The Fiery Angel (16 page)

Though I have never had much confidence in the protection of holy objects, yet, in this my horrible position, expecting at every moment that all the unshackled demons would hurl themselves at us out of the room of invocation, there was nothing better left for me than to drag Renata to the small altar in her room and there hope for God’s help. But Renata in her frenzy refused to approach the holy crucifix, shouting that she hated and despised it, and raising her clenched fists at the image of Christ, and at last she fell to the floor in that same fit of convulsion of which I had already twice been a witness. But never yet had I spent such hopeless hours bending over the tormented creature, and watching the rending of her body by the demons that had seized her, perhaps even by my fault.

Little by little, my fears calmed down and I began to feel that we were already out of danger; in the same gradual, natural way, passed the torment of Renata, and the demon that was in her, shouting at me for the last time that we would yet meet, left her. And we two, prostrate on the floor near the crucifix, were like shipwrecked mariners, who have attained to some small rock, but have lost all and are certain that the next wave will wash them down and swallow them for ever. Renata could not speak, and silent tears rolled down her face, and I had no words to comfort or to cheer her. Thus we stayed, silent, on the floor, till dawn came and we had to take care to remove all traces of our nocturnal experiment. I carried Renata in my arms to her bed, for she could neither walk nor stand, and myself, not without some trepidation, entered the room of invocation.

The smoke of the incense filled it, and the broken fragments of the lamps lay on the floor, but no other damage had been done and no agency hindered me in tidying the room and effacing from the floor the traces of the magic circles I had drawn with such care.

Thus ended our experiment in operative magic, for which we had prepared for the length of more than two months, and on which first I, and then Renata, had set such rich hopes.

After that day, Renata relapsed again into that black despair from which she had been raised awhile by her studies and her faith in their success; and this new fit of depression by far surpassed all the earlier ones in its strength. Previously she had found in herself the will and desire to argue and to prove to me that she had many reasons for sadness, but now she did not want to speak, nor to listen nor to answer. During the first few days, ailing, she lay in bed motionless, turning her face to the pillow, not moving a muscle, not opening her eyes. Later, still in the same state of indifference, she would spend hours sitting on a bench, her eyes fixed on a corner of the room, busy with her thoughts or altogether idle, not hearing when her name was spoken, like a wood-carving by some Donatello, at times, however, feebly sighing and only thus showing signs of life. Renata would have sat the nights through, also, in this posture, had I not persuaded her to lay herself down in her bed with the fall of darkness, but several times I had proof that, none the less, she spent the greater part of the time till morn sleepless, with eyes wide open.

All my efforts to arouse in Renata any interest in existence remained fruitless. She could not glance at the magic books without a shudder; and when I broached to her a repetition of our experiment, she shook her head in refusal and contempt. At my invitation to come out into the town, into the streets, she only shrugged her shoulders silently. I also tried, not without ulterior motive, to speak to her even of Count Heinrich, of the angel Madiël, of all that was most sacred to her, but most often Renata did not even hear my words, or at last made painfully always one and the same reply: “Leave me alone!” Only once, when I had attacked her especially insistently with my prayers, Renata said to me: “Do you not understand that I
want
to torture myself to death? Of what service is life to me, when I have not, and never can have, its chiefest joy? It is good for me to sit here and remember—then why do you urge me to go somewhere where each new impression will be painful to me?” And after this long speech she fell once more into her state of lethargy.

This recluse, immobile life of Renata, and the fact, moreover, that she almost completely abstained from taking food, soon affected her so that her eyes sank like the eyes of one dead and became woven round with a blackish wreath, her face became greyish, her fingers transparent like dull mica, so that I, trembling, felt that her last hour was definitely approaching. Sorrow tirelessly graved in the soul of Renata a black pit, deeper and deeper plunging its shovels, and lower and lower sinking its bucket in the shaft, and it was not difficult to foresee the day when a blow of its spade would hack through the thread of life itself.

