If Armand Logreux d’Albury had not introduced himself as the “Master of the Seven Lights,” the setting where he received the young Roma would not have been enough to suggest that he was one of the great scholars of the Occult. Even the weathervane shaped in the form of Solomon’s Pentacle might only have been the fantasy of a chatelain that made an amusing find at some antique dealer’s.
In the ornate chimney hearth, dry wood flamed and crackled. But more pedestrian heaters were also present.
Nieve understood at once that the real “home” of the Master of the Seven Lights was not this room, which in a sense remained banal. She knew she would have to go far in the confidence of Armand Logreux to accomplish the mission given to her by the Nyctalope. But she also remembered what the Master had just said: “You will take off your clothes and I will gaze upon your form.” And so she waited.
After looking around, Nieve lowered her eyes toward the basket she had placed on the carpet in front of the man. It contained objects with very fine weaving in different colors of delicate taste and infinite variety, embroidered in designs inspired by geometry or simplest flowers and wild plants. There were glove boxes, tobacco pots, bowls of flower petals allowed to fade until their perfume had faded, and placemats fine and supple as silk, to slide beneath vases or glasses...
With her pretty hands with their almond nails, gilded delicately by henna, the young girl took up one after the other of these humble marvels, presenting them with skill to the gaze, soon amused, of Armand Logreux. Soon he had less attention for the mobile display than for the face, eyes and lips of the Romani girl. Above all her lips!
The lips of this young girl could be the symbolic image of voluptuousness. They were not just a static image; rather, they lived, sometimes grave, sometimes smiling, occasionally lightly ironic, revealing at moments fine clenched teeth of an imperceptibly pearly whiteness. Whatever their expression, they were made of such flesh, colored with such blood, alive with such sap, that they seemed to be modeled and animated precisely for kissing: for the kind of kiss that gives and takes, that breathes and penetrates, that all at once excites, overwhelms, exalts, exhausts...
And Armand Logreux d’Albury, Master of the Seven Lights, who had traveled around the world and known the kisses of hundreds of women, thought: I have never seen lips like these. And her body, what a divine beauty her body must be!
The chatelain of the Cross of Blood had been chaste for months, since the day he had met Basilie d’Hermont for the first time. He had returned that morning to spend the night outside Château-du-Loir, in a villa where a kind of “governess” kept two young women for him alone, discreetly. In the countryside, they passed for the nieces of this respectable lady, who referred to herself, according to the purest tradition, as the “widow of a superior officer.”
After having met Basilie for the first time, Logreux had not returned to the villa. He even gave definitive leave to the lady and her “nieces,” and now a couple of old servants kept up the little pleasure cottage, bought under a borrowed name shortly after his return from the Orient, empty but in good condition.
The voluntary chastity of this ardent man proceeded from a mysticism to which the ascetic men of India and Tibet sacrificed most of the pleasures of the flesh, if not all. To reach the goal he had been aiming for, since his meeting with Basilie, however, Logreux did not need to live as a monk. He did not refuse himself any of the other physical pleasures enjoyed by a rich man. A gourmet and connoisseur of fine wines, he ate with a rational sobriety that was at once a delicate sensuality. He did not deprive himself from smoking a cigar, a pipe or a cigarette, according to his mood. And he looked after the hygiene of his body with vigorous exercises that conserved his health and the supple qualities of youth.
Today, in just a few minutes, a profound revolution had taken place in this man, who had calculated his appetites as strictly as his fortune.
Nieve had entered his existence in a perfectly unexpected way, just as Basilie had. The man said to himself:
She will not leave again. For the pleasure of my days and nights, I will unite Nieve to Basilie, until they begin to grow old as I remain young. They are good only to raise the children I shall have with them. Then I will enter into the third stage of my life.
