Chapter II

Good Sir John sat by his hearth fire. Over against him sat the Bailiff exceeding drowsy, anon nodding to sleep, anon waking with a start when his head fell overmuch forward on his breast. By the light of the flickering fire and a small oil-lamp Sir John read aloud with a running commentary from a great book he held upon his knees. The zeal of his study consumed him; his eyes shone with the excitement of his argument, the continuity and vehemence of his exposition had made his face red as a furnace.

‘_Multa enim mala non egisset Daemon, nisi provocatus a sagis_’ saith mine author, Master Bailiff, which is as much as to say that the Devil availeth precious little, unless he be titillated or spurred on by warlocks, wizards, or witches, and much it is to be feared that this wise Doctor, urged on or driven by an immoderate and hydropathic love (or rather let me call it lust) of learning, hath fallen into a cursed intercourse with the angels of darkness, who, as the blessed Saint Austin saith in his book entitled in English _The City of God_, having been deceived himself, goeth about to deceive others.

‘_Daemones enim advocati praesto sunt, seque exorcismis et conjurationibus quasi cogi patiuntur, ut miserum majorum genus in impietate detineant._’ Lo, Master Bailiff, have we not witnessed proof thereof ourselves? Did not old Mother Nightbird conjure a devil out of a parsley bed, who incontinently deserted her in the end, as she herself confessed, that she might perish in her mortal sin? Alas, wretched men compel the Devil with spells, but the Devil afterwards compelleth them with whips of scorpions. Satan feedeth them at first with tit-bits from his own mouth as they were his own dear darlings, but afterwards he turneth and rendeth them like a fierce hound, gulping them down his foul black throat like so many morsels.’

‘_Vitam turbant, somnos inquietant, irrepentes etiam in corpora mentes terrent, ut ad cultum sui cogant; cum sint ipsi poenales, querunt--et cetera._ The Devil, Master Bailiff, the Devil disquieteth human life, sendeth horrid dreams, terrifieth the mind, that he may compel men to worship him, whereby committing deadly sin. Of this, which I have thus obscurely and indeed somewhat brokenly thrown out, make no doubt but that I shall treat at becoming length and with much matter of illustration in my next Holy Day discourse. But as another author saith, speaking the very words of truth, “_Vita brevior----_” Holy Saints defend us, what was that?’

‘Eh?’ said the Bailiff, starting up, ‘eh?’

‘Some one knocketh,’ said the Parson.

‘’Tis the Doctor,’ said the Bailiff, settling himself resolutely in his chair.

Sir John closed his volume and laid it with a somewhat tremulous hand upon the table. Taking the lamp in his hand he advanced to the door.

‘_In tuas manus, Domine_,’ he murmured as he unbarred and threw it open.

A deep groan came from without, and an agonised voice exclaimed, ‘Hence Hell-hounds, hence; as yet I am not yours.’

The next moment Doctor Montalto leapt flying over the threshold, sending the good priest head over heels into the corner. Swiftly slamming and barring the door behind him, he gave utterance to a long hollow noise, half a sigh of relief and half a moan of despair. Then he threw off his crimson gown and hood and wiped beads of sweat from his brow, groaning horribly the while. He was tall and thin beyond ordinary. His sparse black locks fell in wisps to his shoulders, his face was mere bone upon which the skin was stretched tight and transparent, his whitey blue eyes were sunk deep in their sockets, his nose was hooked like a bird’s beak, his mouth was a slit almost from ear to ear. His yellow hose and scarlet doublet were embroidered with cabalistic signs in green silk. In his belt were stuck a naked dagger and a couple of tooth-drawers. Round his neck he wore two rows of human teeth, the trophies of his art.

The Bailiff had pushed back his chair a little farther into the corner. Sir John picked himself up and advanced hesitatingly towards his penitent.

‘The Saints bless thee,’ he said. ‘Thou art out of breath. Sit thee and drink.’

The Doctor’s face expanded laterally about the jaws, and he seemed softly to smack his lips. Sir John filled a tankard with warm ale. The Doctor took it in both hands and gulped it down at a draught. He refilled it from the stoup on the hearth.

