The Printer's Devil (10 page)

-Thus has she been, whispered Roger in my ear, his voice but a mere thread of sound; thus hath she stood,
⁷
While I breathe, I hope
and hath not moved, since I clothed her in black and brought her hence.

For me my mouth was dry as twere with fear, and yet there was nothing to fear; what could a woman do for to make me to fear? And then, so slow I did not observe it at first, she turned her veiled head toward me. So slow she moved, that I felt the hairs prickle on my scalp an they were like like to rise. Roger spake not, neither could I move; slow, so slow, she lifted up her hands to her veil (and her hands had a pallor like unto a cadaver, yet they were delicate as a child’s) and slipped it from her face.

Now here my pen fails my fingers as my mind then failed my senses; I beheld her countenance, the which first I saw with shock as like unto Catherine’s, was the face of
Eve
and of
Lillith
too; of
Aphrodite, Astarte, Proserpine;
nay; the face of a living woman, but one who embodied in her being all the attributes of woman, saint and seductress, virgin and sinner; such perfection lay in her features that I was stricken. I had believed no man can witness a thing so fair and live, nor recover from the hurt. The former yet I do; the latter, I know not.

And then there came the most terrible thing; for slyly she turned her face as doth a coquette, and rolled up her eyes; and,
horribile dictu
,
⁸
her eyes were as stones, gray and pitted and horrid like unto toads; into mine own eyes she looked with that blank dead stare, the which should have engendered naught but disgust; but so cruel and perverse was this creature that I was overcome with desire, and even stepped towards her, with every intention of taking her in my arms and drinking of her pallid Lips; I felt so tight in the loins and more breathless with desire than ever I had been with Catherine. I reached for her, but Roger took my arm; I did turn to him, and tears stood in my eyes and made the room unclear.

I groaned aloud, -Ah, Roger, what is this that thou’st done, what hast thou done?

She was his creation and newborn to power and life both, and we two grown men stood helpless before her. Roger sank to his knees, pulling me half down, but I would not kneel before her, neither to worship nor as a supplicant, nor never, never as a lover. My fingers fumbled at my sword’s hilt, but none had strength enough to draw it; then it sprang from its scabbard and embedded its point in the roof above, the hilt a-swing-ing in front of my face like unto a pendulum.

And then I knew that I must needs act, or lose my very soul, or worse; and with all my strength I took hold of the dangling sword-hilt, forcing my fingers to do my will, and pulled it from the ceiling. It dragged my hand down, as a magnetised needle doth point to the north; and my senseless fingers were like to drop it, but I wrested my right arm free from Roger’s grip and took hold of the sword with both hands.

Then ’twas as if a voice spake inside my head, one which was for me alone, and it said, -Which one of thy weapons wouldst thou sink in my body, then, little man? and laughed, and that bitter laughter harrowed me to the soul.

But I stood fast, and inch by inch I raised the tip of the sword until that it pointed at her breast.

-Enough of such folly, quoth the voice within my head, and I knew only blackness, an I’d fallen in a swoon.

I awoke thinking:
What is God that he permits such things to be?
And I had no answer, as I have had no answer these many years. Faith indeed hath my father, and my brother also, but in no wise hath that rubbed off on me. I do question all that which they do believe; the foundation of their faith is but the nativity of mine
own unbelief.

⁸
horrid to tell    
₄₈

In the play
Mephistopheles
saith of this world,
Why this is Hell nor am I out of it;
tis true; but tis equally true that if the playwright showed an
Angel Gabriel,
saying,
Why this is Heaven, nor am I out of it,
then folk would shy away and be afeard, fearing their God more than the devil.
Corruptio optimipessima.
⁹

In my head was such a pain as I have never felt, a pounding like unto a blacksmith’s hammer, and lights swam before my eyes; I perceived that I did lie where I had fallen, in that empty chamber where Roger hath shown me his creature, nor had the night come, by which I knew that I had not lain senseless for too long a time; but Roger was gone, and so also was the creature. I put a hand on my head an if it would ease the pain, but it did not do so; and so I must needs get myself hence from that place all weak like unto a man with the palsy. I took up my Sword from the floor where it lay and my hand shook so, it was with much difficulty that I sheathed it.

