The abbé told himself that it would be most likely impossible to detect any fraud; but he felt convinced that, should the prince find this phenomenon ridiculed and laughed to scorn, after a full investigation by a man of sense and culture, his faith in it would be shaken, and ere long he would come himself to despise it.
All the remarkable stories he had heard about spiritualism from Madame de Girardin and others, and which he had hitherto paid no heed to, came back to-night to the abbé as he sat ruminating over the extraordinary offer just made him.
He had heard of dead people appearing, and that was sufficiently absurd—for he did not believe in a future life; but the devil—the idea was preposterous! Poor Luther indeed might throw his ink-pot at him; but no enlightened Roman Catholic priest could in these latter nineteenth-century days be expected to believe in his existence, no matter how much he might be forced, for obvious reasons, to preach about it, and represent it as a fact in sermons.
Yes; he would unhesitatingly consent to investigate the matter, and discover and lay bare the fraud he felt certain was lurking somewhere, but that the prince seemed to feel so provokingly certain of his consent, and he feared by thus fulfilling an idly-expressed prophecy, to plunge the unhappy man still deeper into his slough of superstition.
One thing was certain, the abbé told himself with a smile, nothing on earth or from heaven or hell—if the two latter absurdities existed—could bring him to believe in the devil. No, not even if the devil should come and take him by the hand, and all the hosts of heaven flock to testify to his identity.
By this time, having smoked and thought himself into a state of blasphemous idiocy, our worthy divine threw away his cigarette, went to bed, and read himself into a nightmare with a volume of Von Helmont.
The following morning still found him perplexed as to what course to adopt in this matter.
As luck (or shall we say the devil?) would have it, while he was trifling in a listless way with his breakfast, there called to see him the only priest in whose judgment, purity, and religious conviction he had any confidence. It is probable, to such an extent was his mind engrossed by the subject, that no matter who might have called just then, he would have discussed the extraordinary conduct of Prince Pomerantseff with him; but inasmuch as the visitor chanced to be the very best man calculated to direct his judgment in the matter, he, without unnecessary delay, laid the whole affair before him.
“You see, mon cher,” said the abbé, in conclusion, “my position is just this: it appears to me that this person, whom I will not name, has been trifled with by Home and other so-called spiritualists, to such an extent that his mind is really in danger. Now, although, of course, we are forbidden to have any dealings with such people, or to participate in their infamous, foolish, and unholy practices, surely it would be the act of a Christian if a clear, healthy-minded man were to expose the fraud, and thus save to society a man of such transcendent ability as my friend. Moreover, should I decide to accept his mad invitation, I hardly think I could be said to participate in any of the scandalous, and perhaps even blasphemous, rites he may have to perform to bring about the supposed result. What do you think, and what do you advise?”
His friend walked up and down the room for a few minutes, turning the matter over carefully in his mind, and then, coming up to where the abbé lay lazily stretched upon a lounge, he said earnestly—
“Mon cher Henri, I am very glad you have asked me about this. It appears to me that your duty is quite clear. You perhaps have it in your power, as you yourself have seen, to save, not only as you say a mind, but what I wish I could feel you prized more highly, a soul. You must accept the invitation.
The abbé rose in delight at having found another man who, taking the responsibility off his shoulders, commanded him as a duty to indulge his ardent curiosity.
“But,” continued the other in a solemn voice, “before accepting the invitation you must do one thing.”
The abbé threw himself back on the lounge in disgust.
“Oh, pray for strength, of course,” he exclaimed petulantly; “I am quite aware of that.”
“Not only pray, but fast, and that for seven days at least, my dear brother.”
This was a very disagreeable view of the matter; but the abbé was equal to the occasion.
After a pause, during which he appeared absorbed in religious reflection, he rose, and taking his friend by the hand—
“You are right,” said he, “as you always are. Although, of course, I know the evil spirit cannot harm an officer of God’s Holy Catholic Church, even supposing, for the sake of argument, my poor friend can invoke Satan, yet if I am to be of any good—if I am to save my friend from destruction, I must be armed with extraordinary grace, and this, as you truly divine, can only come by fasting.”
The other wrung his hand warmly. “I knew you would see it in its proper light, my dear Henri,” he said; “and now I will leave you to recover your peace of mind by religious meditation.”
The abbé smiled gravely, and his friend departed.
The following letter was the result of this edifying interview between the two divines:
“Mon Cher Prince,—
No doubt you will feel very triumphant when you learn that my object in writing this is to accept your most kind offer of presentation to Sa Majesté; but I do not care whether you choose to consider this yielding to what is only in part whimsical curiosity a triumph or no.
“I will not write to you any cut and dried platitudes about good and evil, but I frankly assure you that one of the strongest reasons which induces me to go on this fool’s errand is a belief that I can discover the absurdity and imposture, and cure you of a hallucination which is unworthy of you.
—Tout à vous,
“Henri Girod.”
