The Magician: Chapter 7

Chapter 7

On the morning of the day upon which they had asked him to tea, Oliver
Haddo left at Margaret's door vast masses of chrysanthemums. There were
so many that the austere studio was changed in aspect. It gained an
ephemeral brightness that Margaret, notwithstanding pieces of silk hung
here and there on the walls, had never been able to give it. When Arthur
arrived, he was dismayed that the thought had not occurred to him.

'I'm so sorry,' he said. 'You must think me very inconsiderate.'

Margaret smiled and held his hand.

'I think I like you because you don't trouble about the common little
attentions of lovers.'

'Margaret's a wise girl,' smiled Susie. 'She knows that when a man sends
flowers it is a sign that he has admired more women than one.'

'I don't suppose that these were sent particularly to me.'

Arthur Burdon sat down and observed with pleasure the cheerful fire. The
drawn curtains and the lamps gave the place a nice cosiness, and there
was the peculiar air of romance which is always in a studio. There is a
sense of freedom about it that disposes the mind to diverting
speculations. In such an atmosphere it is possible to be serious without
pompousness and flippant without inanity.

In the few days of their acquaintance Arthur and Susie had arrived at
terms of pleasant familiarity. Susie, from her superior standpoint of an
unmarried woman no longer young, used him with the good-natured banter
which she affected. To her, he was a foolish young thing in love, and she
marvelled that even the cleverest man in that condition could behave
like a perfect idiot. But Margaret knew that, if her friend chaffed him,
it was because she completely approved of him. As their intimacy
increased, Susie learnt to appreciate his solid character. She admired
his capacity in dealing with matters that were in his province, and the
simplicity with which he left alone those of which he was ignorant. There
was no pose in him. She was touched also by an ingenuous candour which
gave a persuasive charm to his abruptness. And, though she set a plain
woman's value on good looks, his appearance, rough hewn like a statue in
porphyry, pleased her singularly. It was an index of his character. The
look of him gave you the whole man, strong yet gentle, honest and simple,
neither very imaginative nor very brilliant, but immensely reliable and
trustworthy to the bottom of his soul. He was seated now with Margaret's
terrier on his knees, stroking its ears, and Susie, looking at him,
wondered with a little pang why no man like that had even cared for her.
It was evident that he would make a perfect companion, and his love, once
won, was of the sort that did not alter.

Dr Porho�t came in and sat down with the modest quietness which was one
of his charms. He was not a great talker and loved most to listen in
silence to the chatter of young people. The dog jumped down from Arthur's
knee, went up to the doctor, and rubbed itself in friendly fashion
against his legs. They began to talk in the soft light and had forgotten
almost that another guest was expected. Margaret hoped fervently that he
would not come. She had never looked more lovely than on this afternoon,
and she busied herself with the preparations for tea with a housewifely
grace that added a peculiar delicacy to her comeliness. The dignity which
encompassed the perfection of her beauty was delightfully softened, so
that you were reminded of those sweet domestic saints who lighten here
and there the passionate records of the Golden Book.

'_C'est tellement intime ici_,' smiled Dr Porho�t, breaking into French
in the impossibility of expressing in English the exact feeling which
that scene gave him.

It might have been a picture by some master of _genre_. It seemed hardly
by chance that the colours arranged themselves in such agreeable tones,
or that the lines of the wall and the seated persons achieved such a
graceful decoration. The atmosphere was extraordinarily peaceful.

