The Further Adventures of Sherlock Holmes--The Devil and the Four

by Sam Siciliano

  He gave an appreciative nod, his eyes fixed on Violet. The wind had brought some color to her cheeks, and she looked quite stunning in the red hat with the feathers. His admiration of her beauty was clear enough in his eyes. “Bienvenue, Madame Bennet. And you, also, are Catholic?”

  “Certainly, Monsieur l’Abbé Docre. Seulement une fille humble de l’église.”

  My eyebrows came together. Only a humble daughter of the church. I thought that might be putting it on a bit thickly, but Docre was pleased with the response. “Your French is excellent, madame. I am glad we will be able to speak freely.”

  “No more than I,” Violet replied.

  He hesitated only an instant. “And your husband, madame, is he with you on your visit to our fair city?”

  “No. I am a widow.”

  “Alas.” He touched her lightly on the upper arm. “I hope the Church has provided you with some consolation?”

  “Indeed it has.”

  Docre stepped back and swung his arm about in a great arc. “Behold the grand city of light, all of Paris spread out before you in its glory! There below teem the masses of our metropolis, most of them gone astray, their lives dominated by labor and petty sorts of sin.”

  We drew nearer to the wall and stared down at the square to the west, mostly empty now in November, the trees all bare, the fountain still. The buildings, the trees—all had a sort of golden glow because of the sun low in the sky. We took a few minutes to walk slowly round the wall, looking in all four directions. Docre provided a running commentary, even as he set one hand gently on my shoulder, then on Violet’s. We could see the hill of Montmartre to the northwest with its partly constructed basilica there. To the east was Notre Dame, to the south the Jardin du Luxembourg. The sun sank behind a streak of gray cloud, the bottom half turning red and coloring all the cloud pinkish-orange. The light around us dimmed and lost color.

  Violet was beside me, and she suddenly shivered. “What is it?” I asked.

  “I’m rather cold.”

  “Ah, let us go inside then,” Docre said.

  It was a relief to get out of the cold air, and it was quieter, too, once the priest closed the trap door. He gestured toward the dark opening before us. “The rotunda here is nearly seventy meters up.” He took a small torch and struck a match to light the wick. “I shall go first and guide the way.” He slipped past us, brushing us closely. I reflected that either he was wary of heights, or he enjoyed being near to ladies. “Would you prefer the tour first, or should we descend for Confession?”

  I glanced at Violet, whose face was largely hidden in shadow. “The tour, I think,” I said.

  “Very good, although perhaps we may occasionally touch upon matters of spirit.” He started down the circular staircase. I took the candle, and we followed. “We shall pass our five shapely ladies: Thérèse, Caroline, Louise, Marie and Henriette.”

  “What ladies?” I asked.

  He laughed. “Those are the names of the great bells of Saint-Sulpice.” He paused and shone the light on a vast curving expanse of metal, the bronze worn and pitted. “This is Mademoiselle Henriette, and down there is Caroline. Caroline is the most grand of the bells. It takes four great strapping men to make her sing. You can see the metal footrest where they must stand, two on either side.”

  “It must be deafening up here when it rings,” Violet said.

  “Indeed it is, madame. Caroline is very loud in her cry.”

  The priest kept up further commentary as we descended, pausing occasionally to point out some detail of the bells or the workings of the sounding shutters. The sun had set by then; already there was much less light coming through the shutters than when we had ascended. We came at last to the first landing where there were four doors. He shone the light on one of them.

  “There are lodgings here. Behind this door is the dwelling of the old bell-ringer Carhaix and his wife. He has been at his work some thirty years. As you might guess, he is almost completely deaf. A pity, but the sacrifice was made for the greater glory of God.” He pulled open one of the doors. “This leads to the great attic of the church and more chambers.” He started forward, and we followed. It was a vast, dim, dusty sort of cavern, massive wooden beams on either side and overhead supporting the roof. My nose felt itchy, and I saw dust particles dancing in the beam of the torch.