‘Holy Father,’ he said, and the tears fell from his eyes, ‘I am a lost soul.’ He groaned and gulped his ale, and groaned again.

‘Despair not, my son,’ quoth the Parson. ‘The brand may be plucked from the burning even at the eleventh hour. The good Bailiff here hath discoursed of thee to me. Lo, I have diligently consulted my books, I have considered thy case, I discern the sickness in thy soul, I will prescribe for thee, I will prognosticate concerning thee. This is how the matter stands, is it not so? Thou art exceeding melancholy, thou hauntest solitary places; sleeping, thy slumbers are broken with horrible dreams; waking, thou seest visions in the sky, thou nearest voices in the air, thy food turneth to dust in thy mouth, thy drink scarifieth thy throat; is it not so?’

‘Ay, ay,’ moaned the Doctor, applying himself to his tankard.

‘The Devil tempteth thee day and night, he allureth thee, he fondleth thee. Perchance thou yieldest to him?’

‘Worse, worse,’ moaned the Doctor.

‘Ha, ha,’ cried Sir John, rubbing his hands, ‘Methought I should ferret thee out. Lo, Master Bailiff, you see what cometh of this book-learning of mine?’

‘Worse, worse,’ cried the Doctor in a loud voice. ‘I have sold my immortal soul to the Devil for ever and aye.’

‘Holy Mary,’ cried the Bailiff, signing himself again and again.

Sir John dropped on his knees and rattled off prayers faster than a woman could shell peas.

The Doctor emptied his tankard and turned it upside down on the table with a bang.

‘Listen,’ he cried, stretching out his hand above his head in the direction of the Parson,--‘Listen, and learn how I fell into damnation. What a learned man should do with a wife I cannot tell, but fool that I was, I married, and that was the beginning of sin.’

‘Pardon,’ cried the Priest, ‘but marriage is a Sacrament and should be well esteemed of all men.’

‘By thy leave,’ continued the Doctor, ‘I married one Mistress Beatbush. She had some small jointure; I was her third husband, but at first she did not seem to be so vile. However, when her portion was spent, my gorge rose at her, for know, good gentlemen, her face was withered and puckered like a Christmas apple, her voice like the barking of dogs or croaking of frogs, and her foul tongue dropped adders and vipers. Then did I call to mind the admonitions of the Holy Apostle Paul, and beat her often, yea, I even threw her once into the fire, and twice into our pond.’

‘Certes,’ cried the Parson, ‘if thou didst this in measure and for faults duly committed, there thou didst but rightly, as I could prove to thee out of Gratian, did but time and circumstance serve.’

‘I beat her strictly according to the canon,’ said the Doctor. ‘She was one huge fault, an offence both to God and man, and in those days I was a right dutiful son of the Church.’

‘And shall be yet, an I can help it,’ interrupted Sir John.

‘Prithee, do not interrupt, good Sir John,’ quoth the Bailiff, ‘I am right anxious to hear this story.’

‘I will cut it short,’ said the Doctor. ‘One morning as I meditated in my study according to my wont, I heard this wife of mine yelping and barking in a quarrel with a neighbour, whereupon, consumed with sudden wrath, I cried out, ‘The Devil fly away with thee, thou ill-conditioned bitch,’ and, running to my books, straightway cast a spell into the air, so that the Devil immediately leapt into my room through the window.’

‘Wrath, wrath, the beginning of sin,’ exclaimed Sir John.

‘He hath horns and hoofs and a great tail, hath he not?’ asked the Bailiff.

‘Nay,’ replied the Doctor. ‘He was like an ugly black dog with a white patch on his forehead.’

‘Ay, ay, thou’rt right,’ cried the Parson. ‘I have seen him many a time, lurking about our God’s acre, but he slinketh away fast enough when he catcheth sight of me, I warrant you.’

‘Lo,’ resumed the Doctor. ‘This Devil bargained to fly away with my wife, as I had desired, and also to serve me faithfully for twenty years, would I but surrender my soul to him. Unhappy wretch that I am, I took the offer.’

