15.Dubieties of the MasterCOME,” said Janicot, yawning in the dawn of Christmas Day, “but here is our romantic lordling of Puysange, to whom love is divine, and the desired woman a goddess.”Florian did not at once reply. He had for the instant forgotten his need of the sword Flamberge. For on account of the requirements of the various ceremonies, Janicot, except for a strip of dappled fawn-skin across his chest, was not wearing any clothes, not even any shoes. Florian had just noticed Janicot’s feet. But Florian was too courteous to comment upon personal peculiarities: for this only is the secret of all good-breeding, he reflected, not ever to wound the feelings of anybody, in any circumstances, without premeditation. So his upsetment was but momentary, and was not shown perceptibly, he felt sure, by the gasp which politeness had turned into a sigh.“But what the deuce,” said Janicot then, “is thisa proper groan, is this the appropriate countenance, for one whose love has overridden the by-laws of time and nature and even of necromancy?”“Ah, Monsieur Janicot,” answered Florian, “gravity everywhere goes arm-in-arm with wisdom, and I am somewhat wiser than I was when we last talked together. For I have been to the high place, and my desires have been gratified.”“That is an affair of course, since all my friends have all their desires in this world. What cannot be with equal readiness taken for granted is the fact that you appear on that account to be none the happier.”“Merriment,” replied Florian, “is a febrile passion. But content is quiet.”“So, then, you are content, my little duke?”“The word ‘little,’ Monsieur Janicot, has in its ordinary uses no uncivil connotations. Yet, when applied to a person—”“I entreat your pardon, Monsieur the Duke, for the ill-chosen adjective, and I hastily withdraw it.”“Which pardon, I need hardly say, I grant with even more haste. I am content, then, Monsieur Janicot. I have achieved my heart’s desire, and I find it”—Florian coughed,—-“beyond anything I ever imagined. But now, alas! the great love between my wife and me draws toward its sweet fruition, and one must be logical. So I comprehend—with not unnatural regret,—that my adored wife will presently be leaving me forever.”“Ah, to be sure! Then you have already, in this brief period, passed from the pleasures of courtship to the joys of matrimony—?”“Monsieur, I am a Puysange. We are ardent.”“—And she is already—?”“Monsieur, I can but repeat my remark.”“Eh,” replied Janicot, “you have certainly spared no zeal, you have not slept, in upholding the repute of your race: and this punctilious and loving adherence to the fine old forthright customs of your fathers affects me. There remains, to be sure, our bargain. Yet I am honestly affected, and since this parting grieves you so much, Florian, some composition must be reached—”“It is undeniable,” said Florian, with a reflective frown, “that my most near acquaintances address me—”“I accept the reproof, I withdraw the vocative noun, and again I entreat your pardon, Monsieur the Duke.”“I did not so much voice a reproof, Monsieur Janicot, as a sincere lament that I have never enjoyed the privilege of your close friendship.” And Florian too bowed. “I was about to observe, then, that a gentleman adheres in all to all his bargains. So I can in logic consider no alteration of our terms,though you comprehend, I trust, how bitter I find their fulfilment.”“Yes,” Janicot responded, “it is precisely the amount of your grief which I begin to comprehend. Its severity has even brought on a bronchial irritation which prevents your speaking freely: and indeed, one might have foreseen this.”“—So I have come to inquire how I am to get the sword Flamberge, which, as you may remember, must figure in the ceremony of—your pardon, but I really do appear to have contracted a quite obstinate cough in the night air,—of giving you your honorarium, by the old ritual.”Janicot for a moment reflected. “You have sacrificed—”“Monsieur, pray let us be logical! I have offered you no sacrifice. I have participated in no such inadvisable custom of heathenry. I must remind you that this is Christmas; and that I, naturally, elect to follow our Christian custom of exchanging appropriate gifts at this season of the year.”“I again apologize, I withdraw the verb. You have made me a Christmas present, then, of the life of a person of some note and mightiness, as your race averages. So it is your right to demand my aid. Yet there is one at your home, in an earthen pot, who could have procured for you the information, and very probably the sword too, without yourstirring from your fireside and adored wife. It appears to me odd that, with so few months of happiness remaining, you should absent yourself from the sources of your only joy.”Florian’s hand had risen in polite protest. “Ah, but, Monsieur Janicot, but in mere self-respect, one would not employ the power of which you speak, unless there were some absolute need. Now, for my part, I have always found it simple enough to get what I wanted without needing to thank anyone for help except myself. And Flamberge too is a prize that I prefer to win unaided, at the trivial price of a slight token of esteem at Christmas. I prefer, you conceive,” said Florian, as smilingly he reflected upon the incessant carefulness one had to exercise in dealing with these fiends, “to settle the affair without incurring humiliating and possibly pyrotechnic obligations to anybody.”Janicot replied: “Doubtless, such independent sentiments are admirable. And it shall be as you like—”“Still, Monsieur Janicot,” said Florian, with just the proper amount of heartbreak in his voice, “is it not regrettable that this cruel price should be exacted of me?”