The Arm and the Darkness Read online

  Mist was before his eyes, and he could not see that Arsène was watching him, astounded. For his face was no longer human, but mad and black, and his eyes were full-of flame. Arsène, alarmed by something he knew was not of living flesh, and of the emotions of men, stepped back involuntarily, stirred to swift uneasiness. His hand fumbled for the hilt of his sword, for he discerned that in some way he was the object of all this fury.

  Louis’ voice came from his lips, choked and strangling: “Beware!” he cried. He turned suddenly, and made for the door, moving with a kind of haste and disorder. But when he had reached the door, the monstrous madness suddenly abated, leaving him with frozen flesh and wildly beating heart and sanity. He pressed his hand against the door, and bent his head. He forced himself to breathe slowly. His forehead was wet, and felt as though fingers of ice had been laid upon it.

  Arsène, his uneasiness ebbing, looked at Louis sharply. He had seen these enigmatic and unfathomable manifestations of Louis’ too often, and if he had ever tried to understand them, indolently, he did so no longer. They were only a part of his brother’s general peculiarity and and esoteric character, amusing but unimportant. But since his own illness, the world had sharpened in his sight, become many-dimensioned, lit with nuances of meaning never discerned by him before. He was like a man recovered from color blindness and dimness of vision, and he was filled with excitement and wonder, racked by sensations that were new and too poignant.

  As Louis, with bent head and quivering back, struggled for composure, Arsène said to himself: I have seen these seizures all my life. What do they portend? What is the curse? Often, during the most casual conversations with him, he has been seized by a kind of fit while he looked into my eyes, or quarrelled with me. Am I so hateful to him that his composure cracks? But why should he hate me so, even though he is narrow of mind and brittle of temperament? What have I done to him to arouse such enmity, such loathing? What is there in me to create such madness, such wildness? It is incomprehensible!

  An occult and dreamlike sensation came over him, as though he thought and conjectured in the midst of a smothering nightmare. And he was overwhelmed with compassion, for all his bewilderment. Even though I am different from him, he thought, he ought not to hate me so. Divergencies of temperament are no excuse, no cause, for such monstrous emotion, especially in so lofty a mind.

  He wanted to speak to Louis, gently, to demand, with impetuousness, the explanation for this great upheaval. But he could not speak. He could only wait.

  Louis lifted his head. A deep shudder ran through him. He prayed silently: My God, I have sinned against Thee again, as I have often sinned! I have desired to kill, as Cain desired! I am evil and unregenerate, and a lifetime of prayer and dedication and chastity has not changed me. Forgive me, if Thou canst.

  A kind of numbed and frozen calm finally came to him, which was not peace. He turned a still smooth face to Arsène, though its color was mortal and his blue eyes were clouded over with mist and threaded red veins.

  “I have said all that can be said. I have given you warning. This is today. Tomorrow, I shall be able to do nothing.” His voice was weak, yet steadfast, and he looked at Arsène. But Arsène had the uncanny sensation that Louis did not really see him. Then, having said this, Louis opened the door and stepped across the threshold.

  Arsène spoke in a voice very grave and hesitant for so careless a young man:

  “Louis, I too have something to say, if you will spare me a moment.” Louis turned upon the threshold, and regarded him with the blind gaze of stone. He was the priest again, patient;

  “Please. You will come into the room, Louis? It is important, at least to me.”

  Then Louis saw his brother’s face, discerned its gravity and obscure distress. He slowly reentered the room, quietly closed the door behind him.

  “Monsieur the Cardinal is waiting for me,” he said. “However, if it is a matter of extreme importance, I am glad to listen.”

  So tranquil was his manner, so stately his voice, that Arsène could hardly believe that it was only a few moments ago that Louis had been contorted with obscure madness. His blue eyes had cleared, and there was the usual polished gleam in them, which seemed rather on the surface than rising from some source within.

  Arsène, with his brother’s face bent upon him, hesitated. He ran his hand through his long dark hair, as if embarrassed.

  “Louis,” he began, “I have been absent for some time. You have been generous enough not to ask me where I have been.”