Now I am a man in good health and but five and twenty years of age, but I felt like unto a very ancient, nor was it an easy matter to hie me home to my lodging. My eye-sight was blurred like unto bad printing, and my head hurt so, I could think of nothing but the pain of it. I staggered from side to side like a drunk man, and I dare say that was what those folk whom I passed thought I was; nor did I care one whit, being concerned only with the getting to my bed. And when that I had done so, at length the spinning lights did take their leave, and I sank into sleep.

And that night in my sleep I was visited by a very curious dream, the which puzzled me greatly; for it seemed to me that I heard the sound of a great peal of bells, but it was as if many more did ring than we should ever find in a tower, and their sound was like unto iron, nor did they ring any pattern which I do know. And I beheld the figure of a woman or girl with a handbell, nor did any sound come from this bell, although she swung it most lustily. Nor could I make out her features; she was not veiled, twas simply that I could not make her face come clear; And words came into my mind then, which I set down when I awoke, lest I should forget them:

In memoriam Ledw Helena matris, Lamiw atque, Filiw Doloris, Reginw Orientis at occidentis, Ave atque vale.
¹⁰

And then she was overwhelmed by the sea which rushed through narrow streets in vast saves with the speed of thought, that I feared would drown me also; But the shock of the waves was not tremendous, and they bore me along with gentleness, though swiftly. And over all the sound of the iron bells continued, but they slowed until that I could hear but six ringing, then five, four, three, two and at last one, and its music spoke to me and said,
Sum Rosa Pulsata Mondi Maria Vocata.
¹¹
And I was borne away on the surface of the waters, to waken amazed in my narrow bed, and the morning was fresh without.

I had as lief searched for a gypsy or a fortune-teller, for though have no wish (nor should any man for all that all the world seems to wish it) to know what lies in my future; let come what will; of such an one I could have asked,
Riddle me this dream;
but it being just such a day as any other, I must get me to Master Pakeman’s shop to work.

⁹
Corruption of the best is the worst thing of all

¹⁰
In memory of Leda, Helen’s mother; and of Lamia, Daughter of Sorrow, Queen of the East and of the West, Hail and farewell.

¹¹
See pag
^e
32

Many days hence I did make bold to apprise Roger on’t; he seemed to take no heed thereof. But my thoughts were in tempest, like unto the roiling skies when that a wild storm blows; what had befallen Roger, what of the woman (by what other name shall I call it?) which I greatly feared as I have feared naught in my life before.

However I am thankful that though of Catherine created she resembled my Town Miss in no wise for that would greatly distress me; but she had stupefied me, and put words in my mind, and taken from me near the whole of my will, and in the face of that power who would not be affrighted; Speak with Roger I must, lest he be possessed by her, he him-self who created her, the which remains a Wondrous and Miraculous Deed, whatsoever Prodigy hath resulted.

I am in unease when that I do consider that Roger is becoming a very
Faustus
for power, not that I do think he hath sold his soul, rather that there is hubris in the possessing of overmuch power. For Roger is an ill-tempered Man & not given over-much to humility. Alas for the slaying of Ann Pakeman, that hath inspired him to this deed.

And indeed many days passed ere that I saw Roger again, and each day that passed I could not forbear from conjecture as to his fate. But I confess I never thought to see him attend to Ring with us again; but hence he came, merry as you please, and clapped me on the back saying -How dost thou, Fabian?

The which I most Admired; and I made to Speak, but Roger spake first, saying -Hist, hist, hold thy peace, I will tell all by and by.

