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With this letter in my hand I went to the traitor who had been lanced an hour before. "You're an infamous traitor," I began, "but as Madame d'Urfe knows of the disgraceful state you are in she would not so much as read your letter. I have read it, and by way of reward I give you two alternatives which you must decide on immediately. I am in a hurry.
A banker brought me four hundred louis and I had thirteen hundred in my cash-box. I always had a dread of penuriousness, and I delighted myself at the thought that M. de Valenglard would write and tell Madame d'Urfe, who was always preaching economy to me, what he had seen.
"Very likely," answered he, "it often happens like that; but it is rather difficult to prove." "Bring me writing materials, and have a trusty messenger at my disposal." I wrote to my counsel, my attorney, to Madame d'Urfe, and to all my friends, including my brother, who was just married.
If I had known where he lived I could have had Possano expelled from Lyons through the influence of Madame d'Urfe, whose relative, M. de la Rochebaron, was the governor; but as it was, I had no other course than the one I took. Although Possano was a liar and an ungrateful, treacherous hound, yet I could not help being uneasy.
"Monsieur Scuderi," she said, "is a soldier, brother; and, as I have heard, a complete one, and so is the Sieur d'Urfe." "More shame for them; they should have known better what they were writing about.
"I owe her all the more friendship," added the sublime madwoman, "as the family of Lascaris is connected with the family of d'Urfe, and as I am to be born again in the seed of the happy virgin." I felt that my task would be not exactly to throw cold water on her enthusiasm, but to hold it in check and to moderate its manifestations.
The deaths of M. de Bragadin and Madame d'Urfe had left me alone in the world, and I was slowly but steadily approaching what is called a certain age, when women begin to look on a man with coldness. I only called on Madame Valville on the eve of my departure: and found her in a richly-furnished house, and her casket well filled with diamonds.
This being done, it was to be my part to care for the child with the magisterium which was known to me, and as soon as it had attained to its third year Madame d'Urfe would begin to recover her self-consciousness, and then I was to begin to initiate her in the perfect knowledge of the Great Work. The operation must take place under the full moon during the months of April, May, or June.
I redeemed all the goods she had pawned, and although the daughter had not yet yielded entirely to my ardour, I formed the plan of taking them to Colmar with Madame d'Urfe. To make up the good lady's mind, I resolved to let that be one of the instructions from the moon, and this she would not only obey blindly but would have no suspicions as to my motive.
In the seventeenth century there had been a very considerable movement in the direction of prose fiction. The pastoral romances of the Elizabethans had continued to circulate; France had set an example in the heroic stories of D'Urfé and La Calprenède, which English imitators and translators had been quick to follow, even as early as 1647.
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