BOOK IV: THE MILLIPEDE

“_Et je ne puis approuver que ceux qui cherchent en gémissant._”

--PASCAL, 3421.

I

Amédée Fleurissoire had left Pau with five hundred francs in his pocket.

This, he thought, would certainly suffice him for his journey,

notwithstanding the extra expenses, to which the Lodge’s wickedness

would no doubt put him. And if, after all, this amount proved

insufficient--if he found himself obliged to prolong his stay, he would

have recourse to Blafaphas, who was keeping a small sum in reserve for

him.

As no one at Pau was to know where he was going, he had not taken his

ticket further than Marseilles. From Marseilles to Rome a third-class

ticket cost only thirty-eight francs, forty centimes, and left him free

to break his journey if he chose--an option of which he took advantage,

to satisfy, not his curiosity for foreign parts, which had never been

lively, but his desire for sleep, which was inordinately strong. There

was nothing he feared so much as insomnia, and as it was important to

the Church that he should arrive at Rome in good trim, he would not

consider the two days’ delay or the additional expense of the hotel

bills.... What was that in comparison to spending a night in the

train?--a night that would certainly be sleepless, and particularly

dangerous to health on account of the other travellers’ breaths; and

then if one of them wanted to renew the air and took it into his head to

open a window, that meant catching a cold for certain.... He would

therefore spend the first night at Marseilles and the second at Genoa,

in one of those hotels that are found in the neighbourhood of the

station, and are comfortable without being over-grand.

For the rest he was amused by the journey and at making it by

himself--at last! For, at the age of forty-seven, he had never lived but

in a state of tutelage, escorted everywhere by his wife and his friend

Blafaphas. Tucked up in his corner of the carriage, he sat with a faint

goat-like smile on his face, wishing himself Godspeed. All went well as

far as Marseilles.

On the second day he made a false start. Absorbed in the perusal of the

Baedeker for Central Italy which he had just bought, he got into the

wrong train and headed straight for Lyons; it was only at Arles that he

noticed his mistake, just as the train was starting, so that he was

obliged to go on to Tarascon and come back over the same ground for the

second time; then he took an evening train as far as Toulon rather than

spend another night at Marseilles, where he had been pestered with bugs.

And yet the room which looked on to the Cannebière had not been

uninviting, nor the bed either, for that matter; he had got into it

without misgivings, after having folded his clothes, done his accounts

and said his prayers. He was dropping with sleep and went off at once.

The manners and customs of bugs are peculiar; they wait till the candle

is out, and then, as soon as it is dark, sally forth--not at random;

they make straight for the neck, the place of their predilection;

sometimes they select the wrists; a few rare ones prefer the ankles. It

is not exactly known for what reason they inject into the sleeper’s skin

an exquisitely irritating oily substance, the virulence of which is

intensified by the slightest rubbing....

The irritation which awoke Fleurissoire was so violent that he lit his

candle again and hurried to the looking-glass to gaze at his lower jaw,

where there appeared an irregular patch of red dotted with little white

spots; but the smoky dip gave a bad light; the silver of the glass was

tarnished and his eyes were blurred with sleep.... He went back to bed

still rubbing and put out his light; five minutes later he lit it again,

for the itching had become intolerable, sprang to the wash-hand-stand,

wetted his handkerchief in his water jug and applied it to the inflamed

zone, which had greatly extended and now reached as far as his

collar-bone. Amédée thought he was going to be ill and offered up a

prayer; then he put out his candle once more. The respite which the cool

compress had granted him lasted too short a time to permit the sufferer

to go to sleep; and there was added now to the agony of the itching, the

discomfort of having the collar of his night-shirt drenched with water;

he drenched it, too, with his tears. And suddenly he started with

horror--bugs! it was bugs!... He was surprised that he had not thought

of them sooner; but he knew the insect only by name, and how was it

possible to imagine that a definite bite could result in this

indefinable burning? He shot out of his bed and for the third time lit

his candle.

Being of a nervous and theoretical disposition, his ideas about bugs,

like many other people’s, were all wrong; cold with disgust, he began by

searching for them on himself--found ne’er a one--thought he had made a

mistake--again believed that he must be falling ill. There was nothing

on his sheets either; but nevertheless, before getting into bed again,

it occurred to him to lift up his bolster. He then saw three tiny

blackish pastilles, which tucked themselves nimbly away into a fold of

the sheet. It was they, sure enough!

Setting his candle on the bed, he tracked them down, opened out the fold

and discovered five of them. Not daring to squash them with his

finger-nail, he flung them in disgust into his chamber-pot and watered

them copiously. He watched them struggling for a few moments--pleased

and ferocious. It soothed his feelings. Then he got back into bed and

blew out his candle.

The bites began again almost immediately with redoubled violence. There

were new ones now on the back of his neck. He lighted his candle once

more in a rage and took his night-shirt right off this time so as to

examine the collar at his leisure. At last he perceived four or five

minute light red specks running along the edge of the seam; he crushed

them on the linen, where they left a stain of blood--horrid little

creatures, so tiny that he could hardly believe that they were bugs

already; but a little later, on raising his bolster again, he unearthed

an enormous one--their mother for certain; at that, encouraged, excited,

amused almost, he took off the bolster, undid the sheets and began a

methodical search. He fancied now that he saw them everywhere, but as a

matter of fact caught only four; he went back to bed and enjoyed an

hour’s peace.

Then the burning and itching began again. Once more he started the hunt;

then, worn out at last with disgust and fatigue, gave it up, and noticed

that if he did not scratch, the itching subsided pretty quickly. At dawn

the last of the creatures, presumably gorged, let him be. He was

sleeping heavily when the waiter called him in time for his train.

* * * * *

At Toulon it was fleas.

He picked them up in the train, no doubt. All night long he scratched

himself, turning from side to side without sleeping. He felt them

creeping up and down his legs, tickling the small of his back,

inoculating him with fever. As he had a sensitive skin, their bites rose

in exuberant swellings, which he inflamed with unrestrained scratching.

He lit his candle over and over again; he got up, took off his

night-shirt and put it on again, without being able to kill a single

one. He hardly caught a fleeting glimpse of them; they continually

escaped him, and even when he succeeded in catching them, when he

thought they were flattened dead beneath his finger-nail, they suddenly

and instantaneously blew themselves out again and hopped away as safe

and lively as ever. He was driven to regretting the bugs. His fury and

exasperation of the useless chase effectually wrecked every possibility

of sleep.

All next day the bites of the previous night itched horribly, while

fresh creepings and ticklings showed him that he was still infested. The

excessive heat considerably increased his discomfort. The carriage was

packed to overflowing with workmen, who drank, smoked, spat, belched and

ate such high-smelling victuals that more than once Fleurissoire thought

he was going to be sick. And yet he did not dare leave the carriage

before reaching the frontier, for fear that the workmen might see him

get into another and imagine they were incommoding him; in the

compartment into which he next got, there was a voluminous wet-nurse,

who was changing her baby’s napkins. He tried nevertheless to sleep; but

then his hat got in his way. It was one of those shallow, white straw

hats with a black ribbon round it, of the kind commonly known as

“sailor.” When Fleurissoire left it in its usual position, its stiff

brim prevented him from leaning his head back against the partition of

the carriage; if, in order to do this, he raised his hat a little, the

partition bumped it forwards; when, on the contrary, he pressed his hat

down behind, the brim was caught between the partition and the back of

his neck, and the sailor rose up over his forehead like the lid of a

valve. He decided at last to take it right off and to cover his head

with his comforter, which he arranged to fall over his eyes so as to

keep out the light. At any rate, he had taken precautions against the

night; at Toulon that morning he had bought a box of insecticide and,

even if he had to pay dear for it, he thought to himself that he would

not hesitate to spend the night in one of the best hotels; for if he had

no sleep that night, in what state of bodily wretchedness would he not

be when he arrived at Rome?--at the mercy of the meanest freemason!

At Genoa he found the omnibuses of the principal hotels drawn

up outside the station; he went straight up to one of the most

comfortable-looking, without letting himself be intimidated by the

haughtiness of the hotel servant, who seized hold of his miserable

portmanteau; but Amédée refused to be parted from it; he would not allow

it to be put on the roof of the carriage, but insisted that it should be

placed next him--there--on the same seat. In the hall of the hotel the

porter put him at his ease by talking French; then he let himself go

and, not content with asking for “a very good room,” inquired the prices

of those that were offered him, determined to find nothing to his liking

for less than twelve francs.

The seventeen-franc room which he settled on after looking at several,

was vast, clean, and elegant without ostentation; the bed stood out from

the wall--a bright brass bed, which was certainly uninhabited, and to

which his precautions would have been an insult. The washstand was

concealed in a kind of enormous cupboard. Two large windows opened on to

a garden; Amédée leant out into the night and gazed long at the

indistinct mass of sombre foliage, letting the cool air calm his fever

and invite him to sleep. From above the bed there hung down a cloudy

veil of tulle, which exactly draped three sides of it, and which was

looped up in a graceful festoon on the fourth by a few little cords,

like those that take in the reefs of a sail. Fleurissoire recognised

that this was what is known as a mosquito net--a device which he had

always disdained to make use of.

After having washed, he stretched himself luxuriously in the cool

sheets. He left the window open--not wide open, of course, for fear of

cold in the head and ophthalmia, but with one side fixed in such a way

as to prevent the night effluvia from striking him directly; did his

accounts, said his prayers and put out the light. (This was electric and

the current was cut off by turning down a switch.)

* * * * *

Fleurissoire was just going off to sleep when a faint humming reminded

him that he had failed to take the precaution of putting out his light

before opening his window; for light attracts mosquitoes. He remembered,

too, that he had somewhere read praises of the Lord, who has bestowed on

this winged insect a special musical instrument, designed to warn the

sleeper the moment before he is going to be stung. Then he let down the

impenetrable muslin barrier all round him. “After all,” thought he to

himself as he was dropping off, “how much better this is than those

little felt cones of dried hay, which old Blafaphas sells under the

quaint name of ‘fidibus’; one lights them on a little metal saucer; as

they burn they give out a quantity of narcotic fumes; but before they

stupefy the mosquitoes, they half stifle the sleeper. Fidibus! What a

funny name! Fidibus....” He was just going off, when suddenly a sharp

sting on the left side of his nose awoke him. He put his hand to the

place and as he was softly stroking the raised and burning

flesh--another sting on his wrist. Then right against his ear there

sounded the mock of an impertinent buzzing.... Horror! he had shut the

enemy up within the citadel! He reached out to the switch and turned on

the light.

Yes! the mosquito was there, settled high up on the net. Amédée was

long-sighted and made him out distinctly; a creature that was wisp-like

to absurdity, planted on four legs, with the other pair sticking out

insolently behind him, long and curly; Amédée sat up on his bed. But how

could he crush the insect against such flimsy, yielding material? No

matter! He gave a hit with the palm of his hand, so hard and so quick

that he thought he had burst a hole in the net. Not the shadow of a

doubt but the mosquito was done for; he glanced down to look for its

corpse; there was nothing--but he felt a fresh sting on the calf of his

leg.