I
T is no easy matter to stop a cart that has settled down to run along one road, and so I too could not immediately turn off that road along which, during the last months, I had been rushing full tilt. Even after the failure of this first experiment, I was still unable to force myself to think of anything but incantations, magic circles, pentagrams, pentacles, the names and characters of demons. … Once more, I carefully went through the pages of the books we had so often studied, trying to find out the cause of our failure, only to convince myself that we had performed everything correctly and according to the advice of science. I should certainly not have failed to repeat the experiment, even without the help of Renata, had it not been that I was deterred by the thought that, as I could import no new element into my methods, I had no right to expect any new result.

In this my uncertainty there began to flicker, like the light of a beacon in a white shore mist, one scheme, which at first I dismissed as inaccomplishable and hopeless, but which later, when the idea became familiar, seemed perhaps accessible. I had learned from Jacob Glock that the writer whose work on magic was my most valuable find amongst all the treasure of books I had gathered, and who at last had presented me with that thread of Ariadne that led me out of the labyrinth of formulae, names and incomprehensible aphorisms—Doctor Agrippa of Nettesheim, resided a bare few hours’ ride distant from my place of habitation: in the City of Bonn, on the Rhine itself. And so, more and more, I began to ponder over the idea that I might turn, for the solution of my doubts, to this man, initiated into all the mysteries of the hermetic sciences, and knowing, no doubt, from experiment and from relations with other scientists, a great deal that it would not be proper to communicate in print
profano vulgo
. It seemed to me an impertinence to disturb the labours or repose of a sage with my private affairs, but, in my heart of hearts, I did not think myself unworthy of a meeting with him, and I did not think that he would find my conversation either ridiculous or dull.

For advice, as yet undecided on my course, I visited Glock’s shop; it was already a long time since I had been there and he was very glad to see me, for he was pleased to have in me a humble listener. This time I had to endure a voluble panegyric to Bernard of Treves, one of the few to discover the philosopher’s stone—and only when the foundation of ecstatic words dried up, or perhaps Glock’s throat became parched, did I attack the exposition of my case. With circumspection, I explained that my studies of magic were now nearing their end, that, none the less, the conclusions I had reached differed widely from those generally held, and that, accordingly, before expressing my views in a composition, I should like to subject them for consideration to a true authority in such matters; here I mentioned the name of Agrippa and expressed the supposition that Glock, whose beneficial labours were renowned all over Germany, might be able to give me aid in such a matter.

To my great surprise, Glock not only received my proposal with no little attention, but expressed readiness to help it, and there and then he promised to secure me an introductory letter to Agrippa from his printer, with whom he, Glock, was on terms of friendship. This promise I accepted as an
omen bonum
, and I wondered whether it were not the goddess Fortuna herself who had assumed for that day the doddering shape of the old bookseller to help me on my way, as, in the songs of the divine blind poet, the goddess Minerva assumes the shape of the aged Mentor.

Two days later, Glock kept his promise, and did indeed send me a letter, of which the inscription stood as follows:
Doctissimo ac ornatissimo viro, Henrico Cornelio Agrippæ, comprimis amico Godefridus Hetorpius
—and then it seemed to me that it would have been even unworthy to withdraw from my enterprise. Of course I was disturbed at having to leave Renata, but by staying at her side I could in no way alleviate the heavy malady that cut her life at its root. I tried to talk over my plan with Renata, but she showed no wish to penetrate the meaning of my words, and begged me with a pitiful sign of the hand not to torment her with explanations, so, shutting my lips tightly, I decided to act at my own risk, went to buy myself a horse and got out from the corner my travelling bag, which had grown all over dust.

And when, on the very day of my departure, in the early morning, I went into Renata’s room to take my leave, and told her that, though I left, I rode on our joint business, she thus replied to me:

“We—you and I, can have no joint business together: you are alive, I—dead. Farewell.”

I kissed Renata’s hand and walked out, as if in truth from a room where stood a coffin and funeral candles smoked.