And so I must needs contain my soul in patience against the time when he is ready to speak. Look so hard as I might I could see no change in him as one who hath been harrowed or possessed or even who had seen a great wonder; Yet these last days have I observed that I have some white hairs upon mine own head, where all hitherto were brown. And I did conceive the thought, for I have heard it said that great dread can turn a man’s hair white, that this might be the cause; or it may be they were present all the time and I but did not see them.

For it is true indeed and I have observed before, and not only in myself, that it is not only possible for a man to be wilfully blind, but that he doth this constantly; blind, and deaf also; we convince ourselves of halftruths and pretty fables (that we are all saved by Jesus Christ, that a maid be chaste, that good fortune shall come in a week or a year) Such Concerns that we wish to Believe, and ignore the Truth an we mislike it.

And thus Roger Southwell: being wilfully blind to his own acts; believing that they signify naught, or naught evil; happy as an hog in his filth and seeing not (nor did I then) how consequences do flow out from an action like unto the ripples from a pebble cast into a pool of water. And thus also mine own self, for I do admit contradictions in my thoughts: for the one side, some doings of Roger which I have witnessed do run perilously close to witchcraft, and witches do hang yet in England, we being a most enlightened country (by the flames of fanatical Puritanism, I mean); For the other, that I should not believe witches exist, for
non habeo anima naturaliter Christiana
¹²
nor to be truthful
anima
of any other persuasion. I may call myself a rational and pragmatic man, yet even so I have seen very magic, and therefore I do believe in it, for I cannot dis-believe that which mine own eyes do witness. But I know not where in any scheme of things the creature of Roger’s art doth have her place.

¹²
My soul is not naturally Christian

Therefore having at length no patience left to me at all I did demand of Roger what hath befallen that time when last I did see him, and what became of the creature.

-Lilu is grown free of any Constraints I have, he said.

-Why dost thou name the creature
Lilu?
I asked.

-Tis but another way of saying,
Lilith,
he replied, and ’tis as good a name as any other for a person that was not born.

-A person, quoth I, she is no person, but what manner of thing is she?

-She is of flesh and blood, Roger said, but whether or no she hath a soul I know not; and I have not the power to compel her; she will do an she will, say I yea or nay; and I know not whither she went, nor when she will return.

-Do you not care neither? I asked, and an expression passing strange visited Roger’s eyes; I was not sure I had seen anything there; it passed in the blink of an eye.

But all he said was this,
-Hoc mihi non est negotium,
¹³
I
have other fish to fry.

¹³
That is nothing to me

7
: Not Exactly Ghosts

‘...thither he / Will come to know his destiny.

Your vessels, and your spells, provide,

Your charms, and every thing beside...

He shall spurn fate, scorn death, and bear His hopes ’bove wisdom, grace, and fear:

And you all know, security Is mortal’s chiefest enemy.’

William Shakespeare,
Macbeth

Alan stared at the things he had uncovered with such effort. Disappointingly, there was no grimoire, no treasure map; there was a crystal ball, though, or not quite a ball, which was intriguing. It was an ovoid of smoky glass, wrapped in a linen cloth turned beige with the years. As if it dwelt there, the glass fit comfortably in the palm of his hand; he nearly failed to realise that the cloth itself was important, was what he had gone to seek, until he remembered the key to the cipher.

The Verony.

Alan picked it up from where he’d discarded it, and held it up: the light of the fire shone through it, and he saw the outline of a face made translucent by the flames, like the watermark on a sheet of paper. The cloth was about eighteen inches square, coarsely woven, and threadbare in places, especially at the hem. He laid it flat on the carpet, and the image disappeared.

For no apparent reason, then, the skin on Alan’s back crawled, and he shuddered. He picked up the cloth again, and held it up to the gaslight. The face which he saw was not, as he had subconsciously expected, an image like the Turin Shroud. The old word ‘verony’, then,
was
being used metaphorically; but if this was the imprint of Roger Southwell’s face - his death-mask in two dimensions - who had placed it there? Who had subsequently removed it and placed it with the glass? Who had invented the maddening series of clues leading to it?