Such were the strange thoughts of Armand Logreux d’Albury, as he let drop from his hands the objects that Nieve handed him, and pushed the basket aside. In a calm and serious voice, he said:
“You will leave all this here, Nieve. And in exchange, you will give the chief of the tribe a sum of money that will enrich it for many generations. As for you, I will soon tell you my desire, but first, you must stand and remove all your clothes.”
Before, when the Master had said: “You will take off your clothes and I will gaze upon your form, so that your beauty remains alive in my thoughts,.” the young Romani girl had not expressed any astonishment. Nor did she show any now, when she heard the words that, this time, were not the expression of any desire for future satisfaction, but an order that required immediate agreement or refusal.
She did not stand. In a voice equally calm and serious, she said:
“My body is not of the type that one displays casually, without veils, in a profane place. A Master of the Seven Lights must have a secret sanctum, if he is not wandering on the paths of this world. Take me there and you will see me naked.”
Was he expecting this reply? Or did it take him by surprise? Neither his eyes nor his face let any of his inner thoughts appear. Yet, he hesitated. Brief and contained as this hesitation was, Nieve discerned it. Her green eyes grew languid and her lips opened in such a way that, in it, Logreux saw a promise that increased his intimate trouble.
Hiding his agitation well, for nothing in this man showed itself openly, he replied:
“That is fair, Nieve. I would like you to know the sacred rites. We will observe them. Come!”
He held out his left hand. She gave him her right, which he clasped. Together, with one supple movement, they stood up. Guiding her at her own pace, they crossed the room. In the corridor lit by electric light, the Master raised successive flaps and opened a series of doors. Then, all at once, he stopped, as did Nieve at his side.
They were now in a room much longer than it was wide, gently illuminated by two electric ceiling lights and several torches with porcelain screens. At the left end, a tall hanging drapery concealed a door. At the right end, a bay window had replaced the entire wall. It was made of a single pane of glass that reflected every object in the room, but Nieve saw that it was not a mirror, because a curtain of corrugated iron masked it from the exterior. This metallic curtain could be raised and lowered by an electric mechanism fixed at arm’s height on the large frame of glass. The glass itself was mobile, as one could see from the metal handles that glistened at the bottom of its crystalline mass.
The walls, of a slightly greenish white, were bare. There were no paintings, no bookshelves, no tapestries, only the door in the back, on the left. The floor was bare too, made of wood tinted like the walls, and absolutely clean. Three glass cases were stacked with various instruments, intended for what Nieve had not the slightest idea. There were seats, stools of wood tinted in pale green. In the corner, between the door and the largest of the windows, there was also an immense low couch on which many cushions had been tossed randomly. Stretching along the length of the floor was a magnificent black panther skin. The velvet and silk coverings of the couch and cushions were black as well.
At the bedside, a sort of marble chest held up drinking glasses and many large glass vessels, containing liquids of various colors. Above and along the length of the couch, the wall was covered by a broad band of purple silk on which, in gold and silver, there were embroidered images of the twelve constellations of the zodiac.
Finally—and this was the only thing that surprised the young girl—in the middle of the room, a massive wood pedestal held up a strange machine. All at once, Nieve could only look in its directio
n, and she wondered what it could be used for.
At first, she thought she had never seen anything like it. Then, as she contemplated the machine, she remembered a vision from her childhood. The caravan of her tribe had passed by the harbor of Villefranche, on the road that borders the sea. Great nautical festivals were prepared there in honor of the navy squadron that anchored in the harbor. On a large pontoon near the shore, sailors were setting up a sort of apparatus that Nieve later found out was a powerful projector, used to throw long, wide jets of moving light into space.
In this sanctum, belonging to M. Armand Logreux d’Albury, Master of the Seven Lights, the young girl recognized the projector of the harbor of Villefranche. It was the same sort of machine, standing on its enormous pedestal, directed toward the immense bay window, surrounded on all sides by mechanical devices, electric cables and wires.
The machine looked so monstrous, so forbidding, and so sinister that Nieve quickly turned her gaze away from it, after having first examined it with such interest.
