“Raoul, Page Raoul,” she said, “I have come to request from you the end of my pain, from you to whom I have caused so much—without knowing it, however, for you carefully hid your fervent and dolorous tenderness, Raoul…” At that point I thought I saw an imperceptible blush color the pale cheeks of the soul. “Raoul, I have sinned! The Prince de Valois... As a punishment for that sin I am retained in Purgatory until the moment when the man who made me sin has recited a de profundis in my intention.
“Alas, he has not yet given me a thought—me, who died because of him, and who is suffering so much in Purgatory because I loved him too much!
“And yet, Raoul, God and the Holy Virgin are my witnesses that I would gladly have consented to remain a thousand more years in this place of darkness and tears, if he had only said, at the news that I had died: ‘Poor Berthe!’
“Go, then, Raoul, to Messire de Valois; tell him that Berthe’s soul is in pain in Purgatory, and that if he will only recite one de profundis, the angels will take her to Paradise. He will not refuse you, Raoul; I hope so, at least—for is there a Christian harsh enough to refuse a de profundis, even if it were a matter of saving the soul of a Jew?”
That apparition returned me to life as if by a miracle; from that moment on the fever and delirious transports departed, and within two months, by the grace of God, I was in a state to undertake the journey that Madame Berthe had requested of me.
In order to complete that expedition, it was necessary for me to obtain leave from Monseigneur Bishop Philippe; I therefore went to him, and begged him to hear my confession, to which he consented. The marvelous vision that I had had and the duty to which Madame Berthe had commanded me were related faithfully by me, except that I did not allow myself the shame of daring to confess the hopeless amour that I had nourished for the departed. Nevertheless, I was not making a bad confession in that, for that amour, so chaste and so secret, could not be a sin.
Monseigneur Philippe listened to me in silence. Finally, he said: “These are supernatural things, and it is necessary not to lend credence to them too easily. Perhaps it was a hollow dream of malady and feverish transport. In any case, my son, there are hundreds of obstacles that are opposed to the accomplishment of your pious design; great and sad events have occurred in our house.”
Then he set about telling me how the King of France, Philippe le Bel, had died. His son Louis X, had succeeded him; under the new King the Prince de Valois had become all-powerful at the court, and, driven by the wicked Comtesse Mahaud, had done disservice to Monseigneur Enguerrand, and had accused him in full council of dissipating the State treasury, requiring him to say how he had employed the large contributions levied on Flanders. Now, they had been paid by the lord treasurer into the hands of the Prince de Valois himself
Messire Enguerrand therefore replied frankly: “I have given the greater part of them to you, Monseigneur, as is proven by regulation parchments sealed with your seal.”
“Parchments that lie!” cried the Prince.
“Monseigneur, if there is a lie, it is not on the part of those parchments, but you,” the Lord Treasurer interrupted, justly indignant at such an outrage. The Prince de Valois drew his sword; he would have struck Messire Enguerrand, but the prudent men of the council held him back. He went out then, swearing by the living God that he would not come back from the Louvre without having taken bloody vengeance against the high treasurer.
“Since the time when my brother sent me this news himself by way of a faithful bodyguard,” the Bishop went on, “I have been in great anxiety and painful doubt as to what has happened. The Comte de Valois will not rest until he has had Enguerrand hanged. Judge, my son, whether he is in a disposition to pray for Berthe’s soul.
“Go in peace, then, Raoul. Tomorrow, we shall celebrate a solemn mass to the intention of the mistress of whom you are showing yourself such a faithful servant. As for your design, it is necessary to renounce it, as hazardous and recklessly conceived.”
It was necessary for me to obey. But on the very night that followed that conversation, I was woken up by a plaintive groan; Madame Berthe was there again, joining her hands in a sign of distress and prayer. I resolved to go and see Monseigneur the Bishop again, but as I was preparing to go to him, a varlet came on his behalf to summon me.
