Hadrian the Seventh

by Frederick Rolfe

  The cardinals discussed them with the Pope. The Secretary of State was insinuatory. He spoke of the terrible scandal; and let it be understood that, in his opinion, payments should be made to stop it. He hinted at the impossibility of defending the indefensible. Better to use that million, the balance of the sale of the Vatican treasure. That million had paid the expenses of the sale and of the restoration of the sacristy; and had endowed St. George’s College of historical researchers under the presidency of Dr. Richard Barnett: it was accounted for in della Volta’s balance-sheet, Hadrian put in. Carvale added that payment never stopped scandal. Caerleon earnestly hoped that nothing would be done: it would rake up the past and involve so many people. Semphill yearned for the good old days, faggots, tongue-tearing, hand-chopping, ear-cropping, head-cutting, eye-gouging, maiming, and stoning, and the groaning with much wailing of those impaled by the spine, and all that sort of thing out of the Eymenides. He loudly said so; and was silenced by a look from the Pontiff’s scornful anguished face. Discussion languished. Then Hadrian said “Bring them here.”

  Sir Iulo pit-pit-pit-pitted across the City on a motorbicycle, and burst into Via Due Macelli, a scarlet Hermes, with the annunciation, “You are summoned to attend our Most Holy Father in the Vatican. Mrs. Crowe hiccoughed “At last”; and bolted upstairs to put on her most fetching hat. Jerry Sant grinned spikily through a tattered moustache. The two got into a hired victoria; and followed the gentleman-of-the-secret-chamber.

  Hadrian received them in the throne-room. He did not occupy the throne, but the central chair of a semicircular group of five. Ragna, Sterling, Leighton, and Caerleon used the others. The latter had a pigskin portfolio on his knee. In front of the ecclesiastics were two chairs of equal importance. The man and woman lounged there. It was quite a family gathering. But between the Church and the World, Sir John stood by a little table furnished with the pontifical phonographs.

  “We have summoned you, in order that ye may speak your minds to Us,” the Supreme Pontiff said: “but ye shall know that We will not hold any communication with you except Our utterances and yours be recorded by these instruments.” His voice was very frigid: but there was neither menace nor offence in it. His quiet tone totally was at variance with the furious defiance of the matter of His words. The paradox disconcerted his hearers. Sant went magenta with wrath: remembered how much he had at stake; and was canny enough not to demur. With an attempt at an easy laugh, he said that it was a little unusual, not quite what he expected, but he didn’t want to be unpleasant to His Lordship, and so he had no objection he was sure. And he lolled in his armchair, as who should say “A’m fair easy.” Mrs. Crowe bit her upper lip: but said that she had no objection either. Hadrian waved His hand; and the pontifical gentleman sat down and set the machines in motion.

  The Pope put the woman to the question: “Madam, what do you want?”

  Face to face with that she failed to put her want in words. It was an acrid pungent permanent want, not-to-be-named. She bit at her upper lip again; and looked at Jerry for a lead. He proceeded “I think, Reverend Sir, that it will be more advantageous tor all parties if I was to speak for Mrs. Crowe.”

  “We will concede the point. Sir, what do you want?” the Pontiff said.

  Then the virtuous Jerry also began to flounder. Want? Eh, but he wanted several things.

  “Name them:” the Pope commanded.

  “Well:—reparation—damages.”

  “For what?” the Pope inquired.

  “For ma loss of time whiles I’ve had to be here and for ma business which Ye may say’s gone ta th dogs; and for the loss of ma Liblab Fellowship.”

  “To what extent have you suffered?”

  “To fhat extent? Well, I’ll let Ye know. I’ve been here since last July, say eight months, say forty weeks, say three hundred days; and I take ordinarily a pound-note per day on journeys for expenses: but it’s cost me a heap more than that this trip. Ye can call it five hundred pounds for out-of-pocket expenses. Then there’s ma business which I’ve had to neglect, eight months, better say a year at one-fifty for salary, and commissions—say another fifty. There’s eight hundreds. Then they’ve had the cheek to expel me as a Fellowshipper, as I suppose Ye’ve heard. Of course that’s very damaging to ma prestige, say to the extent of a couple of thousands. Fhat’s that come to? Two thousands eight hundreds—may as well call it three thousands. And of course there’s fhat old Krooger named moral and intellectual damage—I don’t know fhat tae pit that at, I’m sure—but Ye might tot it all up together and call it twenty thousands.”

  “And your companion?”

  “Aweel, Ye’d better double it and we’ll both ca’ quits. Forty thousands cash!”

  The Pope cast a slight look round upon his cardinals. They returned it. ‘You are demanding that We should pay you forty thousand pounds,” He said to the expectant Jerry.

  “That’s correct.”

  “Why do you demand this sum of Us?”

  “Why? Why because we’ve run into all these expenses on Your account. If Ye hadna have been here, neither would we have came and have had all this fuss and bother. Who’s to indemnify us for that but Yersel’, I’m asking Ye. I’ll let Ye know we’ve fair ruined oursels——”

  The Bald She interrupted. “If I could have a private word with Your Holiness.”