“Old customs must be honored, and mine are oldish. Besides, as I recall it, you suggested the bargain, not I.”“Yes, because I know that gifts from you are dangerous. Why, but let us be logical! Would you have me purchase an ephemeral pleasure at the price of my own ruin, when I could get it at the cost of somewhat inconveniencing others?”“You say that my gifts are dangerous. Yet, what do you really know about me, Florian? Again I entreat your pardon, Monsieur the Duke, but, after all, our acquaintance progresses.”“I know nothing about you personally, Monsieur Janicot, beyond the handsomeness of your generosity. I only know the danger of accepting a free gift from any fiend; and you I take to be, in cosmic politics, a leader of the party in opposition.”Janicot looked grave for a moment. He said:“No, I am not a fiend, Monsieur the Duke; nor, for that matter, does your current theology afford me any niche.”“Well, then,” asked Florian, with his customary fine frankness, “if you are not the devil, what the devil are you?”Janicot answered: “I am all that has been and that is to be. Never has any man been able to imagine what I am.”“Ah, monsieur, that sounds well, and, quite possibly, it means something. Of that I know no more than a frog does about toothache, but I doknow they call you the adversary of all the gods of men—”“Yes,” Janicot admitted, rather sadly, “I have been hoping, now for a great while, that men would find some god with whom a rational person might make terms, but that seems never to happen.”“Monsieur, monsieur!” cried Florian, “pray let us have no scepticism—!”“Scepticism also is a comfort denied to me. Men have that refuge always open. But I have in my time dealt at close grips with too many gods to have any doubt about them. No, I believe, and I shudder with distaste.”“Come, now, Monsieur Janicot, religion and somewhere to go on Sundays are quite necessary amenities—”Janicot was surprised. “Why, but, Monsieur the Duke, can it be true that you, as a person of refinement, approve of worshipping goats and crocodiles and hawks and cats and hippopotami after the Egyptian custom?”“Parbleu, not in the least! I, to the contrary—”“Oh, you admire, then, the monkeys and tigers, in whose honor the men of India build temples?”“Not at all. You misinterpret me—”“Ah, I perceive. You approve, instead, of those gods of Greece and Rome, who went about earth as bulls and cock cuckoos and as sprinklings ofdoubloons and five franc pieces, when they were particularly desirous of winning affection?”“Now, Monsieur Janicot, you very foolishly affect to misunderstand me. One should be logical in these grave matters. One should know, as the whole world knows, that the Dukes of Puysange care nothing for the silly fables of paganism, and that for five centuries we of Puysange have been notable and loyal Christians.”Janicot said: “For five whole centuries! Jahveh also, being so young a god, must think that a long while; and doubtless he feels honored by these five centuries of patronage.”“Well, of course,” said Florian, modestly, “as one of the oldest families hereabouts, we find that our example is apt to be followed. But we ourselves think little of our long lineage, we have grown used to it, we think that logically it is only the man himself who matters: and I confess, Monsieur Janicot, that it seems almost droll to see you impressed by our antiquity.”“I!” said Janicot. Then he said: “For all that, I am impressed. Yes, men are really wonderful. However, let that pass. So it is Jahveh of whom you approve. You confess it. Why, then, I ask you, as one logical person addressing another—”“A pest! logic is a fine thing, but let us not put these matters altogether upon the ground of logic,”said Florian, recoiling just perceptibly, as a large tumble-bug climbed on the rock, and sat beside Janicot.“—I ask you,” Janicot continued, “as one person of good taste addressing another—”“It is not wholly an affair of connoisseurs. Let us talk about something else.”“—For you have this Jahveh’s own history of his exploits all written down at his own dictation. I allow him candor, nor, for one so young, does he write badly. For the rest, do these cruelties, these double-dealings, these self-confessed divine blunders and miscalculations, these subornings of murders and thefts and adulteries, these punishments of the innocent, not sparing even his own family—”Florian yawned delicately, but without removing his eyes from the tumble-bug. “My dear Monsieur Janicot, that sort of talk is really rather naïve: it is, if you will pardon my frankness, quite out of date now that we have reached the eighteenth century.”