Madame Bavoil was right; to understand the welcome the Virgin could
bestow on Her visitors, the early Mass in the crypt must be attended;
above all, the Communion should be received.
Durtal made the experiment; one day when the Abbé Gévresin enjoined on
him to approach the Table, he followed the housekeeper's advice and went
to the crypt at early dawn.
The way down was by a cellar-stair lighted by a small lamp with a
sputtering wick darkening the chimney with smoke; having safely reached
the bottom, he turned to the left in the darkness; here and there, at an
angle, a floating wick threw a ruddy light on the circuit which he made
in alternate light and shade, till at last he had some notion of the
general outline of the crypt. Its plan would be fairly represented by
the nave of a wheel whence the spokes radiated in every direction,
joining the outer circle or tyre. From the circular path in which he
found himself passages diverged like the sticks of a fan, and at the end
little fogged glass windows were visible, looking almost bright in the
opaque blackness of the walls.
And by following the curve of the corridor, Durtal came to a green baize
door which he pushed open. He found himself in the side aisle of a nave
ending in a semicircle, where there was a high altar. To the right and
left two little recesses formed the arms or transept of a small cross.
The centre aisle, forming a low nave, had chairs on either side, leaving
a narrow space to give access to the altar.
It was scarcely possible to see; the sanctuary was lighted only by tiny
lamps from the roof in little saucers of lurid orange or dull gold. An
extraordinarily mild atmosphere prevailed in this underground structure,
which was also full of a singular perfume in which a musty odour of hot
wax mingled with a suggestion of damp earth. But this was only the
background, the canvas, so to speak, of the perfume, and was lost under
the embroidery of fragrance which covered it, the faded gold, as it
were, of oil in which long kept aromatic herbs had been steeped, and
old, old incense powder dissolved. It was a weird and mysterious vapour,
as strange as the crypt itself, which, with its furtive lights and
breadths of shadow, was at once penitential and soothing.
Durtal went up the broader aisle to the left arm of the cross and sat
down; the tiny transept had its little altar, with a Greek cross in
relief against a purple disk. Overhead the enormous curve of the
vaulting hung heavy, and so low that a man could touch it by stretching
an arm; it was as black as the mouth of a chimney, and scorched by the
fires that had consumed the cathedrals built above it.
Presently the clap-clap of sabots became audible, and then the smothered
footfall of nuns; there was silence but for sneezing and nose-blowing
stifled by pocket-handkerchiefs, and then all was still.
A sacristan came in through a little door opening into the other
transept, and lighted the tapers on the high altar; then strings of
silver-gilt hearts became visible in the semicircle all along the walls,
reflecting the blaze of flames, and forming a glory for a statue of the
Virgin sitting, stiff and dark, with a Child on Her knees. This was the
famous Virgin of the Cavern, or rather a copy of it, for the original
was burnt in 1793 in front of the great porch of the Cathedral, amid the
delirious raving of _sans-culottes_.
A choir-boy came in, followed by an old priest; and then, for the first
time, Durtal saw the Mass really as a service, and understood the
wonderful beauty that lies inherent in a devout commemoration of the
Sacrifice.
The boy on his knees, his soul aspiring and his hands clasped, spoke
aloud and slowly, rehearsing the responses of the Psalm with such deep
attention and respect, that the meaning of this noble liturgy, which has
ceased to amaze us, because we are so used to hearing it stammered out
in hot haste, was suddenly revealed to Durtal.
And the priest himself, unconsciously, whether he would or no, took up
the child's tone, imitating him, speaking slowly, not merely tripping
the verses off the tip of his tongue, but absorbed in the words he had
to repeat; and he seemed overwhelmed, as though it were his first Mass,
by the grandeur of the rite of which he was to be the instrument.
In fact, Durtal heard the celebrant's voice tremble when standing before
the altar in the presence of the Father, like the Son Himself whom he
represented, and imploring forgiveness for all the sins of the world
which He bore on His shoulders, supported in his grief and hope by the
innocence of the child whose loving care was less mature and less lively
than the man's.
And as he spoke the despairing words, "My God, my God, wherefore is my
spirit heavy, and why dost Thou afflict me?" the priest was indeed the
image of Jesus suffering on the hill of Calvary, but the man remained in
the celebrant--the man, conscious of himself, and himself experiencing,
in behoof of his personal sins and his own shortcomings, the impressions
of sorrow contained in the inspired text.