There was a knock at the door, and Arthur got up to open. The terrier
followed at his heels. Oliver Haddo entered. Susie watched to see what
the dog would do and was by this time not surprised to see a change
come over it. With its tail between its legs, the friendly little beast
slunk along the wall to the furthermost corner. It turned a suspicious,
frightened eye upon Haddo and then hid its head. The visitor, intent upon
his greetings, had not noticed even that there was an animal in the room.
He accepted with a simple courtesy they hardly expected from him the
young woman's thanks for his flowers. His behaviour surprised them. He
put aside his poses. He seemed genuinely to admire the cosy little
studio. He asked Margaret to show him her sketches and looked at them
with unassumed interest. His observations were pointed and showed a
certain knowledge of what he spoke about. He described himself as an
amateur, that object of a painter's derision: the man 'who knows what he
likes'; but his criticism, though generous, showed that he was no fool.
The two women were impressed. Putting the sketches aside, he began to
talk, of the many places he had seen. It was evident that he sought to
please. Susie began to understand how it was that, notwithstanding
his affectations, he had acquired so great an influence over the
undergraduates of Oxford. There was romance and laughter in his
conversation; and though, as Frank Hurrell had said, lacking in wit,
he made up for it with a diverting pleasantry that might very well have
passed for humour. But Susie, though amused, felt that this was not the
purpose for which she had asked him to come. Dr Porho�t had lent her
his entertaining work on the old alchemists, and this gave her a chance
to bring their conversation to matters on which Haddo was expert. She had
read the book with delight and, her mind all aflame with those strange
histories wherein fact and fancy were so wonderfully mingled, she was
eager to know more. The long toil in which so many had engaged, always to
lose their fortunes, often to suffer persecution and torture, interested
her no less than the accounts, almost authenticated, of those who had
succeeded in their extraordinary quest.

She turned to Dr Porho�t.

'You are a bold man to assert that now and then the old alchemists
actually did make gold,' she said.

'I have not gone quite so far as that,' he smiled. 'I assert merely that,
if evidence as conclusive were offered of any other historical event, it
would be credited beyond doubt. We can disbelieve these circumstantial
details only by coming to the conclusion beforehand that it is impossible
they should be true.'

'I wish you would write that life of Paracelsus which you suggest in your
preface.'

Dr Porho�t, smiling shook his head.

'I don't think I shall ever do that now,' he said. 'Yet he is the most
interesting of all the alchemists, for he offers the fascinating problem
of an immensely complex character. It is impossible to know to what
extent he was a charlatan and to what a man of serious science.'

Susie glanced at Oliver Haddo, who sat in silence, his heavy face in
shadow, his eyes fixed steadily on the speaker. The immobility of that
vast bulk was peculiar.

'His name is not so ridiculous as later associations have made it seem,'
proceeded the doctor, 'for he belonged to the celebrated family of
Bombast, and they were called Hohenheim after their ancient residence,
which was a castle near Stuttgart in W�rtemberg. The most interesting
part of his life is that which the absence of documents makes it
impossible accurately to describe. He travelled in Germany, Italy,
France, the Netherlands, in Denmark, Sweden, and Russia. He went even to
India. He was taken prisoner by the Tartars, and brought to the Great
Khan, whose son he afterwards accompanied to Constantinople. The mind
must be dull indeed that is not thrilled by the thought of this wandering
genius traversing the lands of the earth at the most eventful date of the
world's history. It was at Constantinople that, according to a certain
_aureum vellus_ printed at Rorschach in the sixteenth century, he
received the philosopher's stone from Solomon Trismosinus. This person
possessed also the _Universal Panacea_, and it is asserted that he was
seen still alive by a French traveller at the end of the seventeenth
century. Paracelsus then passed through the countries that border the
Danube, and so reached Italy, where he served as a surgeon in the
imperial army. I see no reason why he should not have been present at the
battle of Pavia. He collected information from physicians, surgeons and
alchemists; from executioners, barbers, shepherds, Jews, gipsies,
midwives, and fortune-tellers; from high and low, from learned and
vulgar. In the sketch I have given of his career in that volume you hold,
I have copied out a few words of his upon the acquirement of knowledge
which affect me with a singular emotion.'

Dr Porho�t took his book from Miss Boyd and opened it thoughtfully. He
read out the fine passage from the preface of the _Paragranum_:

'I went in search of my art, often incurring danger of life. I have not
been ashamed to learn that which seemed useful to me even from vagabonds,
hangmen, and barbers. We know that a lover will go far to meet the woman
he adores; how much more will the lover of Wisdom be tempted to go in
search of his divine mistress.'