Between the towns of Köln and Bonn lay only a few good hours riding along the Emperor’s highway, but as winter weather had set in already, and snow might be expected at any moment, the road was in bad condition, and I had to journey the whole day long, from morning dawn till darkness, not once resting in the village inns, at Godorf, Wesseling, Widdig, Gerzel, and even having almost to spend the night not far away from the town. I should also mention that my new clothes, of dark brown woollen cloth, that I had had made for me in Köln and was wearing for the first time on this visit to Agrippa, reached a very sad state, and even my trusty comrade—the sea-cape that had seen the tempests of the Atlantic, failed to protect them in any way. However, throughout the whole duration of the journey, I was in so brisk a mood as I had not known for a long time, for, having left Renata on the first occasion after several months, it was as though I had recovered my lost self. I experienced the sensation of walking from a dark cellar suddenly into clear light, and my solitary journey along the Rhine to Bonn seemed to me the immediate continuation of my solitary road from Brabant, while the recent days with Renata—seemed like a painful nightmare at one of the wayside halts.

However, I never forgot the purpose of my journey, and I was pleased with the thought that I was to see Agrippa of Nettesheim, one of the greatest scientists and most remarkable writers of our time. Yielding to the play of imagination, of which everyone is probably aware, I visualised to myself in every detail my visit to Agrippa, and word after word did I repeat mentally the speeches that I intended to address to him, and that I expected to hear in reply, and some of these, not without difficulty, I even composed in Latin. I wanted to believe that I should appear before Agrippa not as an inexperienced disciple, but as a modest young scientist, not devoid of knowledge and experience, but seeking instruction and advice in those highest spheres of science that are as yet not sufficiently elaborated, and among which it is not derogatory to enquire one’s way. I imagined to myself how Agrippa would at first listen to my discourses not without misgiving, then with joyful attention, and how, at last, astonished by my intellect and the rich store of my information, he would ask me with surprise how, at my years, I had yet succeeded in achieving a so rare and many-sided learning, and how I would reply to him that my best guide had been his works. … Not a few other, no less foolish, unbelievable, and simply unthinkable conversations did my childish vanity prompt in me, as it dived suddenly out of the bottom of my soul during the hours of my difficult road along the cold and deserted fields of the Archbishopric.

Cold and tired, but still in possession of my spirits, I reached the gates of Bonn after the third bell had already sounded from the tower, in complete darkness, and obtained a
laisser-passer
from the night watch not without difficulty, so I was unable to be very particular about the choice of my night shelter and eagerly accepted a room in the first hostelry that came handy, I seem to remember, under the sign of “The Golden Vine.”

On the morning of the following day, the host came to me, as is the custom in small hostelries, ostensibly to enquire whether I were in need of anything, but rather for curiosity, to worm out of the new guest who he be. I greeted him not without gladness, for I had to make enquiries about where Agrippa lived, and, apart from that, I was pleased to show that I came to visit so important a man. And as the host proved a native of long standing, I heard from him, apart from the intelligence about the street where the house of Agrippa stood, also the town gossip concerning the latter:

“How should we not know Agrippa?” said the host. “Every one of our urchins knows him from long since and, to tell the truth, shuns him! Little good is spoken of him, and very much that is evil. They say that he practises Black Arts and consorts with the Devil. … In any case he sits like a barn-owl in his nest, and sometimes does not show himself on the streets for weeks on end. That he cannot be so very good-a man may be judged from the fact that he has brought two of his wives to the grave and that the third, a bare month gone by, has just divorced him. However, I trust your kindness may excuse me if he be your good acquaintance, for I speak only from hear-say, and what will not folk say in their chatter! One cannot hear the half of it!”

I hastened to assure him that I had no friendship with Agrippa, but only monetary transactions, and the host, reassured, but lowering his voice, began to relate to me all manner of fables concerning the illustrious guest of his town. Thus he related that Agrippa always kept several familiar demons who lived with him in the guise of dogs; that Agrippa read of all that happened at the various ends of the earth upon the disc of the moon, and thus knew all the news without messengers; that, possessing the secret of the transformation of metals, he often settled his accounts with coins that had all the appearance of fair ones, but later reverted to pieces of horn or dung; that he would show to noblemen all their future in a magic mirror; that in his young days, when attached to the person of the Spanish general Antonio de Leyva in Italy, he secured by magic means success to his chief in all undertakings; that once Agrippa was seen finishing a public discourse in the town of Freiburg at ten o’clock in the morning exactly, at the same moment as, already, he was beginning another public discourse many miles away, in the town of Pontimussae—and a great many other equally doubtful stories.