At that, in order to get as much as possible of his person into shelter,

he crept between the sheets and stayed there perhaps a quarter of an

hour, without daring to turn out the light; then, all the same, somewhat

reassured at catching neither sight nor sound of the enemy, he switched

it off. And instantly the music began again.

Then he put out one arm, keeping his hand close to his face, and from

time to time when he thought he felt one well settled on his forehead or

cheek, he would give himself a huge smack. But the second after, he

heard the insect’s sing-song once more.

After this it occurred to him to wrap his head round with his comforter,

which considerably interfered with the pleasure of his respiratory

organs, and did not prevent him from being stung on the chin.

Then the mosquito, gorged, no doubt, lay low; at any rate, Amédée,

vanquished by slumber, ceased to hear it; he had taken off his comforter

and was tossing in a feverish sleep; he scratched as he slept. The next

morning, his nose, which was by nature aquiline, looked like the nose of

a drunkard; the spot on the calf of his leg was budding like a boil and

the one on his chin had developed an appearance that was volcanic--he

recommended it to the particular solicitude of the barber when, before

leaving Genoa, he went to be shaved, so as to be respectable when he

arrived in Rome.

II

At Rome, as he was lingering outside the station, so tired, so lost, so

perplexed that he could not decide what to do, and had only just

strength enough left to repel the advances of the hotel porters,

Fleurissoire was lucky enough to come upon a facchino who spoke French.

Baptistin was a native of Marseilles, a young man with bright eyes and a

chin that was still smooth; he recognised a fellow-countryman in

Fleurissoire, and offered to guide him and carry his portmanteau.

Fleurissoire had spent the long journey mugging up his Baedeker. A kind

of instinct--a presentiment--an inward warning--turned his pious

solicitude aside from the Vatican to concentrate it on the Castle of St.

Angelo (in ancient days Hadrian’s Mausoleum), the celebrated jail which

had sheltered so many illustrious prisoners of yore, and which, it

seems, is connected with the Vatican by an underground passage.

He gazed upon the map. “That is where I must find a lodging,” he had

decided, setting his forefinger on the Tordinona quay, opposite the

Castle of St. Angelo. And by a providential coincidence, that was the

very place where Baptistin proposed to take him; not, that is, exactly

on the quay, which is in reality nothing but an embankment, but quite

near it--Via dei Vecchierelli (of the little old men), which is the

third street after the Ponte Umberto, and leads straight on to the river

bank; he knew of a quiet house (from the windows of the third floor, by

craning forward a little, one can see the Mausoleum) where there were

some very obliging ladies, who talked every language, and one in

particular who knew French.

“If the gentleman is tired, we can take a carriage; yes, it’s a long

way.... Yes, the air is cooler this evening; it’s been raining; a little

walk after a long railway journey does one good.... No, the portmanteau

is not too heavy; I can easily carry it so far.... The gentleman’s first

visit to Rome? He comes from Toulouse, perhaps?... No; from Pau. I ought

to have recognised the accent.”

Thus chatting, they walked along. They took the Via Viminale; then the

Via Agostino Depretis, which runs into the Viminale at the Pincio; then

by way of the Via Nazionale they got into the Corso, which they crossed;

after this their way lay through a number of little streets without any

names. The portmanteau was not so heavy as to prevent the facchino from

stepping out briskly; and Fleurissoire could hardly keep up with him. He

trotted along beside Baptistin, dropping with fatigue and dripping with

heat.

“Here we are!” said Baptistin at last, just as Amédée was going to beg

for quarter.

The street, or rather the alley of the Vecchierelli, was dark and

narrow--so much so that Fleurissoire hesitated to enter it. Baptistin,

in the meantime, had gone into the second house on the right, the door

of which was only a few yards from the quay; at the same moment,

Fleurissoire saw a _bersagliere_ come out; the smart uniform which he

had noticed at the frontier, reassured him--for he had confidence in

the army. He advanced a few steps. A lady appeared on the threshold (the

landlady of the inn apparently) and smiled at him affably. She wore an

apron of black satin, bracelets, and a sky-blue silk ribbon round her

neck; her jet-black hair was piled in an edifice on the top of her head

and sat heavily on an enormous tortoise-shell comb.

“Your portmanteau has been carried up to the third floor,” said she to

Amédée in French, using the intimate “thou,” which he imagined must be

an Italian custom, or must else be set down to want of familiarity with

the language.

“_Grazia!_” he replied, smiling in his turn. “_Grazia!_--thank

you!”--the only Italian word he could say, and which he considered it

polite to put into the feminine when he was talking to a lady.

He went upstairs, stopping to gather breath and courage at every

landing, for he was worn out with fatigue, and the sordidness of the

staircase contributed to sink his spirits still lower. The landings

succeeded each other every ten steps; the stairs hesitated, tacked, made

three several attempts before they managed to reach a floor. From the

ceiling of the first landing hung a canary cage which could be seen from

the street. On to the second landing a mangy cat had dragged a haddock

skin, which she was preparing to bolt. On the third landing the door of

the closet stood wide open and revealed to view the seat, and beside it

a yellow earthenware vase, shaped like a top-hat, from whose cup

protruded the stick of a small mop; on this landing Amédée refrained

from stopping.

On the first floor a smoky gasolene lamp was hanging beside a large

glass door, on which the word _Salone_ was written in frosted letters;

but the room was dark, and Amédée could barely make out through the

glass panes of the door a mirror in a gold frame hanging on the wall

opposite.

He was just reaching the seventh landing, when another soldier--an

artillery man this time--who had come out of a room on the second floor,

bumped up against him; he was running downstairs very fast and, after

setting Amédée on his feet again, passed on, muttering a laughing excuse

in Italian, for Fleurissoire was stumbling from fatigue and looked as if

he were drunk. The first uniform had reassured him, but the second made

him uneasy.

“These soldiers are a noisy lot,” thought he. “Fortunately my room is on

the third floor. I prefer to have them below me.”

He had no sooner passed the second floor than a woman in a gaping

dressing-gown, with her hair undone, came running from the other end of

the passage and hailed him.

“She takes me for someone else,” thought he, and hurried on, turning his

eyes away so as not to embarrass her by noticing the scantiness of her

attire.

He arrived panting on the third floor, where he found Baptistin; he was

talking Italian to a woman of uncertain age, who reminded him

extraordinarily--though she was not so fat--of the Blafaphas’ cook.

“Your portmanteau is in No. sixteen--the third door. Take care as you

pass of the pail which is in the passage.”

“I put it outside because it was leaking,” explained the woman in

French.

The door of No. sixteen was open; outside No. fifteen a tin slop-pail

was standing in the middle of a shiny repugnant-looking puddle, which

Fleurissoire stepped across. An acrid odour emanated from it. The

portmanteau was placed in full view on a chair. As soon as he got inside

the stuffy room, Amédée felt his head swim, and flinging his umbrella,

his shawl and his hat on to the bed, he sank into an arm-chair. His

forehead was streaming; he thought he was going to faint.

“This is Madame Carola, the lady who talks French,” said Baptistin.

They had both come into the room.

“Open the window a little,” sighed Fleurissoire, who was incapable of

movement.

“Goodness! how hot he is!” said Madame Carola, sponging his pallid and

perspiring countenance with a little scented handkerchief, which she

took out of her bodice.

“Let’s push him nearer the window.”

Both together lifted the arm-chair, in which Amédée swung helpless and

half unconscious, and put it down where he was able to inhale--in

exchange for the tainted atmosphere of the passage--the varied stenches

of the street. The coolness, however, revived him. Feeling in his

waistcoat pocket, he pulled out the screw of five lire which he had

prepared for Baptistin:

“Thank you very much. Please leave me now.”

The facchino went out.

“You oughtn’t to have given him such a lot,” said Carola.

She too used the familiar “thou,” which Amédée accepted as a custom of

the country; his one thought now was to go to bed; but Carola showed no

signs of leaving; then, carried away by politeness, he began to talk.

“You speak French as well as a Frenchwoman.”

“No wonder. I come from Paris. And you?”

“I come from the south.”

“I guessed as much. When I saw you, I said to myself, that gentleman

comes from the provinces. Is it your first visit to Italy?”

“My first.”

“Have you come on business?”

“Yes.”

“It’s a lovely place, Rome. There’s a lot to be seen.”

“Yes ... but this evening I’m rather tired,” he ventured; and as though

excusing himself: “I’ve been travelling for three days.”

“It’s a long journey to get here.”

“And I haven’t slept for three nights.”

At those words, Madame Carola, with a sudden Italian familiarity, which

Amédée still couldn’t help being astounded at, chucked him under the

chin.

“Naughty!” said she.

This gesture brought a little blood back into Amédée’s face, and in his

desire to repudiate the unfair insinuation, he at once began to

expatiate on fleas, bugs and mosquitoes.

“You’ll have nothing of that kind here, dearie; you see how clean it

is.”

“Yes; I hope I shall sleep well.”

But still she didn’t go. He rose with difficulty from his arm-chair,

raised his hand to the top button of his waistcoat and said tentatively:

“I think I’ll go to bed.”

Madame Carola understood Fleurissoire’s embarrassment.

“You’d like me to leave you for a bit, I see,” said she tactfully.

As soon as she had gone, Fleurissoire turned the key in the lock, took

his night-shirt out of his portmanteau and got into bed. But apparently

the catch of the lock was not working, for before he had time to blow

out his candle, Carola’s head reappeared in the half-opened door--behind

the bed--close to the bed--smiling....

* * * * *

An hour later, when he came to himself, Carola was lying against him, in

his arms, naked.

He disengaged his left arm, which had “fallen asleep,” and then drew

away. She was asleep. A light from the alley below filled the room with

its feeble glimmer, and not a sound was to be heard but the woman’s

regular breathing. An unwonted languor lay heavy on Amédée’s body and

soul; he drew out his thin legs from between the sheets; and sitting on

the edge of the bed, he wept.

As first his sweat, so now his tears washed his face and mingled with

the dust of the railway carriage; they welled up--silently,

uninterruptedly, in a slow and steady stream, coming from his inmost

depths, as from a hidden spring. He thought of Arnica, of Blafaphas,

alas! Ah! if they could see him now! Never again would he dare to take

his place beside them. Then he thought of his august mission, for ever

compromised; he groaned below his breath:

“It’s over! I’m no longer worthy! Oh! it’s over! It’s all over!”

The strange sounds of his sobbing and sighing had in the meantime

awakened Carola. There he was, kneeling now, at the foot of the bed,

hammering on his weakly chest with little blows of his fist; and Carola,

lost in amazement, heard him repeat, as his teeth chattered and his sobs

shook him:

“Save us! Save us! The Church is crumbling!”

At last, unable to contain herself any longer:

“You poor old dear, what’s wrong with you? Have you gone crazy?”