‘Oh, miserable man,’ cried Sir John. ‘That man, born of woman, should be such a fool to wager his immortal soul against twenty short years of pleasure and the evanishment of his wife.’

‘Thou didst not know my wife,’ said the Doctor indignantly.

‘Methinks the terms were not unduly unreasonable,’ quoth the Bailiff. ‘But, please God, Master Doctor, thou didst sign no paper?’

‘Ay, but I did,’ groaned the Doctor. ‘I signed a monstrous long roll of parchment, and the Devil took it away in his pocket, when he left.’

‘Saving thy reverence, Master Doctor, ’tis there thou played foolishly,’ said the Bailiff. ‘I or any man would do business with the Devil on the large terms thou mentionest, for I hold it no sin to spoil the Egyptians, but to sign a paper, to bind thyself to the Devil with a contract, that is horrid impiety indeed, that is rank heresy and witchcraft. But hold, belike the Devil hath not kept his part of the agreement. Hath he indeed served thy pleasure these twenty years as ’twas set down in the deed; otherwise, the one party not fulfilling his obligation, the other party cannot in equity be held liable, and _ipso facto_ the aforesaid deed becometh null and void and of no account?’

‘I cannot grumble; the Devil hath given me twenty good years of pleasure,’ said the Doctor. ‘I am lost, lost, lost.’

Sir John lifted his eyes to Heaven and moaned piteously.

The Bailiff coughed under his hand. ‘I have heard,’ he said, ‘that the Devil is kind to his own. What manner of pleasure was it he solaced thee with? We know full well what Christ can do for us, it behoveth us to know what the Devil can.’

‘Speak, good Doctor,’ said Sir John, ‘and let us hear what the Bailiff desireth, and I will enshrine thy narrative in the little treatise I purpose to endite _de Daemoniis_, for the enlightenment and warning of all Christian men.’

‘Did he give thee gold?’ asked the Bailiff.

‘He did,’ said the Doctor.

‘What didst thou do with it?’

‘I spent it.’

‘Eh, I suppose thou wouldst.’

‘Did he give thee power and glory over all the kingdoms of the earth?’ asked the Parson.

‘He did.’

‘How didst thou use it?’

‘I tweaked the Pope’s nose when he sat in Council with his Cardinals and tripped the Emperor up on his belly, when he would have kissed His Holiness’ toe.’

‘There thou didst rightly,’ said the Parson. ‘For I am a true son of Holy Church and Peter is Peter, but this Pope is a fool and a rascal, and I care not who hears me say it.’

‘Did the Devil give thee wenches?’ asked the Bailiff.

‘Many and many a one,’ said the Doctor with a sigh. ‘I am fain, yet right sad to think of them again; they were good wenches all, and I heartily loved them, but nothing lasts long in this world. He carried me on a rich Turkey carpet to the peerless palace of Ghengis Khan, which is built all of precious stones and embowered in fair gardens and orchards. Ah, many hundred happy days and nights have I spent there, and the Khan’s lovely wife and her beautiful maidens conceived a great affection for me. Even now one of my sons is a mighty emperor in the East.’

‘This Devil seemeth a very honest gentleman,’ said the Bailiff.

‘Then,’ continued the Doctor, ‘seeing, as Solomon saith, there is no satisfaction under the sun, I grew a little aweary even of this Paradise, so I bade the Devil purvey me more pleasure elsewhere. So he took me up on his back and carried me to Prester John’s land, where he made me to alight in the Empress’s bosom in the form of a rose-petal. I have three daughters who wear their golden crowns yet in that court.’

‘Meseemeth you have many children,’ said the Bailiff.

‘A few, a few.’

‘Belike you had something to do with Mistress Catesby’s wench?’ asked the Parson.

‘Ay, ay.’

‘And with Kate Carrywell?’ said the Bailiff.

‘Ay, ay.’

‘And with Gilly Hedgerow?’ said the Parson.

‘Ay, ay.’

