The Fiery Angel

by Valery Bruisov

  “Evil spirit! By Him Who was brought before Caiaphas, the high priest of the Hebrews, Who was questioned and gave answer, I conjure thee, answer me; art thou the enemy of God and the servant of Antichrist?”

  Then Renata suddenly rose from her knees, and, looking straight at the Archbishop, answered, but by whom inspired, I know not:

  “By the holy and mysterious name of God, Adonai, I swear and testify: I am the servant of the All-Highest, standing before His throne!”

  And again her reply was followed by a terrible rumble, but at the same time several sisters, tearing themselves from the ranks, rushed towards Renata, pressed, kneeling, around her feet, and exclaimed in frenzy:

  “And we! and we! we testify! Sister Maria is—holy! Ecce ancilla Domini! Ora pro nobis!”

  In extreme fury of anger, the Archbishop, all red with strain, the sweat streaming down his face, called:

  “Away, false spirit! Vade retro! Children, come to your senses!”

  But the maidens continued to scream, embracing the knees of Renata, who stood with her eyes gazing at the heights; all around the terrible knockings continued, and the excitement reached such intensity that already none could control themselves, but all shouted, howled, wept, or screamed with frenzied laughter. I saw that the Archbishop himself was, at last, himself shaken, but, once more raising his voice, he began one of the most crucial exorcisms in the following terms:

  “Per Christum Dominum, per eum, qui venturus est iudicare vivos et mortuos, obtemperare! Spiriti maligni, damnati, interdicti, exterminati, extorsi, jam vobis impero et prœcipio, in nomine et virtute Dei Omnipotentis et Justi! In ictu oculi discedite omnes qui operamini iniquitatem!”

  He had, however, by no means reached the end, when first one sister, then another, fell to the floor with laughter and weeping, possessed by the spirits who lay in wait around, for immediately many others were unable to withstand the assault upon their bodies of the powers of evil. The unfortunate maidens suddenly fell, one after the other, each with a moan, and flung themselves about terribly on the stone flags of the floor, either shouting out impious words, naming the Archbishop himself the servant of the Devil, or blasphemies, exalting Sister Maria as the bride of an angel of Heaven. Shouts, moans, laughter, blasphemies, plaints, curses—all mingled with the mysterious knocking of invisible hands and the confusion of the other spectators, who, shaken by terror, reeling like men drunk, strove to flee to the doors, and there was not one man in this crowd able to retain mastery over himself: thus mighty was the power of the demons, who unquestionably had seized the whole temple in their sway. I too felt that my head was swooning, that my throat was strangling, that darkness was in my eyes, and I too yearned to throw myself towards Renata, fall on my knees before her, and shout into the Archbishop’s face that she was a saint, and perhaps, had this state lasted but one more minute, I should have done so.

  There were two who retained a measure of calm in all this frenzy: the Archbishop, who still repeated, though in a shaken voice, the words of the exorcisms, already unheard in the general tumult—and Renata; embracing her faithful followers with her arms, amidst screams and moans, amidst praises and curses, she stood straight in front of the Archbishop, her eyes directed above, and the immobility of her face seeming as the strength of a granite rock amidst the fury of storming waves—but at that very moment when, forgetting my prudent calculations, I was already about to rush towards her, suddenly there came into her eyes a striking change. I saw that her features started, that her lips twisted at first hardly perceptibly, then a sudden convulsion racked all her face, in her eyes was suddenly reflected inexpressible terror, and in this one minute, instantly, I too fathomed what had happened to her, as she exclaimed, in a voice of despair:

  “My God! My God! Why hast Thou forsaken me?“

  Immediately afterwards she too, in a fit of possession, subsided into the mass of the sisters who were pressing about her, and who at once, as if in obedience to a command, began to fling themselves about, to beat themselves against the floor, and to scream. Then the last vestige of order was broken in this assembly, and everywhere around, wherever the eye could reach, could be seen only women possessed by demons, and they ran about the chapel, in a frenzy, gesticulating, striking themselves on the breasts, waving their arms, preaching; or rolled about on the ground, singly or in couples, twisting in convulsions, pressing each other in embraces, kissing each other in a fury of passion, or biting each other like wild beasts; or sat fast on one spot, furiously distorting their features in grimaces, rolling out and in their eyes, thrusting out their tongues, roaring with laughter, and then becoming suddenly silent, or suddenly falling backwards, striking their skulls against the stones of the floor; some of them screamed, others laughed, a third group cursed, a fourth blasphemed, a fifth chanted; yet others hissed like snakes, or barked like dogs, or grunted like swine;—it was a hell, more terrible than that which appeared before the eyes of Dante Alighieri.

