by Paul Busson
Two grave-diggers, one old, the other young, came forward with sticks in their hands and asked me what had happened and why had shots been fired. At once I described to them the man with the wallet, and under what suspicious circumstances I had encountered him previously, near an unburied body. His behaviour at the new grave had made me so angry that I fired my pistol at him, I explained, but apparently I had done him no harm, for he ran away laughing. They listened to me earnestly. As I concluded the old gravedigger nodded his head, as though to say he knew the man well, and detested him even as I did. Then he asked me my name. I told him, and he said:
“Of course a Baron may do as he likes. But we have the chartered right to fine every misdemeanour against the sanctity of this place and if the fine is not paid, to bring the case before the magistrate. The fine for shooting on holy ground is one silver thaler.”
I offered the man two thalers. But he pushed one of them back to me.
“I may not take more than my due,” he explained. “But it is a pity that your pistol could not have done the monster any damage.”
“What do you mean?” I asked. “Is the fellow charmed?”
The young man laughed and the old gravedigger shrugged his shoulders.
“If you haven’t made a cross in your bullet mould, so that it shows on your ball,” explained the young man, “you can’t possibly do him any harm, be the weapon ever so good.”
“I have no cross on my bullets.”
“Then it’s a pity you fired at all. You have wasted your powder, and your thaler as well.”
“But there’s one thing about it, sir.” The old man bobbed his head. “That you can see him at all is significant.”
“Why, what do you mean?”
“Tisn’t everyone who can do that,” the young man put in.
“It’s only those who are specially graced. My father has often frightened him away from fresh graves, and I would give anything to see him. I have been on the look-out for him for days and nights together, but it’s no good, I have never seen him. But still he has been here.”
“Who is the fellow?” I asked.
“Fangerle,” said the old man, and crossed himself.
“Is he a man or?”
But they gave me no answer. They were staring away through the drizzle towards the entrance to the graveyard. A funeral procession was approaching. I heard singing, and quiet-voiced prayer.
“I had always expected that he would turn up for that miser Torbacken,” murmured the old man as he clambered down into the grave. He paid no more attention to me, and when I asked him a question, the young man said rather brusquely:
“You’d better pray about it, sir.”
Confused and troubled, I went away by a side path, while Torbacken’s coffin was carried towards the open grave.
Chapter Twenty Five
Before the mail-coach started on the journey that was to take me far from the home of my childhood, I suddenly remembered the faded and sealed little box which the attorney had handed to me as the legacy of my aunt, Aglaia’s mother. I broke the seal there and then, and opened the lid. Lying on the yellowish-white silk was a lock of my beloved and unforgettable cousin’s golden-red hair, along with the silver ring I had so often seen on her little hand. The ring was of exquisite workmanship, and consisted of two snakes that coiled round a fire opal. I kissed the mysteriously glimmering stone many times, and also the silver scales of the two snakes that had once encircled a finger of the sweetest of hands; and I murmured over and over again the name that was so deeply and painfully engraved on my heart.
I arrived in due course at the great city of Vienna, and gazed in astonishment at the street life with coaches and sedan chairs. That very evening I met once again with adventures so singular that I was forced to believe in the influence on my life of dark and superhuman powers for good or evil. My first adventure, however, was agreeable and pleasant.
As I was crossing the square in which St. Stephen’s Minster reared its stone carvings I was held up by a congestion of carriages and sedan-chairs. I stood on the pavement close to an elegant chair carried by two bearers in dark red liveries, and found myself face to face through the open window with the lady inside. How can I describe the amazement I felt when I recognised in this fashionable high-wigged lady the saddler Holbrich’s daughter, Lorle? The recognition was mutual. Lorle uttered an exclamation, and called me by name.
There I stood, with my hat off, enraptured by her full-blown beauty to which I was a stranger, a beauty that was slightly enhanced by trivial artifices. In an excited whisper I asked her to let me see her, and I asked when I might call. She made a rapid gesture of warning in the direction of the crimson-liveried porters, and then, in a very loud voice:
“Yes, Doctor,” she said, “you can bring me the cream for the complexion to my house. Just ask for Madame Laurette Triquet in Schonlaterngasse.”
