next world. Or I could point out what you already know from the texts, that every magician hopes to cheat Hell in the end – and as several did who are now nicely ensconced on the calendar as authentic saints.
‘But the real fact of the matter, Dr Hess, is that I think what I’m after is worth the risk, and what I’m after is something you understand perfectly, and for which you’ve sold your own soul, or if you prefer an only slightly less loaded word, your integrity, to Dr Baines –
knowledge
.’
‘Uhmn. Surely there must be easier ways –’
‘You don’t believe that. You think there may be more reliable ways, such as scientific method, but you don’t think they’re any easier. I myself have the utmost respect for scientific method, but I know that it doesn’t offer me the kind of knowledge I’m looking for – which is also knowledge about the makeup of the universe and how it is run, but not a kind that any exact science can provide me with, because the sciences don’t accept that some of the forces of nature are Persons. Well, but some of them are. And without dealing with those Persons I shall never know any of the things I want to know.
This kind of research is just as expensive as underwriting a gigantic particle accelerator, Dr Hess, and obviously I’ll never get any government to underwrite it. But people like Dr Baines can, if I can find enough of them – just as they underwrite you.
‘Eventually, I may have to pay for what I’ve learned with a jewel no amount of money could buy. Unlike MacBeth, I know one
can’t
“skip the life to come.” But even if it does come to that, Dr Hess – and probably it will – I’ll take my knowledge with me, and it will have been worth the price.
‘In other words – just as you suspected – I’m a fanatic.’
To his own dawning astonishment, Hess said slowly:
‘Yes. Yes, of course … so am I.’
Father Domenico lay in his strange bed on his back, staring sleeplessly up at the pink stucco ceiling. Tonight was the night he had come for. Ware’s three days of fasting, lustration and prayer – surely a blasphemous burlesque of such observances as the Church knew them, in intent if not in content – were over, and he had pronounced himself ready to act.
Apparently he still intended to allow Baines and his two repulsive henchmen to observe the conjuration, but if he had ever had any intention of including Father Domenico in the ceremony, he had thought better of it. That was frustrating, as well as a great relief; but in his place, Father Domenico wouldhave done the same thing.
Yet even here, excluded from the scene and surrounded by every protection he had been able to muster, Father Domenico could feel the preliminary oppression, like the dead weather before an earthquake. There was always a similar hush and tension in the air just before the invocation of one of the Celestial Powers, but with none of these overtones of maleficence and disaster … or would someone ignorant of what was actually proposed be able to tell the difference? That was a disquieting thought in itself, but one that could practically be left to Bishop Berkeley and the Logical Positivists. Father Domenico knew what was going on – a ritual of supernatural murder; and could not help but tremble in his bed.
Somewhere in the palazzo there was the silvery sound of a small clock striking, distant and sweet. The time was now 10:00 p.m., the fourth hour of Saturn on the day of Saturn, the hour most suitable – as even the blameless and pitiable Peter de Abano had written – for experiments of hatred, enmity and discord; and Father Domenico, under the Covenant, was forbidden even to pray for failure.
The clock, that two-handed engine that stands behind the Door, struck, and struck no more, and Ware drew the brocaded hangings aside.
Up to now, Baines despite himself, had felt a little foolish in the girdled white-linen garment Ware had insisted upon, but he cheered up upon
‘But the real fact of the matter, Dr Hess, is that I think what I’m after is worth the risk, and what I’m after is something you understand perfectly, and for which you’ve sold your own soul, or if you prefer an only slightly less loaded word, your integrity, to Dr Baines –
knowledge
.’
‘Uhmn. Surely there must be easier ways –’
‘You don’t believe that. You think there may be more reliable ways, such as scientific method, but you don’t think they’re any easier. I myself have the utmost respect for scientific method, but I know that it doesn’t offer me the kind of knowledge I’m looking for – which is also knowledge about the makeup of the universe and how it is run, but not a kind that any exact science can provide me with, because the sciences don’t accept that some of the forces of nature are Persons. Well, but some of them are. And without dealing with those Persons I shall never know any of the things I want to know.
This kind of research is just as expensive as underwriting a gigantic particle accelerator, Dr Hess, and obviously I’ll never get any government to underwrite it. But people like Dr Baines can, if I can find enough of them – just as they underwrite you.
‘Eventually, I may have to pay for what I’ve learned with a jewel no amount of money could buy. Unlike MacBeth, I know one
can’t
“skip the life to come.” But even if it does come to that, Dr Hess – and probably it will – I’ll take my knowledge with me, and it will have been worth the price.
‘In other words – just as you suspected – I’m a fanatic.’
To his own dawning astonishment, Hess said slowly:
‘Yes. Yes, of course … so am I.’
Father Domenico lay in his strange bed on his back, staring sleeplessly up at the pink stucco ceiling. Tonight was the night he had come for. Ware’s three days of fasting, lustration and prayer – surely a blasphemous burlesque of such observances as the Church knew them, in intent if not in content – were over, and he had pronounced himself ready to act.
Apparently he still intended to allow Baines and his two repulsive henchmen to observe the conjuration, but if he had ever had any intention of including Father Domenico in the ceremony, he had thought better of it. That was frustrating, as well as a great relief; but in his place, Father Domenico wouldhave done the same thing.
Yet even here, excluded from the scene and surrounded by every protection he had been able to muster, Father Domenico could feel the preliminary oppression, like the dead weather before an earthquake. There was always a similar hush and tension in the air just before the invocation of one of the Celestial Powers, but with none of these overtones of maleficence and disaster … or would someone ignorant of what was actually proposed be able to tell the difference? That was a disquieting thought in itself, but one that could practically be left to Bishop Berkeley and the Logical Positivists. Father Domenico knew what was going on – a ritual of supernatural murder; and could not help but tremble in his bed.
Somewhere in the palazzo there was the silvery sound of a small clock striking, distant and sweet. The time was now 10:00 p.m., the fourth hour of Saturn on the day of Saturn, the hour most suitable – as even the blameless and pitiable Peter de Abano had written – for experiments of hatred, enmity and discord; and Father Domenico, under the Covenant, was forbidden even to pray for failure.
The clock, that two-handed engine that stands behind the Door, struck, and struck no more, and Ware drew the brocaded hangings aside.
Up to now, Baines despite himself, had felt a little foolish in the girdled white-linen garment Ware had insisted upon, but he cheered up upon
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