‘Oh, no. I hardly think so. At any rate, it doesn’t extend farther than the imprint. The writer was in deadly earnest, I feel sure.’
‘Ah! so it seems.’ As Canon Spenlow turned the pages, scanning a paragraph here and there a heavy frown gathered upon his brow. ‘God bless my soul! Why, wherever did you get this thing?’
‘From Merritt, as I told you. He bought it from a casual seller, and I bought it from him the very next day. Have you ever seen a copy before?’
‘No, and God forbid I should ever see a copy again.’ The old man shut the book sharply, and slapped it down on a table with the utmost distaste. ‘Have you examined it, have you read it, Hodsoll?’
‘No, not yet. I am looking forward——’
‘Then take my advice and forgive me for speaking frankly. Put it behind the fire. Nay, I am certain you will do so when you read it.’
Dr Hodsoll stood petrified. ‘Put it behind the fire! Why, it may be unique. At any rate, I’m sure it’s of the last rarity.’
‘Thank God for that. I am quite serious. Never have I seen in print such filth, such appalling blasphemy.’
‘Oh, I know some of these demonologists are a trifle strong, but——’
‘It’s not a question of being a trifle strong. Read, man, read for yourself.’ The Canon was deeply moved.
In some surprise Hodsoll took up the offending volume to discover the cause of so unexpected an outburst. Nor had he long to search. The very page to which he turned seemed to be some kind of liturgical ceremony, there were prayers addressed to the powers of darkness in terms of hideous profanity and rubrics of the most crapulous obscenity.
What a blunder to have shown that to Canon Spenlow! He must be diplomatic and smooth the old fellow down.
‘Whew!’ he ejaculated, ‘that’s pretty bad. I assure you, Canon, I had no idea there was anything like this. I’m sorry. Yet as a matter of curiosity, or rather from a bibliographical point of view, I think one ought to set on record a full description of this fellow, lewd and degraded as he is.’
‘Personally I should burn it here and now,’ retorted the Canon. ‘But, of course, it’s not my property. It’s an evil book.’
‘I shall certainly follow your advice. Yet I think it would be a mistake not to have a memorandum of it, and perhaps a photograph of the title-page which, you must admit, is singular.’
Canon Spenlow made an impatient noise, and, pointing a long lean finger, quoted vigorously: ‘Many of them also which used curious arts brought their books together, and burned them before all men: and they counted the price of them, and found it fifty thousand pieces of silver.’ These were regions into which Dr Hodsoll was quite unable to follow his friend, and he therefore contented himself with a murmured ‘Quite,’ which he felt none the less to be inappropriate and inconclusive.
At that moment there came a not unwelcome interruption in the shape of the butler with a note for his master, a missive which required an immediate answer, and Hodsoll hastily gathering up his book lest it should be seized for a holocaust was glad to escape to the fastness of his bedroom where, bolting the door behind him, he sank into an arm-chair, feeling breathless and flurried.
‘Phew!’ he exclaimed, mopping his brow with his handkerchief, ‘whoever could have supposed that the old chap would flare up like that! It’s just it, you never know with these religious folk where you are going to have ’em. And now let’s see what all the bother’s about.’
He was soon obliged to confess that the contents of the Mysterium Arcanum were sufficiently startling. There were a number of charms, a few to constrain love, others to compel hate, and some with a yet more definitely atrocious aim, ‘capitis damnatio’, the ‘death warrants’ they were termed. There were receipts for poison, and philters of the foulest ingredients. Next followed evocations of demons, cantrips and spells, and three sections entitled respectively, ‘the way of Cain’, ‘the error of Balaam’, and ‘the gainsaying of Core’. There were litanies addressed to the fallen archangel as the patron of every licence and abomination. There were prayers to the powers of the pit ante et post missam, and a rubric which set Hodsoll wondering, missam autem quaere apud Missale Nigrum (the Mass itself will be found in the Black Missal).
Could it be that the mysterious book of the witches had fallen into his hands, that volume which was mentioned in more than one trial of the seventeenth century, but which apparently had never been seen by any who was not a member of that horrid society? The Mysterium Arcanum showed at any rate the signs of constant use. In the margins, here and there, an old hand had jotted various notes and drawn strange cabalistic signs. And to his delight he saw that a blank page at the end was covered with fine close writing headed Evocatio efficacissima, A most Powerful and Efficacious Evocation. ‘Crabbed, contracted Latin! Well, I suppose I shall have to transcribe this at length, and the sooner I do it the better.’ Uncapping his fountain pen, and taking a quire of quarto paper from his case, Dr Hodsoll set to work, and before long had written out in full the impious and unhallowed charm. In order to check it carefully and make sure he had omitted no word nor syllable, he then read it through sentence by sentence softly to himself.
There came a light tap at the door, and he actually started. ‘The servant with hot water. How time flies! I must change at once.’ Hastily shuffling the book and his manuscript under a sheet of blotting-paper, he called over his shoulder, ‘Come in.’
‘You wanted me, sir,’ said a low voice.
Dr Hodsoll turned and saw that there had entered the room and was standing waiting his orders a tall young man with the impassive features and formal bearing of the well-trained servant. He was dressed, not in livery, but in a smartly-cut black suit, and seemed the very pattern of a gentleman’s valet. At the same time there was something foreign in his appearance, which was perhaps due to his large dark eyes, full of infinite sadness and a yearning regret, and the extreme pallor of his countenance.
‘Another valet of the Canon’s,’ thought Hodsoll. ‘Really he has more servants just to look after himself than would be needed to wait on a family. But I suppose he entertains a good deal in this large house.’ Then aloud, ‘No, thanks, I didn’t ring. I need nothing until my hot water comes.’
‘I beg your pardon, sir, I thought you wanted me,’ and the servant withdrew.
Dr Hodsoll, reflecting that the Canon would not care for the Mysterium to be left about, although certainly none of the household could read Latin, and the book was quite safe unless indeed from a conscientious scruple his host purloined and destroyed it, locked it away in a suit-case. He was glad he had done so, for as he went downstairs he noticed the valet loitering in the passage not far from his door, and in these days of universal education who knows, he asked himself, whether this chap hasn’t taken a course in classics and reads Horace or Livy in the servants’ hall.
The Canon, he was relieved to find, made no allusion either covert or direct to the Mysterium, and the evening passed tranquilly, closing however at a rather earlier hour in view of the morrow being a Sunday. Upon entering his bedroom and switching on the light Hodsoll was surprised and a little annoyed to find the valet awaiting him.
‘What do you want?’ he asked rather abruptly.
‘I was waiting for you, sir,’ was the reply in perfectly courteous and even deferential tones, ‘what can I do for you?’
‘Nothing at all,’ answered Hodsoll. ‘I will ring if I require anything more.’