He turned the page to find a few more lines further on:

'We should look for knowledge where we may expect to find it, and why
should a man be despised who goes in search of it? Those who remain at
home may grow richer and live more comfortably than those who wander; but
I desire neither to live comfortably nor to grow rich.'

'By Jove, those are fine words,' said Arthur, rising to his feet.

Their brave simplicity moved him as no rhetoric could have done, and
they made him more eager still to devote his own life to the difficult
acquisition of knowledge. Dr Porho�t gave him his ironic smile.

'Yet the man who could write that was in many ways a mere buffoon, who
praised his wares with the vulgar glibness of a quack. He was vain and
ostentatious, intemperate and boastful. Listen:

'After me, O Avicenna, Galen, Rhases and Montagnana! After me, not I
after you, ye men of Paris, Montpellier, Meissen, and Cologne; all you
that come from the countries along the Danube and the Rhine, and you that
come from the islands of the sea. It is not for me to follow you, because
mine is the lordship. The time will come when none of you shall remain in
his dark corner who will not be an object of contempt to the world,
because I shall be the King, and the Monarchy will be mine.'

Dr Porho�t closed the book.

'Did you ever hear such gibberish in your life? Yet he did a bold thing.
He wrote in German instead of in Latin, and so, by weakening the old
belief in authority, brought about the beginning of free thought in
science. He continued to travel from place to place, followed by a crowd
of disciples, some times attracted to a wealthy city by hope of gain,
sometimes journeying to a petty court at the invitation of a prince. His
folly and the malice of his rivals prevented him from remaining anywhere
for long. He wrought many wonderful cures. The physicians of Nuremberg
denounced him as a quack, a charlatan, and an impostor. To refute them he
asked the city council to put under his care patients that had been
pronounced incurable. They sent him several cases of elephantiasis,
and he cured them: testimonials to that effect may still be found in the
archives of Nuremberg. He died as the result of a tavern brawl and was
buried at Salzburg. Tradition says that, his astral body having already
during physical existence become self-conscious, he is now a living
adept, residing with others of his sort in a certain place in Asia. From
there he still influences the minds of his followers and at times even
appears to them in visible and tangible substance.'

'But look here,' said Arthur, 'didn't Paracelsus, like most of these old
fellows, in the course of his researches make any practical discoveries?'

'I prefer those which were not practical,' confessed the doctor, with
a smile. 'Consider for example the _Tinctura Physicorum_, which neither
Pope nor Emperor could buy with all his wealth. It was one of the
greatest alchemical mysteries, and, though mentioned under the name
of _The Red Lion_ in many occult works, was actually known to few
before Paracelsus, except Hermes Trismegistus and Albertus Magnus. Its
preparation was extremely difficult, for the presence was needed of two
perfectly harmonious persons whose skill was equal. It was said to be a
red ethereal fluid. The least wonderful of its many properties was its
power to transmute all inferior metals into gold. There is an old church
in the south of Bavaria where the tincture is said to be still buried in
the ground. In the year 1698 some of it penetrated through the soil, and
the phenomenon was witnessed by many people, who believed it to be a
miracle. The church which was thereupon erected is still a well-known
place for pilgrimage. Paracelsus concludes his directions for its
manufacture with the words: _But if this be incomprehensible to you,
remember that only he who desires with his whole heart will find, and to
him only who knocks vehemently shall the door be opened_.'

'I shall never try to make it,' smiled Arthur.

'Then there was the _Electrum Magicum_, of which the wise made mirrors
wherein they were able to see not only the events of the past and of the
present, but the doings of men in daytime and at night. They might see
anything that had been written or spoken, and the person who said it,
and the causes that made him say it. But I like best the _Primum Ens
Melissae_. An elaborate prescription is given for its manufacture. It was
a remedy to prolong life, and not only Paracelsus, but his predecessors
Galen, Arnold of Villanova, and Raymond Lulli, had laboured studiously to
discover it.'

'Will it make me eighteen again?' cried Susie.

'It is guaranteed to do so,' answered Dr Porho�t gravely. 'Lesebren, a
physician to Louis XIV, gives an account of certain experiments witnessed
by himself. It appears that one of his friends prepared the remedy, and
his curiosity would not let him rest until he had seen with his own eyes
the effect of it.'