He turned towards her:

“Please, Madame Carola, leave me. I must--I absolutely must be alone.

I’ll see you to-morrow morning.”

Then, as after all it was only himself that he blamed, he kissed her

gently on the shoulder:

“Ah! you don’t know what a dreadful thing we’ve done. No, no! You don’t

know. You can never know.”

III

The swindling concern that went under the pompous name of _Crusade for

the Deliverance of the Pope_, extended its shady ramifications through

more than one of the French departments; Protos, the false monk of

Virmontal, was not its only agent, nor the Comtesse de Saint-Prix its

only victim. All its victims, however, were not equally accommodating,

even if all the agents proved equally dexterous. Even Protos, Lafcadio’s

old school-mate, was obliged, after this exploit of his, to keep the

sharpest possible look-out; he lived in continual apprehension that the

clergy (the real clergy) would get wind of the affair, and expended as

much ingenuity in covering his rear as in pushing his attack; but his

versatility was great, and, moreover, he was admirably seconded; from

one end to the other of the band (which went by the name of the

Millipede) there reigned extraordinary harmony and discipline.

Protos was informed that same evening by Baptistin of the stranger’s

arrival, and no little alarmed at hearing that he came from Pau, he

hurried off at seven o’clock the next morning to see Carola. She was

still in bed.

The information which he gathered from her, the confused account that

she gave of the events of the previous night, the anguish of the

_pilgrim_ (this was what she called Amédée), his protestations, his

tears, left no further doubt in his mind. Decidedly his Pau preachifying

had brought forth fruit--but not precisely the kind of fruit which

Protos might have wished for; he would have to keep an eye on this

simple-minded crusader, whose clumsy blunderings might give the whole

show away....

“Come! let me pass,” said he abruptly to Carola.

This expression might seem peculiar, because Carola was lying in bed;

but Protos was never one to be stopped by the peculiar. He put one knee

on the bed, passed the other over the woman’s body and pirouetted so

cleverly that, with a slight push of the bed, he found himself between

it and the wall. Carola was no doubt accustomed to this performance, for

she asked simply:

“What are you going to do?”

“Make up as a _curé_,” answered Protos, no less simply.

“Will you come back this way?”

Protos hesitated a moment, and then:

“You’re right; it’s more natural.”

So saying, he stooped and touched the spring of a secret door, which

was concealed in the thickness of the wall and was so low that the bed

hid it completely. Just as he was passing through the door, Carola

seized him by the shoulder.

“Listen,” she said with a kind of gravity, “you’re not to hurt this one.

I won’t have it.”

“I tell you I’m going to make up as a _curé_.”

As soon as he had disappeared, Carola got up and began to dress.

I cannot exactly tell what to think of Carola Venitequa. This

exclamation of hers leads me to suppose that her heart at that time was

not altogether fundamentally corrupt. Thus sometimes, in the very midst

of abjection, the strangest delicacies of feelings suddenly reveal

themselves, just as an azure tinted flower will grow in the middle of a

dung-heap. Essentially submissive and devoted, Carola, like so many

other women, had need of guidance. When Lafcadio had abandoned her, she

had immediately rushed off to find her old lover, Protos--out of

spite--out of self-assertion--to revenge herself. She had once more gone

through hard times--and Protos had no sooner recovered her than he had

once more made her his tool. For Protos liked being master.

Another man than Protos might have raised, rehabilitated this woman. But

first of all, he must have had the wish to. Protos, on the contrary,

seemed bent on degrading her. We have seen what shameful services the

ruffian demanded of her; it is true that she apparently submitted to

them without much reluctance; but the first impulses of a soul in revolt

against the ignominy of its lot, often pass unperceived by that very

soul itself. It is only in the light of love that the secret kicking

against the pricks is revealed. Was Carola falling in love with Amédée?

It would be rash to affirm it; but, corrupt as she was, she had been

touched to emotion by the contact of his purity, and the exclamation

which I have recorded came indubitably from her heart.

Protos returned. He had not changed his dress. He carried in his hand a

bundle of clothes, which he put down on a chair.

“Well! and now what?” she asked.

“I’ve reflected. I must first go round to the post and look at his

letters. I won’t change till this afternoon. Pass me your

looking-glass.”

He went to the window, and bending towards his reflection in the glass,

he fastened to his lip a pair of short brown moustaches, a trifle

lighter than his hair.

“Call Baptistin.”

Carola had finished dressing. She went to the door and pulled a string

hanging near it.

“I’ve already told you I can’t bear to see you in those sleeve-links.

They attract attention.”

“You know very well who gave them to me.”

“Precisely.”

“You aren’t jealous, are you?”

“Silly fool!”

At this moment Baptistin knocked at the door and came in.

“Here! Try and get up in the world a peg or two,” said Protos, pointing

to a coat, collar and tie, which were lying on the chair and which he

had brought back with him from his expedition to the other side of the

wall. “You’re to keep your client company in his walks abroad. I shan’t

take him off your hands till this evening. Until then, don’t lose sight

of him.”

* * * * *

It was to S. Luigi dei Francesche that Amédée went to confess, in

preference to St. Peter’s, whose enormousness overwhelmed him. Baptistin

guided him there, and afterwards led him to the post office. As was to

be expected, the Millipede had confederates there too. Baptistin had

learnt Amédée’s name by means of the little visiting-card which was

nailed on to the top of his portmanteau, and had informed Protos, who

had no difficulty in getting an obliging employé to hand him over a

letter of Arnica’s--and no scruple in reading it.

“It’s curious!” cried Fleurissoire, when an hour later he came in his

turn to ask for his letters. “It’s curious! The envelope looks as if it

had been opened.”

“That often happens here,” said Baptistin phlegmatically.

Fortunately the prudent Arnica had ventured only on the most discreet of

allusions. The letter, besides, was very short; she simply recommended

Amédée, on the advice of Father Mure, to go to Naples and see Cardinal

San-Felice S.B. “before attempting to do anything.” Her expressions were

as vague as could well be desired and in consequence as little

compromising.

IV

When he found himself in front of the Castle of St. Angelo, Fleurissoire

was filled with bitter disappointment. The huge mass of building rose

from the middle of an inner court-yard, access to which was forbidden

to the public, and into which only such visitors as were provided with

cards were allowed to enter. It was even specified that they must be

accompanied by one of the guardians.

These excessive precautions, to be sure, confirmed Amédée’s suspicions,

but they also enabled him to estimate the extravagant difficulty of his

task. Fleurissoire then, having at last got rid of Baptistin, was

wandering up and down the quay, which was almost deserted at that hour

of the evening, and alongside the outer wall which defends the approach

to the castle. Backwards and forwards in front of the drawbridge, he

passed and repassed, with gloomy and despondent thoughts; then he would

retreat once more to the bank of the Tiber and endeavour from there to

get a better view of the building over the top of the first enclosure.

He had not hitherto paid any particular attention to a priest (there are

so many of them in Rome) who was sitting on a bench not far from there,

and who, though apparently plunged in his breviary, had been observing

him for some time past. The worthy ecclesiastic had long and abundant

locks of silver, and the freshness of his youthful complexion--the sure

sign of purity of life--contrasted curiously with that apanage of old

age. From the face alone one would have recognised a priest, and from

that peculiarly respectable something which distinguishes him--a French

priest. As Fleurissoire was about to pass by the bench for the third

time, the _abbé_ suddenly rose, came towards him, and in a voice which

had in it something of a sob:

“What!” he said, “I am not the only one! You too are seeking him!”

So saying, he hid his face in his hands and the sobs which he had been

too long controlling burst forth. Then suddenly recovering himself:

“Imprudent! Imprudent that I am! Hide your tears! Stifle your sighs!”

... Then, seizing Amédée by the arm: “We must not stay here, Sir. We are

observed. The emotion I am unable to master has been remarked already.”

Amédée by this time was following him in a state of stupefaction.

“But how,” he at last managed to ask, “how could you guess what I am

here for?”

“Pray Heaven that no one else has been permitted to suspect it! But how

could your anxious face, your sorrowful looks, as you examined this

spot, escape the notice of one who has haunted it day and night for the

last three weeks? Alas! my dear sir, as soon as I saw you, some

presentiment, some warning from on high, told me that a sister soul....

Hush! Someone is coming. For Heaven’s sake, pretend complete unconcern.”

A man carrying vegetables was coming along the quay from the opposite

direction. Immediately, without changing his tone of voice, but speaking

in a slightly more animated manner, and as if he were continuing a

sentence:

“And that is why Virginia cigars, which some smokers appreciate so

highly, can be lighted only at the flame of a candle, after you have

removed the thin straw, that goes through the middle of them, and whose

object is to keep open a little channel in which the smoke can circulate

freely. A Virginia that doesn’t draw well is fit for nothing but to be

thrown away. I have seen smokers who are particular as to what they

smoke, throw away as many as six, my dear sir, before finding one that

suits them....”

And as soon as the man had passed them:

“Did you see how he looked at us? It was essential to put him off the

scent.”

“What!” cried Fleurissoire, flabbergasted, “is it possible that a common

market gardener can be one of the persons of whom we must beware?”

“I cannot certify that it is so, sir, but I imagine it. The

neighbourhood of this castle is watched with particular care; agents of

a special police are continually patrolling it. In order not to arouse

suspicion, they assume the most varied disguises. The people we have to

deal with are so clever--so clever! And we so credulous, so naturally

confiding! But if I were to tell you, sir, that I was within an ace of

ruining everything simply because I gave my modest luggage to an

ordinary-looking facchino to carry from the station to the lodging where

I am staying! He spoke French, and though I have spoken Italian fluently

ever since I was a child ... you yourself, I am persuaded, would have

felt the same emotion.... I couldn’t help giving way to it when I heard

someone speaking my mother tongue in a foreign land.... Well! This

facchino....”

“Was he one of them?”

“He was one of them. I was able to make practically sure of it.

Fortunately I had said very little.”

“You fill me with alarm,” said Fleurissoire; “the same thing happened to

me the evening I arrived--yesterday, that is--I fell in with a guide to

whom I entrusted my portmanteau, and who talked French.”

“Good heavens!” cried the _curé_, struck with terror; “could his name

have been Baptistin?”

“Baptistin! That was it!” wailed Amédée, who felt his knees giving way

beneath him.

“Unhappy man! What did you say to him?” The _curé_ pressed his arm.

“Nothing that I can remember.”

“Think! Think! Try to remember, for Heaven’s sake!”

“No, really!” stammered Amédée, terrified; “I don’t think I said

anything to him.”

“What did you let out?”

“No, nothing, I assure you. But you do well to warn me.”

“What hotel did he take you to?”

“I’m not in a hotel. I’m in private lodgings.”

“God save us! But you must be somewhere.”

“Oh, I’m in a little street which you certainly don’t know,” stuttered

Fleurissoire, in great confusion. “It’s of no consequence. I won’t stay

on there.”

“Be very careful! If you leave suddenly, it’ll look as if you suspected

something.”