  At this same moment, I saw between me and the Archbishop, who stood rooted to the ground, the figure of the Dominican brother, Thomas, who had as if dived up suddenly from beneath the floor, and who exclaimed in a voice sharp and commanding, unaccustomed in him:

  “These women are guilty of extreme heresy and obvious carnal connection with the Devil! In the name of His Holiness, I declare them subject to the court of the Holy Inquisition!”

  I heard the rattle against the floor of the staff that fell from the hands of the Archbishop, startled by these simple words, in the chaos around him, more than by a trumpet call from Heaven—but his reply to the speech of Brother Thomas I already failed to hear. Like a flash of lightning there cut through my brain the thought that this was the last moment in which to save Renata, and that perhaps it was yet possible for me to tear her from hence, bearing her, perhaps against her will, as those demented are borne from flaming houses. Not thinking of the consequences, of the means of leaving the nunnery, which was surrounded by guards, I rushed to Renata, who was convulsed on the floor, still wound by the arms of her companions, and had already touched her body, so beloved by me, so precious to me, when I felt Brother Thomas softly thrusting me aside, and saw, busying themselves around, several archers who had not been present in the temple, and who had just been brought in, of course by the inquisitor, and were preserving all the calm of soldiers.

  Brother Thomas said to me:

  “Holy zeal deceives you, Brother Rupprecht! Calm yourself! These men will do everything, as is becoming.”

  I saw the archers of the Archbishop impassively bind the hands of the now unconscious Renata, and raise her to carry off somewhither. Still hardly knowing myself, I did not heed the words of the inquisitor, but once more rushed forward and was about to engage in personal combat with these men, to tear their precious burden from them, when I felt someone now take me by the arm, and it was Count Adalbert, who said sternly to me:

  “Rupprecht! You are losing your reason!”

  Commandingly and almost by force, he led me away across the whole chapel towards the doors of the exit; I obeyed him without will, as a child a grown-up, and we suddenly came into the fresh air and into the light of the sun, and behind us still were heard the howlings, and the moans, and the screams, and the laughter of the unfortunates possessed by the demons.

  Chapter the Fifteenth

  How Renata was tried under the Presidency of the Archbishop

  CONTINUING to hold me by the arm, the Count led me across the whole convent yard, beyond the gates, until, crossing a small lawn set with a few silvered willows, we sat ourselves down, as if by accord, on the slope of the hill above the moat that encircled the walls of the convent. Here the Count said to me:

  “Rupprecht! Your excitement is unusual. I swear by Hyperion that you are touched closer by this affair than all the rest of us! Explain it all to me as you would to a comrade.”

  And in truth I had, at this hour, no other comrade in all the wide world, and the fears and hopes teeming in
my soul sought exit, like birds confined in a narrow cage, so, like a drowning man clutching at his last support—I told the Count everything: how I had met with Renata, how we had spent the winter together, as man and wife, and how only the caprice of her character had prevented us from sealing this union before the altar, how Renata had suddenly left me, and how I now recognised her as Sister Maria; I with-held only the real reasons of Renata’s flight, explaining it by her sorrow for her sins and her desire for repentance—and I ended my narrative by addressing a request to the Count to aid me in this terrible position.

  “These last weeks”—I declared—“as you yourself, gracious Count, may have noticed, I had somehow become resigned, or rather, grown accustomed, to the thought that I had parted from Renata for ever. But scarcely did I look once more upon her face, than all the love in my soul resurrected like a Phoenix, and I realised once more that this woman is dearer to me than my own life. But alas, the merciless fate that has returned Renata to me, at the same time has thrown her into the hands of the Inquisition, and all the circumstances of the case cry out to me that I have miraculously regained her whom I had lost only to lose her utterly! What can I undertake for the salvation of my beloved—I, alone against the power of the Inquisition, against the will of the Archbishop, and against his force of archers and guards? If in you, Count, I can find neither assistance nor protection, if in you there is no compassion for me, there remains naught for me to do but to shatter my head against the walls of the prison that encloses Renata?”