  “Here lies a sister of the five ladies, one who has unfortunately split herself.” He traced the outline of the crack along the surface of the bell. It lay on its side like some beached whale or other great fish. “And we also have some statues of the saints which are broken, as well as an old baptismal font just there. The attic is like that of a grand old house, a storeroom for the broken-down and discarded. Just ahead there is the room which serves as my oratory. I come here to pray and meditate.”

  He swung open the door, and we immediately felt a welcome warmth. He stepped inside. Violet and I looked at one another, then followed. It was bare and austere, with only a small table and two chairs, the tiny black stove which warmed the room, a narrow spartan-looking bed, and of course, a prie-dieu, an antique with leather-covered kneeler and a velvet top to support one’s arms. A small window let in the gray light of dusk. The priest gestured at the stove where a steaming kettle sat.

  “I know you English are lost without your tea. May I prepare you some?”

  I frowned slightly, but Violet smiled. “Only if you will join us, Monsieur l’Abbé.”

  “Gladly, madame, gladly.” He poured the hot water from the kettle into a plain white tea pot. “We must give it a few minutes of course.” He lit a small lamp on the table, extinguished the torch, then stepped back to gesture at the chairs. “Please sit down, mesdames.”

  “But where will you sit?” Violet asked. “There are only two chairs.”

  “The bed is good enough for me.” He pulled out a chair for each of us, then sat on the bed and leaned upon his right hand. The mattress had hardly any give. His sensual lips formed a polite smile, and his gaze shifted from Violet to me, then back to her. “Have you been in Paris long, Madame Bennet?”

  “A few months. I wished to put my past behind me and begin anew.”

  He nodded. “A beneficial attitude.” He smiled. “Your French really is excellent for an English woman. Not perfect like that of madame la docteur, who has no accent, but impressive all the same.”

  “Thank you, Monsieur l’Abbé. I have labored at it.”

  “And it has paid off indeed. You have been here several months, you say. Where do you go for Mass?”

  “I rent a home near Auteuil, and a small church is nearby where I generally go. Sometimes I come into the city for the Mass at Notre Dame.”

  “Ah, you must visit us here at Saint-Sulpice! I often preach at the ten o’clock Mass.”

  “I shall make a point of coming!” She smiled enthusiastically.

  “Excellent!” His smiled faded, his expression suddenly distasteful. “I doubt that Auteuil would have a priest who could provide a clever lady such as yourself with proper spiritual instruction.”

  “No, I think not,” Violet said. “And do you think such instruction is truly necessary?”

  “But certainly! How is the female soul, weak as it is created by God, to progress without the firm guidance of a holy father?”

  My mouth twitched slightly as I tried to keep my face neutral. Docre noticed it. “You do not agree, madame la docteur?”

  “Oh yes, absolutely.”

  “I think our tea is ready.” He stood, took down three cups and saucers from a shelf, then poured out tea. “I fear I have no sugar. It is an indulgence which I do not permit myself.”

  “I prefer mine without sugar,” Violet said.

  “Very good!” He pushed our cups toward us, then took a cup and saucer, sat back on the edge of the bed, and took a polite sip.

  His eyes watched Violet as she pulled off first one glove, then the other: one did not eat or drink tea in gloves. Her fingers were so long and slend
er compared to mine, her hands like those of Botticelli’s graceful ladies. I actually put my own hands under the table as I pulled off my gloves, but his eyes lingered on my fingers as I set them on the table.

  I quickly took a sip of tea, then nodded. “It is very good.” His dark brown eyes stared at me over the rim of his cup. What on earth am I doing here? I asked myself. Perhaps Henry had been right: I had taken leave of my senses.

  “And do you have many ladies to whom you provide spiritual guidance?” Violet asked.

  “A select few.”

  “And how do you choose them? I suspect they all may be under forty and rather pretty.”

  Docre seemed briefly disconcerted, then shrugged. “Come to think of it, they are under forty. And I must confess that I am not one of those narrow ministers who despises beauty. It is a gift from God which he gives only to a lucky few.” He gave an appreciative nod at us both.

  Violet glanced at me. “I think we are being complimented, my dear.”

  “So we are.” I tried to keep my voice sprightly.