“Yes, perhaps it will. You’re right. I had better not leave at once.”

“How I thank a merciful Heaven that you arrived in Rome to-day! One day

later and I should have missed you! To-morrow--no later than

to-morrow--I’m obliged to leave for Naples in order to see a saintly and

important personage, who is secretly devoting himself to the cause.”

“Could it be the Cardinal San-Felice?” asked Fleurissoire, trembling

with emotion.

The _curé_ took a step or two back in amazement:

“How did you know?” Then drawing nearer: “But why should I be

astonished? He is the only person in Naples who is in the secret.”

“Do you ... know him?”

“Do I know him? Alas! my dear sir, it is to him I owe.... But no matter!

Were you thinking of going to see him?”

“I suppose so; if I must.”

“He is the best of men....” With a rapid whisk of his hand, he wiped the

corner of his eye. “You know where to find him, of course?”

“I suppose anyone could tell me. Everyone knows him in Naples.”

“Naturally! But I don’t suppose you are going to inform all Naples of

your visit. Surely, you can’t have been told of his participation in ...

you know what, and perhaps entrusted with some message for him, without

having been instructed at the same time how to gain access to him.”

“Pardon me,” said Fleurissoire timidly, for Arnica had given him no such

instructions.

“What! were you meaning to go and see him straight off--in the

archbishop’s palace, perhaps!--and speak to him point-blank?”

“I confess that....”

“But are you aware, sir,” went on the other severely, “are you aware

that you run the risk of getting _him_ imprisoned too?”

He seemed so deeply vexed that Fleurissoire did not dare to speak.

“So sacred a cause confided to such imprudent hands!” murmured Protos,

and he took the end of a rosary out of his pocket, then put it back

again, then crossed himself feverishly; then turning to his companion:

“Pray tell me, sir, who asked you to concern yourself with this matter.

Whose instructions are you obeying?”

“Forgive me, Monsieur l’abbé,” said Fleurissoire in some confusion, “I

was given no instructions by anyone. I am just a poor distraught soul

seeking on my own behalf.”

These humble words disarmed the _curé_; he held out his hand to

Fleurissoire:

“I spoke to you roughly.... But such dangers surround us.” Then, after a

short hesitation:

“Look here! Will you come with me to-morrow? We will go and see my

friend together....” and raising his eyes to Heaven: “Yes, I dare to

call him my friend,” he repeated in a heartfelt voice. “Let’s sit down

for a minute on this bench. I will write him a line which we will both

sign, to give him notice of our visit. If it is posted before six

o’clock (eighteen o’clock, as they say here), he will get it to-morrow

morning in time for him to be ready to receive us by twelve; we might

even, I dare say, have lunch with him.”

They sat down. Protos took a note-book from his pocket, and under

Amédée’s haggard eyes began on a virgin sheet as follows:

“Dear old cock....”

Then, seeing the other’s stupefaction, he smiled very calmly:

“So, it’s the Cardinal you’d have addressed if you’d had your way?”

After that he became more amicable and consented to explain things to

Amédée: once a week the Cardinal San-Felice was in the habit of leaving

the archbishop’s palace in the dress of a simple _abbé_; he became plain

chaplain Bardolotti and made his way to a modest villa on the slopes of

Mount Vomero, where he received a few intimate friends, and the secret

letters which the initiated addressed him under his assumed name. But

even in this vulgar disguise, he could feel no security--he could not be

sure that his letters were not opened in the post, and begged therefore

that nothing of any significance should be said in any letter and that

the tone of a letter should in no way suggest his Eminence, or have in

it the slightest trace of respect.

Now that he was let into the secret, Amédée smiled in his turn.

“‘Dear old cock’.... Let me think! What shall we say to the dear old

cock?” joked the _abbé_, hesitating with pencil in hand. “Ah!... ‘I’ve

got a funny old chap in tow!’ (Yes, yes! It’s all right! I know the kind

of style.) ‘I’ll bring him along, so dig out a bottle or two of

Falernian and to-morrow we three will have a party.’ ... Here! you sign

too.”

“Perhaps I’d better not sign my own name.”

“Oh, it doesn’t matter about yours,” returned Protos, and after the name

of Amédée Fleurissoire he wrote the word _Cave_.[G]

“Oh, that’s very clever!”

“What! are you astonished at my signing the name _Cave_? Your head is

full of nothing but the Vatican _Cave_. You must know, my good Monsieur

Fleurissoire, that _Cave_ is a Latin word too, and that it means

BEWARE!”

All this was said in so potent and so strange a tone that poor Amédée

felt a cold shiver run down his spine. It lasted only a second; Father

Cave had already recovered his affability when he handed him the

envelope on which he had just inscribed the Cardinal’s apocryphal

address.

“Will you post it yourself? It’s more prudent; _curés’_ letters are

opened. And now we’d better part; we mustn’t be seen together any

longer. Let’s agree to meet to-morrow morning in the train that leaves

for Naples at seven-thirty. Third class of course. I shall not be in

this dress, naturally. What an idea! You must look out for just an

ordinary Calabrian peasant. (I don’t want to have to cut my hair.)

Good-bye! Good-bye!”

He went off, making little signs with his hand.

“Thanks be to Heaven that I met that excellent _abbé_!” murmured

Fleurissoire as he returned homewards. “What should I have done without

him?”

And Protos murmured as he went:

“You shall have a jolly good dose of your Cardinal, my boy!... Why, if

he had been left to himself, I’m hanged if he wouldn’t have gone to see

the _real_ one.”

V

As Fleurissoire complained of great fatigue, Carola had allowed him to

sleep that night notwithstanding the interest she took in him and the

tender compassion she was thrown into when he confessed his ignorance in

the matter of love ... sleep, that is, as much as he was able for the

intolerable itching of the bites--fleas’ as well as mosquitoes’--which

covered his whole body.

“You oughtn’t to scratch like that, dearie,” she said to him the next

morning, “you only irritate it. Oh, how inflamed this one is!” and she

touched the spot on his chin. Then as he was getting ready to go out:

“Here! wear these in remembrance of me.” And she fastened the grotesque

trinkets which Protos had objected to her wearing, into the _pilgrim’s_

cuffs. Amédée promised to come back the same evening, or at latest the

next morning.

“You’ll swear that you’ll not hurt him?” repeated Carola a moment later

to Protos, who had come through the secret door already disguised; and

as he was late because he had waited for Fleurissoire to leave before

showing himself, he was obliged to take a carriage to the station.

In his new aspect, with his open shirt, his brown breeches, his sandals,

laced over his blue stockings, his short pipe and his tan-coloured hat

with its small flat brim, it must be admitted that he looked far more

like a regular Abruzzi brigand than like a _curé_. Fleurissoire, who was

walking up and down the platform waiting for him, hesitated to recognise

the individual who, like St. Peter Martyr, with a finger on his lips,

passed by him without seeming to see him and disappeared into a carriage

at the head of the train. But after a moment he reappeared at the door

of the carriage, and looking in Amédée’s direction with one eye half

shut, he made him a surreptitious sign with his hand to come up; and as

Amédée was about to get in:

“Please see whether there’s anyone next door,” whispered Protos.

No one; and their compartment was the last in the carriage.

“I was following you in the street,” went on Protos; “but I wouldn’t

speak to you for fear that we might be seen together.”

“How is it that I didn’t see you?” asked Fleurissoire. “I turned round a

dozen times to make sure that I wasn’t being followed. Your conversation

yesterday filled me with such terror that I see nothing but spies

everywhere.”

“Yes, you show that you do only too clearly. Do you think it’s natural

to turn round every twenty paces?”

“What? Really? Do I look ...?”

“Suspicious. Alas! That’s the word--suspicious. It’s the most

compromising look you can have.”

“And yet I didn’t even discover that you were following me! On the other

hand, I see something disquieting in the appearance of everyone I pass

in the street. It alarms me if they look at me, and if they don’t look

at me they seem as if they were pretending not to see me. I didn’t

realise till to-day how rarely people’s presence in the street is

justifiable. There aren’t more than four out of twelve whose occupation

is obvious. Ah! You have given me food for thought, and no mistake! For

a naturally credulous soul like mine suspicion is not easy; it’s an

apprenticeship....”

“Pooh! You’ll get accustomed to it--quickly too; you’ll see; in a short

time it’ll become a habit--a habit, alas! Which I’ve been obliged to

adopt myself.... The main thing is to look cheerful all the time. Ah! A

word to the wise! When you’re afraid you’re being followed, don’t turn

round; just merely drop your stick or your umbrella (according to the

weather) or your handkerchief, and as you pick it up--whatever it may

be--while your head is down, look between your legs behind you, in a

natural kind of way. I advise you to practise. But tell me. What do you

think of me in this costume? I’m afraid the _curé_ may show through in

places.”

“Don’t worry,” said Fleurissoire candidly; “no one but I, I’m sure,

could see what you are.” Then, looking him up and down benevolently,

with his head a little on one side: “Evidently, when I examine you

carefully, I can see a slight touch of the ecclesiastic behind your

disguise--I can distinguish beneath the joviality of your voice the

sickening anxiety which is tormenting us both. But what self-control you

must have to let it show so little! As for me, I have still a great deal

to learn, it’s clear. Your advice....”

“What curious sleeve-links you have!” interrupted Protos, amused at

seeing Carola’s links on Fleurissoire.

“They’re a present,” he said, blushing.

The heat was sweltering. Protos was looking out of the window; “Monte

Cassino,” he said; “can you see the celebrated convent up there?”

“Yes, I see it,” said Fleurissoire absently.

“You don’t care much for scenery, then?”

“Yes, yes, I do care for it! But how can I take an interest in anything

as long as I’m so uneasy? It’s the same at Rome with the sights. I’ve

seen nothing; I’ve not tried to see anything.”

“How well I understand you!” said Protos. “I’m like that too; I told you

that ever since I’ve been in Rome I’ve spent the whole of my time

between the Vatican and the Castle of St. Angelo.”

“It’s a pity, but _you_ know Rome already.”

In this way our travellers chatted.

At Caserta they got down, and went each on his own account to the

buffet, to get a sandwich or two and a drink.

“At Naples too,” said Protos, “when we get near his villa we will part

company, if you please. You must follow me at a distance; I shall want a

little time first, especially if he isn’t alone, to explain who you are

and the object of your visit, so you mustn’t come in till a quarter of

an hour after me.”

“I’ll take the opportunity of getting shaved. I hadn’t time this

morning.”

A tram took them as far as the Piazza Dante.

“Let’s part here,” said Protos. “It’s still rather a long way off, but

it’s better so. Walk about fifty paces behind me; and don’t look at me

the whole time as if you were afraid of losing me; and don’t turn round

either; you would get yourself followed. Look cheerful.”