  The motive did not escape Hadrian’s notice. “Daughter, your conduct and your notorious proclivities debar you from a private interview with any clergyman, except in the open confessional.”

  “Then in the confessional.”

  The Pope rose and beckoned her to follow. He beckoned Sir John to stop the machines and remain: the others to follow. They descended into St. Peter’s. There, He turned out the English Confessor; and took his place, while the woman kneeled at the left side. Just out of earshot, the four cardinals stayed with Sant, who fumed in his inward parts. Fhat blathers was this going on under their very noses? The half-door and the window both were open: only the lateral partition divided the priest from the penitent. The grating was between their faces; and, though they were perfectly visible, they were visible apart and separate.

  Hadrian in a low tone recited “May the Lord be in thine heart and on thy lips”—; and put Himself to listen.

  Through the grating there came a whine,—“Georgie!”

  “My child, there is no Georgie here, but only your Judge. Confess your sins, if you will,—only to Almighty God. Shew contrition. And, by His authority committed to me His minister, I will absolve.”

  Then the Devil entered into her. She incoherently spluttered “I have no sins—if I had, I wouldn’t tell You.—You reject me?—Oh I’ll make You regret it—I’ll make You suffer as I have—I’ll shew you up for what You are——” She stiffened and rushed across to Jerry “Now do your worst,” she said; and her face was livid.

  Sant gripped the lapels of his grotesque frock-coat and approached the white figure which emerged from the central compartment of the confessional.

  “I should like to mak’ an end of this matter,” he said.

  Hadrian led the way to the throne-room: the phonographs were set to work; and the conference was resumed.

  “Now,” said Jerry, “I’m thinking that Your Right Reverence had better let us know definitely fhat Ye intend to do.”

  The Pope spoke rather more slowly and with more singular mildness than before. “You demand that We should pay you forty thousand pounds in reparation for damage which, you say, We have caused.”

  “That’s so.”

  “It is useless to point out to you that We did not ask you to waste your time in Rome——”

  “I should have been surprised if Ye had have.”

  “And that We did not force you, or induce you, to neglect your business——”

  “Nae! Ye never thought I’d have dared to face Ye as I have.”

  “And that We were in no wise concerned with your expulsion from the Liblab Fellowship——”

 
“But Ye were! If Ye’d have had the civility to give the deputation a satisfactory answer, or even to have satisfied the fellowshippers afterwards, or to have made it all right with me so as I could have settled them, then there wouldn’t have been all this trouble and unpleasantness, my Lord.”

  “Some men are gifted with an abnormal capability for making the greatest possible fools of themselves. For the credit of the human race, it must be said that indecent exhibitions of this kind are rare. Mr. Sant, does it not occur to you that you are engaging in a very foolish and a very dirty business?”

  “Dirty business Yersel’! Who’re Ye talking to? Ma hands are as clean as Yours any day. Who owes twenty pound notes to this lady I’m brought with me?”

  “We do not know.”

  “Imphm. Well, suppose I was to say it was Yersel’?”

  “You would tell an officious lie, Mr. Sant.” The Pope turned to the woman. “Madam, do We owe you twenty pounds?”

  “You owe me a great deal more than that:” she barked.

  “Mr. Sant alludes to a specific sum of twenty pounds odd which was due to this lady’s deceased husband for books, newspapers, and stationery, supplied some years ago when he kept a shop:” the Pope explained to the cardinals, with a gesture to Talacryn. The Cardinal of Caerleon extracted a slip from the portfolio; and read a receipt for the amount named plus 5 per cent, interest. This document was dated the thirty-first of the previous March. The Pope continued, “You know, Madam, that We paid this bill the moment We were in a position to pay it. You also know that payment was long delayed solely because you yourself, by calumniating and libelling Us to Our employers and to those who called themselves Our friends, prevented Us from earning more than a bare sustenance——”

  Jerry burst in, “Well, if Ye’ve paid her why shouldn’t Ye pay me?”

  “Because We do not owe you anything.”

  “Then Ye mean me ta pit some more about Ye in the papers?”

  “Listen, Mr. Sant. We look upon you as a deeply injured man——”

  “Hech! Now that’s something like!”

  “We look upon you as a deeply injured man, injured by himself. You have been your own enemy. You have suffered loss and damage simply because you have allowed yourself to persist in doing silly things and wicked things. Now, is it useless to ask you to change all that? Will you turn over a new leaf and begin your life again? You shall not be left alone. You shall be helped.”

  “A want ma money.”

  “If you wish to do well for yourself, if you wish honestly to earn a better living than you ever have earned, you shall have the opportunity.”

  An appeal to a goodness which is not in him is, to a vain and sensitive soul, a stinging insult. Jerry’s face became wetter and redder. “And fhat about damages for the past?” he barked.

  “You shall have a chance for the future.”

  “Then Ye willna pay! Ye want me to shew Ye up in the papers again?”

  “You may put what you please in the papers. We will not pay even a farthing to prevent you, Mr. Sant,—not one farthing.”

  “Then I’m not to get anything?”

  “At a threat? No. Nothing!” Defiance hurled denial at the brute.