  “And you might have time to meet with me on a regular basis, Monsieur l’Abbé?”

  “I would absolutely make the time, madame.” It seemed clear to me that Violet had made a conquest, that his interest, though divided, had shifted toward her.

  “And what might you teach me, what tenants of the faith? You do not strike me as some narrow moralist who would focus only on the threat of damnation.”

  His smile faltered. “Damnation is not something to be mocked.”

  “Certainly not!” she exclaimed. “Forgive me if I gave the impression I was suggesting such a thing.”

  “All the same, there is a certain higher level of the soul that can be obtained, a meeting with God in the joining of human spirits. We are all islands apart, but in true union can come great joy. Men and women were not meant to always be so separate and distant, one from the other.”

  He did not remark it, but I recognized a certain sardonic quality to Violet’s smile. I decided I wanted to change the subject.

  “And do you truly think you can help Madame Hardy? She is in such spiritual distress.”

  “Ah.” He shook his head gravely. “Indeed she is. The Devil has made great inroads. I fear that some great sin from her past hangs like a millstone about her neck, beckoning to Satan.”

  The metaphor seemed almost comical to me (I could see Marguerite with a millstone necklace round her neck), but I only nodded. “Is it Satan himself?” Violet asked. “Or only one of his minions?”

  “Satan is everywhere. His minions never act alone.”

  “I thought only God was everywhere,” I said. “Only god is omnipresent.”

  Docre shrugged. “Satan is not in Heaven, but he lurks everywhere in this world of ours.”

  “I suppose if he is almost everywhere, at least he cannot be seen,” Violet said.

  “Ah, but he can!” Docre spoke with utter certainty.

  “How is that possible?” I asked.

  “He manifests himself locally to inspire fear.”

  I could not restrain myself. “Does he have horns and a tail?”

  “Horns, no. The tail… not exactly.”

  I laughed although I was not amused. “Does he look like a man?”

  “Not at all. He is a great black shadowy being. He has no head, but two red whirlpools for eyes and a greater yellow-white one for a mouth.”

  Violet and I exchanged a glance. “And the angels, what are they like?” she asked.

  “Luminous beings. But it can be hard to distinguish demons from angels. The demons are clever. They can assume almost the same form. They are, however, all much smaller than their great lord and master.”

  Violet hesitated an instant, then said, “‘Ô toi, le plus savant et le plus beau des Anges, dieu trahi par le sort et privé de louanges…’”

  I frowned in concentration. Oh you, the wisest and most beautiful of angels, god betrayed by fate and denied praise… That was from one of Charles Baudelaire’s poems from Les Fleurs du Mal—The Flowers of Evil. As I recalled, the poem was a prayer to Satan.

  The words struck Docre dumb. He stared at Violet, his eyes opening very wide, his jaw thrusting forward slightly. His face was so pale against the black of his soutane and his curly hair. His mouth twitched into a smile which came and went quickly. His voice was a sudden hoarse whisper: “‘Ô Satan, prends pitié de ma longue misère!’” That was the refrain of the poem, which repeated itself every few lines: Oh Satan, take pity on my long misery.

  Violet’s brief smile was grim. “‘Toi qui sais tout, grand roi des choses souterraines, guérisseur familier des angoisses humaines…’ ” You who knows everything, great king of underground things, familiar healer of human agonies…

  Docre smiled again, then said, without much of a pause this time, “‘Ô Satan, prends pitié de ma longue misère!’ ”

  “Bravo, Monsieur l’Abbé,” Violet said. “You know your Baudelaire. I would hardly have expected it.”

  Docre frowned, his eyes fixed on her, his indecision obvious. “I… I have an appreciation for poetry, for the grand beauty of his language. I do not, of course, condone its blasphemous content.” Somehow the last sentence was rather equivocal. “And you, Madame Bennet, why would you choose a prayer to Satan to quote to me, a priest?”

  She shrugged. “Oh, we were talking about the Devil, and it was just the first thing to come to mind. I’m afraid ‘The Litanies of Satan’ is a favorite. Of course, I don’t condone all the blasphemy either, but my French teacher recommended I study the poems to assist in my learning.”