He started off in front. Fleurissoire followed with downcast eyes. The

street was narrow and steep; the sun blazed; sweating, hustling,

effervescing, the crowd clamoured and gesticulated and sang, while

Fleurissoire panted bewildered through their midst. A number of

half-naked children were dancing in front of a barrel organ; a kind of

mountebank was getting up an impromptu lottery at two-sous the ticket,

for a fat plucked turkey, which he was holding up at the end of a stick;

Protos, to seem more natural, took a ticket as he passed, and

disappeared into the crowd; Fleurissoire, unable to advance, thought he

had lost him for good; then, after he had managed to get through the

obstruction, he caught sight of him again, walking briskly up the hill,

with the turkey under his arm.

At last the houses became smaller and further apart, fewer people were

to be seen, and Protos slackened his pace. He stopped in front of a

barber’s shop and, turning to Fleurissoire, winked his eye; then, twenty

paces further on, stopped again in front of a little low door and rang

the bell.

The barber’s window was not particularly attractive but Father Cave

doubtless had his reasons for pointing it out; moreover, Fleurissoire

would have had to go a long way back before finding another, which would

no doubt have been equally uninviting. The door was left open on account

of the excessive heat; a wide-meshed curtain kept the flies out and let

the air in; one had to raise it to go in; he entered.

Truly, a skilful fellow, this barber! After soaping Amédée’s chin, he

cautiously pushed aside the lather with a corner of his towel and

brought to light the fiery pimple, which his nervous client pointed out

to him. Oh, somnolence! Oh, warmth and drowsiness of the quiet little

shop! Amédée, half lying in the leather arm-chair, with his head leaning

comfortably back, let himself drift. Ah! just for one short moment to

forget! To think no more of the Pope and the mosquitoes and Carola! To

imagine himself back to Pau with Arnica; to imagine himself

somewhere--anywhere else--no longer to know where he was!... He shut his

eyes, then half opening them, saw as in a dream on the wall opposite

him, a woman with streaming hair issuing out of the Bay of Naples, and

bringing up from the watery depths, together with a voluptuous sensation

of coolness, a glittering bottle of hair-restorer. Above this

advertisement were arranged, on a marble slab, more bottles, a stick of

cosmetic and a powder puff, a pair of tweezers, a comb, a lancet, a pot

of ointment, a glass jar in which a few leeches were indolently

floating, a second glass jar which contained the long ribbon of a

tapeworm and lately a third jar which was without a lid, half full of

some gelatinous substance, and had pasted on its crystalline surface a

label, inscribed by hand, in large fancy capitals, with the word

ANTISEPTIC.

The barber now, in order to bring his work to perfection, spread afresh

an unctuous lather over the already shaven chin, and with the gleaming

edge of a second rasor, which he sharpened on the palm of his damp hand,

he set about his final polishing. Amédée thought no more of his

appointment, thought no more of leaving, began to doze off.... It was

just at this moment that there came into the shop a loud-voiced

Sicilian, rending the peacefulness with his clatter; it was then that

the barber, plunging at once into talk, began to shave with a less

attentive hand, and with a sudden sweep of his blade--pop! the pimple

was beheaded!

Amédée gave a cry and was putting his hand to the cut, from which a drop

of blood came oozing:

“_Niente! Niente!_” said the barber, holding back his arm; then, taking

a piece of discoloured cotton-wool from the back of the drawer, he

lavishly dipped it into the ANTISEPTIC and applied it to the place.

Without caring now whether the passers-by turned to look at him, Amédée

fled down the hill towards the town--where else but to the first

druggist’s he could find?

He showed his hurt to the man of healing--a mouldy, greenish,

unhealthy-looking old fellow, who smiled and, taking a little round of

sticking-plaster out of a box, passed his broad tongue over it and....

Flinging out of the shop, Fleurissoire spat with disgust, tore off the

slimy plaster and, pressing his pimple between two fingers, made it

bleed as much as he could. Then, having wetted his handkerchief with

saliva--his own this time--he rubbed the place. Then, looking at his

watch, he was seized with panic, rushed up the street at a run, and

arrived in front of the Cardinal’s door, perspiring, panting, bleeding,

red in the face, and a quarter of an hour late.

VI

Protos welcomed him with a finger on his lips.

“As long as the servants are there, nothing must be said to arouse

suspicion. They all speak French. Not a word--not a sign to betray us!

Don’t go plastering him with ‘Cardinals,’ whatever you do. Your host is

Ciro Bardolotti, the chaplain. As for me, I’m not ‘Father Cave’ but

plain Cave. Understand?” And abruptly changing his tone and smacking him

on the shoulder, he explained in a loud voice: “Here he is, by Jove!

It’s Amédée! Well, old man, you’ve been a fine time over your shave! In

another moment or two, per _Baccho_, we should have sat down without

you. The turkey that turneth on the spit beginneth to glow like the

setting sun!” Then, in a whisper: “Ah, my dear sir, how painful it is to

play a part! My heart is wrung....” Then in a loud voice: “What do I

see? A cut? Thou bleedest, my lad. Run, Dorino, to the barn and fetch a

cobweb--a sovereign remedy for wounds....”

Thus clowning it, he pushed Fleurissoire across the lobby, towards a

terrace garden, where a table lay spread under a trellis of vine.

“My dear Bardolotti, allow me to introduce my cousin, Monsieur de la

Fleurissoire. He’s a devil of a fellow, as I told you.”

“I bid you welcome, sir guest,” said Bardolotti with a flourish, but

without rising from the arm-chair in which he was sitting; then,

pointing to his bare feet, which were plunged in a tub of clear water:

“These pedal ablutions improve my appetite and draw the blood from my

head.”

He was a funny little roundabout man, whose smooth face gave no

indication of age or sex. He was dressed in alpaca; there was nothing

about him to denote a high dignitary; one would have had to be

exceedingly perspicacious, or else in the secret--like Fleurissoire--to

have discovered a discreet touch of cardinalesque unction beneath the

joviality of his manners. He was leaning sideways on the table, fanning

himself languidly with a kind of cocked hat made out of a sheet of

newspaper.

“Er ... er ... highly flattered ... er ... er ... what a charming

garden!” stuttered Fleurissoire, finding speech and silence equally

embarrassing.

“Soaked enough!” cried the Cardinal. “Hullo, someone! Take away this

tub! Assunta!”

A young maidservant came running up, plump and debonair; she took up the

tub and emptied it over a flower-bed; her breasts were bursting out of

her stays and all a-quiver beneath the muslin of her bodice; she stayed

laughing and lingering beside Protos, and the gleam of her bare arms

made Fleurissoire uncomfortable. Dorino put the fiaschi down on the

table, which had no cloth on it; and the sun, streaming joyously through

the wreaths of vine, set its frolic touch of light and shade on the

dishes.

“We don’t stand upon ceremony here,” said Bardolotti, and he put on the

paper hat. “You take my meaning, my dear sir?”

In a commanding tone, emphasising the syllables and beating with his

fist on the table, Father Cave repeated in his turn:

“We don’t stand upon ceremony here!”

Fleurissoire gave a knowing wink. Did he take their meaning? Yes,

indeed, and there was no need for reiteration; but he racked his brains

in vain for a pregnant sentence that would say nothing and convey

everything.

“Speak! Speak!” prompted Protos. “Make a pun or two. They understand

French perfectly.”

“Come, come, sit down!” said Ciro. “My dear Cave, stick your knife into

this _pastecca_ and slice it up into Turkish crescents. Are you one of

those persons, Monsieur de la Fleurissoire, who prefer the pretentious

melons of the north--prescots--cantaloups--whatnots--to our streaming

Italian watermelons?”

“Nothing, I’m sure, could come up to this--but please allow me to

refrain; I’m feeling a bit squeamish,” said Amédée, who was still

heaving with repugnance at the recollection of the druggist.

“Well, then, some figs at any rate! Dorino has just picked them.”

“No, not any either. Excuse me.”

“That’s bad! That’s bad! Make a pun or two,” whispered Protos in his

ear. Then aloud: “We must dose that squeamish stomach of yours with a

little wine and get it ready for the turkey. Assunta, fill our worthy

guest’s glass!”

Amédée was obliged to pledge his hosts and drink more than he was

accustomed to; this, added to the heat and fatigue of the day, soon

fuddled him. He joked with less effort. Protos made him sing; his voice

was shrill but it enraptured his audience. Assunta wanted to kiss him.

And yet from the depths of his poor battered faith there rose a

sickening and undefinable distress; he laughed so as not to cry. He

admired Cave’s easy naturalness.... Who but Fleurissoire and the

Cardinal could ever have imagined that he was playing a part?

Bardolotti’s dissimulation and self-possession were for that matter, no

whit inferior to the _abbé’s_, and he laughed and applauded and lewdly

jostled Dorino, when Cave, upsetting Assunta in his arms, nuzzled her

with his face; and then, as Fleurissoire, with a bursting heart, bent

towards Cave and murmured: “How you must be suffering!” Cave seized his

hand behind Assunta’s back and pressed it silently, his head turned

aside and his eyes cast up to Heaven.

Then, rising abruptly, Cave clapped his hands:

“Now then, you must leave us! No, you can clear away later. Be off with

you! Via! Via!”

He went to make certain that Dorino and Assunta were not eavesdropping,

and came back with a face turned suddenly long and grave, while the

Cardinal, passing his hand over his countenance, effaced in an instant

all its profane and factitious gaiety.

“You see, Monsieur de la Fleurissoire, you see, my son, to what we are

reduced! Oh, this acting! this shameful acting!”

“It makes me turn in loathing,” added Protos, “from even the most

innocent joys--from the purest gaiety.”

“God will count it to your credit, my poor dear Father Cave,” went on

the Cardinal, turning towards Protos; “God will reward you for helping

me to drain this cup,” and, by way of symbol, he tossed off the wine

which remained in his half-emptied glass, while the most agonised

disgust was painted on his features.

“What!” cried Fleurissoire, bending forward, “is it possible that even

in this retreat and under this borrowed habit, your Eminence....”

“My son, call me plain Monsieur.”

“Forgive me! I thought in private....”

“Even when I am alone I tremble.”

“Can you not choose your servants?”

“They are chosen for me; and those two you have seen....”

“Ah! if I were to tell him,” said Protos, “that they have gone straight

off to report our most trifling words to....”

“Is it possible that in the palace....”

“Hush! No big words! You’ll get us hanged. Don’t forget that it’s to the

chaplain Ciro Bardolotti that you’re speaking.”

“I am at their mercy,” wailed Ciro.

And Protos, who was sitting with his arms crossed on the table, leant

across it towards Ciro.

“And if I were to tell him,” said he, “that you are never left alone,

night or day, for a single hour!”

“Yes, whatever disguise I put on,” continued the bogus Cardinal, “I can

never be sure that some of the secret police aren’t at my heels.”

“What! Do these people here know who you are?”

“You misunderstand him,” said Protos. “You are one of the few

persons--and I say it before God--who can pride themselves on

establishing any resemblance between Cardinal San-Felice and the modest

Bardolotti. But try to understand this--their enemies are not the same!

While the Cardinal in his palace has to defend himself against the

freemasons, chaplain Bardolotti is threatened by the....”