She nodded to me graciously, I should even say condescendingly; and, pulling the string, she ordered the men to hurry on. After an excellent dinner that evening I again went forth from my lodging in Himmelpfortegasse. I wished to mix among the people in the thoroughfares as they enjoyed the coolness after the long, hot day. Soon I became aware that a very elegant and smartly-dressed young man was dogging my steps.
Ere long he caught me up, and said, “If your honour wants to meet good company and enjoy a round at cards, I am ready to take you to a house where everything is of the best quality.”
I was in the mood to pass the evening agreeably, and, incidentally, I hoped to swell my purse a little by luck at cards; therefore I expressed my willingness to accept the guidance of the man before me. He was very discreet. He left my side and went on ahead, only looking round occasionally to see if I was following him. After many turns to the right and many to the left through the badly lighted and badly paved streets we came into a very narrow and crooked lane. The young man stopped at a great door and gave four short raps with the knocker, followed by two that were louder.
While we were waiting for an answer I saw a dark eye scrutinising us very attentively through the keyhole. Then a postern was opened in the great, iron-clamped door; a sly-looking old woman appeared, who looked carefully at us as she held up a burning candle. Only when my guide whispered something in her ear did the woman step back, and allow us to pass. We crossed a large, damp ivy-clad court with a fountain centring it in the form of a triton’s head; and then we climbed up a steep winding staircase that was almost in complete darkness.
On the first floor my seemingly unselfish guide gave a similar knock on one of the doors. A footman threw open the doors to let me in. The next moment I found myself completely dazzled by the light of hundreds of wax candles, and stumbled forward, the gold-brocaded footman relieved us of our swords, hats and mantles. I realised at once that the shabby exterior of this out-of-the-way house and the inhospitable darkness on the staircase and in the court were calculated to keep away any over-inquisitive person.
Incidentally it concealed the splendour of the interior. For the walls shone with gold. Beautiful Gobelins tapestry partly concealed the scarlet wall-hangings. The floor was as smooth as glass, and hundreds of candles burned in chandeliers of Venetian glass and silver wall-brackets. Exquisite sweetmeats and sparkling liquors were set forth on the tables, among priceless dishes of malachite, lapis-lazuli and marble.
“Would Baron von Dronte care to step into the card-room?” asked my guide, politely smiling.
“How do you know my name?” I asked, and I spoke rather sharply.
The young man smiled in a superior manner.
“We take an interest in all strangers of quality who arrive among us,” was the answer, “and we are kept informed of their appearance here by the post-boys. That is why I know that my Lord Baron has taken chambers at the widow Schwebskuchlein’s; and may I be pardoned for having brought your Lordship into a company he will surely appreciate, and where he will find gentlemanly amusement, and perhaps something from Fo
rtune’s full horn.”
As he spoke we entered one of the ante-rooms, brilliantly lighted and as brilliantly and luxuriously furnished. The games of “faro” and “landsknecht” were being played at many tables. When my name was announced the players scarcely turned their heads towards me, for at the largest table all eyes were anxiously fixed on the banker as I approached.
Abrupt exclamations of “Va tout” or “Va banque” came from all sides, interrupted by the muffled ring of louis d’ors rolling on the green cloth that covered the marble of the tables. I drew out my purse, which I always wore inside my embroidered vest for fear of thieves; and I came up to the big table. The young man who had been my guide immediately brought a comfortable chair for me and disappeared as I was sitting down and thanking him negligently.