“Yes, but—”“No, Monsieur Janicot, I can consent to hear no more of these sophomoric blasphemies. I must tell you I have learned that in these matters, as in all matters, it is better taste to recognize some drastic regeneration may be necessary without doing anything about it, and certainly without aligning ourselves with the foul anarchistic mockers of everything in our social chaos which is making for beauty and righteousness—”“Why, but, Monsieur the Duke,” said Janicot, “but what—!”“I must tell you I perceive, in honest sorrow, that with a desire for fescennine expression you combine a vulgar atheism and an iconoclastic desire to befoul the sacred ideas of the average man or woman, collectively scorned as the bourgeoisie—”“Yes, doubtless, this is excellent talking. Still, what—?”“I must tell you also that I very gravely suspect you to be one of those half-baked intellectuals who confuse cheap atheism, and the defiling of other men’s altars, with deep thinking; one of those moral and spiritual hooligans who resent all forms of order as an encroachment upon their diminutive, unkempt and unsavory egos; one of the kind of people who relish nasty books about sacred persons and guffaw over the amours of the angels.”“Yes, I concede the sonority of your periods; but what does all this talking mean?”“Why, monsieur,” said Florian, doubtfully, “I do not imagine that it means anything. These are merely the customary noises of well-thought-of persons in reply to the raising of any topic which they prefer not to pursue. It is but an especially dignified manner of saying that I do not care to followthe line of thought you suggest, because logic here might lead to uncomfortable conclusions and to deductions without honorable precedents.”“Ah, now I understand you,” said Janicot, smiling. He looked down, and stroked the tumble-bug, which under his touch shrank and vanished. “I should have noticed the odor before; and as it is, I confess that, in this frank adhesion to your folly without pretending it is anything else, I recognize a minim of wisdom. So let us say no more about it. Let us return to the question of that sword with which the loyal servant of him who also came not to bring peace, but a sword, has need to sever his family ties. Those persons just behind you were very pretty swordsmen in their day: and I imagine that they can give you all the necessary information as to the sword Flamberge.”Serpent woman
15.Dubieties of the Master
15.Dubieties of the Master
C
OME,” said Janicot, yawning in the dawn of Christmas Day, “but here is our romantic lordling of Puysange, to whom love is divine, and the desired woman a goddess.”
Florian did not at once reply. He had for the instant forgotten his need of the sword Flamberge. For on account of the requirements of the various ceremonies, Janicot, except for a strip of dappled fawn-skin across his chest, was not wearing any clothes, not even any shoes. Florian had just noticed Janicot’s feet. But Florian was too courteous to comment upon personal peculiarities: for this only is the secret of all good-breeding, he reflected, not ever to wound the feelings of anybody, in any circumstances, without premeditation. So his upsetment was but momentary, and was not shown perceptibly, he felt sure, by the gasp which politeness had turned into a sigh.
“But what the deuce,” said Janicot then, “is thisa proper groan, is this the appropriate countenance, for one whose love has overridden the by-laws of time and nature and even of necromancy?”
“Ah, Monsieur Janicot,” answered Florian, “gravity everywhere goes arm-in-arm with wisdom, and I am somewhat wiser than I was when we last talked together. For I have been to the high place, and my desires have been gratified.”
“That is an affair of course, since all my friends have all their desires in this world. What cannot be with equal readiness taken for granted is the fact that you appear on that account to be none the happier.”
“Merriment,” replied Florian, “is a febrile passion. But content is quiet.”
“So, then, you are content, my little duke?”
“The word ‘little,’ Monsieur Janicot, has in its ordinary uses no uncivil connotations. Yet, when applied to a person—”
“I entreat your pardon, Monsieur the Duke, for the ill-chosen adjective, and I hastily withdraw it.”
“Which pardon, I need hardly say, I grant with even more haste. I am content, then, Monsieur Janicot. I have achieved my heart’s desire, and I find it”—Florian coughed,—-“beyond anything I ever imagined. But now, alas! the great love between my wife and me draws toward its sweet fruition, and one must be logical. So I comprehend—with not unnatural regret,—that my adored wife will presently be leaving me forever.”
“Ah, to be sure! Then you have already, in this brief period, passed from the pleasures of courtship to the joys of matrimony—?”
“Monsieur, I am a Puysange. We are ardent.”
“—And she is already—?”
“Monsieur, I can but repeat my remark.”