For two days he received no reply to this letter, nor did he happen to meet the prince in society in the interval, although he heard of him from De Frontignan and others; but on the third day the following note was brought to him:
“Mon Cher Ami,—
There is no question of triumph any more than there is of deception. I will call for you this evening at half-past nine You must remember your promise to trust yourself entirely to me.—Cordialement à vous,
“Pomerantseff.”
So the matter was now arranged, and he, the Abbé Girod, the renowned preacher of the celebrated Church, was to meet that very night by special appointment, at half-past nine, the prince of darkness; and this in January, in Paris, at the height of the season, in the capital of civilization—la ville Lumière!
CHAPTER VI
As maybe well imagined, during the remainder of that eventful day until the hour of the prince’s arrival, the abbé did not enjoy his customary placidity.
A secretary of the Turkish Embassy who called at four found him engaged in a violent discussion with one of the Rothschilds about the belief held by the early Christians in demons, as shown by Tertullian and others; while Lord Middlesex, who called at half-past five, found he had captured Faure, installed him at the piano, and was inducing him to hum snatches from Don Juan.
When his dinner-hour arrived, having given orders to his valet to admit no one lest he should be discovered not fasting, he hastily swallowed a few mouthfuls, fortified himself with a couple of glasses of Chartreuse verte, and lighting a Henry Clay, awaited the coming of the messenger of Satan.
At half-past nine o’clock precisely the prince arrived. He was in full evening dress, but—contrary to his usual custom—wearing no ribbon or decoration, and his face was of a deadly pallor.”
“Mon Dieu!” exclaimed the abbé, “what is the matter with you, prince? You are looking very ill; we had better postpone our visit.”
“No; it is nothing,” said the prince gravely. “Let us be off without delay. In matters
of this kind waiting is unendurable.”
The abbé rose, and rang the bell for his hat and cloak. The appearance of the prince, his evident agitation, and his unfeigned impatience, which seemed to betoken terror, were far from reassuring; but the abbé promptly quelled any feelings of misgiving he might have felt. Suddenly a thought struck him—a thought which certainly his brain would never have engendered had it been in its normal condition.
“Perhaps I had better change my dress and go en pékin?” he inquired anxiously.
The ghost of a sarcastic smile flitted across the prince’s face as he replied, “No, certainly not; your soutane will be in every way acceptable. Come, let us be off.”
The abbé made a grimace, put on his hat, flung his cloak around his shoulders, and followed the prince downstairs.
He remarked, with some surprise, that the carriage awaiting them was not the prince’s.
“I have hired a carriage for the occasion,” said Pomerantseff quietly, noticing Girod’s glance of surprise. “I am unwilling that my servants should suspect anything of this.”
They entered the carriage, and the coachman, evidently instructed beforehand where to go, drove off without delay. The prince immediately pulled down the blinds, and taking a silk pocket-handkerchief from his pocket, began quietly to fold it lengthwise.
“I must blindfold you, mon cher,” he remarked simply, as if announcing the most ordinary fact.
“Diable!” cried the abbé, now becoming a little nervous. “This is very unpleasant; I like to see where I am going. I believe, Pomerantseff, you are the devil yourself.”
“Remember your promise,” said the prince, as he carefully covered his friend’s eyes with the pocket-handkerchief, and effectually precluded the possibility of his seeing anything until he should remove the bandage.
After this nothing was said. The abbé heard the prince pull up the blind, open the window, and tell the coachman to drive faster. He endeavored to discover when they turned to the right, and when to the left, but in a few minutes got bewildered, and gave it up in despair. At one time he felt certain they were crossing the river.
“I wish I had not come,” he murmured to himself. “Of course the whole thing is folly; but it is a great trial to the nerves, and I shall probably be upset for many days.”
On they drove: the time seemed interminable to the abbé
“Are we near our destination yet?” he inquired at last.
“Not very far off now,” replied the other, in what seemed to Girod a most sepulchral tone of voice.
At length, after a drive of about half an hour, which seemed to the abbé double that time, Pomerantseff murmured in a low tone, and with a profound sigh, which sounded almost like a sob, “Here we are”; and at that moment the abbé felt the carriage was turning, and heard the horses’ hoofs clatter on what he imagined to be the stones of a courtyard.
The carriage stopped, Pomerantseff opened the door himself, and assisted the blindfolded priest to alight.
“There are five steps,” he said, as he held the abbé by the arm. “Take care!”
The abbé stumbled up the five steps. They had now entered a house, and Girod imagined to himself it was probably some old hotel like the Hôtel Pimodan, where Gautier, Baudelaire, and others at one time were wont to resort to disperse the cares of life in the fumes of opium. When they had proceeded a few yards, Pomerantseff warned him that they were about to ascend a staircase, and up many shallow steps they went, the abbé regretting every instant more and more that he had allowed his vulgar curiosity to lead him into an adventure which could be productive of nothing but ridicule and shattered nerves.