“Jesuits!” interrupted the chaplain wildly.

“That has not yet been explained to him,” said Protos.

“Ah! If we’ve got the Jesuits against us too!” sobbed Fleurissoire. “But

who would have thought it? Are you sure?”

“Reflect a little; you will see it is quite natural. You must understand

that the Holy See’s recent policy, all made up as it is of conciliation

and compromise, is just the thing to please them and that the last

encyclicals are exactly to their taste. Perhaps they are not aware that

the Pope who promulgated them is not the _real_ one; but they would be

heart-broken if he were changed.”

“If I understand you rightly,” Fleurissoire took him up, “the Jesuits

are allied with the freemasons in this affair.”

“How do you make that out?”

“But Monsieur Bardolotti has just revealed....”

“Don’t make him say absurdities.”

“I’m sorry. I know so little about politics.”

“That is why you must believe just what you are told and no more: two

great parties are facing each other--the Lodge and the Company of Jesus;

and as we who are in the secret cannot get support from either of them

without discovering ourselves, we have them both against us.”

“What do you think of that? Eh?” asked the Cardinal.

Fleurissoire had given up thinking; he was utterly bewildered.

“Yes, they are all against us,” went on Protos; “such is always the way

when one has truth on one’s side.”

“Ah! how happy I was when I knew nothing!” wailed Fleurissoire. “Alas!

never, never more shall I be able to know nothing!” ...

“He has not yet told you all,” continued Protos, touching him gently on

the shoulder. “Prepare for something more terrible still....” Then,

leaning forward, he whispered: “In spite of every precaution, the secret

has leaked out; a certain number of sharpers are using it to make a

house-to-house collection in the departments which have a reputation for

piety; they act in the name of the Crusade and rake in money which in

reality ought to come to us.”

“How frightful!”

“Added to which,” said Bardolotti, “they throw discredit and suspicion

on us and oblige us more than ever to make use of the greatest cunning

and caution.”

“Look here! Read this!” said Protos, holding out a copy of the _Croix_

to Fleurissoire; “it’s the day before yesterday’s paper. This short

paragraph tells its own story!”

“‘We cannot too earnestly warn devout souls against certain individuals

who are going about the country disguised as ecclesiastics, and in

particular against a certain pseudo-canon who, under pretext of being

entrusted with a secret mission, shamefully abuses the credulity of the

public and actually extorts money from them for a so-called CRUSADE FOR

THE DELIVERANCE OF THE POPE. The name alone sufficiently proclaims the

absurdity of the business.’”

Fleurissoire felt the ground give way beneath his feet.

“Whom can one trust then? Shall I tell you in my turn, gentlemen, that

it is perhaps due to this very swindler--this false canon, I mean--that

I am with you to-day?”

Father Cave looked gravely at the Cardinal, then, striking his fist on

the table:

“I suspected as much!” he cried.

“Everything contributed to make me fear,” continued Fleurissoire, “that

the person who informed me of the affair was herself a victim of this

rogue’s blandishments.”

“It would not surprise me,” said Protos.

“You see now,” went on Bardolotti, “how difficult our position is,

between these sharpers on the one hand, who have stepped into our shoes,

and the police on the other, who, when they mean to catch _them_, may

very well lay hold upon _us_ instead.”

“What is one to do?” wailed Fleurissoire. “I see danger everywhere.”

“Are you surprised now at our excessive prudence?” asked Bardolotti.

“And can you fail to understand that at moments we do not hesitate to

clothe ourselves in the livery of sin and feign indulgence towards the

most culpable of pleasures?”

“Alas!” stammered Fleurissoire, “you at any rate do no more than feign,

and you only simulate sin to hide your virtues. But I....” And as the

fumes of wine and the vapours of melancholy, drunken retchings and

hiccuping sobs all beset him at once, he began--bent double in Protos’s

direction--by bringing up his lunch and then went on to tell a muddled

story of his evening with Carola and the lamented loss of his virginity.

Bardolotti and Father Cave had a hard job to prevent themselves from

bursting into laughter.

“But have you been to confession, my son?” asked the Cardinal, full of

solicitude.

“I went next morning.”

“Did the priest give you absolution?”

“Far too readily. That’s why I’m so uneasy. But how could I confide to

him that I was no ordinary pilgrim ... reveal what it was that brought

me here?... No, no! It’s all over now. It was a chosen mission that

demanded the service of a blameless life. I was the very man. And now

it’s all over! I have fallen!” Again he was shaken by sobs and as he

struck little blows on his breast, he repeated: “I’m no longer worthy!

I’m no longer worthy!...” Then he went on in a kind of chant: “Ah! you

who hear me, you who see my anguish, judge me, condemn me, punish me....

Tell me what extraordinary penance will wash away my extraordinary

guilt. What chastisement?”

Protos and Bardolotti looked at one another. The latter rose at last and

began to pat Amédée on the shoulder:

“Come, come, my son! You mustn’t let yourself go like that. Well, yes!

you have sinned, but, hang it all, you are still needed. (You’ve dirtied

yourself; here, take this napkin; rub it off.) But of course I

understand your anguish, and since you appeal to us, we will give you

the means of redeeming yourself. (You’re not doing it properly. Let me

help you.)”

“Oh, don’t trouble! Thank you! Thank you!” said Fleurissoire as

Bardolotti, scrubbing the while, went on:

“At the same time, I understand your scruples; out of respect to them, I

will begin by setting you a little task; there’s nothing conspicuous

about it, but it will give you the opportunity of atoning and be a test

of your devotion.”

“I ask nothing more.”

“Dear Father Cave, have you that little cheque about you?”

Protos pulled a paper out of the inner pocket of his shirt.

“Surrounded on all sides by enemies as we are,” went on the Cardinal,

“we sometimes find it difficult to cash the offerings which a few

generous souls send us in response to our secret solicitations. Watched

at the same time by the freemasons and the Jesuits, by the police and by

the swindlers, it would not be suitable for us to be seen presenting

cheques or money orders at the banks and post offices, where our person

might be recognised. The sharpers Father Cave was telling you about just

now have thrown such discredit on our collections!” (Protos, in the

meantime, was thrumming impatiently on the table.) “In short, here is a

modest little cheque for six thousand francs which I beg you, my son, to

cash in our stead; it is drawn on the Credito Commerciale of Rome by

the Duchess of Ponte Cavallo; though it was addressed to the archbishop,

the name of the payee has purposely been left a blank, so that it may be

cashed by the bearer. Do not scruple to sign it with your own name,

which will arouse no suspicions. Take care not to let yourself be robbed

of it or of.... What is the matter, my dear Father Cave? You seem

agitated.”

“Go on! Go on!”

“...or of the money which you will bring back to me ... let me see ...

you return to Rome to-night; you can take the six o’clock express

to-morrow evening; you will be at Naples again at ten and you will find

me waiting for you at the station. After that we will think of employing

you on some worthier errand.... No, no, my son, do not kiss my hand. Can

you not see there is no ring on it?”

Amédée had half prostrated himself at his feet. The Cardinal touched his

forehead, and Protos, taking him by the arm, shook him gently:

“Come, come! another glass before you start. I am very sorry I can’t go

back to Rome with you; but I’m kept here by all sorts of

business--besides, it’s better we shouldn’t be seen together. Good-bye!

Let me embrace you, my dear Fleurissoire. May God keep you! I thank Him

for having permitted me to know you.”

He accompanied Fleurissoire to the door, and as he was leaving:

“Ah! sir,” he said, “what do you think of the Cardinal? Is it not

distressing to see the state to which persecution has reduced such a

noble intelligence?”

Then, as he went back to the bogus Cardinal:

“You fathead! That was a bright idea of yours, wasn’t it, to get your

cheque endorsed by a silly ass who hasn’t even got a passport, and whom

I shall have to shadow?”

But Bardolotti, heavy with sleep, let his head roll upon the table,

murmuring:

“We must keep the old ’uns busy.”

* * * * *

Protos went indoors to take off his wig and his peasant’s costume; he

appeared a little later, looking thirty years younger and dressed like a

bank clerk or a shop assistant of inferior grade. He had very little

time to catch the train he knew Fleurissoire was going to take, and he

went off without taking leave of the slumbering Bardolotti.

VII

Fleurissoire got back to Rome and the Via dei Vecchierelli that same

evening. He was extremely tired and persuaded Carola to allow him to

sleep.

The next morning, as soon as he woke, his spot, from the way it felt,

seemed to him odd; he examined it in the glass and found that a

yellowish scab had formed over the part that had been grazed; the whole

had a decidedly nasty look. As at that moment he heard Carola outside on

the landing, he called her in and begged her to examine the place. She

led Fleurissoire up to the window and at first glance assured him:

“It’s not what you think.”

To tell the truth, Amédée had not thought particularly of _it_, but

Carola’s attempt to reassure him had the contrary effect of filling him

with alarm. For, indeed, directly she asserted that it was not _it_, it

meant there was a chance that it might be. After all, was she really

certain that it wasn’t? It seemed to him quite natural that it should

be; for there was no doubt that he had sinned; he deserved that it

should be _it_; it must be _it_. A cold shudder went down his spine.

“How did you get it?” she asked.

Ah! what signified that occasional cause--the rasor’s cut or the

chemist’s spittle? The real, the root cause, the one that had earned him

this chastisement, could he with decency tell her what it was? Would she

understand him if he did? She would laugh, no doubt.... As she repeated

her question:

“It was a barber,” he said.

“You ought to put something on it.”

This solicitude swept away his last doubts; what she had said at first

was merely to reassure him; he saw himself with his face and body eaten

away by boils--an object of disgust to Arnica; his eyes filled with

tears.

“Then you think....”

“No, no, dearie, you mustn’t get into such a state; you look like a

funeral. In the first place, it would be impossible to tell it at this

stage, even if it is that.”

“It is! It is!... Oh! it serves me right! It serves me right!” he

repeated.

She was touched.

“And, besides, it never begins like that. Shall I call Madam in to tell

you so?... No? Well, then, you’d better go out a little to distract your

thoughts. Go and get a glass of Marsala.” She kept silent for a moment.

At last, unable to restrain herself any longer:

“Listen,” she broke out. “I’ve something serious to tell you. You didn’t

happen to meet a sort of _curé_ yesterday, with white hair, did you?”

“Why?” asked Fleurissoire in amazement.

“Well ...” she hesitated again; then, looking at him and seeing how pale

he was, she went on impulsively: “Well, don’t trust him. Take my word

for it, you poor lamb; he means to fleece you. I oughtn’t to tell you

so, but ... don’t you trust him.”

Amédée was getting ready to go out, not knowing whether he was on his

head or on his heels; he was already on the stairs, when she called him

back:

“And mind, if you see him again, don’t tell him that I said anything.

You’d as good as murder me.”

* * * * *

Decidedly, life was becoming too complicated for Amédée. And, what is

more, his feet were frozen, his head burning and his ideas topsyturvy.