  “Fhat are we waiting here for, wumman?” Sant snarled at Mrs. Crowe. “Here let’s get out of this. He makes me fair sick with His holy preaching!” At the door, he turned round, bragging boldly like a cock beside his partlet; and waved his bowler hat, “E-e-e-h but A’ll mak’ Ye squirm, Ye . . . inseck!” he foamed.

  Ragna was furious. “Holiness, why don’t You shoot them at once? You are Sovereign within these walls. Give order for their arrest before they leave the palace, Holiness; and have them shot!”

  “It is Our will that they be left to the common executioner,” the Pope disdainfully ordained, sitting very hieratically in his chair, young, rigid, and terrific as the Flamen Virbialis. The audience had been a fresh phase of agony to Him: He had tried to merge His humanity in His apostolature, and had failed; and the failure was torment, physical, poignant. He was indignant; and He was dangerous. Their Eminencies inquiringly looked at Him. Leighton blinked; and thought it a dreadful pity. Talacryn was for running out and trying to persuade the blackmailers even at some cost,—anything was better than scandal, he said. The Pope told him not to be a stupid fool with his infernal hankerings after compromise. “Fancy paying for silence!” His Holiness scornfully adjoined.

  “No but Holy Father, I think if You were to leave them to me, I could find some way of silencing them. Silence is what we want indeed, whatever.”

  “Your Eminency is well skilled in the art of silencing people, bad and good. It is by no means an honourable art; and you are prohibited from practising it. We believed that you had ceased to practise it in 1899. Were We in error?”

  “No indeed no, indeed, Holiness. It was merely a suggestion of mine, indeed,” the cardinal burbled.

  “Drop it then!” the Pontiff slammed at him.

  “Indeed I do, Holiness, indeed I do, whatever.”

  “One would hardly have believed that such blatant wickedness could have existed in the world,” Sterling gravely meditated.

  “Holy Father, it will all begin again,” Leighton sadly sighed.

  “Let it begin again!” Hadrian challenged, white-flaming, irate, retiring to the secret chamber.

  Their Eminencies went out through the other door. They were not at all pleased with the Pope. In the first antechamber several cardinals were congregated anxious for news, Orezzo and Courtleigh each in a sedan-chair, Percy, Fiamma, della Volta, Semphill, Carvale, and Whitehead. Ragna was of opinion that the charges ought publicly to be answered, that is to say if they could be answered: but—— Could the accusations satisfactorily be disposed of? No one put the question: but the aroma of the idea of it was in the air.

  “There was so much mystery about His Holiness:” Orezzo said.

  “There always has been. He is a most incomprehensible creature, indeed:” Talacryn pronounced.

  “One might expect anything, everything of Him: the height and depth of good and bad: extreme virtue, extreme vice: one almost could believe Him to be capable of anything:” Sterling adjudicated.

  “Oh yes, until you have heard Him explain,” little Carvale put in. “Did none of Your Eminencies ever watch Him in His talk? I have. Shall I tell you the difference between our Holy Father and ourselves? We see things from a single view-point. He sees things from several. We decide that the thing is as we see it. But He has seen it otherwise, and He presents it as a more or less complete coaction of its qualities. See this sapphire. Well, you see the face of it: underneath, if I take it off my finger, there are a number of facets to be seen and a number more which are hidden by the gold of the setting. Now my meaning is that our Holy Father has seen all the facets as well as the table of the sapphire, or the thing. Consequently He knows a great deal more about the sapphire, or the thing, than we do. You must have noted that in Him. You must have noted how that every now and then, when He deigns to explain, He makes mysteries appear most wonderfully lucid.”

  “But, if one might venture to ask, how often does He condescend to explain—except to His cat?” Sterling interjected.

  “I’m bound to admit that He opened my eyes considerably during that fortnight we spent together in town just before His election,” Courtleigh threw out of his chair. Ragna went to him and spoke of the desirability of capital punishment.

  “Well, anyhow, I believe in Him,” Whitehead murmured.

  “Yes:” Leighton energetically blinked. “You’ll excuse me if I’m shoppy, but I say with St. Anselm, ‘Neque enim quæro intelligere ut credam: sed credo ut intelligam. Nam et hoc credo quia nisi credidero non intelligam.’ ”

  The gong in the secret chamber loudly and suddenly sounded. The scarlet limbs of Sir John and Sir Iulo darted towards it. Talacryn was shaking an unwilling dubious head. Van Kristen gave him a tall look of disgust. “Well, I guess Your Eminency will feel pretty smal
l some day if you don’t believe in Him too. There are no flies on Hadrian:” and he stalked away with the dignity of a grand boy honourably enraged.

  “No no, Percy,” said Talacryn, running after him. “Of course I believe in Him: but just for that reason I don’t want Him to defend Himself. I want to keep Him quiet. I think it unwise to rake up the past. There would be so many frightful scandals, whatever.”

  “Have you told Him that?”

  “Have I not indeed.”

  “And what did He say?”

  Talacryn once more shook his head.

  “Well then I advise Your Eminency to go ‘way back and sit down,’ as we say in the States.”