Meanwhile his little acolyte had words of comfort, bid him hope; and
after repeating the _Confiteor_ in the face of the congregation, who on
their part purified their souls by the same ablution of confession, the
priest with revived assurance went up the altar steps and began the
Mass.
Positively, in this atmosphere of prayers crushed in by the heavy roof,
Durtal, in the midst of kneeling Sisters and women, was struck with a
sense as of some early Christian rite buried in the catacombs. Here were
the same ecstatic tenderness, the same faith; and it was possible even
to imagine some apprehension of surprise, and some eagerness to profess
the faith in the face of danger. And thus, as in a vague image, this
sacred cellar held the dim picture of the neophytes assembled so long
since in the underground caverns of Rome.
The service proceeded before Durtal's eyes, and he was amazed to watch
the boy, who, with half closed eyes and the reserve of timid emotion,
kissed the flagons of wine and of water before presenting them to the
priest.
Durtal would look no more; he tried to concentrate his mind while the
priest was wiping his hands, for the only prayers he could honestly
offer up to God were verses and texts repeated in an undertone.
This only had he in his favour, but this he had: that he passionately
loved mysticism and the liturgy, plain-song and cathedrals. Without
falsehood or self-delusion, he could in all truth exclaim, "Lord, I have
loved the habitation of Thy house, and the place where Thine honour
dwelleth." This was all he had to offer to the Father in expiation of
his contumely and refractoriness, his errors and his falls.
"Oh!" thought he, "how could I dare to pour out the ready-made collects
of which the prayer-books are full, how say to God, while addressing Him
as 'Lovely Jesus,' that He is the beloved of my heart, that I solemnly
vow never to love anything but Him, that I would die rather than ever
displease Him?
"Love none but Him!--If I were a monk and alone, possibly; but living in
the world!--And then who but the Saints would prefer death to the
smallest sin? Why then humbug Him with these feints and grimaces?
"No," said Durtal, "apart from the personal outpourings, the secret
intimacy in which we are bold to tell Him everything that comes into our
head, the prayers of the liturgy alone can be uttered with impunity by
any man, for it is the peculiarity of these inspirations that they adapt
themselves in all ages to every state of the mind and every phase of
life. And with the exception of the time-honoured prayers of certain
Saints, which are as a rule either supplications for pity or for help,
appeals to God's mercy or laments, all other prayers sent forth from the
cold insipid sacristies of the seventeenth century, or, worse still,
composed in our own day by the piety-mongers who insert in our books of
prayer the pious cant of the Rue Bonaparte--all these inflated and
pretentious petitions should be avoided by sinners who, in default of
every other virtue, at least wish to be sincere.
"Only that wonderful child could thus address the Lord without
hypocrisy," he went on, looking at the little acolyte, and understanding
truly for the first time what innocent childhood meant--the little
sinless soul, purely white.
"The Church, which tries to find beings absolutely ingenuous and
immaculate to wait upon the altar, had succeeded at Chartres in moulding
souls and transforming ordinary boys on their admission to the sanctuary
into exquisite angels. There must certainly be, above and besides their
special training, some blessing and goodwill from Our Lady, to mould
these little rogues to the service, to make them so unlike others, and
endow them in the middle of the nineteenth century with the fire of
chastity and primitive fervour of the middle age."
The service proceeded slowly, soaking into the abject silence of the
worshippers, and the child, more reverent and attentive than ever, rang
the bell; it was like a shower of sparks tinkling under the smoky vault,
and the silence seemed deeper than ever behind the kneeling boy,
upholding with one hand the chasuble of the celebrant, who bowed over
the altar. The Host was elevated amid the shower of silver sound; and
then, above the prostrate heads, in the clear sparkle of bells, the
golden tulip of a chalice flashed out till, to a final hurried peal, the
gilded flower was lowered, and the prostrate worshippers looked up.
And Durtal was thinking,--
"If only He to whom we refused shelter when the Mother who bore Him was
in travail, could find a loving refuge in our souls to-day! But alas!
apart from these nuns, these children, these priests, and these peasant
women who cherish Him so truly, how many here present are, like me,
embarrassed by His presence, and at all times incapable of making ready
the chamber He requires, of receiving Him in a room swept and garnished?