‘And with Tib Rushring?’ asked the Bailiff.

‘Ay, ay.’

‘And with Sim’s wife of the Wry Mouth?’ asked the Parson.

‘Ay, ay.’

‘As for my wife,’ said the Bailiff in a rage, ‘I defy you or any man to speak ill of her.’

‘Ay, ay,’ said the Doctor, ‘thy wife is as virtuous as any woman in Christendom, I’ll be bound.’

‘’Tis well thou sayest so,’ said the Bailiff.

‘Come, Master Bailiff,’ said the Doctor, ‘bear no malice against a man for a little worldly pleasure, which departeth more swiftly than snow at Easter or the shaft from the bow. We are all sinners, all of us. My bolt is shot, my shaft is sped, and this time to-morrow night must I deliver up my soul to the Fiend and his everlasting torments.’

‘What?’ cried the Parson. ‘Is thy term up? Must the Devil have his own so soon?’

‘He must, by the Blessed Virgin,’ groaned the Doctor, smiting his forehead and wiping the tears from his eyes with his sleeve. ‘To-morrow at midnight, I am the foul Fiend’s, unless, thou good man of religion, thou canst save me.’

‘Thou shouldst not have been so ready with other folk’s wenches,’ said the Bailiff resentfully.

The Doctor fell on his knees before Sir John and raised his hands in supplication.

‘Holy Father,’ he cried, ‘save me, save me, save me! Reverend priest, blessed clerk, devise some sacred sleight to save a miserable, wretched, damned soul.’

Round tears fell from Sir John’s eyes and tumbled over his cassock.

‘My poor son,’ he quavered in a voice broken by sobs, ‘thou shalt have a good two quart or more of holy water.’

‘An ocean of holy water would not save me,’ groaned the Doctor. ‘The Fiend would dry it all up with one blast from his foul, hot mouth.’

‘My son, my son; what shall I say? I will give thee the Blessed Host to hold between thy teeth all night.’

‘Holy Father, this is a full terrible and mighty Fiend. He would bear me away in spite of the Host and but beat me the more fiercely therefore in Hell-flames.’

‘I have heard,’ said the Parson, ‘that the Devil may not come into a holy and sanctified place.’

The Doctor leapt to his feet, clasped the Parson around the neck and kissed him on both cheeks.

‘Oh wise and sagacious Father,’ he cried. ‘Thou hast saved me, thou hast saved me.’

‘That I have,’ said the Parson, ‘but, but----’

‘Thou hast said it,’ cried the Doctor, ‘thou hast said it. Good Sir John, of thy charity and for our dear Lord’s sake, Who died on tree, suffer me to bestow myself the morrow night in the church of the blessed Saint Osbert.’

The Parson rose to his feet and put his hands on his plump hips.

‘’Tis done,’ he said. ‘’Tis done. In that sanctified and holy place will I bestow thee safe from the filthy claws of Satan, until the time of peril be passed, and I have exorcised the fiend from thy precious soul.’

The Doctor prostrated himself at the Parson’s feet and wept his gratitude.

‘A thousand, thousand thanks, holy Father. And the better to make certain, do thou also give unto me the key of the Church, that I may lock fast the great door against the Devil and his angels.’

‘Thou shalt have it, my son, and in the morning shall Master Bailiff and I come to greet thee and sing _Jubilate_ with thee.’

‘’Tis a goodly device and a holy,’ said the Bailiff, ‘but I would that there were some substitution in the contract, that thou hadst been able to sub-enfief, to sub-let thy part in the deed to some persona or body corporate, which hath neither a body to be smitten nor a soul to be damned. Would that there were some substitution of the liability set forth in the deed!’

The Doctor sat on the hearth, nursed his knees, and pondered.

‘Thou art also, good Master Bailiff,’ he said at last, ‘a vir doctissimus, a man truly sagacious and learned in all points of the law. Verily thou art right, and I do begin to see clearly how we shall outwit this cunning and cruel fiend.’

‘Yes, verily, I am right,’ said the Bailiff eagerly.