'That is the true scientific attitude,' laughed Arthur.

'He took every morning at sunrise a glass of white wine tinctured with
this preparation; and after using it for fourteen days his nails began to
fall out, without, however, causing him any pain. His courage failed him
at this point, and he gave the same dose to an old female servant. She
regained at least one of the characteristics of youth, much to her
astonishment, for she did not know that she had been taking a medicine,
and, becoming frightened, refused to continue. The experimenter then took
some grain, soaked it in the tincture, and gave it to an aged hen. On the
sixth day the bird began to lose its feathers, and kept on losing them
till it was naked as a newborn babe; but before two weeks had passed
other feathers grew, and these were more beautifully coloured than any
that fortunate hen had possessed in her youth. Her comb stood up, and she
began again to lay eggs.'

Arthur laughed heartily.

'I confess I like that story much better than the others. The _Primum Ens
Melissae_ at least offers a less puerile benefit than most magical
secrets.'

'Do you call the search for gold puerile?' asked Haddo, who had been
sitting for a long time in complete silence.

'I venture to call it sordid.'

'You are very superior.'

'Because I think the aims of mystical persons invariably gross or
trivial? To my plain mind, it is inane to raise the dead in order to hear
from their phantom lips nothing but commonplaces. And I really cannot see
that the alchemist who spent his life in the attempted manufacture of
gold was a more respectable object than the outside jobber of modern
civilization.'

'But if he sought for gold it was for the power it gave him, and it was
power he aimed at when he brooded night and day over dim secrets. Power
was the subject of all his dreams, but not a paltry, limited dominion
over this or that; power over the whole world, power over all created
things, power over the very elements, power over God Himself. His lust
was so vast that he could not rest till the stars in their courses were
obedient to his will.'

For once Haddo lost his enigmatic manner. It was plain now that his words
intoxicated him, and his face assumed a new, a strange, expression. A
peculiar arrogance flashed in his shining eyes.

'And what else is it that men seek in life but power? If they want
money, it is but for the power that attends it, and it is power again
that they strive for in all the knowledge they acquire. Fools and sots
aim at happiness, but men aim only at power. The magus, the sorcerer,
the alchemist, are seized with fascination of the unknown; and they
desire a greatness that is inaccessible to mankind. They think by the
science they study so patiently, but endurance and strength, by force of
will and by imagination, for these are the great weapons of the magician,
they may achieve at last a power with which they can face the God of
Heaven Himself.'

Oliver Haddo lifted his huge bulk from the low chair in which he had been
sitting. He began to walk up and down the studio. It was curious to see
this heavy man, whose seriousness was always problematical, caught up by
a curious excitement.

'You've been talking of Paracelsus,' he said. 'There is one of his
experiments which the doctor has withheld from you. You will find it
neither mean nor mercenary, but it is very terrible. I do not know
whether the account of it is true, but it would be of extraordinary
interest to test it for oneself.'

He looked round at the four persons who watched him intently. There was
a singular agitation in his manner, as though the thing of which he spoke
was very near his heart.

