The Pocket Bible; or, Christian the Printer: A Tale of the Sixteenth Century

"Impossible! Hervé, whom we brought up in the same principles as his brother – Hervé, who never was away from us – "

"Bridget, I told you, the suspicion is horrible; I have struggled against it with all my might," and the artisan's voice was smothered with sobs. "And yet, if after all it should be so! If our son is indeed the guilty one!"

"My friend, your suspicion bereaves me of my senses. You love Hervé so dearly, and your judgment is always so sound, your mind so penetrating, that I can not conceive how so unjustifiable a thought could take possession of you. Our son is continuously at the printing shop, at your side, as Hena is at mine; better than anyone else should you know your son's heart." Bridget remained silent for a moment and then proceeded while scalding tears rolled down her cheeks: "Oh, I feel it, even if your suspicion is never justified, it will embitter the rest of my life! Oh, to think our son capable of stealing!"

"And for that very reason there is no one else in the world but you, and you alone, to whom I confide the horrid suspicion. Oh, Bridget, it is more than a suspicion. Let us not exaggerate matters; let us not be unnecessarily cast down; let us calmly look into the affair; let us carefully refresh our memories; we may arrive – may God hear my words – at the conclusion that the suspicion is unfounded. As I was just saying, a great change has lately come over Hervé. You noticed the singular manifestations as well as I."

"Yes, recently, he, who formerly was so cheerful, so open, so affectionate, has of late been cold and somber, dreamy and silent. He has grown pale and thin; he is quickly irritated. Shortly before the departure of our little Odelin, he often and without cause scolded the poor boy, for whom he always before had only kind words. And often since then, have I had occasion to reproach Hervé for his rudeness, I should almost say harshness towards his sister, whom he dearly loved. He now seems to avoid her company. At times I simply cannot understand his conduct towards her. Why, only yesterday, when you and he came home from the printing shop, after embracing you, as is her custom, Hena offered her forehead to her brother – but he rudely pushed her aside."

"I did not notice that; but I did notice the growing indifference of Hervé towards his sister. What mystery can lie below that?"

"And yet, my friend, we love all our children equally. Hervé might feel hurt if we showed any preference for Hena or Odelin. But we do not. We are equally kind to all the three."

"Yes, indeed. We shall have to look elsewhere for the cause of the change that afflicts us. Can it be that, without our knowledge, he keeps bad company? There is one circumstance in this affair that has struck me. Paternal love does not blind me. I see great aptitudes in Hervé. Not to mention the gift of an easy flowing eloquence that is exceptional at his age, he has become an excellent Latinist. Owing to his aptitude in that direction he has more than once been chosen to gather precious manuscripts at the houses of some men of letters, who are the friends of Master Robert Estienne. Usually our son attended to such work with accuracy and despatch. Of late, however, his absence from the shop on such errands is often long, unnecessarily so and also frequent, and he does not attend properly to his errands, sometimes does not attend to them at all. Master Robert Estienne has complained to me in a friendly way, saying that Hervé should be watched, that he was drawing near his eighteenth year and might contract acquaintances that would be cause of trouble for us later."

"On that very subject, my friend, only a few days ago I was reproaching Hervé for his estrangement from the friends of his boyhood, all of whom are good and honest lads. He flees their company and spurns their cordial advances. The only person with whom he seems to be intimate is Fra Girard, the Franciscan friar and son of our neighbor the mercer."

"I would prefer some other company for our son, but not that I accuse Fra Girard of being, like so many other monks, an improper person to associate with. He is said to be of austere morals, but being older than Hervé, he has, I am afraid, gained considerable influence over him, and rendered him savagely intolerant. Several of the artisans at the shop of Master Estienne are, like he himself, partisans of the religious reform; some are openly so, despite the danger that their outspokenness entails, others more privately. More than once did our son raise his voice with excessive violence against the new ideas which he calls heresies. And yet he knows that you and I share them."

