Books: The Master Christian

M >> Marie Corelli >> The Master Christian

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Martine said nothing. She simply removed the one stabbed bird from
among the others, and setting it aside, picked up the knife from the
ground and went on knitting as calmly as ever.

"I am going to see the Archbishop," proceeded Marguerite, tossing
back her dishevelled locks and making one or two fantastic dance-
steps as she spoke--"The great Archbishop of this wonderful city of
Rouen! I want to ask him how it happened that God made men. It was a
mistake which He must be sorry for! The Archbishop knows
everything;--he will tell me about it. Ah!--what a beautiful mistake
is the Archbishop himself!--and how soon women find it out! Bon
jour, Martine!"

"Bon jour, Marguerite!" responded Martine quietly.

Singing to herself, the crazed girl sauntered off. Several of the
market women looked after her.

"She killed her child, they say," muttered the old vegetable-seller-
-"But no one knows--"

"Sh--sh--sh!" hissed Martine angrily--"What one does not know one
should not say. Mayhap there never was a child at all. Whatever the
wrong was, she has suffered for it;--and if the man who led her
astray ever comes nigh her, his life is not worth a centime."

"Rough justice!" said one of the market porters, who had just paused
close by to light his pipe.

"Aye, rough justice!" echoed Martine--"When justice is not given to
the people, the people take it for themselves! And if a man deals
ill by a woman, he has murdered her as surely as if he had put a
knife through her;--and 'tis but even payment when he gets the knife
into himself. Things in this life are too easy for men and too hard
for women; men make the laws for their own convenience, and never a
thought of us at all in the making. They are a selfish lot!"

The porter laughed carelessly, and having lit his pipe to his
satisfaction went his way.

A great many more customers now came to Martine's stall, and for
upwards of an hour there was shrill argument and driving of bargains
till she had pretty well cleared her counter of all its stock. Then
she sat down again and looked to right and left of the market-place
for any sign of the Patoux children returning with her little son,
but there was not a glimpse of them anywhere.

"I wonder what they are doing!" she thought--"And I wonder what sort
of a Cardinal it is they have taken the child to see! These great
princes of the Church care nothing for the poor,--the very Pope
allows half Italy to starve while he shuts himself up with his
treasures in the Vatican;--what should a great Cardinal care for my
poor little Fabien! If the stories of the Christ were true, and one
could only take the child to Him, then indeed there might be a
chance of cure!--but it is all a lie,--and the worst of the lie is
that it would give us all so much comfort and happiness if it were
only true! It is like holding out a rope to a drowning man and
snatching it away again. And when the rope goes, the sooner one
sinks under the waves the better!"

VI.

The Cardinal was still in his room alone with the boy Manuel, when
Madame Patoux, standing at her door under the waving tendrils of the
"creeping jenny" and shading her eyes from the radiance of the sun,
saw her children approaching with Fabien Doucet between them.

"Little wretches that they are!" she murmured--"Once let them get an
idea into their heads and nothing will knock it out! Now I shall
have to tell Monseigneur that they are here,--what an impertinence
it seems!--and yet he is so gentle, and has such a good heart that
perhaps he will not mind . . ."

Here she broke off her soliloquy as the children came up, Babette
eagerly demanding to know where the Cardinal was. Madame Patoux set
her arms akimbo and surveyed the little group of three half-
pityingly, half derisively.

"The Cardinal has not left his room since breakfast," she answered--
"He is playing Providence already to a poor lad lost in the streets,
and for that matter lost in the world, without father or mother to
look after him,--he was found in Notre Dame last night,--"

"Why, mother," interrupted Henri--"how could a boy get into Notre
Dame last night? When Babette and I went there, nobody was in the
church at all,--and we left one candle burning all alone in the
darkness,--and when we came out the Suisse swore at us for having
gone in, and then locked the door."

"Well, if one must be so exact, the boy was not found actually in
Notre Dame, obstinate child," returned his mother impatiently--"It
happened at midnight,--the good Cardinal heard someone crying and
went to see who it was. And he found a poor boy outside the
Cathedral weeping as if his heart were breaking, and leaning his
head against the hard door for a pillow. And he brought him back and
gave him his own bed to sleep in;--and the lad is with him now."

Little Fabien Doucet, leaning on his crutch, looked up with
interest.