“Eh,” replied Janicot, “you have certainly spared no zeal, you have not slept, in upholding the repute of your race: and this punctilious and loving adherence to the fine old forthright customs of your fathers affects me. There remains, to be sure, our bargain. Yet I am honestly affected, and since this parting grieves you so much, Florian, some composition must be reached—”
“It is undeniable,” said Florian, with a reflective frown, “that my most near acquaintances address me—”
“I accept the reproof, I withdraw the vocative noun, and again I entreat your pardon, Monsieur the Duke.”
“I did not so much voice a reproof, Monsieur Janicot, as a sincere lament that I have never enjoyed the privilege of your close friendship.” And Florian too bowed. “I was about to observe, then, that a gentleman adheres in all to all his bargains. So I can in logic consider no alteration of our terms,though you comprehend, I trust, how bitter I find their fulfilment.”
“Yes,” Janicot responded, “it is precisely the amount of your grief which I begin to comprehend. Its severity has even brought on a bronchial irritation which prevents your speaking freely: and indeed, one might have foreseen this.”
“—So I have come to inquire how I am to get the sword Flamberge, which, as you may remember, must figure in the ceremony of—your pardon, but I really do appear to have contracted a quite obstinate cough in the night air,—of giving you your honorarium, by the old ritual.”
Janicot for a moment reflected. “You have sacrificed—”
“Monsieur, pray let us be logical! I have offered you no sacrifice. I have participated in no such inadvisable custom of heathenry. I must remind you that this is Christmas; and that I, naturally, elect to follow our Christian custom of exchanging appropriate gifts at this season of the year.”
“I again apologize, I withdraw the verb. You have made me a Christmas present, then, of the life of a person of some note and mightiness, as your race averages. So it is your right to demand my aid. Yet there is one at your home, in an earthen pot, who could have procured for you the information, and very probably the sword too, without yourstirring from your fireside and adored wife. It appears to me odd that, with so few months of happiness remaining, you should absent yourself from the sources of your only joy.”
Florian’s hand had risen in polite protest. “Ah, but, Monsieur Janicot, but in mere self-respect, one would not employ the power of which you speak, unless there were some absolute need. Now, for my part, I have always found it simple enough to get what I wanted without needing to thank anyone for help except myself. And Flamberge too is a prize that I prefer to win unaided, at the trivial price of a slight token of esteem at Christmas. I prefer, you conceive,” said Florian, as smilingly he reflected upon the incessant carefulness one had to exercise in dealing with these fiends, “to settle the affair without incurring humiliating and possibly pyrotechnic obligations to anybody.”
Janicot replied: “Doubtless, such independent sentiments are admirable. And it shall be as you like—”
“Still, Monsieur Janicot,” said Florian, with just the proper amount of heartbreak in his voice, “is it not regrettable that this cruel price should be exacted of me?”
“Old customs must be honored, and mine are oldish. Besides, as I recall it, you suggested the bargain, not I.”
“Yes, because I know that gifts from you are dangerous. Why, but let us be logical! Would you have me purchase an ephemeral pleasure at the price of my own ruin, when I could get it at the cost of somewhat inconveniencing others?”
“You say that my gifts are dangerous. Yet, what do you really know about me, Florian? Again I entreat your pardon, Monsieur the Duke, but, after all, our acquaintance progresses.”
“I know nothing about you personally, Monsieur Janicot, beyond the handsomeness of your generosity. I only know the danger of accepting a free gift from any fiend; and you I take to be, in cosmic politics, a leader of the party in opposition.”
Janicot looked grave for a moment. He said:
“No, I am not a fiend, Monsieur the Duke; nor, for that matter, does your current theology afford me any niche.”
“Well, then,” asked Florian, with his customary fine frankness, “if you are not the devil, what the devil are you?”
Janicot answered: “I am all that has been and that is to be. Never has any man been able to imagine what I am.”
“Ah, monsieur, that sounds well, and, quite possibly, it means something. Of that I know no more than a frog does about toothache, but I doknow they call you the adversary of all the gods of men—”
“Yes,” Janicot admitted, rather sadly, “I have been hoping, now for a great while, that men would find some god with whom a rational person might make terms, but that seems never to happen.”
“Monsieur, monsieur!” cried Florian, “pray let us have no scepticism—!”
“Scepticism also is a comfort denied to me. Men have that refuge always open. But I have in my time dealt at close grips with too many gods to have any doubt about them. No, I believe, and I shudder with distaste.”