‘Lo, then,’ said the Doctor, ‘I will substitute an image, a simulacrum for the corporal body mentioned in the deed. To-morrow my man Martin and I shall cunningly fashion a man of straw, and dress him in seemly wise in my clothes, and when it is dark Martin shall carry him hither and lay him in yonder corner with his face to the wall.’

‘Excellent, excellent,’ cried Sir John. ‘But why bring him here?’

‘The more to puzzle the fiend,’ said the Doctor. ‘And the further to perplex him I will leave word with mine hostess that I am gone to see Sir John.’

‘Yea, and the Devil shall carry away the man of straw in thy stead?’ said the Bailiff. ‘An he do, methinks he is a great fool after all.’

‘Nay, he is cunning enough,’ said the Doctor, ‘but hasty, terribly hasty, and I warrant he shall never find his mistake till he be inside Hell-gates with his load of straw.’

“’Tis a good jest and will work,’ cried the Parson, ‘or call me no scholar.’

‘When the Devil shall hear I am gone to Sir John’s,’ continued the Doctor, ‘he will fly hither at great pace, and for the protection of my soul, and of the Holy Church and of thy dwelling-house, I do most heartily beseech you, worthy gentlemen, that ye will therefore watch here to-morrow night by my man of straw, and assist me with thy continual prayers, stirring no jot nor ceasing from your holy occupation, no matter what strange and belike unearthly noises ye do hear from the Church.’

The Bailiff’s jaw dropped, and the Parson stirred uneasily.

‘Methinks,’ said Sir John, ‘the Devil is but a simple soul after all, and would be deceived without our prayers.’

‘Worthy, worthy gentlemen,’ said the Doctor, ‘as ye love God, grant me my boon. If your prayers be lacking, there is no telling what the Devil may do in this, thine house, Master Parson.’

‘I should not like the house destroyed,’ said Sir John.

‘If ye only pray,’ said the Doctor, ‘it can suffer no harm, nor ye yourselves in your bodies or souls, for I have heard the Devil himself say, times out of mind, that there is nothing he feareth more than a good man’s prayers.’

The Bailiff shook his head. The Parson took a deep draught of warm ale, heaved a deep sigh, and gazed into the fire.

‘Master Doctor,’ he said at length, ‘I have always tried to do my duty as it behoveth a Christian man and a priest, nor am I conscious of any mortal sin upon my conscience. It shall never be said that I, Sir John, Master of Arts in the University of Oxford and priest of this parish, was ever afeard of a devil. I will pray by thy man of straw, and mine honest Churchwarden shall pray with me.’

The Bailiff started and drew back suddenly, ‘Nay, nay,’ he cried.

‘May the Holy Virgin bless thee,’ cried the Doctor. ‘I warrant thee the Devil cannot harm such men as be of clean life.’

‘Art afeard, Master Bailiff?’ asked Sir John.

‘Nay, nay, not afeard,’ said the Bailiff, ‘but I would to God I were a man of better life.’

‘Nay, thou art a godly layman,’ said Sir John. ‘Wilt thou leave the Shepherd to fight the Devil alone?’

‘I have been Churchwarden these ten years,’ said the Bailiff. ‘Thou knowest, Sir John, I have done what I might for Holy Church. But to meet the Devil face to face----’

‘Thou shalt not be weary in well-doing,’ cried the Parson. ‘Do thou but pray with me to-morrow night and I warrant thee it shall win thee many indulgences.’

‘Many, didst thou say, Sir John, many? Thou persuadest me overmuch, but of my conscience, I----’

‘Marry then, it is agreed,’ cried the Parson. ‘Do thou, Master Doctor, lock thyself in the Church and give thyself up to continual prayer before the sanctuary, and the good Bailiff and I shall cease not importuning the Saints for thee, here by thy man of straw.’

‘I wish thou hadst taken thy Devil to another town,’ quoth the Bailiff to the Doctor, ‘or thou hadst considered all this before gadding about to wenches on Turkey carpets. Well, well, I would, by Our Lady, I were a man of better life.’