"Is he lame like me?" he asked.

"No, child," replied Madame compassionately--"He is straight and
strong. In truth a very pretty boy."

Fabien sighed. Babette made a dash forward.

"I will go and see him!" she said--"And I will call Monseigneur."

"Babette! How dare you! Babette!"

But Babette had scurried defiantly past her mother, and breathless
with a sense of excitement and disobedience intermingled, had burst
into the Cardinal's room without knocking. There on the threshold
she paused,--somewhat afraid at her own boldness,--and startled too
at the sight of Manuel, who was seated near the window opposite the
Cardinal, and who turned his deep blue eyes upon her with a look of
enquiry. The Cardinal himself rose and turned to greet her, and as
the wilful little maid met his encouraging glance and noted the
benign sweetness of his expression she trembled,--and losing nerve,
began to cry.

"Monseigneur . . . Monseigneur . . ." she stammered.

"Yes, my child,--what is it?" said the Cardinal kindly--"Do not be
afraid,--I am at your service. You have brought the little friend
you spoke to me of yesterday?"

Babette peeped shyly at him through her tears, and drooping her
head, answered with a somewhat smothered "Yes."

"That is well,--I will go to him at once,"--and the Cardinal paused
a moment looking at Manuel, who as if responding to his unuttered
wish, rose and approached him--"And you, Manuel--you will also come.
You see, my child," went on the good prelate addressing Babette, the
while he laid a gently caressing hand on her hair--"Another little
friend has come to me who is also very sad,--and though he is not
crippled or ill, he is all alone in the world, which is, for one so
young, a great hardship. You must be sorry for him too, as well as
for your own poor playmate."

But Babette was seized with an extraordinary timidity, and had much
ado to keep back the tears that rose in her throat and threatened to
break out in a burst of convulsive sobbing. She did not know in the
least what was the matter with her,--she was only conscious of an
immense confusion and shyness which were quite new to her ordinarily
bold and careless nature. Manuel's face frightened yet fascinated
her; he looked, she thought, like the beautiful angel of the famous
stained glass "Annunciation" window in the crumbling old church of
St. Maclou. She dared not speak to him,--she could only steal
furtive glances at him from under the curling length of her dark
tear-wet lashes,--and when the Cardinal took her by the hand and
descended the staircase with her to the passage where the crippled
Fabien waited, she could not forbear glancing back every now and
then over her shoulder at the slight, supple, almost aerial figure
of the boy, who, noiselessly, and with a light gliding step,
followed. And now Madame Patoux came forward;--a bulky, anxious
figure of gesticulation and apology.

"Alas, Monseigneur!" she began plaintively--"It is too shameful that
your quiet should be disturbed in this way, but if you could only
know the obstinacy of these children! Ah yes!--if you knew all, you
would pity their parents!--you would indeed! And this is the unhappy
little creature they have brought to you, Monseigneur,--a sad sight
truly!--and afflicted sorely by the will of God,--though one could
hardly say that God was anywhere about when he fell, poor baby, from
his mother's cart and twisted his body awry,--one would rather think
the devil was in the business, asking your pardon, Monseigneur; for
surely the turning of a human creature into a useless lump has
little of good, or divine kindness in it! Now make thy best bow to
the Cardinal," went on Madame with a gasp for breath in her voluble
speech, addressing the little cripple--" And it is a pity them hast
no time to confess thy sins and take the Sacrament before so holy a
man lay hands on thee!"

But at these words Cardinal Bonpre turned to her with a reproving
gesture.

"I pray you do not call me holy, my daughter," he said earnestly,
the old shadows of pain and prote gathering in his eyes, "Nothing
can make me more sorrowful than to hear such an epithet applied to
one who is so full of errors and sins as myself. Try to look upon me
just as I am,--merely an old man, nearing the grave, with nothing of
merit in me beyond the desire to serve our Lord and obey His
commands,--a desire which is far stronger than the practical force
to obey it. Much that I would do I cannot; and in much that I
attempt I fail. Come to me, my child."