She looked toward the sofa, where, to her surprise she saw the smiling Master sitting on the edge of the bed, amongst the cushions.
“Nieve,” she heard, “I am waiting for you to show yourself to me in all your beauty.”
A short silence. Then the same voice continued:
“Come. Approach. Stand naked on this panther skin, which will be soft under your feet.”
She obeyed, and moved forward.
Before she reached the silky black skin, she removed her shoes and stockings. Her feet trampled the furry hide of the beast. But her flesh was not moved, for her mind remained in control.
With slow, almost ritual gestures, she began to undress.
It took a long time. In the Romani fashion, the young girl wore several skirts and layered petticoats. One by one, she unlaced them, and they fell softly around her legs. Before the last petticoat, she unfastened her bodice, letting it slide off with a supple movement of her shoulders. Soon, she had on only a very fine linen shirt, tied with a cord over her breasts. She undid the cord, and the shirt slid down to her knees. Then, raising her legs one after the over, she took a step forward. There she stopped, standing straight, arms folded and fingers on her shoulders, in an attitude as sculptural as it was simple. Her wide eyes, fixed on the face of the man, seemed empty of all thought.
The beauty of Nieve was perfect. The beauty of the young girl would, in its womanly form, take on a little more roundness in certain places, thought Logreux, but it would remain for a long time as it was now, if it did not deform in an ill-attended and ill-treated maternity. A slim and firm beauty, it would not be destroyed by the weight gains and relaxations of her many years to come.
For several minutes, the Master contemplated Nieve in admiring silence. He had sat down on the edge of the couch, his back almost straight, leaning against the piled-up cushions. Hands clenched his knees, his tension betrayed his excitement. But he made no other sign. His face with its serious eyes remained impassive.
Suddenly he said, in a slightly hoarse voice:
“Nieve, you are the most beautiful of all girls, and there will be no woman more beautiful than you...”
A silence. Nieve seemed not to have heard.
The male voice continued:
“Nieve, turn around and walk away. Then come back.”
The statue grew animated. She uncrossed her arms, and her natural movements were like waves. She walked a dozen steps, turned, came back, and was still again, standing in front of her clothes on the panther skin, her arms hanging on her sides.
In a dull voice, the man commanded:
“Approach again.”
A flash shone in the green eyes of the living goddess. And her lips opened slightly to utter:
“No.”
The man frowned, contracted his jaws, tightened his lips and tightened his fingers even more on his knees.
“No!” repeated Nieve, after a brief silence. “If I were within your reach, you would touch me. I can only allow a man to touch me during the twelve days before the Purification. Do you not know the Law of Virgins who do not yet want to be mothers?”
“I know it,” said the man with visible effort.
“Then you will obey it, as I do.”
Then, in a voice surprisingly supplicating and firm at the same time, he said:
“Nieve, at this moment, I do not command, I beg. But remember that this is the first time in my life, and it will be the last. I beg, do you hear?”
“I am listening,” said the girl, still impassive.
“Stay here for an hour. Live in this room as if you were alone, dreamily idle. Would you like to try some exquisite liquors? Here they are. Would you like to smoke? Here are Egyptian cigarettes, with tobacco that has been lightly dipped in opium. I will get up and move away from your body. I swear to you that I will not approach close enough to touch you, even once. Sit or lie down as you please. Just live and forget that I am here.”
He stood up. From the bedside cabinet he drew out boxes of cigarettes, an electric lamp that he plugged in and several small fine towels that he placed on the table near the vessels and glasses.
He said:
“Are you hungry? I can have Hambad Sin bring fruit and jam, sweets...”
“No. I will neither drink nor eat. I will only smoke. I see there is a radio there: that is something I know about. Today is Sunday and the time is right. Let me listen to music... pure music, without a human voice... a big orchestra... or wild jazz...”
“Yes,” he said. “Yes!”
