CHAPTER IX.
HATE IS AS STRONG AS LOVE.
Queen Anne had several of these low voices about her. Barkilphedro wasone.
Besides the queen, he secretly worked, influenced, and plotted upon LadyJosiana and Lord David. As we have said, he whispered in three ears, onemore than Dangeau. Dangeau whispered in but two, in the days when,thrusting himself between Louis XIV., in love with Henrietta, hissister-in-law, and Henrietta, in love with Louis XIV., herbrother-in-law, he being Louis's secretary, without the knowledge ofHenrietta, and Henrietta's without the knowledge of Louis, he wrote thequestions and answers of both the love-making marionettes.
Barkilphedro was so cheerful, so accepting, so incapable of taking upthe defence of anybody, possessing so little devotion at bottom, sougly, so mischievous, that it was quite natural that a regal personageshould come to be unable to do without him. Once Anne had tastedBarkilphedro she would have no other flatterer. He flattered her as theyflattered Louis the Great, by stinging her neighbours. "The king beingignorant," says Madame de Montchevreuil, "one is obliged to mock at thesavants."
To poison the sting, from time to time, is the acme of art. Nero lovesto see Locusta at work.
Royal palaces are very easily entered; these madrepores have a way insoon guessed at, contrived, examined, and scooped out at need by thegnawing thing which is called the courtier. A pretext to enter issufficient. Barkilphedro, having found this pretext, his position withthe queen soon became the same as that with the Duchess Josiana--that ofan indispensable domestic animal. A witticism risked one day by himimmediately led to his perfect understanding of the queen and how toestimate exactly her kindness of heart. The queen was greatly attachedto her Lord Steward, William Cavendish, Duke of Devonshire, who was agreat fool. This lord, who had obtained every Oxford degree and did notknow how to spell, one fine morning committed the folly of dying. To dieis a very imprudent thing at court, for there is then no furtherrestraint in speaking of you. The queen, in the presence ofBarkilphedro, lamented the event, finally exclaiming, with a sigh,--
"It is a pity that so many virtues should have been borne and served byso poor an intellect."
"Dieu veuille avoir son ane!" whispered Barkilphedro, in a low voice,and in French.
The queen smiled. Barkilphedro noted the smile. His conclusion was thatbiting pleased. Free licence had been given to his spite. From that dayhe thrust his curiosity everywhere, and his malignity with it. He wasgiven his way, so much was he feared. He who can make the king laughmakes the others tremble. He was a powerful buffoon. Every day he workedhis way forward--underground. Barkilphedro became a necessity. Manygreat people honoured him with their confidence, to the extent ofcharging him, when they required him, with their disgracefulcommissions.
There are wheels within wheels at court. Barkilphedro became the motivepower. Have you remarked, in certain mechanisms, the smallness of themotive wheel?
Josiana, in particular, who, as we have explained, made use ofBarkilphedro's talents as a spy, reposed such confidence in him that shehad not hesitated to entrust him with one of the master-keys of herapartments, by means of which he was able to enter them at any hour.This excessive licence of insight into private life was in fashion inthe seventeenth century. It was called "giving the key." Josiana hadgiven two of these confidential keys--Lord David had one, Barkilphedrothe other. However, to enter straight into a bedchamber was, in the oldcode of manners, a thing not in the least out of the way. Thenceresulted incidents. La Ferte, suddenly drawing back the bed curtains ofMademoiselle Lafont, found inside Sainson, the black musketeer, etc.,etc.
Barkilphedro excelled in making the cunning discoveries which place thegreat in the power of the little. His walk in the dark was winding,soft, clever. Like every perfect spy, he was composed of the inclemencyof the executioner and the patience of a micograph. He was a borncourtier. Every courtier is a noctambulist. The courtier prowls in thenight, which is called power. He carries a dark lantern in his hand. Helights up the spot he wishes, and remains in darkness himself. What heseeks with his lantern is not a man, it is a fool. What he finds is theking.
