Jurgen - James Branch Cabell (reading a book TXT) 📗

which would repay looking into, were not young Guenevere the mistress of my heart.”

Aloud he said: “Perhaps then I am drunk, madame. None the less, I still think the cock crew just at the wrong moment.”

“Some day you must explain the meaning of that,” says she. “Meanwhile I am going back to bed, and I again advise you to do the same.”

Then the door closed, the bolt fell, and Jurgen went away, still in considerable excitement.

“This Dame Anaïtis is an interesting personality,” he reflected, “and it would be a pleasure, now, to demonstrate to her my grievance against the cock, did occasion serve. Well, things less likely than that have happened. Then, too, she came upon me when my sword was out, and in consequence knows I wield a respectable weapon. She may feel the need of a good swordsman some day, this handsome Lady of the Lake who has no husband. So let us cultivate patience. Meanwhile, it appears that I am of royal blood. Well, I fancy there is something in the scandal, for I detect in me a deal in common with this King Smoit. Twelve wives, though! no, that is too many. I would limit no man’s liaisons, but twelve wives in lawful matrimony bespeaks an optimism unknown to me. No, I do not think I am drunk: but it is unquestionable that I am not walking very straight. Certainly, too, we did drink a great deal. So I had best go quietly back to bed, and say nothing more about tonight’s doings.”

As much he did. And this was the first time that Jurgen, who had been a pawnbroker, held any discourse with Dame Anaïtis, whom men called the Lady of the Lake.

XVIII Why Merlin Talked in Twilight

It was two days later that Jurgen was sent for by Merlin Ambrosius. The Duke of Logreus came to the magician in twilight, for the windows of this room were covered with sheets which shut out the full radiance of day. Everything in the room was thus visible in a diffused and tempered light that cast no shadows. In his hand Merlin held a small mirror, about three inches square, from which he raised his dark eyes puzzlingly.

“I have been talking to my fellow ambassador, Dame Anaïtis: and I have been wondering, Messire de Logreus, if you have ever reared white pigeons.”

Jurgen looked at the little mirror. “There was a woman of the Léshy who not long ago showed me an employment to which one might put the blood of white pigeons. She too used such a mirror. I saw what followed, but I must tell you candidly that I understood nothing of the ins and outs of the affair.”

Merlin nodded. “I suspected something of the sort. So I elected to talk with you in a room wherein, as you perceive, there are no shadows.”

“Now, upon my word,” says Jurgen, “but here at last is somebody who can see my attendant! Why is it, pray, that no one else can do so?”

“It was my own shadow which drew my notice to your follower. For I, too, have had a shadow given me. It was the gift of my father, of whom you have probably heard.”

It was Jurgen’s turn to nod. Everybody knew who had begotten Merlin Ambrosius, and sensible persons preferred not to talk of the matter. Then Merlin went on to speak of the traffic between Merlin and Merlin’s shadow.

“Thus and thus,” says Merlin, “I humor my shadow. And thus and thus my shadow serves me. There is give-and-take, such as is requisite everywhere.”

“I understand,” says Jurgen: “but has no other person ever perceived this shadow of yours?”

“Once only, when for a while my shadow deserted me,” Merlin replied. “It was on a Sunday my shadow left me, so that I walked unattended in naked sunlight: for my shadow was embracing the church-steeple, where churchgoers knelt beneath him. The churchgoers were obscurely troubled without suspecting why, for they looked only at each other. The priest and I alone saw him quite clearly⁠—the priest because this thing was evil, and I because this thing was mine.”

“Well, now I wonder what did the priest say to your bold shadow?”

“ ‘But you must go away!’⁠—and the priest spoke without any fear. Why is it they seem always without fear, those dull and calm-eyed priests? ‘Such conduct is unseemly. For this is High God’s house, and far-off peoples are admonished by its steadfast spire, pointing always heavenward, that the place is holy,’ said the priest. And my shadow answered, ‘But I only know that steeples are of phallic origin.’ And my shadow wept, wept ludicrously, clinging to the steeple where churchgoers knelt beneath him.”

“Now, and indeed that must have been disconcerting, Messire Merlin. Still, as you got your shadow back again, there was no great harm done. But why is it that such attendants follow some men while other men are permitted to live in decent solitude? It does not seem quite fair.”

“Perhaps I could explain it to you, friend, but certainly I shall not. You know too much as it is. For you appear in that bright garment of yours to have come from a land and a time which even I, who am a skilled magician, can only cloudily foresee, and cannot understand at all. What puzzles me, however”⁠—and Merlin’s forefinger shot out. “How many feet had the first wearer of your shirt? and were you ever an old man?” says he.

“Well, four, and I was getting on,” says Jurgen.

“And I did not guess! But certainly that is it⁠—an old poet loaned at once a young man’s body and the Centaur’s shirt. Adères has loosed a new jest into the world, for her own reasons⁠—”

“But you have things backwards. It was Sereda whom I cajoled so nicely.”

“Names that are given by men amount to very little in a case like this. The shadow which follows you I recognize⁠—and revere⁠—as the gift of Adères, a dreadful