"Alas! to think that things are always the same, always going back to
the beginning! Our souls are still the crafty synagogues who betrayed
Him, and the vile Caiaphas that lurks within us rises up at the very
moment when we fain would be humble and love Him while we pray! My God!
My God! Would it not be better to depart than to drag myself thus, with
such a bad grace, into Thy presence? For, after all, it is all very well
for the Abbé Gévresin to insist that I should communicate, he is not
I--he is not in me; he does not know the wild doings in my hidden lairs,
or the turmoil in my ruins. He believes it to be mere nervelessness,
indolence. Alas! That is not all. There is a dryness, a coldness, which
are not altogether free from a certain amount of irritation and
rebelliousness against the rules he insists on."
The moment of Communion was at hand. The little boy had gently thrown
the white napkin back on the table; the nuns and poor women and peasants
went forward, all with clasped hands and bowed heads, and the child took
a taper and passed in front of the priest, his eyes almost shut for fear
of seeing the Host.
There was in this little creature such a glow of love and reverence that
Durtal gazed with admiration and trembled with awe. Without in the least
knowing why, in the midst of the darkness that fell on his soul, of the
impotent and wavering feeling that thrilled it without there being any
word to describe them, he felt a tide bearing him to the Saviour, and
then a recoil.
The comparison was inevitably forced upon him between that child's soul
and his own. "Why, it is he, not I, who should take the Sacrament!"
cried he to himself; and he crouched there inert, his hands folded, not
knowing how to decide, in a frame at once beseeching and terrified, when
he felt himself gently drawn to the table and received the Sacrament.
And meanwhile he was trying to collect himself, and to pray, and at the
same time, at the same instant, was in the discomfort of the shuddering
fears that surge up within us, and that find expression physically in a
craving for air, and in that peculiar condition when the head feels as
if it were empty, as if the brain had ceased to act, and all vitality
was driven back on the heart, which swells to choking; when it seems, in
the spiritual sense, that as energy returns so far as to allow of
self-command once more, of introspection, we peer down in appalling
silence into a black void.
He painfully rose and returned to his place, not without stumbling.
Never, not even at Chartres, had he been able to hinder the torpor that
overpowered him at the moment of receiving the Sacrament. His powers
were benumbed, his faculties arrested.
In Paris, at the core of his soul, which seemed rolled up in itself like
a chrysalis, there had always been a sort of restraint, an awkwardness
in waiting, and in approaching Christ, and then an apathy which nothing
could shake off. And this state was prolonged in a sort of cold,
enveloping mist, or rather in a vacuum all round the soul, deserted and
swooning on its couch.
At Chartres this state of collapse was still present, but some indulgent
tenderness presently enwrapped and warmed the spirit. The soul as it
recovered was no longer alone; it was encouraged and perceptibly helped
by the Virgin, who revived it. And this impression, peculiar to this
crypt, permeated the body too; it was no longer a feeling of suffocation
for lack of air; on the contrary, it was the oppression of inflation, of
over-fulness, which would be mitigated by degrees, allowing of easy
breathing at last.
Durtal, comforted and relieved, rose to go. By this time the crypt had
become a little lighter from the growing dawn; the passages, ending in
altars backing against the windows, were still dark, as a result of the
ground plan, but in the perspective of each a moving gold cross was to
be seen almost distinctly, rising and falling with a priest's back,
between two pale stars twinkling one on each side above the tabernacle;
while a third, lower and with redder flame, lighted up the book and the
white napery.
Durtal wandered away to meditate in the Bishop's garden, where he had
permission to walk whenever he pleased.
The garden was perfectly still, with tomb-like avenues, pollard poplars,
and trampled lawns--half dead. There was not a flower, for the Cathedral
killed everything under its shadow. Its vast deserted apse, without a
statue, rose amid a flight of buttresses flung out like huge ribs,
inflated as it were by the breath of incessant prayer within; shade and
damp always clung round the spot; in this funereal Close, where the
trees were green only in proportion as they were distant from the
church, lay two microscopic ponds like the mouths of two wells; one
covered to the brim with yellow-green duck-weed, the other full of
brackish water of inky blackness, in which three goldfish lay as in
pickle.
Durtal was fond of this neglected spot, with its reek of the grave and
the salt marsh, and the mouldy smell, that earthy scent that comes up
from a rotting soil of wet leaves.