Kings do not like to see those about them pretend to greatness. Ironyaimed at any one except themselves has a charm for them. The talent ofBarkilphedro consisted in a perpetual dwarfing of the peers and princesto the advantage of her Majesty's stature, thus increased in proportion.The master-key held by Barkilphedro was made with two sets of wards, oneat each end, so as to open the inner apartments in both Josiana'sfavourite residences--Hunkerville House in London, Corleone Lodge atWindsor. These two houses were part of the Clancharlie inheritance.Hunkerville House was close to Oldgate. Oldgate was a gate of London,which was entered by the Harwich road, and on which was displayed astatue of Charles II., with a painted angel on his head, and beneath hisfeet a carved lion and unicorn. From Hunkerville House, in an easterlywind, you heard the peals of St. Marylebone. Corleone Lodge was aFlorentine palace of brick and stone, with a marble colonnade, built onpilework, at Windsor, at the head of the wooden bridge, and having oneof the finest courts in England.
In the latter palace, near Windsor Castle, Josiana was within thequeen's reach. Nevertheless, Josiana liked it.
Scarcely anything in appearance, everything in the root, such was theinfluence of Barkilphedro over the queen. There is nothing moredifficult than to drag up these bad grasses of the court--they take adeep root, and offer no hold above the surface. To root out aRoquelaure, a Triboulet, or a Brummel, is almost impossible.
From day to day, and more and more, did the queen take Barkilphedro intoher good graces. Sarah Jennings is famous; Barkilphedro is unknown. Hisexistence remains ignored. The name of Barkilphedro has not reached asfar as history. All the moles are not caught by the mole-trapper.
Barkilphedro, once a candidate for orders, had studied a little ofeverything. Skimming all things leaves naught for result. One may bevictim of the _omnis res scibilis_. Having the vessel of the Danaides inone's head is the misfortune of a whole race of learned men, who may betermed the sterile. What Barkilphedro had put into his brain had left itempty.
The mind, like nature, abhors vacuum. Into emptiness nature puts love;the mind often puts hate. Hate occupies.
Hate for hate's sake exists. Art for art's sake exists in nature morethan is believed. A man hates--he must do something. Gratuitoushate--formidable word! It means hate which is itself its own payment.The bear lives by licking his claws. Not indefinitely, of course. Theclaws must be revictualled--something must be put under them.
Hate indistinct is sweet, and suffices for a time; but one must end byhaving an object. An animosity diffused over creation is exhausting,like every solitary pleasure. Hate without an object is like ashooting-match without a target. What lends interest to the game is aheart to be pierced. One cannot hate solely for honour; some seasoningis necessary--a man, a woman, somebody, to destroy. This service ofmaking the game interesting; of offering an end; of throwing passioninto hate by fixing it on an object; of of amusing the hunter by thesight of his living prey; giving the watcher the hope of the smoking andboiling blood about to flow; of amusing the bird-catcher by thecredulity of the uselessly-winged lark; of being a victim, unknowinglyreared for murder by a master-mind--all this exquisite and horribleservice, of which the person rendering it is unconscious, Josianarendered Barkilphedro.
Thought is a projectile. Barkilphedro had, from the first day, begun toaim at Josiana the evil intentions which were in his mind. An intentionand a carbine are alike. Barkilphedro aimed at Josiana, directingagainst the duchess all his secret malice. That astonishes you! What hasthe bird done at which you fire? You want to eat it, you say. And so itwas with Barkilphedro.
Josiana could not be struck in the heart--the spot where the enigma liesis hard to wound; but she could be struck in the head--that is, in herpride. It was there that she thought herself strong, and that she wasweak.
Barkilphedro had found it out. If Josiana had been able to see clearlythroug
h the night of Barkilphedro, if she had been able to distinguishwhat lay in ambush behind his smile, that proud woman, so highlysituated, would have trembled. Fortunately for the tranquillity of hersleep, she was in complete ignorance of what was in the man.
The unexpected spreads, one knows not whence. The profound depths oflife are dangerous. There is no small hate. Hate is always enormous. Itpreserves its stature in the smallest being, and remains a monster. Anelephant hated by a worm is in danger.