“Come, now, Monsieur Janicot, religion and somewhere to go on Sundays are quite necessary amenities—”
Janicot was surprised. “Why, but, Monsieur the Duke, can it be true that you, as a person of refinement, approve of worshipping goats and crocodiles and hawks and cats and hippopotami after the Egyptian custom?”
“Parbleu, not in the least! I, to the contrary—”
“Oh, you admire, then, the monkeys and tigers, in whose honor the men of India build temples?”
“Not at all. You misinterpret me—”
“Ah, I perceive. You approve, instead, of those gods of Greece and Rome, who went about earth as bulls and cock cuckoos and as sprinklings ofdoubloons and five franc pieces, when they were particularly desirous of winning affection?”
“Now, Monsieur Janicot, you very foolishly affect to misunderstand me. One should be logical in these grave matters. One should know, as the whole world knows, that the Dukes of Puysange care nothing for the silly fables of paganism, and that for five centuries we of Puysange have been notable and loyal Christians.”
Janicot said: “For five whole centuries! Jahveh also, being so young a god, must think that a long while; and doubtless he feels honored by these five centuries of patronage.”
“Well, of course,” said Florian, modestly, “as one of the oldest families hereabouts, we find that our example is apt to be followed. But we ourselves think little of our long lineage, we have grown used to it, we think that logically it is only the man himself who matters: and I confess, Monsieur Janicot, that it seems almost droll to see you impressed by our antiquity.”
“I!” said Janicot. Then he said: “For all that, I am impressed. Yes, men are really wonderful. However, let that pass. So it is Jahveh of whom you approve. You confess it. Why, then, I ask you, as one logical person addressing another—”
“A pest! logic is a fine thing, but let us not put these matters altogether upon the ground of logic,”said Florian, recoiling just perceptibly, as a large tumble-bug climbed on the rock, and sat beside Janicot.
“—I ask you,” Janicot continued, “as one person of good taste addressing another—”
“It is not wholly an affair of connoisseurs. Let us talk about something else.”
“—For you have this Jahveh’s own history of his exploits all written down at his own dictation. I allow him candor, nor, for one so young, does he write badly. For the rest, do these cruelties, these double-dealings, these self-confessed divine blunders and miscalculations, these subornings of murders and thefts and adulteries, these punishments of the innocent, not sparing even his own family—”
Florian yawned delicately, but without removing his eyes from the tumble-bug. “My dear Monsieur Janicot, that sort of talk is really rather naïve: it is, if you will pardon my frankness, quite out of date now that we have reached the eighteenth century.”
“Yes, but—”
“No, Monsieur Janicot, I can consent to hear no more of these sophomoric blasphemies. I must tell you I have learned that in these matters, as in all matters, it is better taste to recognize some drastic regeneration may be necessary without doing anything about it, and certainly without aligning ourselves with the foul anarchistic mockers of everything in our social chaos which is making for beauty and righteousness—”
“Why, but, Monsieur the Duke,” said Janicot, “but what—!”
“I must tell you I perceive, in honest sorrow, that with a desire for fescennine expression you combine a vulgar atheism and an iconoclastic desire to befoul the sacred ideas of the average man or woman, collectively scorned as the bourgeoisie—”
“Yes, doubtless, this is excellent talking. Still, what—?”
“I must tell you also that I very gravely suspect you to be one of those half-baked intellectuals who confuse cheap atheism, and the defiling of other men’s altars, with deep thinking; one of those moral and spiritual hooligans who resent all forms of order as an encroachment upon their diminutive, unkempt and unsavory egos; one of the kind of people who relish nasty books about sacred persons and guffaw over the amours of the angels.”
“Yes, I concede the sonority of your periods; but what does all this talking mean?”
“Why, monsieur,” said Florian, doubtfully, “I do not imagine that it means anything. These are merely the customary noises of well-thought-of persons in reply to the raising of any topic which they prefer not to pursue. It is but an especially dignified manner of saying that I do not care to followthe line of thought you suggest, because logic here might lead to uncomfortable conclusions and to deductions without honorable precedents.”
“Ah, now I understand you,” said Janicot, smiling. He looked down, and stroked the tumble-bug, which under his touch shrank and vanished. “I should have noticed the odor before; and as it is, I confess that, in this frank adhesion to your folly without pretending it is anything else, I recognize a minim of wisdom. So let us say no more about it. Let us return to the question of that sword with which the loyal servant of him who also came not to bring peace, but a sword, has need to sever his family ties. Those persons just behind you were very pretty swordsmen in their day: and I imagine that they can give you all the necessary information as to the sword Flamberge.”
Serpent woman