  An inscrutable flash passed over Louis’ face. He lifted his hand.

  “I have not asked. I do not wish to know.”

  Arsène shook his head impatiently, but he said in a pleading tone:

  “Hear me out. You have said I have changed. This is true. I have been thinking, and perhaps the change is due to this. How can I begin to tell you! I do not know. You are not helping me.”

  Interest quickened in Louis’ eye. He approached a step towards his brother.

  “You have a confession to make, to me, as a priest?” His voice was incredulous, but hopeful.

  Arsène was silent. Then he said, averting his head: “Yes. In a manner of speaking. This is very hard for me, for I have always been careless, living on the surface of things, as a fly dances over a pool in the sunlight. You must bear with me, Louis. These words are strange and unfamiliar in my mouth. I find them hard to say. They are like clumsy boots being forced over feet that not do fit them.”

  He paused. Louis waited, majestical in his black robes, a strangely gentle expression on his features. He was also consumed with curiosity, tinged with malice. Was it possible that this silly courtier, this dancer, this haunter of boudoirs, had experienced a change of heart?

  Arsène continued, and now he seemed to be thinking aloud, feeling his way, rather than speaking to his brother:

  “I cannot express what has happened to me. The thoughts I think are peculiar, and strange. I am shaken to the soul. I am in a different world. I have seen and heard astounding things.”

  He looked at Louis, his mobile face darkening, shining:

  “I may seem naïve to you, Louis. I speak to you now as to a priest. Surely you can explain these things to me, help me to understand them, for you must have heard of them, if not experienced them yourself.”

  Louis’ large white hand played with the golden cross that hung about his neck. His expression was benign and smooth.

  Arsène made a desperate motion with his hands. “You see!” he exclaimed. “I am saying nothing at all to you! The things I have been thinking cannot be put into words! Never before have I thought of religion, of faith, of the power they have in men’s lives, and the miracles they can perform. I have had a glimpse of it—”

  Louis was not too astonished. As a priest, he had heard many amazing things. He regarded his brother’s working features with detached benevolence, in which there was still a little suspicion.

  “I have often tried to tell you, Arsène, that in Mother Church is the only refuge, the only peace. You have not listened; you have laughed. Is it possible that my words did not fall on stony soil, after all?”

  Arsène did not speak. The strangest look stood in his dark and restive eyes as he stared at his brother. Then he said: “I had hoped that you might help me understand the world, understand men, help to find the way to what I must do.”

  “The Church,” said Louis gravely, with a quiver in his voice, “is the interpreter of the world, the mouth of God. Deliver yourself up to her, Arsène, with humility, and you will understand all things.”

  Arsène’s lips moved. A brilliant point of light appeared in the pupils of his eyes. He said, almost inaudibly: “I feel that there is something I must do—Something I must understand. Something against which I must set my shoulder and my strength.”

  Again, he made that desperate gesture. He moved to the window, stared unseeingly down at the heaving and vivacious stream of humanity that poured down the Champs-É
lysées. He forgot Louis, who had suddenly become a weariness to him. That obtuse but pathetic priest, who had only banal words to blow against fevered flesh! He felt no impatience with his brother, no animosity, but only a great tiredness.

  He said, as if to himself: “The Church can survive only in two ways: by nobly serving the best interests of men, or by serving the powerful. These two ways are irreconcilable. From what I have seen, and heard, she is lackey to kings and oppressors. Can she have a change of heart? Must a man work for that change of heart, or must he work sternly for her destruction, dedicating himself to the service of the oppressed and the voiceless?”

  Louis listened. He started. He gazed at his brother’s slender back, disbelieving that he had heard these words. His face moved; his lips worked. Stark anguish leapt into his eyes, and he clasped his hands together as a shudder passed over his flesh. Had Arsène seen these strange manifestations, he would have been amazed.

  Louis cried out, and his voice was muffled, yet strong: “One must believe that the Church can do no wrong, that all her servants work only for the good of man and God, and that it is the will of God that she bring all men under her wing! How is it possible to live, if one cannot believe this?”