Here, interrupting himself, he bent down, and putting his arms
tenderly round Fabien, lifted him bodily, crutch and all, and
carried him into the next room, and as he did so, the young Manuel
glided in before him, and stood beside his chair, his blue eyes
shining with a soft and eager light of interest, and a little smile
lifting the delicate upper curve of his lips as he looked on. Fabien
meanwhile, perched on the Cardinal's knee, and held close in the
Cardinal's arms, was not at all frightened,--he simply sat,
contented, gazing up confidingly at the pale venerable face above
him. Henri and Babette, having as they considered, got their way,
stayed at the door half afraid to enter, and their mother peered
over their heads at the little scene in mingled awe and curiosity.

"My poor child," then said the Cardinal gently--"I want you to
understand quite clearly how sorry I am for you, and how willingly I
would do anything in the world to make you a strong, well, and happy
boy. But you must not fancy that I can cure you. I told your little
friends yesterday that I was not a saint, such as you read about in
story-books,--and that I could not work miracles, because I am not
worthy to be so filled with the Divine Spirit as to heal with a
touch like the better servants of our Blessed Lord. Nevertheless I
firmly believe that if God saw that it was good for you to be strong
and well, He would find ways to make you so. Sometimes sickness and
sorrow are sent to us for our advantage,--sometimes even death comes
to us for our larger benefit, though we may not understand how it is
so till afterwards. But in Heaven everything will be made clear; and
even our griefs will be turned into joys,--do you understand?"

"Yes," murmured Fabien gravely, but two large tears welled up in his
plaintive eyes as the faint glimmer of hope he had encouraged as to
the possibility of his being miraculously cured by the touch of a
saintly Cardinal, expired in the lonely darkness of his little
afflicted soul.

"That is well," continued the Cardinal kindly--"And now, since it is
so difficult for you to kneel, you shall stay where you are in my
arms,--so!"--and he set him on his knee in a position of even
greater comfort than before, "You shall simply shut your eyes, and
clasp your little hands together as I put them here,"--and as he
spoke he crossed the child's hands on his silver crucifix-"And I
will ask our Lord to come and make you well,--for of myself I can do
nothing."

At these words Henri and Babette glanced at each other
questioningly, and then as if simultaneously moved by some
inexplicable emotion, dropped on their knees,--their mother, too
stout and unwieldy to do this with either noiselessness or
satisfaction to herself, was contented to bend her head as low as
she could get it. Manuel remained standing. Leaning against the
Cardinal's chair, his eyes fixed on the crippled Fabien, he had the
aspect of a young Angel of compassion, whose sole immortal desire
was to lift the burden of sorrow and pain from the lives of
suffering humanity. And after a minute or two passed in silent
meditation, the Cardinal laid his hands tenderly on Fabien's fair
curly head and prayed aloud.

"Oh merciful Christ! Most pitying and gentle Redeemer!--to Whom in
the days of Thy sacred life on earth, the sick and suffering and
lame and blind were brought, and never sent away unhealed or
uncomforted; consider, we beseech Thee, the sufferings of this Thy
little child, deprived of all the joys which Thou hast made so sweet
for those who are strong and straight in their youth, and who have
no ailment to depress their courage or to quench the ardour of their
aspiring souls. Look compassionately upon him, oh gentle King and
Master of all such children!--and even as Thou wert a child Thyself,
be pleased to heal him of his sad infirmity. For, if Thou wilt, Thou
canst make this bent body straight and these withered muscles
strong,--from death itself Thou canst ordain life, and nothing is
impossible to Thee! But above all things, gracious Saviour, we do
pray Thee so to lift and strengthen this child's soul, that if it is
destined he should still be called upon to bear his present pain and
trouble, grant to him such perfection in his inward spirit that he
may prove worthy to be counted among Thy angels in the bright
Hereafter. To Thy care, and to Thy comfort, and to Thy healing,
great Master, we commend him, trusting him entirely to Thy mercy,
with perfect resignation to Thy Divine Will. For the sake and memory
of Thy most holy childhood mercifully help and bless this child!
Amen!"

A deep silence ensued. Only the slow ticking of the big old-
fashioned clock in Madame Patoux's kitchen, which was next door to
the room they were all in, could be distinctly heard. Henri and
Babette were the first to stir. They got up from their knees,
brushed the dust of the floor from their clothes, and stared
curiously at Fabien. Was a miracle going to happen? Fabien, however-
-still resting against the Cardinal's breast, with his meagre little
hands clasped tight on the Cardinal's crucifix, kept his eyes
solemnly shut and gave no sign, till the Cardinal himself gently
moved him and set him down. Then he glanced around him
bewilderingly, tottered, and would have fallen had he not been given
his little crutch for support. Very pathetic was the smile which
then quivered on his pale lips,--very doleful was the shake of his
head as he prepared to hobble away.