  Roughly in such words as these I spoke to the Count, and he listened to me with great tenderness, and showed, by the occasional questions he put to me, that he was trying sincerely to comprehend my history. And when I had finished, he said to me:

  “Dear Rupprecht! Your history touches me to the quick, and I pledge you my knightly word that I shall render you every assistance within my power.”

  The events that followed proved that the Count did not trifle with his knightly honour, for, in trying to aid me against the inquisitor, he bravely endangered his high position, but, none the less, I am by no means certain that he acted thus owing to his goodwill towards or his interest in me. Reflecting now upon the behaviour of the Count, I am inclined to suppose that he was urged, first, by the desire to show himself a true Humanist by defending Sister Maria from the fanaticism of the inquisitor, for he would on no account agree to believe in the reality of demoniac possession; second, his dislike, of long standing, of the Archbishop, his liege lord, whose intentions it pleased him to frustrate; third and lastly, his youthful fondness for adventures and all manner of exploits, the same that prompted him to the involved and precarious mockery of Doctor Faustus. These considerations, however, it goes without saying, do not prevent me from preserving a feeling of the liveliest gratitude to the Count, and I think that, till death itself, his memory will ever be for me like a refreshing breeze in a torrid desert.

  From the hour of this conversation the Count took upon himself the direction of all my actions, and began to behave towards me like an elder brother to his junior. While, after our talk, we were walking back to camp, I constructed on the way dozens of plans for more speedily securing the freedom of Renata, and all these plans converged to one—that we must tear the captive from her prison by main force. The Count pointed out to me with reason that the means of the other side were far superior to ours, that even should all the Count’s men-at-arms obey us without a murmur, yet against us we should find the whole strength of the numerous guard of the Archbishop, his might as a prince, the power and influence of the inquisitor, and probably the whole population of the district, naturally ill-disposed towards witches, so that it would be preferable for us to use cunning, saving the sword till the last extremity. The remnants of sound reason could not but declare to me that the Count in this argument had hold of the stirrup of rightness; and I had naught else to do but yield to those contentions, bowing my soul beneath them, as an ox bows its head beneath the yoke.

  Leading me to his tent, the Count ordered me to await him there, and I remained for several hours in a state of inactivity forced and burdensome, yielded a prey to ravening thoughts and merciless dreams. The major part of this time I spent lying face downwards on the bear’s skin spread upon the couch, listening to the beating of my heart, and trying not to marshal into rank the images that appeared in my imagination, one after the other, like horsemen on a hillock, and disappeared, after glittering for a second in the light of the sun. First I imagined Renata prostrate on the filthy and cold floor of a dark underground cell, then I saw the executioners submitting her to torment and elaborate torture, then her body being carried to burial without the cemetery walls; then, on the contrary, I imagined myself leading her forth from the prison, galloping on my horse with her across the countryside, sailing with her beyond the Ocean, beginning a new life with her in the New World. … At times I would be seized with such terror from my visions that I would leap to my feet, impetuously, ready to run whither only I might be able to do something, but with the power of will and the reasonings of logic I would shackle myself once more to my couch, and force myself once more to watch, like an idle spectator, the scenes enacted before me on the boards of my dream.

  It was long past noon, and I was already almost exhausted by solitude and uncertainty, when at last the Count came in, but he avoided giving any reply to my passionate questions, demanding whether he had learnt anything of the fate of Sister Maria, and half-jokingly, half-didactically, he said that, since we had touched no food since morning, we must first partake of dinner. Painful was this meal, while Michael, a servant from the castle, served the simple dishes cooked in camp, which we were able to drink down with red Arbleichert of the best, from the convent cellars, and while the Count, pretending not to notice my gloom, persistently dragged me into a conversation about various ancient and modern writers. And, though forcing my mind, I yet involuntarily confused the names of the authors and books, thus exciting the gay laughter of the Count, which seemed blasphemous to me at that hour. And when, at last, our dinner had come to end, the Count, washing his hands after the meal, said to me:

  “And now, Rupprecht, take up your inkstand and let us be going to the convent: they are about to begin the examination of your Renata.”

