THE MEMOIRS OF A PHYSICIAN (Complete Edition: Volumes 1-5). Alexandre Dumas
pot edges deepened into brick red, then browner, while its conical shape appeared rosy and silvery in the twilight of the recess. Finally the molten metal could be spied, forming a violet cream on the top, with golden shivers, which hissed out of the lips of the container, and leaped flaming into the black mold. At its orifice reappeared the gold, spouting up furious and fuming, as if insulted by the vile metal which confined it.
"Number two," said Balsamo, passing to the second mold, which he filled with the same skill and strength.
Perspiration streamed from the founder, while the beholder crossed himself, in the shadow.
It was truly a picture of wild and majestic horror. Illumined by the yellow gleams of the metallic flame, the operator resembled the condemned souls writhing in the Infernos of Dante and Michelangelo, in their caldrons. Add to this the sensation of what was in progress being unheard-of. Balsamo did not stop to take breath between the two drawings of the charges, for time pressed.
"There is little loss," observed he, after filling the second mold. "I let the boiling go on the hundredth of a minute too long."
"The hundredth of a minute?" repeated the cardinal, not trying to conceal his stupefaction.
"Trifles are enormous in the hermetical art," replied the magician simply; "but anyway, here are two crucibles empty and two ingots cast, and they amount to a hundred weight of fine gold."
Seizing the first mold with the powerful tongs, he threw it into a tub of water, which seethed and steamed for a long time; at length he opened it, and drew out an ingot of purest gold in the shape of a sugarloaf, flattened at both ends.
"We shall have to wait nearly an hour for the other two," said Balsamo. "While waiting, would your eminence not like to sit down and breathe the fresh air?"
"And this is gold!" said the cardinal, without replying, which made the hearer smile, for he had firm hold of him now.
"Does your eminence doubt?"
"Science has so many times been deceived."
"You are not speaking your mind wholly," said Balsamo. "You suppose that I cheat you, but do so with full knowledge. My lord, I should look very small to myself if I acted thus, for my ambition would then be restricted by the walls of this foundry, whence you would go forth to give the rest of your admiration to the first juggler at the street corner. Come, come! honor me better, my prince, and take it that I would cheat you more skillfully and with a higher aim if cheating was intended by me. At all events your eminence knows how to test gold?"
"By the touchstone, of course."
"Has not my lord made the application of the lunar caustic to the Spanish gold coins much liked at card-play on account of the gold being the finest, but among which a lot of counterfeits have got afloat?"
"This indeed has happened me."
"Well, here is acid, and a bluestone, my lord."
"No, I am convinced."
"My lord, do me the pleasure of ascertaining that this is not only gold, but gold without alloy."
The doubter seemed averse to giving this proof of unbelief, and yet it was clear that he was not convinced. Balsamo himself tested the ingots and showed the result to his guest.
"Twenty-eight karats fine," he said: "I am going to turn out the other twain."
Ten minutes subsequently, the two hundred thousand crowns' worth of the precious metal was lying on the damp oakum bed, in four ingots altogether.
"I saw your eminence coming in a carriage, so I presume it is in waiting. Let it be driven up to my door, and I will have my man put the bullion in it."
"A hundred thousand crowns," muttered the prince, taking off the mask in order to gloat on the metal at his feet.
"As you saw it made, you can freely say so," added the conjurer, "but do not make a town talk of it, for wizards are not liked in France. If I were making theories instead of solid metal, it would be a different matter."
"Then what can I do for you?" questioned the prince, with difficulty hoisting one of the fifty pound lumps in his delicate hands.
The other looked hard at him and burst into laughter without any respect.
"What is there laughable in the offer I make you?" asked the cardinal.
"Why, your lordship offers me his services, and it seems more to the purpose that I should offer mine."
"You oblige me," he said, with a clouding brow, "and that I am eager to acknowledge. But if my gratitude ought to be rated higher than I appraise it, I will not accept the service. Thank heaven, there are still enough usurers in Paris for me to find the hundred thousand crowns in a day, half on my note of hand, half on security; my episcopal ring alone is worth forty thousand livres."
Holding out his hand, white as a woman's, a diamond flashed on the ring-finger as large as a hickory nut.
"Prince, you cannot possibly have held the idea for an instant that I meant to insult you. It is strange that truth seems to have this effect on all princes," he added, as to himself. "Your eminence offers me his services; I ask you yourself of what nature can they be?"
"My credit at court, to begin with."
"My lord, you know that is shaky, and I would rather have the Duke of Choiseul's, albeit he may not be the prime minister for yet a fortnight. Against your credit, look at my cash—the pure, bright gold! Every time your eminence wants some, advise me overnight or the same morning, and I will conform to his desire. And with gold one obtains everything, eh, my lord?"
"Nay, not everything," muttered the prince, falling from the perch of patronage, and not even seeking to regain it.
"Quite right. I forgot that your eminence seeks something else than gold, a more precious boon than all earthly gifts; but that does not come within the scope of science as in the range of magic. Say the word, my lord, and the alchemist will become a magician, to serve you."
"Thank you, I need nothing and desire no longer," sighed the prelate.
"My lord," sighed the tempter, drawing nearer, "such a reply ought not to be made to a wizard by a prince, young, fiery, handsome, rich and bearing the name of Rohan. Because the wizard reads hearts and knows to the contrary."
"I wish for nothing," repeated the high nobleman, almost frightened.
"On the contrary, I thought that your eminence entertained desires which he shrank from naming to himself, as they are truly royal."
"I believe you are alluding to some words you used in the Princess Royal's rooms?" said the prince, starting. "You were in error then, and are so still."
"Your highness is forgetting that I see as clearly in your heart what is going on now as I saw your carriage coming from the Carmelite convent, traversing the town and stopping under the trees fifty paces off from my house."
"Then explain what is there?"
"My lord, the princes of your house have always hungered for a great and hazardous love affair."
"I do not know what you mean, my lord," faltered the prince.
"Nay, you understand to a T. I might have touched several chords in you—but why the useless? I went straight to the heartstring which sounds loudest, and it is vibrating deeply, I am sure."
With a final effort of mistrust the cardinal raised his head and interrogated the other's clear and sure gaze. The latter smiled with such superiority that the cardinal lowered his eyes.
"Oh, you are right not to meet my glance, my lord, for then I see into your heart too clearly. It is a mirror which retains the image which it has reflected."
"Silence, Count Fenix; do be silent," said the prelate, subjugated.
"Silence?—you are right, for the time has not come to parade such a passion."
"Not yet? may it expect a future?"
"Why