The Horrific Sufferings Of The Mind-Reading Monster Hercules Barefoot: His Wonderful Love and his Terrible Hatred (15 page)

Still muttering, the Cardinal picked out a leather-bound volume and blew the dust off its covers.

“This is a very useful book,” he said, “in the right hands, that’s to say.”

Schuster read the yellowing title page:
SPIRITUS SUCUBA E INCUBU
.

“This folio contains illustrations of the fruits of the Devil’s concubinage,” Rivero muttered, “as well as case descriptions of monsters. Look at this: Printed at Avignon, under the pontificate of Benedictus XII!” He pointed at a woodcut representing a boy with a horn in the middle of his forehead. “A well-known case. The mother was a dissident nun, the father an incubus.”

Some lectures on the subject of demonology he’d heard shortly before leaving for the New World more than sixty years ago flashed through Schuster’s memory: in the category of demons a sucubas was a female sexual partner, incubus a male one. The sperm was said to be cold as ice; but in most cases the supposed fruits of these unnatural unions between a human and a demon did not survive. They were eaten up, or so it was said, during the orgies following a black mass.

He could not help but laugh.

“If you were to believe half of what man has made up, inspired by his nightmares, the world would be a dreadful place to live in.”

“How can you be so sure about that, my dear brother?”

“No-one could believe this!” Schuster pointed at another illustration, showing a boy with a pig’s tail and a demon’s face growing out of his stomach. “That these beings could be the fruit of a devil’s concubine are imaginings of sick souls.”

“And how do you explain the boy’s monstrosity?”

“You mean that he came into this world during a black mass? Accompanied by seven sputtering black candles, steeped in fat from unbaptised infants? If he was born deformed, it wasn’t to expiate innate sins, or because his mother had invited an incubus into her bedchamber. It was because God, whose ways are inscrutable, wished it to be so.”

Rivero passed the tip of his tongue across his teeth.

“Judging by your tone of voice, Schuster, you sometimes seem to forget I’m your superior . . . Look! This is most interesting.”

A new page showed a picture of an adult monster. The deformities were much the same as those of Hercule Barfuss: the furry back, the calluses, the bumps, the cloven tongue, an abnormally cavernous face.

“This man was called Silvester de Costa. He lived in Lisbon in the sixteenth century. The odd thing was although he was both deaf and dumb he had certain gifts; it was said he had second sight. The Inquisition investigated him and found him guilty of sorcery. He was executed during an auto-da-fé at Burgos.”

The Cardinal regarded the illustrations with a look so full of contempt that Schuster shuddered.

“I assume nothing of the sort will occur in this case,” he said.

The Cardinal slammed the folio shut.

“Of course not. I only want to impress upon you the gravity of the situation. Let me just say that there are functionaries within our field who are not quite as enlightened as you or I, and you must have no Rousseauesque expectations as to their methods.”

“Permit me, Your Eminence . . .” Schuster fumbled for words, “I stand on the right side vis-à-vis our former enemies, just as you do. There’s every reason for us to praise the work of the Congress of Vienna. I’m no supporter of Freemasons or Jacobites; but the fact is that we’re living in a new era. The steam engine’s here to stay, and if I correctly understand our Order’s strivings, we too will enjoy the benefits of this new age. Not everything that happened in the dark years was bad. There was a power in the Enlightenment that has contributed to the good of man; new sciences, research, technique . . .”

Cardinal Rivero threw him a peculiar look.

“I appreciate your being so forthright!” he said. “But whether or not the steam engine is to our benefit is not for you to judge. Allow others to draw conclusions in these matters. This is not what you have come to Rome for. I want you to bring the boy to my office tomorrow morning. We have experts on these matters. The examination is exhaustive and will leave nothing to be desired. We must establish, once and for all, the source of his supposed gifts.”

The Cardinal made a gesture towards the exit.

“Meanwhile,” he said, “I really think you should consider the Granada offer. The boy’s in good hands, and as soon as the investigation is over, we shall see to it that he is given a place in one of our monasteries. He must be of some use. Take my advice and board the ship to Málaga. They need you in Spain.”