How was he to know where he was, if Father Cave himself turned out to be

a humbug?... Then, the Cardinal too perhaps?... But the cheque then? He

took the paper out of his pocket, felt it and was reassured by its

reality. No, no! It wasn’t possible! Carola was wrong. And then what did

she know of the mysterious interests that compelled poor Cave to play

double? It was much more likely that the whole thing was some paltry

vengeance of Baptistin’s, against whom, in fact, the _abbé_ had warned

him.... No matter! he would keep his eyes open wider than ever; he would

suspect Cave for the future just as he already suspected Baptistin; and

who knows if even Carola ...?

“And, indeed,” he said to himself, “here we have at once the

consequence and the proof of that initial vice--the collapse of the Holy

See; everything comes tottering down with that. Whom can one trust if

not the Pope? And once the corner-stone on which the Church was built

gives way, nothing else deserves to be true.”

Amédée was walking hurriedly in the direction of the post office; he was

in great hopes of finding news from home--honest, comfortable news, on

which he could at length rest his wearied confidence. The slight

mistiness of early morning and that southern profusion of light in which

everything seemed melting away into a vaporous haze--seemed losing

substance and reality--increased his dizziness; he walked as though in a

dream, doubting the solidity of the ground, of the walls--doubting the

actual existence of the people he passed--doubting, above all, his own

presence in Rome.... Then he pinched himself so as to wake from this

horrid dream and find himself again in Pau, in his own bed, with Arnica

already up and bending over him with the accustomed question on her

lips: “Have you slept well, dear?”

At the post office they recognised him and made no difficulty in giving

him another letter from his wife.

“...I have just heard from Valentine de Saint-Prix,” wrote

Arnica, “that Julius is in Rome, too, where he has been summoned to

a congress. I am so glad to think that you will meet him!

Unfortunately Valentine was not able to give me his address. She

thinks he is at the Grand Hotel, but she isn’t sure. She knows,

however, that he is going to the Vatican on Thursday morning; he

wrote beforehand to Cardinal Pazzi so as to be given an audience.

He has just been to Milan, where he saw Anthime, who is in great

distress because he can’t get what the Church promised him after

his conversion; so Julius means to go and ask the Holy Father for

justice; for of course he knows nothing about it as yet. He is

sure to tell you about his visit and then you will be able to

inform him.

“I hope you are being very careful to take precautions against the

malaria and that you are not tiring yourself too much. I shall be

so glad when you write to say that you are coming home....” Etc.

Then, scribbled in pencil across the fourth page, a few words from

Blafaphas:

“If you go to Naples, you should take the opportunity of finding

out how they make the hole in the macaroni. I am on the brink of a

new discovery.”

Joy rang through Amédée’s heart like a clarion. But it was accompanied

by a certain misgiving. Thursday, the day of the audience, was that very

day. He had not dared send his clothes to the wash and he was running

short of clean linen--at any rate, he was afraid so. That morning he had

put on yesterday’s collar; but it suddenly ceased to seem sufficiently

clean, now that he knew there was a chance of seeing Julius. The joy

that this circumstance would otherwise have caused him was slightly

dashed. As to returning to the Via dei Vecchierelli, it was not to be

thought of if he intended to catch his brother-in-law on his way out

from the audience--and this would be less agitating than looking up at

the Grand Hotel. At any rate, he took care to turn his cuffs; as for his

collar, he pulled his comforter up to cover it, which had the added

advantage of concealing his pimple as well.

But what did such trifles matter? The fact is, Fleurissoire felt

unspeakably cheered by his letter; and the prospect of renewing contact

with one of his own people, with his own past life, abolished at one

sweep the monsters begotten of his traveller’s imagination. Carola,

Father Cave, the Cardinal, all floated before him like a dream which is

suddenly interrupted by the crowing of the cock. Why had he left Pau?

What sense was there in this absurd fable which had disturbed him in his

happiness? There was a Pope, bless us! and he would soon be hearing

Julius declare that he had seen him. A Pope--that was enough. Was it

possible that God should have authorised such a monstrous substitution?

Fleurissoire would certainly never have believed it if it had not been

for his absurd pride in the part he had to play in the business.

Amédée was walking hurriedly; it was all he could do to prevent himself

from running; at last he was regaining confidence, whilst around him

once more everything recovered weight and size, and natural position and

convincing reality. He was holding his straw hat in his hand; when he

arrived in front of the basilica, he was in such a state of lofty

exhilaration that he began to walk round the fountain on the right-hand

side; and as he passed to the windward of the spray, allowing it to wet

him, he smiled up at the rainbow.

Suddenly he came to an abrupt stop. There, close to him, sitting on the

base of the fourth pillar of the colonnade, surely that was Julius he

caught sight of? He hesitated to recognise him, for if his attire was

respectable, his attitude was very far from being so; the Comte de

Baraglioul had placed his black straw Cronstadt beside him on the crook

of his walking-stick, which he had stuck into the ground between two

paving-stones, and all regardless of the solemnity of the spot, with his

right foot cocked up on his left knee (like any prophet in the Sixtine

Chapel), he was propping a note-book on his right knee, while from time

to time his pencil, poised in air, swooped down upon the pages, and he

began to write; so absorbed was his attention, and the dictates of his

inspiration so urgent, that Amédée might have turned a somersault in

front of him without his noticing it. He was speaking to himself as he

wrote; and though the splashing of the fountain drowned his voice, the

movement of his lips was plainly visible.

Amédée drew near, going discreetly round by the other side of the

pillar. As he was about to touch him on the shoulder:

“In that case, what does it matter?” declaimed Julius, and he consigned

these words with a final flourish to his note-book; then, putting his

pencil in his pocket and rising abruptly, he came nose to nose with

Amédée.

“In Heaven’s name, what are _you_ doing here?”

Amédée, trembling with emotion, began to stutter without being able to

reply; he convulsively pressed one of Julius’s hands between both his

own. Julius, in the meanwhile, was examining him:

“My poor fellow, what a sight you look!”

Providence had dealt unkindly with Julius; of the two brothers in-law

who were left to him, one was a church mouse and the other a scarecrow.

It was less than three years since he had seen Amédée--but he thought

him aged by at least twelve; his cheeks were sunken; his Adam’s apple

was protuberant; his magenta comforter enhanced the paleness of his

face; his chin was quivering; his blear eyes rolled in a way which

should have been pathetic, but was merely grotesque; his yesterday’s

expedition had left him with a mysterious hoarseness, so that his voice

seemed to come from a long way off. Full of his preoccupations:

“So you have seen him?” he said.

“Seen whom?” asked Julius.

This “whom” sounded in Amédée’s ears like a knell and a blasphemy. He

particularised discreetly:

“I thought you had just come from the Vatican.”

“So I have. Excuse me, I was thinking of something else.... If you only

knew what has happened to me!”

His eyes were sparkling; he looked on the verge of jumping out of his

skin.

“Oh, please!” entreated Fleurissoire, “talk about that afterwards; tell

me first of all about your visit. I’m so impatient to hear....”

“Does it interest you?”

“You’ll soon know how much. Go on, go on, I beg you.”

“Well, then,” began Julius, seizing hold of Fleurissoire by one arm and

dragging him away from the neighbourhood of St. Peter’s, “perhaps you

may have heard in what miserable poverty our poor brother Anthime has

been living as a result of his conversion. He is still waiting in vain

for what the Church promised to give him in order to make up for the

loss inflicted on him by the freemasons. Anthime has been duped; so much

must be admitted. I don’t know, my dear fellow, how this affair strikes

you--as for me, I consider it an absolute farce ... but it’s thanks to

it perhaps that I’m more or less clear as to the matter in hand, about

which I’m most anxious to talk to you. Well, then--a _creature of

inconsequence_! That’s going rather far perhaps ... and no doubt his

apparent inconsequence hides what is, in reality, a subtler and more

recondite sequence--the important point is that what makes him act

should not be a matter of interest, or, as the usual phrase is, that he

should not be merely actuated by interested motives.”

“I don’t follow you very well,” said Amédée.

“True, true! I was straying from the subject of my visit. Well, then, I

had determined to take Anthime’s business in hand.... Ah, my dear

fellow, if you’d seen the apartment in which he’s living in Milan! ‘You

can’t possibly stay on here,’ I said to him at once. And when I think of

that unfortunate Veronica! But he’s going in for asceticism--turning

into a regular saint; he won’t allow anyone to pity him--and as for

blaming the clergy! ‘My dear friend,’ I said to him, ‘I grant you that

the higher clergy are not to blame, but it can only be because they know

nothing about it. You must let me go and tell them how matters stand.’”

“I thought that Cardinal Pazzi....” suggested Fleurissoire.

“Yes, but it wasn’t any good. You see, these high dignitaries are all

afraid of compromising themselves. It was necessary for someone who was

quite an outsider to take the matter up. Myself, for instance. For just

see in what a wonderful way discoveries are made!--I mean, the most

important ones; the thing seems like a sudden illumination--but not at

all--in reality one hasn’t ceased thinking of it. So with me; for a long

time past I had been worrying over my characters--their excessive logic,

and at the same time their insufficient definition.”

“I’m afraid,” said Amédée gently, “that you’re straying from the point

again.”

“Nothing of the kind,” went on Julius; “it’s you who don’t follow my

idea. In short, I determined to present the petition to the Holy Father

himself, and I went this morning to hand it to him.”

“Well? Quick! Did you see him?”

“My dear Amédée, if you keep interrupting all the time.... Well, you

can’t imagine how difficult it is to get to see him.”

“Can’t I?” said Amédée.

“What did you say?”

“I’ll tell you by and by.”

“First of all, I had entirely to give up any idea of presenting my

petition myself; it was a neat roll of paper. But as soon as I got to

the second antechamber (or the third, I forget which), a great big

fellow, dressed up in black and red, politely removed it.”

Amédée began to chuckle like a person with private information who knows

there is good reason to laugh.

“In the next antechamber, I was relieved of my hat, which they put on a

table. In the fifth or sixth, I waited for a long time in the company of

two ladies and three prelates, and then a kind of chamberlain came and

ushered me into the next room, where as soon as I was in the presence of

the Holy Father (he was perched, as far as I could see, on a throne with

a sort of canopy over it) he instructed me to prostrate myself--which I

did--so that I saw nothing more.”

“But surely you didn’t keep your head bowed down so low that....”

“My dear Amédée, it’s all very well for you to talk; don’t you know that

one can be struck blind with awe? And not only didn’t I dare raise my

head, but every time I tried to speak of Anthime, a kind of major-domo,

with a species of ruler, gave me a little tap on the back of my neck,

which made me bow it again.”

“But at any rate, did _he_ speak to you?”

“Yes, about my book, which he admitted he hadn’t read.”

“My dear Julius,” said Amédée, after a moment’s silence, “what you have

just told me is of the highest importance. So you didn’t see him! And

from your whole account one thing stands out clear--that there’s a

mysterious difficulty about seeing him. Alas! all my cruellest

apprehensions are confirmed. Julius, I must now tell you ... but come

along here--this street is so crowded....”