Before beginning to play, I looked round at my fellows. I saw that I had joined a company of caricatures. The banker had a colourless, wry face with which havoc had been wrought through a wild and restless life. On his right eye he wore a square patch of cloth with a ribbon that crossed his forehead and disappeared behind his right ear. Seated next to him was a woman who was very short of breath, being monstrously fat; she wore a white-powdered pumpkin-shaped wig. She was decked with a vulgar profusion of pearls and jewels of all sorts. I adjudged her to be Spanish. Beside her sat an exceedingly thin lady, plainly of quality, and of great straightness and haughtiness, with half-shut eyes. Her sallow face was covered with beauty-spots in the form of palms, butterflies and birds. Her white fingers nervously wallowed in a heap of gold coins that lay before her.
On the other side of the banker an old man with lifeless eyes was leaning back in his chair. When it was his turn to receive money his long fingers crawled out of his lace cuffs like the legs of a spider. An uncommonly ugly, hunchbacked man with a dark-brown face, with eyebrows as thick as a finger and black as coal, and sharp, thin lips, was eating bonbons out of a gold paper bag. A sharp smell of bitter almonds, which I had noticed as soon as I had entered the room, proceeded from him. Between him and a hussar, silver tassled and dressed in dark green, sat a timid and shrinking young girl, to whom I was at once attracted.
Nor did the remaining men escape my notice. One was in expensive clothes, with a nose as red as a turkey-cock’s; another, judging by his embroidered coat, was a high official who turned on me a horse-like eye, bluish-white and blind. All the people at the table seemed monstrous in one way or another. But the young girl, who had immediately stirred me, unexpectedly and deeply, through her indescribable likeness to my dead cousin Aglaia, was exquisitely charming and beautiful.
In these surroundings she gave the impression of a flower in a manure heap. She looked across at me with an earnest gaze that seemed to implore my help; it penetrated into my heart like a sweet flame, filling me with intense tenderness. I felt as if it were truly my Aglaia sitting opposite to me, only slightly changed in her appearance, imploring me mutely to defend and save her from some unknown danger. Soon I heard her name spoken by the hunchback in a sharp, commanding tone of foreign-sounding German. “Zephyrine!”
Every time the fellow required a service from that charming and lonely child, the mouth of the spider-like old man, who was addressed as Count Korony, formed itself into a leer, unspeakably lewd and disgusting. I loved Zephyrine at first sight. There and then I vowed that I would seize the first opportunity of offering her my services, so urgently she appeared to need them. My sense of urgency was so strong in me that I could scarcely withhold myself. Several times I almost cast prudence to the winds and addressed her, especially at a moment when she looked at me with her greyish-golden eyes, and I could easily have believed that I was held by the gaze of Aglaia’s unforgettable stars. Still I managed not to betray emotion that would have been completely misunderstood.
I felt able to wait for a convenient moment to speak to her without being noticed. The game went high, and the banker with the covered eye was drawing in whole mountains of gold. The stout Spanish woman who neighboured him was also having great luck. At first I played with circumspection. Twice I made a double, but at the next turn I lost.
Soon I became excited in a manner that precludes reasonable play; I tried to regain quickly what I had lost, but I only lost again and again. The girl’s eyes dwelt on me sadly, telling me with an almost imperceptible glance to be careful, and to watch the banker’s fingers. Deeper and deeper I dived into my purse, more and more of my gold coins found their way into the all-grasping hands as well as those of the Spanish woman.
At midnight I realised with terror that my money was nearly exhausted. Only a few gold coins remained. I bitterly regretted my thoughtlessness. Too late I began to remind myself that such secret gambling-houses were only made to trap simpletons. How often had I heard that after the plundered victim had left, the sham adversaries would share with the winner his gain won by their adroit co-operation.
But though, after Zephyrine’s secret warning, I was on the look-out and watched carefully the banker’s hands, I could discern nothing to justify me in declaring the game unfair and claiming my money back. But even if I had discovered any trickery my demand would probably have had no effect on the majority of the numerous company, which was doubtless prepared for such emergencies. Moreover, the chances were that I would never be able to find the house again. In desperation I staked two of my four remaining gold coins. At the same moment the clock on the mantelpiece announced the hour of twelve in clear strokes and played a hoarse mournful gavotte.