  I felt clearly that my cheeks turned white at this communication, and I had strength enough only to repeat the last words:

  “The examination of Renata?”

  And the Count, becoming suddenly quite serious, related to me in a sad and compassionate voice that the inquisitor and the Archbishop had decided to begin the inquiry without delay, for the case appeared likely to be important and complex; that the Count himself was to be present at the trial by virtue of his rank, and that he had offered my services as a scribe, to record the questions of the judges and the answers of the accused; for, in accordance with the provisions of the new Imperial code, a written record must be kept of the proceedings of every trial.

  “What!”—I exclaimed, on hearing this explanation—“Renata is actually to be tried here, at the convent, without the presence of a representative of the Emperor, without an advocate being accorded to her, without conformation to all the lawful forms of judicial procedure!”

  “You, it would seem”—the Count replied to me—“imagine to yourself that you live in the happy times of Justinian the Great, and not in the days of Iohann of Schwarzenburg! I must remind you that, in the opinion of our jurists, witchcraft is a crime entirely exceptional, crimen exceptum, in prosecuting which it is unnecessary to conform, strictly and faithfully, to the processes laid down by law. In his, they say, ordo est ordinem non servare. They so mightily fear the Devil, that they think any illegality justified in fighting him, and neither you nor I am in a position to dispute that custom!”

  I did, in truth, understand at once the futility of a juristic argument, but none the less, at first view, it seemed to me monstrous—that I should partake in the trial of Renata, sitting amongst h
er judges—so that at first I firmly refused the proposal. Gradually, however, partly influenced by the arguments of the Count, partly having myself thought over the situation, I came to the conclusion that it would not be wise for me to avoid the opportunity of being present in court, for there, at the last extremity, I could in any case come to her assistance. So, in giving at last my consent, I yet firmly declared that, should the matter come to torture, I would permit no despoiling of the body so dear to me, but, unsheathing my sword, would free Renata from the torture by death, and, with a second thrust, myself—from the penalty of thus taking the law into my own hands. I discovered later that it would have been better had I not voiced this decision aloud, but at the time the Count made no attempt to dissuade me, only saying:

  “In case of extremity you must act as you think fit, though we shall try to prevent it from going as far as torture. But remember in general that we are planning a dangerous game, and that you will ruin yourself for certain if you in any way betray your compassion for or intimacy with the accused. It were best for you not to disclose your face to her, and, if she should herself name you as her accomplice, deny it firmly. Now let us be going, and may Hermes, the god of all cunning, render us aid.”

  Having thus agreed, we made our way to the convent for the second time.

  At the gates there awaited us, by the order of the Archbishop, a monk, who, after gruffly and disrespectfully remarking to us that we were late, conducted us to the eastern wall of the temple, where, near the door of the sacristy, there appeared to be yet another, low and embedded in the earth, a door that led into the chapel vaults. By the light of a torch made of pitch, carried by our guide, we descended down a dark, slippery passage, through musty air, to a depth of more than one flight, then crossed two arched chambers, and at last, through a side arch, entered a subterranean hall, lit sparingly, so that everything within it appeared as if in twilight. In a corner of the wall, where was fixed a long torch, stood a heavy oak table, perhaps equal in years to the vaults themselves, and at that table, on a bench, sat two figures, in whom we soon recognised the Archbishop and the inquisitor, while, at some distance, were visible the dark forms and glittered the arms and trappings of the guards. And when the Count had apologised in elegant terms for his delay, and we had taken our places, also on the decayed bench, eaten away by the moisture of centuries, I distinguished in the opposite corner the vague ghost of a pole with a crossbar and a rope, and, realising that this was the strappado, I involuntarily felt for the hilt of my trusted sword. I shall remark also that the Count took his seat in line with the other judges, while I preferred to sit at the very end of the table, firstly because this was required by my respect for the rank of the Archbishop, and second, because there the light of the torch barely penetrated, and I could justly count upon my face remaining in shadow, and consequently not being recognised by Renata.