"Thank you very much, Monseigneur," he murmured gently--"I felt
almost cured while you were praying,--but I am afraid it is no use!
You see there are so many miserable people in the world,--many
cripples, too,--I am not the only one. Our Lord must have enough to
do if He is asked to heal them all! But I am sure you have done
everything you can for me, and I am grateful to you, Monseigneur.
Good-bye!"

"Good-bye, my child!" and the Cardinal, strongly moved by the sight
of the little helpless twisted figure, and painfully impressed too
by the sense of his own entire powerlessness to remove the cause of
the trouble, bent down and kissed him--"Believe me, if the giving of
my own life could make you strong, you should have that life
willingly. May God bless and heal you!"

At that moment Manuel moved from the place he had kept near the
Cardinal's chair. With a light, eager step forward, he went up to
the little cripple, and putting his arms round him kissed him on the
forehead.

"Good-bye, dear little brother!" he said smiling--"Do not be sad!
Have patience! In all the universe, among all the millions and
millions of worlds, there is never a pure and unselfish prayer that
the great good God does not answer! Be sure of that! Take courage,
dear little brother! You will soon be well!"

Fabien stared, half amazed, at the gentle young face that shone upon
him with such an expression of hope and tenderness.

"You are very kind," he said--"And you are just a boy yourself,--so
you can perhaps guess how it must feel not to be like other boys who
can run and leap and walk for miles and miles through the fields and
the green shady forests where the birds sing,--and where there is so
much to see and think about,--when one is lame one cannot go far you
know--and then there is my mother--she is very sad about me,--and it
will be hard for her if I live to be a man and still can do nothing
to help her . . ."

His weak voice broke, and two large tears filled his eyes and
brimmed over, trickling slowly down his pale cheeks. Manuel took his
hand and pressed it encouragingly.

"Do not cry!" he said gently--"Believe in what I say--that you will
soon be quite well. The Cardinal has prayed for you as only good men
CAN pray,--without one selfish thought, in faith and deep humility,-
-such prayers draw angels down! Be patient--be brave! Believe in the
best and the best will come!"

His words rang out with a sweet convincing clearness, and even
Cardinal Bonpre felt a sense of comfort as he listened. The little
cripple smiled through his tears.

"Oh, yes," he murmured--"I WILL hope and I WILL believe! I am always
sure God is near us, though my mother thinks He must be very far
away. Yes,--I will be as brave as I can. You are very good to me,--I
know you understand just how I feel, and I thank you very much. I
hope you will be happy yourself some day. Good-bye!" Then, turning
to Henri and Babette he asked, "Shall we go now?"

Henri's brows were drawn together in a dark frown.

"I suppose so," he replied--"I suppose there's nothing more to be
done?" This, with a somewhat sarcastic air of inquiry directed at
the Cardinal, who met his bold bright glance, mildly and half
compassionately.

"Nothing more my child"--he answered--"Did you expect a miracle? I
told you from the first that I was no saint,--I can do no good
unless our Lord wills it."

"The Pope believes in miracles"--said Henri, flushing as he spoke
with the heat of a sudden angry emotion--"But only those that are
performed on his own behalf! HE thinks that God's chief business is
to look after HIM!"

A silence ensued,--whether of horror or embarrassment could hardly
be determined. The Cardinal said nothing,--Babette trembled a
little,--what a dreadful boy Henri really was, she thought!--Madame
Patoux shut up her eyes in horror, crossed herself devoutly as
against some evil spirit, and was about to speak, when Henri,
nothing daunted, threw himself into the breach again, and turned
with a fiery vehemence of appeal towards the young and thoughtful-
looking Manuel.

"It's just as I say!" he declared hotly--"The Pope is taken as much
care of as if he were a peach wrapped in wadding! Was Christ taken
care of? No,--He suffered all sorts of hardships and at last was
crucified! The Pope shuts himself up in the Vatican with millions
and millions of money's worth, while thousands of people around him
in Italy alone, are starving and miserable. Christ would not allow
such a thing. Christ said 'Sell half that thou hast and give to the
poor'--now the Pope doesn't sell half, nor a quarter, nor a bit of a
quarter! He takes all he can get and keeps it! And yet God is
supposed to work miracles for an old man like that!--Oh I know all
about it! Boys read the newspapers as well as grown men!"