Even before he struck, Barkilphedro felt, with joy, the foretaste of theevil action which he was about to commit. He did not as yet know what hewas going to do to Josiana; but he had made up his mind to do something.To have come to this decision was a great step taken. To crush Josianautterly would have been too great a triumph. He did not hope for somuch; but to humiliate her, lessen her, bring her grief, redden herproud eyes with tears of rage--what a success! He counted on it.Tenacious, diligent, faithful to the torment of his neighbour, not tobe torn from his purpose, nature had not formed him for nothing. He wellunderstood how to find the flaw in Josiana's golden armour, and how tomake the blood of that Olympian flow.
What benefit, we ask again, would accrue to him in so doing? An immensebenefit--doing evil to one who had done good to him. What is an enviousman? An ungrateful one. He hates the light which lights and warms him.Zoilus hated that benefit to man, Homer. To inflict on Josiana whatwould nowadays be called vivisection--to place her, all convulsed, onhis anatomical table; to dissect her alive, at his leisure, in somesurgery; to cut her up, as an amateur, while she should scream--thisdream delighted Barkilphedro!
To arrive at this result it was necessary to suffer somewhat himself; hedid so willingly. We may pinch ourselves with our own pincers. The knifeas it shuts cuts our fingers. What does it matter? That he shouldpartake of Josiana's torture was a matter of little moment. Theexecutioner handling the red-hot iron, when about to brand a prisoner,takes no heed of a little burn. Because another suffers much, he suffersnothing. To see the victim's writhings takes all pain from theinflicter.
Do harm, whatever happens.
To plan evil for others is mingled with an acceptance of some hazyresponsibility. We risk ourselves in the danger which we impel towardsanother, because the chain of events sometimes, of course, bringsunexpected accidents. This does not stop the man who is truly malicious.He feels as much joy as the patient suffers agony. He is tickled by thelaceration of the victim. The malicious man blooms in hideous joy. Painreflects itself on him in a sense of welfare. The Duke of Alva used towarm his hands at the stake. The pile was torture, the reflection of itpleasure. That such transpositions should be possible makes one shudder.Our dark side is unfathomable. _Supplice exquis_ (exquisitetorture)--the expression is in Bodin[12]--has perhaps this terribletriple sense: search for the torture; suffering of the tortured; delightof the torturer.
Ambition, appetite--all such words signify some one sacrificed to someone satiated. It is sad that hope should be wicked. Is it that theoutpourings of our wishes flow naturally to the direction to which wemost incline--that of evil? One of the hardest labours of the just manis to expunge from his soul a malevolence which it is difficult toefface. Almost all our desires, when examined, contain what we dare notavow.
In the completely wicked man this exists in hideous perfection. So muchthe worse for others, signifies so much the better for himself. Theshadows of the caverns of man's mind.
Josiana, in a plenitude of security the fruit of ignorant pride, had acontempt for all danger. The feminine faculty of disdain isextraordinary. Josiana's disdain, unreasoning, involuntary, andconfident. Barkilphedro was to her so contemptible that she would havebeen astonished had any one remarked to her that such a creatureexisted. She went, and came, and laughed before this man who was lookingat her with evil eyes. Thoughtful, he bided his time.
In proportion as he waited, his determination to cast a despair intothis woman's life augmented. Inexorable high tide of malice.
In the meantime he gave himself excellent reasons for his determination.It must not be thought that scoundrels are deficient in self-esteem.They enter into details with themselves in their lofty monologues, andthey take matters with a high hand. How? This Josiana had bestowedcharity on him! She had thrown some crumbs of her enormous wealth tohim, as to a beggar. She had nailed and riveted him to an office whichwas unworthy him. Yes; that he, Barkilphedro, almost a clergyman, ofvaried and profound talent, a learned man, with the material in him fora bishop, should have for employ the registration of nastypatience-trying shards, that he should have to pass his life in thegarret of a register-office, gravely uncorking stupid bottles, incrustedwith all the nastiness of the sea, deciphering musty parchments, likefilthy conjuring-books, dirty wills, and other illegible stuff of thekind, was the fault of this Josiana. Worst of all, this creature"thee'd" and "thou'd" him! And he should not revenge himself--he shouldnot punish such conduct! Well, in that case there would no longer bejustice on earth!