He paced the alleys, where the Bishop never came, and where the children
of the household, rushing about at play, destroyed the fragments of
grass-plots spared by the Cathedral. Slates cracked underfoot, flung
down from the roofs by the wind, and the jackdaws croaked in answer to
each other across the silent park.
Durtal came out on a terrace overlooking the city, and he rested his
elbows on a parapet of grey time-eaten stone, as dry as pumice and
patterned with orange and sulphur-coloured lichens.
Beneath him spread a valley crowded with smoking chimneys and roofs,
veiling this upper part of the town in a tangle of blue. Further down
all was still and lifeless; the houses were asleep, not so far awake
even as to show the transient flash of glass when a window is thrown
open, nor was there such a spot of red as is often seen in a country
street when an eider-down quilt hangs out to air across the bar of a
balcony; everything was closed and dull and soundless; there was not
even the hive-like hum that hangs over inhabited places. But for the
distant rumble of a cart, the crack of a whip, the bark of a dog, all
was still: it was a town asleep, a land of the dead.
And beyond the valley, on the further bank, the scene was still more
sullen and silent; the plains of La Beauce stretched away as far as the
eye could reach, mute and melancholy, without a smile, under a heartless
sky divided by an ignoble barrack facing the Cathedral.
The dreariness of these plains, an endless level without a mound,
without a tree! And you felt that even beyond the horizon they still
stretched away as flat as ever; only the monotony of the landscape was
emphasized by the raging fury of the tempestuous winds, sweeping the
hillside, levelling the tree-tops, and wreaking themselves on this
basilica, which, perched on high, had for centuries defied their
efforts. To uproot it the lightning had been needed to help, firing its
towers, and even the combined attacks of the hurricane and the flames
had been unable to destroy the original stock, which, replanted after
each disaster, had always sprouted in fresh verdure with reinvigorated
growth.
That morning, in the dawn of a rainy autumn day, lashed by a bitter
north wind, Durtal, shivering and ill at ease, left the terrace and took
refuge in the more sheltered walks, going down presently into a
garden-slope where the brushwood afforded some little protection from
the wind; these shrubberies wandered at random down the hill, and an
inextricable tangle of blackberries clung with the cat's-claws of their
long shoots to the saplings that were scattered about.
It was evident that since some immemorial time the Bishops, for lack of
funds, had neglected these grounds. Of all the old kitchen garden,
overgrown by brambles, only one plot was more or less weeded, and rows
of spinach and carrots alternated with the frosted balls of cabbages.
Durtal sat down on a stump that had once supported a bench, and tried to
look into his own soul; but he found within, look where he might, only a
spiritual Beauce; it seemed to him to mirror the cold and monotonous
landscape; only it was not a mighty wind that blew through his being;
but a sharp, drying little blast. He knew that he was cross-grained and
could not make his observations calmly; his conscience harassed him and
insisted on vexatious argument.
"Pride! Ah, how is it to be kept under till the day shall come when it
shall be quelled? It insinuates itself so stealthily, so noiselessly,
that it has ensnared and bound me before I can suspect its presence; and
my case too is somewhat peculiar, and hard to cure by the religious
treatment commonly prescribed in such cases. For in fact," said he to
himself, "my pride is not of the artless and overweening kind, elated,
audacious, boldly displaying, and proclaiming itself to the world; no,
mine is in a latent state, what was called vain-glory in the simplicity
of the Middle Ages, an essence of pride diluted with vanity and
evaporating within me in transient thoughts and unexpressed conceit. I
have not even the opportunity afforded by swaggering pride for being on
my guard and compelling myself to keep silence. Yes, that is very true;
talk leads to specious boasting and invites subtle praise; one is
presently aware of it, and then, with patience and determination, it is
in one's power to check and muzzle oneself. But my vice of pride is
wordless and underground; it does not come forth. I neither see nor hear
it. It wriggles and creeps in without a sound, and clutches me without
my having heard its approach!
"And the good Abbé answers: 'Be watchful and pray;' well, I am more than
willing, but the remedy is ineffectual, for aridity and outside
influences deprive it of its efficacy!
"As for outside suggestions--they never seem to come to me but in
prayer. It is enough that I kneel down and try to collect my thoughts,
they are at once dissipated. The mere purpose of prayer is like a stone
flung into a pool; everything is stirred up and comes to the top!