“Raoul,” Monseigneur said to me, “my sister’s soul appeared to me last night, plaintive and suffering. There is no longer any doubt that I was wrong to deflect you from your pious design. Go then, my son, and may the benediction of Our Savior and that of an old man accompany you!”
While saying those words he extended his venerable hands over my forehead, gave me a purse full of gold coins, and told me that the provost of his house had orders to let me choose the best horse there was in the manor’s stables.
I set forth the following day, the tenth of March in the year of grace thirteen fourteen, when the church was celebrating the festival of the forty blessed martyrs.
I arrived in the city of Paris after a week of travel without incident. My first concern was to go to the palace of the lord treasurer. How rapidly my heart beat when I saw its high towers, its sculpted walls and its multicolored windows! Three times, with a tremulous hand, I made the iron hammer at the enormous door resonate in order to summon an usher, but although the hammer resounded with a great noise, no one came to open the door to me.
Then I had a prescience of the fatal news that I was about to learn.
While I was standing there, darting glances of uncertainty and anxiety around me, an old man surreptitiously made me a sign to follow him, and led me into a solitary street where his lodgings were.
When he had looked around, fearful that someone might be listening, he asked: “Have you so much desire to be hanged that you’re walking in Paris clad in the colors of the Bishop of Cambrai? Do you not know that Messire de Marigny is in disgrace, that he’s a prisoner in the tower of the Louvre, for having cast spells against the person of the King? In addition, he’s accused of having treacherously dissipated the royal treasures.
“The Palais de Marigny has been closed by the King’s seals. The varlets, pages and squires have been ignominiously expelled—those at least, who, like me, did not have the good fortune to be slain defending our master.”
“And my father? In the name of Heaven, my father, Sire Bartholomé Beaugenin? Give me news of him…”
“Requiescat in pace,” replied the old man. “He’s in a better world than this one, along with the venerable lady his legitimate wife; one dead of a dagger-thrust, the other of seizure and grief.”
Taking pity on my distress and despair, the old man, who was one of the Lord Treasurer’s squires and a friend of my father’s, kept me in his lodgings, and comforted me with pious exhortations.
During the three days that I remained in his home, God and the Holy Virgin did me the grace of awakening in my soul a pious design that they had already put there several times; but I had always set it aside, for it would have required, in order to accomplish it, separating myself forever from Madame Berthe. That design was to enter into religion, and consecrate myself to the service of God for the rest of my life.
Well, what would I have been able to do in the world, when those who had made my joy there had died? What love, except divine love, could fill the void that Madame Berthe’s death had left in my soul?
But before entering the cloister, it was necessary for me to accomplish a great and holy duty. I therefore went to the Louvre, where the Prince de Valois resided.
The seneschal, of whom I enquired as to how to obtain an audience with his seigneur, asked me my name and qualities.
“Raoul de Beaugenin, page of Messire Philippe de Marigny, Bishop of Cambrai.”
He looked at me with an expression of surprise, went away, and came back a few moments later to introduce me.
When I found myself alone with the King’s uncle, I felt my heart hammering and my knees buckled.
Finally, trying to pull m
yself together as best I could, I told him about the vision I had had, how I had undertaken such a long and difficult journey, in order to extract Madame Berthe’s soul from Purgatory, and why that only required a de profundis recited by Monseigneur Charles de Valois.
The Prince, while I told my story with a compunction calculated to move a heart of stone, continually turned his gaze toward a crimson curtain that closed a large window. Suddenly, a burst of laughter departed from behind that curtain. The Comtesse d’Artois appeared, and drew me on to the balcony.
“There!” she cried. “Those are the prayers that one recites for the Marignys!”
Holy Virgin! The Lord Treasurer, with a rope around his neck, was being taken from the tower of the Louvre to the gibbet of Montfaucon!”
Two years later, I had been to aid in his final hour a poor sick man who dwelt in the vicinity of the Louvre and was returning to my convent of Minims when two varlets came to me and said: “Revered Father, in the name of Jesus Christ, come; our master is about to die without confession if he is not heard immediately by you; our almoner cannot be found.” And they took me away, without telling me where they were taking me.