In a heavy mood, Julian Schuster left the library of forbidden books, and although the Cardinal tried to mitigate the unspoken misgivings growing within his fellow Jesuit, he was not very successful. Schuster declined an invitation to dine that same evening with a bishop. Under the pretext of having some letters to write before the bell rang for vespers, and after promising to appear with the boy at the ordained hour tomorrow, he left the Cardinal on the via della Conciliazione, in a shadow cast by the dome of St Peter’s.

A MIRROR COVERING
the examination chamber’s shorter wall, in front of which exorcists of old used to place suspected witches in order to ascertain whether they showed up on the foil, made the room seem larger than in fact it was.

There was only one window and it was covered by Spanish-style shutters. On the walls hung pictures of the Virgin, a painting portraying Loyola receiving his divine vision on the road outside La Storta, and a processional cross that had once belonged to the Knights of Malta.

In a corner stood a laboratory bench with a wide range of instruments. Enthroned in the middle of the floor was a spinet, and further away a strange piece of furniture reminiscent of a barber’s chair.

Apart from Hercule and Julian Schuster, only the Cardinal and an inquisitor, Sebastian del Moro, were in the room.

Del Moro was a skinny man, dressed in the robes of the Dominican order. A pair of rimless spectacles gave him a scholarly air. The complicated ritual he was responsible for was part of a plan drawn up long ago and intended to be executed in accordance with Martin del Río’s guidelines for establishing whether or not a person was in alliance with the Devil.

“Is the monster retarded?” he asked, turning Schuster.

“The boy’s intellectual powers are completely normal, unless deafness counts as idiocy.”

Del Moro ignored Schuster’s ironical tone of voice. Out of a leather bag he had brought with him as he soundlessly, with an aura of dark secrets, entered the room through a back door, he took out a notebook and a piece of charcoal which he wetted with an uncommonly pink tongue.

“I hear he’s able to read minds?” he continued amiably.

“He might simply be lip-reading.”

“What do you believe?”

Schuster sighed, “You’re the one who’s been entrusted with this examination, not I.”

“But as an intellectual experiment. It seems inexplicable, does it not? Our innermost thoughts are hidden from everyone but Our Lord, are they not?”

“Confession shows us a way out of the bondage of sin,” Schuster said.

“I happen to be of the opinion that there are exceptions,” del Moro continued, jotting something down in his notebook. “And that there may be those, other than Our Lord, capable of apprehending our thoughts. To start with, what are thoughts? Have you any opinion on this matter?”

“Primarily they’re an expression of our longing for God.”

“Thoughts are the voice of our conscience,” del Moro said. “The soul gives rise to consciousness, consciousness to conscience, and from our conscience comes thought. I surmise your exile in Germany brought you into contact with the new philosophers? What is it Kant says? We can never grasp the world as it is, only the way it seems to us.”

The inquisitor smiled enigmatically and returned to the matter in hand.

“When was the monster born?” he asked

“Our guess is around the year 1810. I thought you’d got all the information from Abbot Kippenberg’s letters. Besides . . . if we are to suppose that the boy can hear even though he’s deaf, that he’s the exception to the rule,
a priori
it could only be reasonable to call him by his name.”

“How do you know his name?”

Schuster bit his lip to stop himself from letting out any more ill-considered remarks.

“He can communicate in writing,” he said. “Even in French, should that prove necessary. The boy is surprisingly well educated considering he’s an idiot.”

“Come come, Schuster,” the Cardinal broke in. “Let the inquisitor ask such questions as he deems necessary. We’re not here to quarrel.”

“Is the family Catholic?” del Moro continued in the same amiable tone.

“The boy’s an orphan, but was probably baptised a Catholic. He had a crucifix around his neck when we found him in the asylum.”

“And confirmed?”

“He’d been put into the lunatic asylum at the time when he would have taken his first communion.”