When at length they had reached the top of the stairs, the prince guided him by the arm through what the abbé imagined to be a hall, opened a door, closed and locked it after them, walked on again, opened another door, which he closed and locked likewise, and over which the abbé heard him pull a heavy curtain. The prince then took him again by the arm, advanced him a few steps, and said in a low whisper—
“Remain quietly standing where you are. I rely upon your honour not to attempt to remove the pocket-handkerchief from your eyes until you hear voices.”
The abbé folded his arms and stood motionless, while he heard the prince walk away, and then suddenly all sound ceased.
It was evident to the unfortunate priest that the room in which he stood was not dark; for although he could of course sec nothing owing to the pocket-handkerchief, which had been bound most skillfully over his eyes, there was a sensation of being in strong light, and his cheeks and hands felt, as it were, illuminated.
Suddenly a horrible sound sent a chill of terror through him—a gentle noise as of naked flesh touching the waxed floor—and before he could recover from the shock occasioned by the sound, the voices of many men—voices of men groaning or wailing in some hideous ecstasy—broke the stillness, crying—
“Father and creator of all sin and crime, prince and king of all despair and anguish! come to us, we implore thee!”
The abbé, wild with terror, tore off the pocket-handkerchief
He found himself in a large old-fashioned room, paneled up to the lofty ceiling with oak, and filled with great light shed from innumerable tapers fitted into sconces on the wall—light which, though by its nature soft, was almost fierce by reason of its greatness and intensity, proceeded from these countless tapers.
He had then been, after all, right in his conjectures: he was evidently in a chamber of some one of the many old-fashioned hotels which are to be seen still in the He Saint Louis, and indeed in all the antiquated parts of Paris. It was reassuring, at all events, to know one was not in the infernal regions, and to feel tolerably certain that a sergent de ville could not be many yards distant.
All this passed into his comprehension like a flash of lightning, for hardly had the bandage left his eyes ere his whole attention was riveted upon the group before him.
Twelve men—Pomerantseff among the number—of all ages from five-and-twenty to fifty-five, all dressed in evening dress, and all, so far as one could judge at such a moment, men of culture and refinement, lay nearly prone upon the floor with hands linked.
They were bowing forward and kissing the floor—which might account for the strange sound heard by Girod—and their faces were illuminated with a light of hellish ecstasy, half distorted, as if in pain, half smiling, as if in triumph.
The abbé’s eyes instinctively sought out the prince.
He was the last on the left-hand side, and while his left hand grasped that of his neighbor, his right was sweeping nervously over the bare waxed floor, as if seeking to animate the boards. His face was more calm than those of the others, but of a deadly pallor, and the violet tints about the mouth and temples showed he was suffering from intense emotion.
They were all, each after his own fashion, praying aloud, or rather moaning, as they writhed in ecstatic adoration.
“O Father of evil! come to us!”
“O Prince of endless desolation! who sittest by the beds of suicides, we adore thee!”
“O Creator of eternal anguish!”
“O King of cruel pleasures and famishing desires! we worship thee!”
“Come to us, thy foot upon the hearts of widows!”
“Come to us, thy hair lurid with the slaughter of innocence!”
“Come to us, thy brow wreathed with the clinging chaplet of despair!”
“Come to us!”
The heart of the abbé turned cold and sick as these beings, hardly human by reason of their great mental exaltation, swayed before him, and as the air, charged with a subtle and overwhelming electricity, seemed to throb as from the echo of innumerable voiceless harps.
Suddenly—or rather, the full conception of the fact was sudden, for the influence had been gradually s
tealing over him—he felt a terrible coldness, a coldness more piercing than any he had ever before experienced even in Russia, and with the coldness there came to him the certain knowledge of the presence of some new being in the room.
Withdrawing his eyes from the semicircle of men, who did not seem to be aware of his, the abbé’s, presence, and who ceased not in their blasphemies, he turned them slowly around, and as he did so they fell upon a newcomer, a Thirteenth, who seemed to spring into existence from the air, and before his very eyes.
CHAPTER VII
He was a young man of apparently twenty, tall, as beardless as the young Augustus, with bright golden hair falling from his forehead like a girl’s.
He was dressed in evening dress, and his cheeks were flushed as if with wine or pleasure; but from his eyes there gleamed a look of inexpressible sadness, of intense despair.
The group of men had evidently become aware of his presence at the same moment, for they all fell prone upon the floor adoring, and their words were now no longer words of invocation, but words of praise and worship.
The abbé was frozen with horror: there was no room in his breast for the lesser emotion of fear; indeed, the horror was so great and all-absorbing as to charm him and hold him spellbound.
He could not remove his eyes from the Thirteenth, who stood before him calmly, a faint smile playing over his intellectual and aristocratic face—a smile which only added to the intensity of the despair gleaming in his clear blue eyes.
Girod was struck first with the sadness, then with the beauty, and then with the intellectual vigor, of that marvelous countenance.
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