  Arsène did not turn back to the room. It was as though a flash of blinding light had passed over his vision. His dark slender hands clenched, pressed themselves hard against the window-sill. He wished to look at his brother, but something stern and mysterious prevented him, like a pressure upon his shoulders from another who did not wish him to gaze upon a naked and tormented soul.

  “One must believe!” cried Louis, his voice rising on the sound of a tempest. “Otherwise, one must die! Or go mad!”

  There was a silence, and the air in the bright and frivolous room quivered as though something violent had passed through it.

  Then Louis cried out again, and his voice was the voice of a man in the most dreadful of travail, crying out in the loneliness of a desert full of darkness and pain:

  “Faith! One must always have the faith! One must refuse to see, knowing that the eyes can lie, the heart deceive. One must clasp the unseen garments of Christ in the blackness of the night, believing always. One must wrestle, always—”

  His voice broke. There was a great sigh in the room, as if a heart were assaulted, breaking with a groan that could express itself only in that sigh.

  Then Arsène slowly turned and gazed at his brother. He saw his face. He closed his eyes, and a sickening wave of profound compassion and understanding rolled over him. He thought: It is not Calvary which is the tragedy. It is Gethsemene.

  When he opened his eyes, Louis had gone.

  CHAPTER XII

  It is not possible! thought Arsène. I have dreamed this.

  For it did not seem to him that he had really heard what he had heard, or had seen what he had seen. A few weeks ago, he would have been stupefied, confused. But now, as he considered his brother, he was both deeply moved and alarmed. He had touched the pillar of ice, and it had melted under his hot and urgent hand. Here, too, was a man distraught and frenzied. The unfamiliar pity which he had lately learned for all things was like iron in his own heart.

  He returned to his father, who was waiting in a very dishevelled state of mind.

  “Has he gone?” he cried. “Did he threaten you, Arsène? What did he say to you? I have been chewing my nails to the quick!”

  But Arsène said gravely: “Louis is ill, father. Ill in mind and spirit. You must promise me something. You must treat him more gently, with more compassion.”

  Armand stared. He could not encompass this. Then he exclaimed: “Poof! What nonsense. He has no bowels. However, if it will benefit you,” he added, shrewdly, “I will coddle the serpent. I will kiss and embrace him. I will listen to his pious stupidities. I will even make a novena! Will that satisfy you?”

  Arsène smiled. “It will, indeed. Be gentle with him. And now, I am very tired, and will go to bed for a while.”

  He waved his hand affectionately, and climbed slowly and heavily to his own chambers. His father’s favorite valet, Pierre, was waiting for him. A jug of hot chocolate had been prepared for his sustenance, and there was a silver platter of small rich cakes. Pierre had drawn the silken draperies across the window, and the shimmering covers had been turned down upon the bed. Arsène climbed upon the stool, sank down in the comforting softness, and allowed Pierre to undress him.

  Pierre, a young lean native of Picardy, with a shrewd sharp face, did not speak until Arsène was under the sheets. Then he poured a cup of the steaming chocolate and handed it to the other man. Arsène held it in his hands. They exchanged a long and significant look.

  “There were two, Monsieur, whom I cut down dexterously,” Pierre said, in a low harsh voice. He chuckled under his breath. “When Monsieur raced from the house, there were twelve in pursuit. I engaged four. Two, I killed, the others I wounded. But since then, I have had many anxious moments. However, Monsieur le Comte later reassured me.”

  Arsène laughed weakly. “What would I do without you, Pierre! And your long sword.”

  “Monsieur had splendid legs. He ran like the wind. At the last, it is legs that are important.”

  He regarded the scar on Arsène’s cheek with concern. “It was treated wrongly, that scar. Had I treated it, there would have remained hardly a line.”

  Arsène touched the scar. “It does not add to my beauty? No matter. Did the others fare worse than this?”

  “Monsieur de Bouillîard is still at death’s door, I regret to say, Monsieur. But he is too fat. His Antoine had a hard time rescuing him.”

  “There is a traitor, somewhere, Pierre. Have you any suggestion?”