Suddenly a door was flung open, and a hollow-eyed footman appeared, dressed in a mourning livery of black, and pushing an armchair that held a new player. Right up to the table he wheeled it. The occupant was a very aged, decrepit old man in a white wig; like his footman he was dressed in black. His face was intelligent, but betrayed the traces of a dissipated life. It was criss-crossed with innumerable furrows and wrinkles. The waxen colour and peculiar immobility of his features lent a corpse-like and deathly aspect to his handsome and clever-looking head.
Then the old man made a startling entry into the game. Taking no heed of the unconcealed amazement of the company round the table, he pushed a roll of gold on to the cloth and commenced without saying a word. The gamblers began whispering among themselves, covertly staring at him. It seemed to me as if the candles burned less brightly since he and his mute attendant had entered the room... And then the man in the invalid’s chair fixed his black, lifeless eyes on me and said in a voice that seemed to come from some unfathomable deep:
“Herr von Dronte, I invite you to play in association with me. I was so thunderstruck that I could only nod. A mist settled before my eyes. Zephyrine’s charming face and glimmering hair were hidden from me for the moment; so were the bejewelled hand of the Spanish woman and the nimble fingers of the banker. The cards fell... Silently the old man pushed towards me half his winnings, a whole roll of golden sovereigns! The banker muttered something between his teeth, the stout lady mopped the perspiration and incidentally the greasy powder from her forehead, and the hussar muttered an unintelligible Hungarian oath.
Again the cards fell; and again the thin old fingers pushed before me a heap of gold coins. Time ran on, but now it seemed to be raining gold. I saw people rising from the other tables and a ring of onlookers came clustering round us. Everybody kept perfectly still. Nothing was to be heard but the scarcely audible fall of the cards, the few words indispensable to the game, and the clear ring of metal.
Presently my gold was too plentiful for me to encompass it with both my hands. I began filling my purse furtively. When it was packed to bursting, I crammed the ducats into my pockets. I now possessed three times as much gold as I had on entering the house. My coat-tails hung heavily down with it, the pockets of even my vest were swollen. Everyone lost, the man with the horse’s eye, the stout Spanish woman, the banker, the hussar, the red-nosed fellow, the courtier, the Count, and the hunchback at Zephyrine’s side.
With trembling hands they searched their po
ckets and purses, their faces glistening with the perspiration of anxiety; and the paint on their eyebrows melted to a rusty black above their staring eyes. I knew I was rich. Soon I had no more room for my gold. Then the clock on the mantelpiece struck the first hour after midnight and rang out its tuneless gavotte. At the same moment the black footman entered and quietly took hold of the chair; and the old man, who was evidently suffering, nodded to me with a faint smile.
The chair moved noiselessly away through the open doorway, through which it had been wheeled an hour ago. I sprang up and hurried after the invalid to express my gratitude to him. No one hindered me. Suddenly I felt a little, ice-cold, trembling hand seeking mine and a folded piece of paper thrust between my fingers. As quickly as I could I ran into the antechamber. Where was the man in the invalid’s chair? A sleepy footman gave me my mantle, hat and sword. I left him a few gold coins and hurried downstairs.
The old woman stood at the door, as if she had just let someone out. She opened the door for me without objection. As I went out I heard frantic cries and wild swearing in the rooms above. I must thank my deliverer, I thought, as I hurried along. But the street was deserted. Nowhere was a trace to be seen of the old man’s vehicle. I ran down several side lanes. Nothing. Not a sound anywhere. How could he have disappeared so quickly?
Then, all suddenly, I beheld in front of me, with terrible and indescribable distinctness, like a picture on a dark background, the chapel and the dead man from whose hands I was to have stolen the cross of two sticks for Fangerle, the desecrator of dead bodies. Half-fainting I leant back against a wall. And when a gust of wind made a lantern creak on its hinges above me I was so startled that I nearly fell to the ground. Zephyrine’s message was still in my hand. I unfolded it and read:
“Save me...”