Imagine my surprise when I found myself taken in to the Palais de Valois, to the bedside of Monseigneur Charles!
At the sight of me he uttered a terrible cry.
“God is just, Raoul! My crimes are very heavy, at this hour of punishment! Will Jesus Christ pardon me, who caused the innocent Marigny to perish for vengeance? Will the Holy Virgin intercede for me, when I have left in Purgatory an unfortunate woman whose death I caused, when it only required a de profundis to extract her from pain? O, despair! O terrible wrath! I’m damned!”
I attempted to return to the sinner some confidence in divine mercy, but nothing could give him hope of salvation, and he rendered his soul in my arms, repeating: “I’m damned!”
That same night, the soul of Madame Berthe appeared to me with a crown of light on her head. Two angels of marvelous beauty were taking her to Paradise.
Thus was delivered from Purgatory the soul of Madame Berthe, which was suffering for having sinned by amour.
She is now in the abode of the blissful, glorifying the Lord forever.
Let it be given to us, by the infinite mercy of God, and the intercession of the Holy Virgin, the unique source of all good, to live piously, in order that in the hour of our death we can, by means of our good works and our sincere actions, find ourselves with Madame Berthe and the elect in eternal glory.
So might it be.
THE PACT
1554
May I hold her in my arms for a day,
an hour, an instant; then you can kill me.
(Owen.)16
Everything presaged a terrible and imminent storm: black and heavy clouds covered the sky; there was only warm air to be respired; and the only objects that could be distinguished in the profound obscurity were the lights shining in the windows on the Château d’Anet.
A pale young man whose gaze had something wild was marching precipitately across country, following the left bank of the Eure. He stopped in front of a cottage built by the riverside, and knocked on the door twice, impatiently. It was only at the third blow, however, that the broken and sullen voice of an old man replied.
“Open up, Mathias, open up!” shouted the young man.
“Tell me who you are.”
“Henriot Maurepain, the Fleming.
“Henriot Maurepain! What are you doing at poor Mathias’ door so late? Is it to say to him, as you did three months ago: ‘Dog of a sorcerer, I’ll denounce you to the high provost, for you merit hanging and the pyre?’”
“Malediction! Open this door, or I’ll break it down and break your head!”
As he spoke those words, Henriot shook the door and get ready to put his threat into execution.
The old man finally gave in and let the young man into his cottage. While the latter marched precipitately back and forth in the narrow enclosure, he considered him in silence. In order to do so more easily, he extended a hand behind the lamp he was holding; the light of the lamp was reflected, ruddy and vacillating, from the wrinkled forehead and little eyes of Mathias, giving his physiognomy, which was scarcely attractive anyway, a truly odious expression.
“Why have you come so late to trouble a poor man’s repose? Is it to run around before him like a madman, as you’re doing?”
“Listen, Mathias,” the young man interrupted, seizing him by the arm and speaking in a distressed voice, “listen... You know how one can make a pact with the Devil; tell me, and this purse, the only wealth I possess in the world, is yours!”
The old man tried to recoil, but the young man’s arm was gripping him too vigorously for that. The result of the attempt was a simple movement on the spot, which Henriot did not even seem to perceive.
“Let me go. I’m sure of it—you’ve come to make me say something indiscreet, and to deliver me to the Lord Provost, who’ll have me burned as a heretic and a sorcerer. There are men there, hidden behind the door. But the Devil take me if you get another word out of my mouth. You’re doing vile work there, young man!”
Henriot stamped his foot impatiently. “Have no fear,” he said. “Look, I’m alone. You must know, in any case, that I wouldn’t do what you fear for anything in the world.