"And people who have not habits of religious practice fancy that there
is nothing easier than prayer. I should like to see them try. They could
then bear witness that profane imaginings, which leave them in peace at
all other times, always surge up unexpectedly, during prayer.
"Besides, what use is therein disputing the fact? Merely looking at a
sleeping vice is enough to wake it."
And his thoughts went back to that warm crypt. "Yes, no doubt, like all
the buildings of the Romanesque period, it is symbolical of the Old
Testament; but it is not simply gloomy and sad, for it is enveloping and
comforting, warm and tender! Admitting even that it is the figure in
stone of the older Dispensation, would it not seem that it symbolizes it
less as a whole, than as embodying more especially a select group of the
Holy Women who prefigured the Virgin in the earlier Scriptures? Is it
not the expression in stone of those passages in which the illustrious
women of the Bible are most conspicuous, who were, in a way, prophetic
incarnations of the New Eve?
"Hence this crypt would reproduce the most consoling and the most heroic
passages of the Sacred Book, for the Virgin is supreme in this
underground sanctuary; it is Hers rather than the terrible Adonaï's, if
one may dare say so.
"And again, She is a very singular Virgin, who has inevitably remained
in harmony with Her surroundings: a Virgin black and rugged, and
stunted, like the rough-hewn shrine She inhabits.
"She is therefore, no doubt, the outcome of the same idea that conceived
of Christ as black and ugly because He had assumed the burthen of all
the sins of the world, the Christ of the first ages of the Church, who
in His humility put on the vilest aspect. In that case Mary would have
conceived Her Son in Her own image; She too had chosen to be ugly and
obscure, out of humility and loving-kindness, that She might the better
console the disfigured and despised creatures whose image She had
borrowed."
And Durtal went on:--
"What a crypt is this where, in the course of so many centuries, kings
and queens have come to worship!
"Philip Augustus and Isabella of Hainault, Blanche of Castille and Saint
Louis, Philippe de Valois, Jean le Bon, Charles V., Charles VI., Charles
VII., Charles VIII. and Anne de Bretagne; then François I., Henri III.
and Louise de Vaudemont, Catherine de' Medici; Henri IV., who was
crowned in this Cathedral, Anne of Austria, Louis XIV., Maria Leczinska,
and so many others--all the nobility of France; and Ferdinand of Spain,
and Léon de Lusignan, the last King of Armenia, and Pierre de Courtenay,
Emperor of Constantinople--all kneeling like the poor folks of to-day,
and like them beseeching Notre Dame de Sous-Terre."
And what was more interesting still was that the Virgin had wrought many
miracles on this spot. She had saved children who had fallen into the
well of the Strong Saints, had preserved the guardians who had charge of
the relic of Her garment when the edifice was blazing above them, and
had cured crowds, half maddened by the Burning plague in the Middle
Ages, shedding Her benefits with a lavish hand.
Times were changed indeed, but fervent worshippers had knelt before the
Image, had relinked the bonds broken in the course of years, had, so to
speak, recaptured the Virgin in a net of prayer; and so, instead of
departing, as She had done elsewhere, She had remained at Chartres.
By some incredible effect of clemency She had endured the insult of the
tenth-day festivals and the outrage of seeing the Goddess of Reason
installed in her place on the altar, had suffered the infamous liturgy
of obscene canticles rising with the thundering incense of gunpowder.
And She had forgiven it all, no doubt for the sake of the love shown Her
by preceding generations, and the awed, but real affection of the humble
believers who had come back to Her when the storm was over.
This cavern was crowded with memories. The coating of those walls had
been formed of the vapours of the soul, of the exhalations of
accumulated desires and regrets, even more than of the smoke of tapers;
how foolish it was then to have painted this crypt in squalid imitation
of the catacombs, to have defaced the glorious darkness of these stones
with colours which were indeed fast vanishing, leaving only traces as of
palette scrapings in the consecrated soot on the roof!
Durtal was expatiating on these reflections as he went out of the
garden, when he met the Abbé Gévresin walking along and reading his
breviary. He asked whether Durtal had taken the Sacrament. And
perceiving that his penitent always came back to his shame of the inert
and torpid grief that came over him in contemplation of the Holy
Sacrament, the old priest said to him,--
"That is no concern of yours; all you have to do is to pray to the best
of your power. The rest is my concern--if the far from triumphant state
of your soul only makes you a little humble, that is all I ask of you."