'The old alchemists believed in the possibility of spontaneous
generation. By the combination of psychical powers and of strange
essences, they claim to have created forms in which life became
manifest. Of these, the most marvellous were those strange beings,
male and female, which were called _homunculi_. The old philosophers
doubted the possibility of this operation, but Paracelsus asserts
positively that it can be done. I picked up once for a song on a barrow
at London Bridge a little book in German. It was dirty and thumbed,
many of the pages were torn, and the binding scarcely held the leaves
together. It was called _Die Sphinx_ and was edited by a certain Dr Emil
Besetzny. It contained the most extraordinary account I have ever read of
certain spirits generated by Johann-Ferdinand, Count von K�ffstein, in
the Tyrol, in 1775. The sources from which this account is taken consist
of masonic manuscripts, but more especially of a diary kept by a certain
James Kammerer, who acted in the capacity of butler and famulus to the
Count. The evidence is ten times stronger than any upon which men believe
the articles of their religion. If it related to less wonderful subjects,
you would not hesitate to believe implicitly every word you read. There
were ten _homunculi_--James Kammerer calls them prophesying spirits--kept
in strong bottles, such as are used to preserve fruit, and these were
filled with water. They were made in five weeks, by the Count von
K�ffstein and an Italian mystic and rosicrucian, the Abb� Geloni. The
bottles were closed with a magic seal. The spirits were about a span
long, and the Count was anxious that they should grow. They were
therefore buried under two cartloads of manure, and the pile daily
sprinkled with a certain liquor prepared with great trouble by the
adepts. The pile after such sprinklings began to ferment and steam, as
if heated by a subterranean fire. When the bottles were removed, it was
found that the spirits had grown to about a span and a half each; the
male _homunculi_ were come into possession of heavy beards, and the nails
of the fingers had grown. In two of the bottles there was nothing to be
seen save clear water, but when the Abb� knocked thrice at the seal upon
the mouth, uttering at the same time certain Hebrew words, the water
turned a mysterious colour, and the spirits showed their faces, very
small at first, but growing in size till they attained that of a human
countenance. And this countenance was horrible and fiendish.'

Haddo spoke in a low voice that was hardly steady, and it was plain that
he was much moved. It appeared as if his story affected him so that he
could scarcely preserve his composure. He went on.

'These beings were fed every three days by the Count with a rose-coloured
substance which was kept in a silver box. Once a week the bottles were
emptied and filled again with pure rain-water. The change had to be made
rapidly, because while the _homunculi_ were exposed to the air they
closed their eyes and seemed to grow weak and unconscious, as though they
were about to die. But with the spirits that were invisible, at certain
intervals blood was poured into the water; and it disappeared at once,
inexplicably, without colouring or troubling it. By some accident one of
the bottles fell one day and was broken. The _homunculus_ within died
after a few painful respirations in spite of all efforts to save him, and
the body was buried in the garden. An attempt to generate another, made
by the Count without the assistance of the Abb�, who had left, failed; it
produced only a small thing like a leech, which had little vitality and
soon died.'

Haddo ceased speaking, and Arthur looked at him with amazement. 'But
taking for granted that the thing is possible, what on earth is the use
of manufacturing these strange beasts?' he exclaimed.

'Use!' cried Haddo passionately. 'What do you think would be man's
sensations when he had solved the great mystery of existence, when he saw
living before him the substance which was dead? These _homunculi_ were
seen by historical persons, by Count Max Lemberg, by Count Franz-Josef
von Thun, and by many others. I have no doubt that they were actually
generated. But with our modern appliances, with our greater skill, what
might it not be possible to do now if we had the courage? There are
chemists toiling away in their laboratories to create the primitive
protoplasm from matter which is dead, the organic from the inorganic. I
have studied their experiments. I know all that they know. Why shouldn't
one work on a larger scale, joining to the knowledge of the old adepts
the scientific discovery of the moderns? I don't know what would be the
result. It might be very strange and very wonderful. Sometimes my mind is
verily haunted by the desire to see a lifeless substance move under my
spells, by the desire to be as God.'

He gave a low weird laugh, half cruel, half voluptuous. It made Margaret
shudder with sudden fright. He had thrown himself down in the chair, and
he sat in complete shadow. By a singular effect his eyes appeared
blood-red, and they stared into space, strangely parallel, with an
intensity that was terrifying. Arthur started a little and gave him a
searching glance. The laugh and that uncanny glance, the unaccountable
emotion, were extraordinarily significant. The whole thing was explained
if Oliver Haddo was mad.

There was an uncomfortable silence. Haddo's words were out of tune
with the rest of the conversation. Dr Porho�t had spoken of magical
things with a sceptical irony that gave a certain humour to the subject,
and Susie was resolutely flippant. But Haddo's vehemence put these
incredulous people out of countenance. Dr Porho�t got up to go. He shook
hands with Susie and with Margaret. Arthur opened the door for him. The
kindly scholar looked round for Margaret's terrier...