"Alas! my friend, what woman, what mother would not share the reform ideas, seeing that they reject auricular confession? Did we not find ourselves compelled to stop our daughter from attending the confessional on account of the shameful questions that a priest dared to put to her and which, in the candor of her soul, she repeated to us? But to return to Hervé, even though, in some respects, I dislike his intimacy with Fra Girard and fear it may tend to render him intolerant, the influence of the monk, the austerity of whose morals is commented upon, must have had the effect of keeping far from our son's mind an act so ugly that we can not mention it without shedding tears of sorrow," added Bridget wiping her moist eyes; "Hervé's piety, my friend, becomes daily more fervent; as you know, the unhappy boy imposes upon himself, at the risk of impairing his health, ever longer fasts. Did I not discover from the traces of blood upon his shirt that on certain days he carries close to his skin a belt that is furnished within with sharp iron pricks? That is not the conduct of a hypocrite! He sought to conceal from all eyes the secret macerations that he inflicts upon himself in penitence. It was only accidentally that I discovered the fact. I deplore such fanaticism; but his fanaticism may also be a safeguard. The very exaggeration to which Hervé carries his religious principles must strengthen him against temptation. Heaven be blessed! You were right, Christian; by closely considering the circumstances, we can come at no other conclusion than that such suspicions are unfounded. Our son is innocent, do you not think so, Christian?"

Gloomy and pensive the artisan listened to his wife without interrupting her. He replied:

"No, dear wife; fanaticism is no safeguard against evil. Alas! differently from you, the more I consider the facts that you adduce – I hardly dare say so to you – my suspicions, so far from being removed, grow in weight. Yes, I believe our son guilty."

"Great God! What a horrible thought!"

"I believe our son is sincere in his devout practices, however exaggerated these may be. But I also know that one of the most frightful consequences of fanaticism is that it clouds and perverts the most elemental principles of right and wrong, of justice and injustice, with those whom it dominates. Religious faith substitutes morality."

"But theft, seeing that I must mention the word – theft – how can fanaticism excuse that? You must be mistaken upon that subject!"

"Listen, Bridget. A few days ago – and it was the recollection of the circumstance that first awoke my suspicions – a few days ago one of our fellow workmen at the shop expressed himself with indignation at the traffic of indulgences that has recently been carried on in Paris, and he said emphatically that besides the immorality of the trade that was being practiced in the Pope's name, the extortion of money by such means from ignorance and from popular credulity was nothing short of a fraud practiced upon the people. And do you know the answer that our son made? 'That is a lie! It is impious! The money that is devoted to a pious deed, even if it be the fruit of a theft, of a murder, is purified and sanctified from the moment that it is employed to the greater glory of the Lord!'"

Bridget grew pale, and murmured in a voice smothered by sobs:

"Oh! now I fear – I also fear! May God have mercy upon us!"

"Do you now understand how, if our son is indeed guilty of the shameful act which we hesitate to impugn to him, in his blind fanaticism the unhappy boy will have believed that he was doing a meritorious act if he employed the money in some such work of devotion as ordering the saying of masses?"

CHAPTER II.

THE NEOPHYTE

As Christian was saying these words, he heard, first at a distance and soon after on the Exchange Bridge itself, the loud clang of several bells and the sharp twirl of metal rattles, intercepted with a lugubrious psalmody, at the close of which the noise of bells and rattles became deafening. No less astonished than his wife, the artisan rose from his seat, opened the window, and saw a long procession filing before the house. At its head marched a detachment of archers carrying their cross-bows on their left shoulders and long thick wax candles in their right hands; behind them came several Dominican monks in their white robes and black cowls, ringing the bells and turning the rattles; after these followed a cart drawn by two horses caparisoned in black and silver network. The four sides of the cart were of considerable height and constituted a huge quadrangular transparency, lighted from within, and representing the figures of men and women of all ages, together with children, plunged up to the waist in a sea of flames, and, amid desperate contortions, raising their suppliant arms towards an image of God seated on a throne. On each of the four sides of the wagon and above the painting the following inscription was to be seen, printed in thick black and red letters:

PRAY

FOR THE SOULS IN PURGATORY

TO-MORROW

AAT

THE CHURCH OF THE CONVENT OF ST. DOMINIC

THE INDULGENCE

WILL RAISE ITS THRONE

PRAY AND GIVE

FOR THE POOR SOULS THAT ARE IN PURGATORY

Four monks equipped with long gilded staves, topped with glass lanthorns, on which also souls in torture were painted, marched on either side of the cart. A large number of other Dominican monks carrying a large silver crucifix at their head, followed the cart. The monks chanted in a loud voice the following lugubrious psalm of penitence:

"De profundis clamavi ad te, Domine;
Domine, exaudi vocem meam.
Fiant aures tuæ intendentes
In vocem deprecationis meæ!"[4 - From the bowels of the earth I have cried up to thee, O, Lord;O, Lord, give ear unto my voice.May thy ears be ready to listenTo the voice of my supplications.]

Every time, at the close of the funereal chant, the clatter of bells and rattles was struck up anew as the procession marched along. Finally, a second detachment of archers brought up the rear. A crowd of ragged men and women, all with cynic and even ruffianly faces, almost all night-strollers, if not worse, followed in the wake of the march. They held one another by the arms, sang, crossed themselves and shouted:

"Glory to the Holy Father!"

"He sends us indulgences!"

"We need them!"

"Blessings upon him!"

Interspersed between these exclamations, coarse and even obscene jokes were exchanged. The mob nevertheless bore the impress of conviction in the most deplorable of superstitions. A large number of the inhabitants of the houses built upon the bridge threw open their windows as the procession filed by; some of these reverently knelt down at their windows. After the procession had passed and the noise sounded only from a distance, Christian re-shut the window of his room, and said to his wife in voice that was even sadder than before:

"Alas, this procession seems to me to bode us only ill."

"I do not understand you, my friend."

"You saw, Bridget, the picture on the transparency of the cart that these monks surrounded. It represented the souls in purgatory, writhing in flames. The Dominican monks, whom the Pope has delegated to sell plenary indulgences, also sell the ransoming of souls in pain. All those who share that belief are convinced that, by means of money, they are able to snatch from the flames of purgatory, not only the near relatives or friends whom they imagine exposed to such torture, but also strangers to them. Could not Hervé have thought to himself: 'With the gold that I purloin from my father I shall be able to ransom twenty souls – fifty souls from purgatory'?"

"Say no more, Christian, say no more!" cried Bridget with a shudder; "say no more! My doubts, alas! almost turn into certainty;" but suddenly interrupting herself and listening in the direction of the door of the room, she added in a low voice: "Listen – listen."

Husband and wife remained silent. In the midst of the profound silence of the night they heard a noise that sounded like the intermittent strapping of a body. A thought flashed through Christian's mind; he motioned his wife not to stir; took up the lamp, and gently opened the door leading to the wooden staircase through which the lower floor was reached. Leaning over the banister with his hand shading the lamp, Christian saw Hervé, whom, no doubt, the clatter of bells and rattles of the procession had awakened, kneeling in only his shirt and trousers upon the floor and inflicting a rude discipline upon his sides and shoulders by means of a cat-o'-nine-tails, the thongs of which ended in knots. The lad flagellated himself with such intense exaltation that he did not notice the proximity of his father on the staircase, although the light shed by the lamp projected its rays into the lower hall. Bridget had followed her husband with tears in her eyes, walking on tip-toe. He felt the trembling hand of his wife upon his shoulder and in his ear the whispered words of distress that forced themselves through her sobs:

"Oh, the unhappy boy!"

"Come, my dear wife; the moment is favorable to obtain a confession from our son."

"And if he confesses, let everything be pardoned," replied the indulgent mother. "He must have succumbed to an impulse of fanatical charity."