“Marie…you know that I’ve loved her since I quit my homeland of Flanders to come and live here; you know that for a year, everyone in the village has been talking about our amour. Well, her father has refused her to me, because my cousin Grégoire Bonneau is the sole heir of my uncle’s wealth. I ought to have half that succession, but the accursed cantor has been able to flatter our old uncle so well that he’s left everything to him alone. There’s even talk of giving Marie’s hand to some rich miller in a neighboring hamlet. She’ll die of it! And me! No, no; it’s necessary that I have her, if only for a year, a day, an hour!
“I want to sell my soul to the Devil. Let him give me a thousand écus au soleil, and in a year, I’ll belong to him body and soul. Give me the means to make that pact, and take this purse.”
The old man started to laugh, picked up the money, and after having stowed it away carefully in his jerkin, he said: “you think, my handsome young man, that Satan will give a thousand écus au soleil for your soul? I very much fear that he’ll find the price excessively dear, for more than three-quarters of it already belongs to the Evil Spirit when one has bloodshot eyes, an unsteady gait, a body shaken by frissons and a forehead covered in cold sweat. In good conscience, even if I knew the means to enable you to conclude such a bargain, I believe it would be futile to tell you what they are.”
Henriot drew his dagger and put it to Mathias’ breast.
“Speak! Speak, or you’re dead!”
“Well, I can see that you’re appropriately resolute. All of that was to test you. Listen, then:
“Begin by stealing a black pullet. There are some very fine ones in the home of my neighbor Bartholomé Giron. After the theft…good! Now he’s trembling at the mere thought of a petty larceny! Fine delicacy, in truth, in a man who wants to sell himself to the Devil! After the theft, you go to the crossroads in the forest; there you trace a circle with this wand.
“It’s made of hazel-wood; I cut it on the first Wednesday of the moon; I needed a new knife for that. I hid my wand furtively on an alter at which a priest was about to celebrate mass; I engraved at the stout end the mysterious agla, in the middle cor, and at the thin extremity, tetragrammaton; a cross surmounts each word.
“Once your circle is traced, you bare your left leg, and you stand in the circle naked. Then, cutting the pullet’s throat, it’s necessary to cry: ‘Silver of the blood of my black beast! I want a thousand écus au soleil for it.’ Then, if the Devil wants you, he’ll appear to you.
“But Henriot, make haste, for midnight is approaching, and after that hour, Lucifer becomes invisible.”
As he finished speaking, he extracted himself abrup
tly from Henriot’s grip and, shoving him outside, closed the door behind him.
The young man remained pensive for a few moments. Then, suddenly starting marching like a man taking a desperate resolution from which he fears he might retreat, he went to the farm that Mathias had mentioned to him, scaled a low wall, seized a black pullet and plunged into the forest.
Meanwhile, the storm had commenced. Large raindrops were falling on the foliage, and a violent tempest was engulfed in the trees with a frightful roaring. Lightning was flashing continually, and detonations of thunder following rapidly.
Henriot, sustained by the frenzy of despair, ran rather than walked to the crossroads. There he accomplished the mysterious rites that Mathias had taught him:
“Silver of the blood of my black beast! I want a thousand écus au soleil for it.”
A frightful clap of thunder resounded at that moment, and a white phantom, and then a squat black figure, appeared through the trees.
Henriot fell in a faint.
Day was beginning to break when he recovered consciousness.
Directing bewildered glances around him, he had to collect himself for a few minutes before being able to recall distinctly his despair, his criminal projects and the fatal apparition of the previous night.
But perhaps that apparition, he thought, was the effect of my trouble imagination. Oh, yes, I need that idea. To think that I’m forever—for eternal life—the property of the demon would be too frightful! Come on—it’s nothing!
He got to his feet, not without difficulty, and dragged himself slowly as far as he path to the hamlet.
A few more steps, and he was about to emerge from the forest, when he tripped over a cadaver lying across the path. Marcy! It was that of his cousin, Grégoire Bonneau.
Henriot uttered a cry of despair.
“It’s done, then! I belong to the Demon, body and soul! He’s struck my cousin with lightning. That’s how he’s paying me the thousand écus au soleil.”
The Angel Asrael Page 13