"Henri!" gasped Madame Patoux, extending her fat arm and hand with a
solemn gesture of reproach--"Henri, thou art mad . . . wicked . . ."

But Henri went on unheedingly, still addressing Manuel.

"Now you are a boy, and I daresay you can read and think,--you are
about my age I suppose. And you are left all alone in the world,
with nobody to care for you,--well, do you think that is well-
arranged?--And do you think there is any sense in believing in a God
who does such a lot of cruel things? And when He won't help us ever
so little? How can people be good if they keep on praying and
praying, and hoping and hoping, and working and working--and yet
nothing comes of it all but trouble and pain and loss . . ." He stopped
for sheer lack of breath to go on.

Manuel looked at him quietly, full in the eyes.

"Yes, it is hard!" he said--"Very hard! But it is not God who does
any cruel thing. God is Love,--and the Spirit of Love cannot be
cruel. It is the people of the world themselves,--the people who
injure each other in thought, word and deed,--and who have no spirit
of love in them,--these invite sorrow and pain, and rush upon
misfortune. Then they blame God for it! Ah, it is easy to blame
God!--so much easier than to blame one's self! And if you ask me if
it is well for those who suffer cruel things to still believe in
God, I say yes, I do think it well,--for it is the only chance they
have of finding the right way of life after much wandering in the
wrong."

His sweet voice fell on the silence like a soft chime, and Henri,
for no particular reason that he could give, felt suddenly abashed.
Cardinal Bonpre listened to the words of this strange foundling with
a singular emotion,--an emotion too deep to find any outlet in
speech. Babette raised her brown trustful eyes, and timidly ventured
to put in her opinion.

"Yes"--she said--"I am sure that is true. You see Henri"--with a
wise glance at her brother--"you see it is always the same,--when
anyone suffers something unfortunate, there is certain to be some
cause for it. Now everybody says that if poor Martine had not put
Fabien in the cart to save herself the trouble of holding him on her
knee, he would not have tumbled out and been hurt. That was the
beginning of it. And that was not God's fault. Come Fabien!--we'll
take you back now."

At this, Madame Patoux started from her stricken condition of
horrified dumbness into speech and action.

"Ah yes, it is indeed time!" she exclaimed--"Enough trouble has been
given, I am sure, to Monseigneur, and if such a prayer as his does
not reach Heaven, why then there is no Heaven at all, and it is no
good bothering ourselves about it. And what things have been said by
my son!--MY son!--against the Holy Father! Ah, mon Dieu! The
wickedness of it!--The horror! And if thou learnest such blasphemy
from newspapers, Henri, thou shalt not read them--"

"Who is to prevent me?" demanded Henri, his eyes sparkling
defiantly.

"Hush--hush my child!" interposed the Cardinal quietly "Nothing
indeed can prevent thee,--no one can hinder thee from walking the
world according to thine own will and direction. Thou must take good
and evil as they come, and strive thy best to discern between them--
and if the love of God cannot help thee--well!--perchance the love
of thy mother may!"

There was a pause. Henri's head drooped, and quick tears filled his
eyes. He said nothing further, but turned to assist Babette in
guiding the little Fabien's hesitating steps as he hobbled from the
room. The emotional Madame Patoux choked back a rising sob.

"God bless you Monseigneur!" she murmured--"Henri will not forget
those words--the lad has a hasty temper, but a good heart--yes,
believe me--a good heart--"

"That I am sure of"--responded the Cardinal--"He is quick and
intelligent--and seeks to know the truth. If he could feel an
asserted 'truth' to be really true, I am confident he would frame
his life upon it, and be a good, brave man. Yes--he is a clever
lad,--and our modern system of education pushes the brain to a
precocity exceeding bodily years,--his impatience and anger only
come from puzzling over what he finds it difficult to understand. It
is all a puzzle to him--all a puzzle!--as it is to most of us!" He
sighed--then added in a lighter tone--"I shall want nothing more at
your kindly hands, my daughter. I have decided to leave Rouen for
Paris to-day and will take an early afternoon train. Manuel"--and he
hesitated a moment--"Manuel will go with me."