Now, for the first time, the inquisitor turned towards Hercule Barfuss. Contemplated him with a look that reflected no feelings whatsoever. It was as if he were standing in front of an inanimate object – had we been able to put ourselves inside Hercule’s world, if only for a brief moment, we would have been utterly astounded. For Inquisitor del Moro’s innermost being had surrounded itself with an impenetrable wall, a kind of watertight mental bulkhead which formed an integral part of the demonological method. Not that the exorcist wasn’t acting wholly in accordance with the ritual. From the moment the examination commenced he had transformed himself into an instrument in God’s hands, and so as not to risk going out of his mind, maybe even losing his life, in a traumatic confrontation with the forces of darkness, not allowed himself any thoughts or feelings whatsoever.

“Have you been able to find out anything about the mother?” he went on, in the same toneless voice.

“No, but our guess is she was an army prostitute.”

“How so?”

“The war years saw an illegitimate child to every second soldier. If they didn’t starve to death they were just abandoned. Especially the idiots.”

“And where did he learn to play the organ?”

“In the monastery.”

Del Moro took off his glasses, wiped them meticulously with a handkerchief.

“I would be interested to partake of the boy’s skills,” he said. “A deaf and dumb monster who plays the organ! To tell you the truth, I’ve never heard the likes of it.”

Hercule positioned himself at the spinet and the inquisitor placed a sheet of music in front of him, gesturing that he wanted to hear him play; and Hercule, whose confusion had been steadily mounting ever since he’d entered the examination room, played the piece flawlessly at only the second time through.

“That was by Clementi,” muttered the inquisitor. “Spectacular, and with his feet at that! Who has he got all this from?”

“From me,” said Schuster. “And I hope I won’t be on the list of lost souls because I had the bad taste to allow a monster into the realms of music.”

Del Moro smiled a military abbreviation of a smile, then, recomposing his facial expression into that of his professional persona, led Hercule over to the strange chair that stood in the middle of the floor. Calm as any doctor, he removed Hercule’s clothes, examined the grey hat’s sweatband, gave the chequered piping a shake, turned the underwear inside out and regarded the flat-heeled buckled shoes as if they bore some cryptic message he was disappointed to find he couldn’t decipher.

“That is all for the time being,” he said, turning to Schuster. “The examination will take no more than twenty-four hours. But in order for it to succeed it must be carried out under controlled conditions. I must ask you to leave us alone with your protégé until tomorrow. Even demonology demands a certain empirical procedure in order to obtain results. Go back to your room, Schuster. We’ll call for you as soon as we’re finished.”

Shortly after Schuster had gone, the Roman sun went behind a cloud, and from far away could be heard an ominous rumble of thunder. Hercule, naturally, noticed nothing of this, nor did he note the inquisitor’s dry voice as he turned to Cardinal Rivero.

“Your Eminence, it is of vital importance that we understand each other if we are to succeed. You must have no thoughts at all while I am examining this creature. Under no circumstances whatsoever may you allow your mind to wander.”

“And why not?” the Cardinal asked

“Believe you me, this creature possesses powers you couldn’t imagine exist.”

Del Moro opened his bag and picked out some strangely shaped bits of metal that he proceeded to join together in a most precise fashion until they took on an appearance reminiscent of a medical instrument.

“Are you familiar with the
Asio otus
?” he asked. “The long-eared owl. It can hear the movements of a dormouse at a distance of two hundred metres. Or hear a mole breathing a metre underground. The bird has an extremely well-developed sense of hearing. And even though it hunts at night, its vision is poor. When it moves it makes almost no sound at all, its thick coat of feathers renders its flight soundless. Its prey – the mole, the mouse – doesn’t stand a chance, doesn’t have time to notice anything before the hunter has it in its clutches.”

The inquisitor lit an oil lamp that was hanging above the examination chair, and held the otoscope up to the light.

“Bats are said to be specialised in the same way,” he went on. “Blind, no sense of smell, a reduced sense of touch. But their hearing is excellent. One sense has effectively been developed at the expense of the others.”

The Cardinal gave him a baffled look.

“Do you mean that the boy, because of his lack of speech and hearing, has developed another sense?”

“What I mean is, that we must take all necessary precautions. This monster is capable of exploiting the least weakness in our soul. Seal off your innermost being, Your Eminence. Pray, if you need to.”

The inquisitor put the instrument to his eye and stared into Hercule’s all but overgrown auditory channels.