  Pierre frowned, shook his head. Then his eye sparkled. “Ah, Monsieur! Only let me guess, and there will be no more treachery.” He sighed, gustily. “What a night that was! Never have I enjoyed myself so much.”

  “You are too ferocious, my Pierre.” But Arsène spoke mechanically. He thought for a few moments. “Pierre, you will wake me shortly after sunset. It is very important.”

  “Monsieur le Marquis is entertaining a few friends at dinner tonight. Is it your intention to join them?”

  “No. You will explain to Monsieur le Marquis that I am still sleeping, and that it is best that I be not disturbed. No one must know that I have left this house.”

  “You are not leaving tonight, Monsieur? That is impossible, in your condition!”

  “I must see the Comte de Vitry, Pierre. Do not annoy me. I expect you to keep every one away from this door, so that it will appear I am still sleeping.”

  He fell, suddenly, into a profound and exhausted slumber. Pierre stood by the bedside, gloomily and affectionately studying that pale countenance with its red scar. He played with the buttons on his doublet, and shook his head. Then he drew the heavy curtains closer about the windows, tiptoed silently from the room. So disturbed was he, that he proceeded to the kitchens to bully the wenches. He was a favorite in that household, and he presumed on this favor to exercise a petty tyranny over the other servants.

  Shortly after sunset he reentered the chamber where Arsène still slept. He laid out black coat, doubtlet and hose, and a cloak and wide plumed hat. The room was thick with twilight. Arsène was breathing uneasily on the bed. Pierre shook him gently.

  Arsène woke sluggishly.

  “I have brought water for Monsieur,” whispered Pierre. “But it is evident that Monsieur is being indiscreet in leaving the hôtel tonight.”

  Arsène shook his head impatiently, and, softly groaning, sat up. He was dizzy with weakness. He said nothing as Pierre, frowning disapprovingly, helped him to dress. He could hardly stand without swaying. His hands shook as he fastened on his sword, and examined the pistol which Pierre handed him. He thrust it in its holster.

  “Shall I order a chair?” asked Pierre.

  “No. Certainly not. I wish no one to know I have left the house. Pardieu, but I am as weak as a babe!”
r />   “Monsieur will at least let me accompany him?”

  “What an idiot you are, Pierre! And have half a dozen people peering into this room? Did I not tell you that I am supposed to be resting, and you are to guard the door? Where are your wits?”

  They tiptoed down the back stairway, Pierre going ahead to reconnoiter. They met no one. The distant kitchens were abuzz, and delicious odors wafted from them, and the laughter of scullery maids. They descended to the wine cellars. There was a strong and acrid odor here, mingled with dust. Cobwebs hung from the low damp ceilings. Pierre lit a candle. They crept through the crypts. Rows upon rows of bottles marched along the walls. Immense casks loomed in their way. The cellars were enormous, and it took some time to pass through them. Finally they reached an iron door set deeply in the stone walls. Pierre produced a large key and opened the door. Close cold air rushed in upon them. The door opened upon a long and tortuous stone corridor.

  Arsène entered the corridor, and Pierre closed and locked the door behind him. As in a pain-filled dream, Arsène threaded his way in the darkness, touching the wet walls with his hands. At times the corridor was hardly wide enough for a man to pass, and Arsène had to wedge sideways in the complete and echoing darkness. The passageway seemed interminable. Arsène’s shirt clung wetly to his back. He could hear his own panting, loud and hollow. His feet struck sharply on the stone floor.

  Now the air was becoming warmer, and the floor was rising. There were Tough steps cut in the stone. Arsène painfully climbed them, almost sobbing with exertion. There was another passageway. He could hear the gurgling of sewers behind the walls, and the dripping of moisture. Above him was the long rumble of traffic. He paused to wipe his face, to breathe deeply of the unclean air, which smelled of decay and corruption. Something scuttled across his foot in the darkness, and he shivered. He heard the squealing of fat rats, and the rattle of their feet as they fled by him. Here and there he saw twin glows of tiny phosphorescence, malignant and alive. He withdrew his sword and struck at them. They winked and disappeared. He quickened his step, and pressed upwards.