"Humble! I am like a water cooler; my vanity sweats out at every pore as
the water oozes from the clay."
"It is some consolation to me that you perceive it," said the Abbé,
smiling. "It would be far worse if you did not know yourself, if you
were so proud as to believe that you had no pride."
"But how then am I to set to work? You advise me to pray; but teach me
at least how not to dissipate myself in every direction, for as soon as
I try to collect myself I go to pieces; I live in a perpetual state of
dissolution. It is like a thing arranged on purpose; as soon as I try to
shut the cage all my thoughts fly off--they deafen me with their
chirping."
The Abbé was thinking.
"I know," said he; "nothing is more difficult than to free the spirit
from the images that take possession of it. Still, and in spite of all,
you may achieve concentration of mind if you observe these three rules:
"In the first place you must humble yourself, by owning the frailty of
your mind, unable to preserve itself from wandering in the presence of
God; next you must not be impatient or restless, for that would only
stir up the dregs and bring other objects of frivolity to the surface;
finally, it is well not to investigate the nature of the distractions
that trouble your prayers till they are over. This only prolongs the
disturbance, and in a way recognizes its existence. You thus run the
risk, in virtue of the law of association of ideas, of inviting new
diversions, and there would be no way of escape.
"After prayer you may examine yourself with benefit; follow my advice,
and you will find the advantage of it."
"That is all very fine," thought Durtal, "but when it comes to putting
the advice into practice it is quite another thing. Are not these mere
old women's remedies, precious ointments, quack medicines, for which the
pious and virtuous have a weakness?"
They walked on in silence across the forecourt of the palace to the
priest's rooms. As they went in, they found Madame Bavoil at the foot of
the stairs, her arms in a tub full of soap-suds. As she rubbed the
clothes, she turned to look at Durtal, and, as if she could read his
thoughts, she mildly asked,--
"Why, our friend, wear such a graveyard face when you took the Sacrament
this morning?"
"So you heard I had been to Communion?"
"Yes, I went into the crypt while Mass was going forward, and saw you go
up to the Holy Table. Well, shall I tell you the truth? You do not know
how to address our Holy Mother."
"Indeed!"
"No. You are shy when She is doing her best to put you at your ease; you
creep close to the wall when you ought to walk boldly up the middle
aisle to face Her. That is not the way to approach Her!"
"But if I have nothing to say to Her?"
"Then you simply chatter to Her like a child; some pretty speech, and
She is satisfied. Oh, these men! How little they know how to pay their
court, how greatly they lack little coaxing ways, and even honest
artfulness! If you can invent nothing on your own part, borrow from
another. Repeat after the Venerable Jeanne de Matel:
"'Holy Virgin, this abyss of iniquity and vileness invokes the abyss of
strength and splendour to praise Thy preeminent Glory.' Well, is that
pretty well expressed, our friend? Try; recite that to Our Lady and She
will unbind you; then prayer will come of itself. Such little ways are
permitted by Her, and we must be humble enough not to presume to do
without them."
Durtal could not help laughing.
"You want me to become a trickster, a sneak in spiritual life!" said he.
"Well, where would be the harm? Does not the Lord know when we mean
well? Does not He take note of our intentions? Would you, yourself,
repulse anyone who paid you a compliment, however clumsily, if you
thought he meant to please you by it? No, of course not."
"Here is another thing," said the Abbé, laughing. "Madame Bavoil, I saw
Monseigneur this morning; he grants your petition and authorizes you to
dig in as many parts of the garden as you choose."
"Aha!" and amused by Durtal's surprise she went on: "You must have seen
for yourself that excepting a little plot of ground where the gardener
plants a few carrots and cabbages for the Bishop's table, the whole of
the garden is left to run wild; it is sheer waste and of no use to
anybody. Now instead of buying vegetables, I mean to grow some, since
Monseigneur gives me leave to turn over his ground, and by the same
token I will give some to your housekeeper."
"Thank you. Then do you understand gardening?"
"I? Why, am I not a peasant? I have lived in the country all my life,
and a kitchen garden is just my business! Besides, if I were in
difficulties, would not my Friends Above come to advise me?"
"You are a wonderful woman, Madame Bavoil," said Durtal, somewhat
disconcerted in spite of himself by the answers of a cook who so calmly
asserted that she was on intimate terms with the divine Beyond.