Then Nieve stretched out halfway amidst the cushions, which she had arranged around her. The cigarettes and small electric lamp were within reach of her left hand. Immediately, she began to smoke. She was happy. She hoped she would soon have reason to be even more so. The temperature of the strange room remained constantly warm. Nieve was naked. And for the first time in her life, she knew the pride of dominating one of the most powerful of men by the virtue of her beauty and the calm force of her secret will alone.
Meanwhile, Logreux had turned various dials of the apparatus without hesitating. A large invisible orchestra billowed forth in a complex magnificence of sound waves.
“Beethoven,” he said.
But the young girl’s taste for music did not extend to musical erudition. Depending on the state of her soul, or the whim of her temper, a Caribbean song could delight her as much as the most sublime concerto. The Beethoven symphony that the radio was now broadcasting was a storm of fierce violence, with oases of sweetness and charm, caresses and dreamy repose. This suited Nieve perfectly for a few minutes.
When this charm was over and the voice of the speaker was heard, the girl said:
“Enough! Now, I would like some jazz—or songs from the islands... or a popular Spanish tune.”
A fanatic of music, making intelligent use of the invention of radio, Armand Logreux d’Albury subscribed regularly to various publications that listed the programs for multiple radio channels.
Amused, for he was conscious he was obeying this girl as a pinnacle of beauty, and trembling with a powerful emotion that mocked his apparent smiling docility, the Master of the Seven Lights selected a pamphlet, flipped through it and after a few moments of research, said:
“Here!”
He changed the music to a well-known dance tune, with the voice of Raquel Meller and the clicking of castanets. 11
Then Nieve slipped her feet onto the panther skin and stood up. Taking two steps forward to reach the smooth floor, she danced. Clapping her fingers, she followed the rhythm of the music with the whole of her wonderfully soft, light body. Her face was serious, her eyes were unfathomably deep and her slightly smiling red lips revealed the bright whiteness of her teeth.
Logreux gazed at her with admiration and desire. He had leaned against the door at the back, and before him, three paces distant, the disturbing Sibyl swayed, leaned, straightened up, turned, jumped, twirled lightly on her toes and raised her le
gs in a harmonious motion, that showed her splendid beauty in a thousand angles and a thousand fleeting attitudes.
When the music ceased, Nieves froze, straight, on her stretched legs, hands on her shoulders, breasts projecting their hard brown nipples, as if with voluptuousness.
Then, suddenly, the man came away from the door, moved forward and held out a hand. But a flashing glance and a brief word stopped him.
“No!”
And with a sigh:
“No!” Nieve repeated. “The rite is sacred. You will not touch me today.”
Sure of her power, she lowered her arms and walked back to the couch. Her left shoulder, in passing, brushed against the trembling fingers of the man.
She sat down, took a cigarette, lit it and smoked a little, dreamy.
Then Nieve glanced calmly around the room, until her gaze stopped at the mysterious machine that rose in the center. She laughed, the pretty pearly laugh of a young girl, as her eyes sparkled with curiosity.
“Look at this!” she said. “What is it?”
In this way she broke the charm.
Standing with a hand on his forehead, all at once Logreux jerked and stood up straight. In his normal voice, he answered:
“There are mysteries of which the Master speaks with an initiate only when the latter has given himself to him entirely, body and soul. You are not there yet, Nieve.”
“It’s true, I am not there yet,” she said gravely.
Calmly. she stretched out and tossed aside the cigarette, which landed on the floor. Then she closed her eyes and made as if she wanted to sleep.
He took a stool and sat in front of her. Her posture suggested total abandonment, but he knew that to touch her was not a possibility.
Sinking into her gaze, her perfume, he revered his voluptuous beauty.
CHAPTER II
Conclusion
The first to return to the gypsy camp that Sunday were the Nyctalope and his two companions, Vitto and Soca.
The Nyctalope and The Tower of Babel Page 18