  Docre gave her a probing glance, then turned to me. “And you, madame la docteur, are you also familiar with Baudelaire?”

  “Oh yes. My mother had a copy of the poems.”

  “Your mother!”

  “Yes, she was English, you know, and she too was studying to perfect her French.” I did not tell him I had started reading Les Fleurs du Mal during the long summer holiday when I was sixteen, mainly because one of the sisters at school had denounced the poems as blasphemous, degenerate and obscene. What respectable young woman could ignore them after that? I had taken the volume down from an upper shelf of the family library and read the poems furtively in my bedroom.

  “And they please you?”

  “Oh yes.” That at least was mostly true.

  He nodded. “Most interesting.” He took a final sip of tea, then set the cup on the saucer and rose to put it on the table. “There is a poem I am particularly fond of, ‘The Giantess.’” His eyes half-closed. “‘J’eusse aimé vivre auprès d’une jeune géante, comme aux pieds d’une reine un chat voluptueux.’”

  I would like to have lived near a young giantess, like a voluptuous cat at the feet of a queen. It took an effort of will to keep smiling, and I suspected my smile must have grown ferocious, because he drew back slightly. I had guessed right before: my height must be part of my appeal for him. I knew that particular poem very well because it was a joke between Henry and me; he often quoted it when we were in bed together, especially the later part about feeling the giantess’s magnificent shape and slumbering in the shade of her breasts. He would kiss me, then murmur “ma belle géante.” I tried to reassure myself that the poem would not be permanently ruined for me, that the speaker had more to do with its effect than the actual content.

  “I know it,” I said.

  “Ah,” he murmured. My smile wavered.

  Violet must have seen that I was faltering. “The language is certainly lush and voluptuous. Do you think that in itself is wicked, Monsieur l’Abbé?”

  His smile broadened. “I do not. They are only words, after all. And… what is voluptuousness but the abundance of God’s beauty, an invitation to the soul’s delights?” His eyes watched us both carefully.

  Violet laughed. “I could not agree more. If the body in all its grace and beauty was created by God, can it be wicked to appreciate that beauty?—to savor it? Certainly not!
”

  I could tell she was playacting, but Docre was quickly taken in. “I agree with you completely, madame. The joy in its beauty can take us to a mystical plane above this wretched earth of ours! And it is all so brief, so ephemeral—such beauty must be seized during the short instance when it exists.”

  Violet laughed again. Her cheeks were flushed, but unlike Docre, I knew it was not from passion. “Again, I could not agree more.”

  He nodded, then glanced at me. “And you?”

  I told myself that if he actually touched me, I would slap him, and that resolution gave animation to my smile. “I am la géante, after all. I like a voluptuous cat at my feet. Or à l’ombre de mes seins.” This last made Violet’s smile falter, her eyes giving me a questioning look.

  “Ah.” He had lowered his eyes, but a smile still played about his mouth. “There are mysteries, grand mysteries of the flesh, voyages which take us beyond ourselves to another plane, to a land where there is no more division, where the soul cries out its joys at union, at the unimaginable meeting of two souls. How can true joy be wicked, heavenly bliss diabolical? Or perhaps…” For an instant his eyes turned inward. “It is all the same, all one—God and Satan, pleasure and pain, the celestial bed and the infernal sty!”

  He leaped suddenly to his feet, making both Violet and me start. I clutched at my handbag, aware of the bulky shape of the revolver within it. “I have something to show you! Come with me. You should find this interesting.” He seized the handle of the lamp and started for the door.

  Violet and I stared at one another, and I half raised the handbag by way of reassurance. I took the candle, and we followed him further along the attic, which was nearly completely dark now, the light from some low openings mostly gone. He came to another door, withdrew a ring of keys, selected one and opened the door. “Wait only one minute.” He darted inside with the lamp and closed the door.

  “Henry was right,” I said. “We have both taken leave of our senses.”

  “I think it is the abbé who has taken leave of his senses.” She gave my hand a quick squeeze.

  The door soon swung open. “Entrez,” he proclaimed. Violet went first, then me.