He dragged him into an almost deserted _vicolo_, and Julius, amused

rather than otherwise, made no resistance.

“What I am going to confide to you is so grave.... Whatever you do,

don’t make any sign. Let’s look as if we weren’t talking about anything

important and make up your mind to hear something terrible.--Julius, my

dear friend, the person you saw this morning....”

“Whom I didn’t see, you mean.”

“Exactly ... is not the _real one_.”

“I beg your pardon?”

“I tell you that you can’t have seen the Pope, for the monstrous reason

that ... I have it from a secret and unimpeachable source--the real Pope

has been kidnapped.”

This astonishing revelation had the most unexpected effect upon Julius.

He suddenly let go Amédée’s arm, and running on ahead, he called out at

the top of his voice right across the _vicolo_:

“Oh, no! no! Not that! Good God! No! Not that!”

Then, drawing near Amédée again:

“What! I succeed--with great difficulty--in clearing my mind of the

whole thing; I convince myself that there’s nothing to be

expected--nothing to be hoped for--nothing to be admitted; that Anthime

has been taken in--that the whole thing is quackery--that there’s

nothing left to do but to laugh at it--when up you come and say: ‘Hold

hard! There’s been a mistake--a miscalculation--we must begin again.’

Oh, no! Not a bit of it! Never in the world! I shan’t budge. If he isn’t

the real one, so much the worse.”

Fleurissoire was horrified.

“But,” said he, “the Church....” And he regretted that his hoarseness

prevented any flights of eloquence. “But supposing the Church herself is

taken in?”

Julius planted himself in front of him, standing crosswise so as almost

to block up the way, and in a mocking, cutting voice which was not like

him:

“Well! What the dickens does it matter to you?”

Then a doubt fell upon Fleurissoire--a fresh, formless, atrocious doubt

which was absorbed in some indefinable way into the thick mass of his

discomfort--Julius, Julius himself, this Julius to whom he was talking,

this Julius to whom he clung with all the longing of his heart-broken

faith--this Julius was not the _real_ Julius either.

“What! Can it be you who say such things? You, Julius? On whom I was

counting so? The Comte de Baraglioul, whose writings....”

“Don’t talk to me of my writings, I beg. I’ve heard quite enough about

them this morning from your Pope--false or true, whichever he may be.

Thanks to my discovery, the next ones will be better--you may count upon

that. I’m anxious to talk to you now about serious matters. You’ll lunch

with me, won’t you?”

“With pleasure; but I must leave you early. I’m expected in Naples this

evening ... yes, on some business, which I’ll tell you about. You’re not

taking me to the Grand, I hope?”

“No; we’ll go to the Colonna.”

Julius, on his side, was not at all anxious to be seen at the Grand

Hotel in company with such a lamentable object as Fleurissoire; and

Fleurissoire, who felt pale and worn out, was already in a twitter at

being seated full in the light at the restaurant table, directly

opposite his brother-in-law and exposed to his scrutinising glance. If

only that glance had sought his own, it would have been more tolerable;

but no, he felt it already going straight to the border line of his

magenta comforter, straight to that frightful spot where the suspicious

pimple was budding, hopelessly divulged. And while the waiter was

bringing the hors-d’œuvre:

“You ought to take sulphur baths,” said Baraglioul.

“It’s not what you think,” protested Fleurissoire.

“I’m glad to hear it,” answered Baraglioul, who, for that matter, hadn’t

thought anything; “I just offered the suggestion in passing.” Then,

throwing himself back in his chair, he went on in a professorial manner:

“Now this is how it is, my dear Amédée. I contend that ever since the

days of La Rochefoucauld we have all followed in his footsteps like

blundering idiots; I contend that self-advantage is _not_ man’s guiding

principle--that there _are_ such things as disinterested actions....”

“I should hope so,” interrupted Fleurissoire, naïvely.

“Don’t be in such a hurry, I beg. By _disinterested_ I mean gratuitous.

Also that evil actions--what are commonly called evil--may be just as

gratuitous as good ones.”

“In that case, why commit them?”

“Exactly! Out of sheer wantonness--or from love of sport. My contention

is that the most disinterested souls are not necessarily the best--in

the Catholic meaning of the word; on the contrary, from the Catholic

point of view, the best-trained soul is the one that keeps the strictest

accounts.”

“The one that ever feels its debt towards God,” added Fleurissoire

seraphically, in an attempt to keep up to the mark.

Julius was obviously irritated by his brother-in-law’s interruptions; he

thought them ludicrous.

“A contempt for what may serve is no doubt the stamp of a certain

aristocracy of nature.... So once a man has shaken free from orthodoxy,

from self-indulgence and from calculation, we may grant that his soul

may keep no accounts at all?”

“No! No! Never! We may not grant it!” exclaimed Fleurissoire vehemently;

then suddenly frightened by the sound of his own voice, he bent towards

Baraglioul and whispered:

“Let’s speak lower; we shall be overheard.”

“Pooh! How could anyone be interested in what we are saying?”

“Oh, my dear Julius, I see you have no conception what the people of

this country are like. I’ve spent only four days here, but during those

four days the adventures I’ve had have been endless, and of a kind to

teach me caution--pretty forcibly too--though it wasn’t in my nature, I

swear. I am being tracked!”

“It’s your imagination.”

“I only wish it were! But what’s to be done? When falsehood takes the

place of truth, truth must needs dissemble. As for me, with this mission

that has been entrusted to me (I’ll tell you about it presently), placed

as I am between the Lodge and the Society of Jesus, it’s all up with me.

I am an object of suspicion to everyone; everything is an object of

suspicion to me. Suppose I were to confess to you, my dear Julius, that

just now when you met my distress with mockery, I actually doubted

whether it was really you to whom I was talking--whether you weren’t an

imitation Julius.... Suppose I were to tell you that this morning before

I met you, I actually doubted my own reality--doubted whether I was

really here in Rome--whether I wasn’t just dreaming--and whether I

shouldn’t wake up presently at Pau, lying peacefully beside Arnica, back

again in my everyday life.”

“My dear fellow, you’ve got fever.”

Fleurissoire seized his hand and in a voice trembling with emotion:

“Fever!” he cried. “You’re right! It’s fever I’ve got--a fever that

cannot--that _must_ not be cured; a fever which I hoped would take you

too when you heard what I had to reveal--which I hoped--yes, I own

it--you too would catch from me, my brother, so that we might burn

together in its consuming fires.... But no! I see only too clearly now

that the path I follow--the dark and dangerous path I am called upon to

follow--must needs be solitary too; your own words have proved it to me.

What, Julius? Can it be true? _He_ is not to be seen? No one succeeds in

seeing him?”

“My dear fellow,” said Julius, disengaging himself from his clasp and in

his turn laying a hand on the excited Amédée’s arm, “my dear fellow, I

will now confess something I didn’t dare tell you just now. When I found

myself in the Holy Father’s presence ... well, I was seized with a fit

of absent-mindedness....”

“Absent-mindedness?” repeated Fleurissoire, aghast.

“Yes. I suddenly caught myself thinking of something else.”

“Am I really to believe you?”

“For it was precisely at that very moment that I had my revelation.

‘Well, but,’ said I to myself, pursuing my first idea, ‘supposing the

evil action--the crime--is gratuitous, it will be impossible to impute

it to its perpetrator and impossible, therefore, to convict him.’”

“Oh!” sighed Amédée, “are you at it again?”

“For the motive of the crime is the handle by which we lay hold of the

criminal. And if, as the judge will point out, _is fecit cui

prodest_.... You’ve studied law, haven’t you?”

“I beg your pardon?” said Amédée, with the beads of perspiration

standing on his brow.

But at that moment the dialogue was suddenly interrupted; the restaurant

page-boy came up to them holding a plate on which lay an envelope

inscribed with Fleurissoire’s name. Petrified with astonishment, he

opened the envelope and found inside it these words:

“You have not a moment to lose. The train for Naples starts at

three o’clock. Ask Monsieur de Baraglioul to go with you to the

Crédit Industriel, where he is known and where he will be able to

testify to your identity.”

“There! What did I tell you?” whispered Amédée, to whom this incident

was a relief rather than otherwise.

“Yes. I admit it’s very odd. How on earth do they know my name and that

I have an account at the Crédit Industriel?”

“I tell you they know everything.”

“I don’t much fancy the tone of the note. The writer might have at any

rate apologised for interrupting us.”

“What would have been the use? He knows well enough that everything must

give way to my mission. I’ve a cheque to cash.... No, it’s impossible to

tell you about it here; you can see for yourself that we are being

watched.” Then, taking out his watch: “Yes, there’s only just time.”

He rang for the waiter.

“No, no,” said Julius. “You’re my guest. The Crédit’s not far off; we

can take a cab if necessary. Don’t be flurried. Oh, I wanted to say that

if you’re going to Naples this evening you can make use of this circular

ticket of mine. It’s in my name, but it doesn’t matter.” (For Julius

liked to be obliging.) “I took it in Paris, thinking that I should be

going further south; but I’m kept here by this congress. How long do you

think of staying?”

“As short a time as possible. I hope to be back to-morrow.”

“Then I’ll expect you to dinner.”

* * * * *

At the Crédit Industriel, thanks to the Comte de Baraglioul’s

introduction, Fleurissoire had no difficulty in cashing his cheque for

six bank-notes, which he slipped into the inner pocket of his coat. In

the meantime he had told his brother-in-law, more or less coherently,

the tale of the cheque, the Cardinal and the _abbé_. Baraglioul, who

went with him to the station, listened with only half an ear.

On their way, Fleurissoire went into a shirtmaker’s to buy himself a

collar, but he didn’t put it on at once, so as not to keep Julius

waiting outside the shop.

“Haven’t you got a bag?” he asked as Fleurissoire joined him.

Fleurissoire would have been only too glad to go and fetch his shawl and

his night things; but own up to the Via dei Vecchierelli before

Baraglioul? It couldn’t be thought of.

“Oh, only for one night!” he said brightly. “Besides, there isn’t time

to go round by my hotel.”

“Where are you staying?”

“Oh, behind the Coliseum,” replied Amédée at a venture.

It was as if he had said: “Oh, under a bridge!”

Julius looked at him again:

“What a funny fellow you are!”

Did he really seem so queer? Fleurissoire mopped his brow. For a few

moments they paced backwards and forwards in front of the station in

silence.

“Well, we must say good-bye now,” said Baraglioul, holding out his hand.

“Couldn’t you ... couldn’t you come with me?” stammered Fleurissoire

timidly. “I don’t exactly know why, but I’m a little nervous about going

by myself.”

“You came to Rome by yourself. What can happen to you? Excuse me for not

going with you on to the platform, but the sight of a train going off

always gives me an inexpressible feeling of sadness. Good-bye. Good

luck! And bring back my return ticket to Paris with you when you come to

the Grand Hotel to-morrow.”