de Grandin, “Six men in seven would have sent him packing and bid him work out his salvation—or damnation—for himself. There’s an essential nastiness in Devil-worship which is revolting to the average man, not to mention its abysmal wickedness—”
“Tiens, who of us can judge another’s wickedness?” the little Frenchman answered. “The young man was repentant, and repentance is the purchase price of heavenly forgiveness. Besides”—a look of strain, like a nostalgic longing, came into his eyes—“before the altar of a convent in la belle France kneels one whom I have loved as I can never love another in this life. Ceaselessly, except the little time she sleeps, she makes prayer and intercession for a sinful world. Could I hold fast the memory of our love if I refused to match in works the prayer she makes in faith? Eh bien, mon père, my inclination was to give him a smart kick in the posterior; to bid him go and sin no more, but sinfully or otherwise, to go. Ha, but I am strong, me. I overcame that inclination.”
The earnestness of his expression faded and an impish grin replaced it as he poured a liberal potion of Napoleon 1811 in his brandy-sniffer. “Jules de Grandin,” he apostrophized himself, “you have acted like a true man. You have overcome your natural desires; you have kept the faith.
“Jules de Grandin, my good and much-admired self—be pleased to take a drink!”
Table of Contents
COPYRIGHT INFO
A NOTE FROM THE PUBLISHER
THE MEGAPACK SERIES
THE POT OF TULIPS, by Fitz-James O’Brien
WHAT WAS IT? by Fitz-James O’Brien
THE HAUNTED SHANTY, by Bayard Taylor
ABOUT DR. MARTIN HESSELIUS
Dr. Martin Hesselius in “GREEN TEA,” by Joseph Sheridan Le Fanu
MR JUSTICE HARBOTTLE, by J. Sheridan Le Fanu
THE UNINHABITED HOUSE, by Mrs. J. H. Riddell
THE PHANTOM HEARSE, by Mary Fortune
AYLMER VANCE AND THE VAMPIRE, by Alice and Claude Askew
THE DOOR INTO INFINITY, by Edmond Hamilton
ABOUT CARNACKI, THE GHOST FINDER
Carnacki in “THE GATEWAY OF THE MONSTER,” by William Hope Hodgson
Carnacki in “THE HOUSE AMONG THE LAURELS,” by William Hope Hodgson
Carnacki in “THE WHISTLING ROOM,” by William Hope Hodgson
Carnacki in “THE HORSE OF THE INVISIBLE,” by William Hope Hodgson
Carnacki in “THE SEARCHER OF THE END HOUSE,” by William Hope Hodgson
Carnacki in “THE THING INVISIBLE,” by William Hope Hodgson
ABOUT FLAXMAN LOW
Flaxman Low in “THE STORY OF SADDLER’S CROFT,” by E. and H. Heron
Flaxman Low in “THE STORY OF BAELBROW,” by E. and H. Heron
Flaxman Low in “THE STORY OF YAND MANOR HOUSE,” by E. and H. Heron
Flaxman Low in “THE STORY OF KONNOR OLD HOUSE,” by E. and H. Heron
Flaxman Low in “THE STORY OF THE SPANIARDS, HAMMERSMITH,” by E. and H. Heron
Flaxman Low in “THE STORY OF SEVENS HALL,” by E. and H. Heron
ABOUT STEVE HARRISON
FANGS OF GOLD, by Robert E. Howard
Steve Harrison in “THE TOMB’S SECRET,” by Robert E. Howard
Steve Harrison in “NAMES IN THE BLACK BOOK,” by Robert E. Howard
Steve Harrison in “GRAVEYARD RATS,” by Robert E. Howard
THE HALF-HAUNTED, by Manly Wade Wellman
ABOUT JULES DE GRANDIN
Jules de Grandin in “THE JEST OF WARBURG TANTAVUL,” by Seabury Quinn
Jules de Grandin in “PLEDGED TO THE DEAD,” by Seabury Quinn
Jules de Grandin in “INCENSE OF ABOMINATION,” by Seabury Quinn