'I must bid my farewells to your little dog.'

He had been so quiet that they had forgotten his presence.

'Come here, Copper,' said Margaret.

The dog slowly slunk up to them, and with a terrified expression crouched
at Margaret's feet.

'What on earth's the matter with you?' she asked.

'He's frightened of me,' said Haddo, with that harsh laugh of his, which
gave such an unpleasant impression.

'Nonsense!'

Dr Porho�t bent down, stroked the dog's back, and shook its paw. Margaret
lifted it up and set it on a table.

'Now, be good,' she said, with lifted finger.

Dr Porho�t with a smile went out, and Arthur shut the door behind him.
Suddenly, as though evil had entered into it, the terrier sprang at
Oliver Haddo and fixed its teeth in his hand. Haddo uttered a cry, and,
shaking it off, gave it a savage kick. The dog rolled over with a loud
bark that was almost a scream of pain, and lay still for a moment as if
it were desperately hurt. Margaret cried out with horror and indignation.
A fierce rage on a sudden seized Arthur so that he scarcely knew what he
was about. The wretched brute's suffering, Margaret's terror, his own
instinctive hatred of the man, were joined together in frenzied passion.

'You brute,' he muttered.

He hit Haddo in the face with his clenched fist. The man collapsed
bulkily to the floor, and Arthur, furiously seizing his collar, began
to kick him with all his might. He shook him as a dog would shake a
rat and then violently flung him down. For some reason Haddo made no
resistance. He remained where he fell in utter helplessness. Arthur
turned to Margaret. She was holding the poor hurt dog in her hands,
crying over it, and trying to comfort it in its pain. Very gently he
examined it to see if Haddo's brutal kick had broken a bone. They sat
down beside the fire. Susie, to steady her nerves, lit a cigarette. She
was horribly, acutely conscious of that man who lay in a mass on the
floor behind them. She wondered what he would do. She wondered why he did
not go. And she was ashamed of his humiliation. Then her heart stood
still; for she realized that he was raising himself to his feet, slowly,
with the difficulty of a very fat person. He leaned against the wall and
stared at them. He remained there quite motionless. His stillness got on
her nerves, and she could have screamed as she felt him look at them,
look with those unnatural eyes, whose expression now she dared not even
imagine.

At last she could no longer resist the temptation to turn round just
enough to see him. Haddo's eyes were fixed upon Margaret so intently
that he did not see he was himself observed. His face, distorted by
passion, was horrible to look upon. That vast mass of flesh had a
malignancy that was inhuman, and it was terrible to see the satanic
hatred which hideously deformed it. But it changed. The redness gave way
to a ghastly pallor. The revengeful scowl disappeared; and a torpid smile
spread over the features, a smile that was even more terrifying than the
frown of malice. What did it mean? Susie could have cried out, but her
tongue cleaved to her throat. The smile passed away, and the face became
once more impassive. It seemed that Margaret and Arthur realized at last
the power of those inhuman eyes, and they became quite still. The dog
ceased its sobbing. The silence was so great that each one heard the
beating of his heart. It was intolerable.

Then Oliver Haddo moved. He came forward slowly.

'I want to ask you to forgive me for what I did,' he said.

'The pain of the dog's bite was so keen that I lost my temper. I deeply
regret that I kicked it. Mr Burdon was very right to thrash me. I feel
that I deserved no less.'

He spoke in a low voice, but with great distinctness. Susie was
astounded. An abject apology was the last thing she expected.

He paused for Margaret's answer. But she could not bear to look at him.
When she spoke, her words were scarcely audible. She did not know why his
request to be forgiven made him seem more detestable.

'I think, if you don't mind, you had better go away.'

Haddo bowed slightly. He looked at Burdon.

'I wish to tell you that I bear no malice for what you did. I recognize
the justice of your anger.'

Arthur did not answer at all. Haddo hesitated a moment, while his eyes
rested on them quietly. To Susie it seemed that they flickered with the
shadow of a smile. She watched him with bewildered astonishment.

He reached for his hat, bowed again, and went.

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