Madame was scarcely surprised at this announcement. She had indeed
expected it. She glanced at Manuel himself to see how he accepted
this sudden change in his fortunes, but he was entirely absorbed in
watching Henri and Babette lead their little crippled friend away.
After all, there was nothing to be said. The Cardinal was a free
agent,--he had a perfect right to befriend a homeless boy and give
him sustenance and protection if he chose. He would make, thought
Madame, a perfect acolyte, and would look like a young angel in his
little white surplice. And so the good woman, deciding in her own
mind that such was the simple destiny for which the Cardinal
intended him, smiled, murmured something deferential and approving,
and hastened from the room, to prepare for Monseigneur, whether he
asked for it or not, a dish of her most excellent soup, to
strengthen and support him before starting on his journey. And ere
four o'clock had chimed from all the towers of the city, the Hotel
Poitiers was deprived of its honoured guest,--the Cardinal,
accompanied by his foundling, had departed, and the black, smoky,
snake-like train had rushed with them through the smiling peace of
the Normandy pasture-lands on towards the brilliant "city enthroned
in wickedness," which sparkles like a jewel on the borders of the
Seine as gloriously as ever Babylon sparkled on the shores of
Euphrates. As godless, as hollow to the very core of rottenness, as
her sister of ancient days, wanton "Lutetia" shines,--with the
ghastly and unnatural lustre of phosphorescent luminance arising
from old graves--and as divinely determined as the destruction of
the old-time city splendid, is the approaching downfall of the
modern capital. To the inhabitants of Rouen, the very name of Paris
carries with it a kind of awe,--it excites various emotions of
wonder, admiration, longing, curiosity and even fear,--for Paris is
a witches' cauldron in which Republicanism, Imperialism, Royalism,
Communism and Socialism, are all thrown by the Fates to seethe
together in a hellish broth of conflicting elements--and the smoke
of it ascends in reeking blasphemy to Heaven. Not from its church-
altars does the cry of "How long, O Lord, how long!" ascend
nowadays,--for its priests are more skilled in the use of the witty
bon-mot or the polished sneer than in the power of the prophet's
appeal,--it is from the Courts of Science that the warning note of
terror sounds,--the cold vast courts where reasoning thinkers
wander, and learn, and deeply meditate, knowing that all their
researches but go to prove the fact that apart from all creed and
all forms of creed, Crime carries Punishment as surely as the seed
is born with the flower,--thinkers who are fully aware that not all
the forces of all mankind, working with herculean insistence to
support a Lie, can drive back the storm-cloud of the wrath of that
"Unknown Quantity" called God, whose thunders do most terribly
declare the truth "with power and great glory." "How long O Lord,
how long!" Not long, we think, O friends!--not long now shall we
wait for the Divine Pronouncement of the End. Hints of it are in the
air,--signs and portents of it are about us in our almost terrific
discoveries of the invisible forces of Light and Sound,--we are not
given such tremendous powers to play with in our puny fashion for
the convenience of making our brief lives easier to live and more
interesting,--no, there is some deeper reason,--one, which in our
heedless way of dancing over our own Earth-grave, we never dream of.
And we go on making our little plans, building our ships and making
loud brags of our armies, and our skill, and our prowess both by
land and sea, and our amazing importance to ourselves and to
others,--which importance has reached such a height at the present
day as to make of us a veritable spectacle for Olympian laughter,--
and we draw out our little sums of life from the Eternal exchequer,
and add them up and try to obtain the highest interest for them,
always forgetting to calculate that in making up the sum total, that
mysterious "Unknown Quantity" will have to come in, and (un less it
has been taken into due counting from the first) will be a figure
likely to swamp the whole banking business. And in this particular
phase of speculation and exchange, Paris has long been playing a
losing game. So steadily has she lost, in honour, in prestige, in
faith, in morals, in justice, in honesty and in cleanly living, that
it does not seem possible she can ever retrieve herself. Her men are
dissolute,--her women shameless--her youth of both sexes depraved,--
her laws are corrupt--her arts de cadent--her religion dead. What
next can be expected of her?--or rather to what extent will Destiny
permit her to go before the bolt of destruction falls? "Thus far,
and no farther" has ever been the Principle of Nature--and Paris has
almost touched the "Thus far."