Chapter XVIII

The Witch of Prague

by F. Marion Crawford

Having made the necessary explanations to account for her sudden
appearance, Unorna found herself installed in two rooms of modest
dimensions, and very simply though comfortably furnished. It was
quite a common thing for ladies to seek retreat and quiet in the
convent during two or three weeks of the year, and there was plenty
of available space at the disposal of those who wished to do so. Such
visits were indeed most commonly made during the lenten season, and
on the day when Unorna sought refuge among the nuns it chanced that
there was but one other stranger within the walls. She was glad to
find that this was the case. Her peculiar position would have made it
hard for her to bear with equanimity the quiet observation of a
number of woman, most of whom would probably have been to some extent
acquainted with the story of her life, and some of whom would
certainly have wished out of curiosity to enter into nearer
acquaintance with her while within the convent, while not intending
to prolong their intercourse with her any further. It could not be
expected, indeed, that in a city like Prague such a woman as Unorna
could escape notice, and the fact that little or nothing was known of
her true history had left a very wide field for the imaginations of
those who chose to invent one for her. The common story, and the one
which on the whole was nearest to the truth, told that she was the
daughter of a noble of eastern Bohemia who had died soon after her
birth, the last of his family, having converted his ancestral
possessions into money for Unorna's benefit, in order to destroy all
trace of her relationship to him. The secret must, of course, have
been confided to some one, but it had been kept faithfully, and
Unorna herself was no wiser than those who mused themselves with
fruitless speculations regarding her origin. If from the first, from
the moment when, as a young girl, she left the convent to enter into
possession of her fortune she had chosen to assert some right to a
footing in the most exclusive aristocracy in the world, it is not
impossible that the protection of the Abbess might have helped her to
obtain it. The secret of her birth would, however, have rendered a
marriage with a man of that class all but impossible, and would have
entirely excluded her from the only other position considered
dignified for a well-born woman of fortune, unmarried and wholly
without living relations or connections--that of a lady-canoness on
the Crown foundation. Moreover, her wild bringing- up, and the
singular natural gifts she possessed, and which she could not resist
the impulse to exercise, had in a few months placed her in a position
from which no escape was possible so long as she continued to live in
Prague; and against those few--chiefly men--who for her beauty's
sake, or out of curiosity, would gladly have made her acquaintance,
she raised an impassable barrier of pride and reserve. Nor was her
reputation altogether an evil one. She lived in a strange fashion, it
is true, but the very fact of her extreme seclusion had kept her name
free from stain. If people spoke of her as the Witch, it was more
from habit and half in jest than in earnest. In strong contradiction
to the cruelty which she could exercise ruthlessly when roused to
anger, was her well-known kindness to the poor, and her charities to
institutions founded for their benefit were in reality considerable,
and were said to be boundless. These explanations seem necessary in
order to account for the readiness with which she turned to the
convent when she was in danger, and for the facilities which were
then at once offered her for a stay long or short, as she should
please to make it. Some of the more suspicious nuns looked grave when
they heard that she was under their roof; others, again, had been
attached to her during the time she had formerly spent among them;
and there were not lacking those who, disapproving of her presence,
held their peace, in the anticipation that the rich and eccentric
lady would on departing present a gift of value to their order.

The rooms which were kept at the disposal of ladies desiring to
make a religious retreat for a short time were situated on the first
floor of one wing of the convent overlooking a garden which was not
within the cloistered precincts, but which was cultivated for the
convenience of the nuns, who themselves never entered it. The windows
on this side were not latticed, and the ladies who occupied the
apartments were at liberty to look out upon the small square of land,
their view of the street beyond being cut off however by a wall in
which there was one iron gate for the convenience of the gardeners,
who were thus not obliged to pass through the main entrance of the
convent in order to reach their work. Within the rooms all opened out
upon a broad vaulted corridor, lighted in the day-time by a huge
arched window looking upon an inner court, and at night by a single
lamp suspended in the middle of the passage by a strong iron chain.
The pavement of this passage was of broad stones, once smooth and
even but now worn and made irregular by long use. The rooms for the
guests were carpeted with sober colours and warmed by high stoves
built up of glazed white tiles. The furniture, as has been said, was
simple, but afforded all that was strictly necessary for ordinary
comfort, each apartment consisting of a bedroom and sitting-room,
small in lateral dimensions but relatively very high. The walls were
thick and not easily penetrated by any sounds from without, and, as
in many religious houses, the entrances from the corridor were all
closed by double doors, the outer one of strong oak with a lock and a
solid bolt, the inner one of lighter material, but thickly padded to
exclude sound as well as currents of cold air. Each sitting-room
contained a table, a sofa, three or four chairs, a small book-shelf,
and a praying-stool provided with a hard and well-worn cushion for
the knees. Over this a brown wooden crucifix was hung upon the gray
wall.

In the majority of convents it is not usual, nor even
permissible, for ladies in retreat to descend to the nuns' refectory.
When there are many guests they are usually served by lay sisters in
a hall set apart for the purpose; when there are few, their simple
meals are brought to them in their rooms. Moreover they of course put
on no religious robe, though they dress themselves in black. In the
church, or chapel, as the case may be, they do not take places within
the latticed choir with the sisters, but either sit in the body of
the building, or occupy a side chapel reserved for their use, or else
perform their devotions kneeling at high windows above the choir,
which communicate within with rooms accessible from the convent. It
is usual for them to attend Mass, Vespers, the Benediction and
Complines, but when there are midnight services they are not expected
to be present.

Unorna was familiar with convent life and was aware that the
Benediction was over, and that the hour for the evening meal was
approaching. A fire had been lighted in her sitting-room, but the air
was still very cold and she sat wrapped in her furs as when she had
arrived, leaning back in a corner of the sofa, her head inclined
forward, and one white hand resting on the green baize cloth which
covered the table.

She was very tired, and the absolute stillness was refreshing
and restoring after the long-drawn-out emotions of the stormy day.
Never, in her short and passionate life, had so many events been
crowded into the space of a few hours. Since the morning she had felt
almost everything that her wild, high-strung nature was capable of
feeling-- love, triumph, failure, humiliation--anger, hate, despair,
and danger of sudden death. She was amazed when, looking back, she
remembered that at noon on that day her life and all its interests
had been stationary at the point familiar to her during a whole
month, the point that still lay within the boundaries of hope's
kingdom, the point at which the man she loved had wounded her by
speaking of brotherly affection and sisterly regard. She could almost
believe, when she thought of it all, that some one had done to her as
she had done to others, that she had been cast into a state of sleep,
and had been forced against her will to live through the storms of
years in the lethargy of an hour. And yet, despite all, her memory
was distinct, her faculties were awake, her intellect had lost none
of its clearness, even in the last and worst hour of all. She could
recall each look on the Wanderer's face, each tone of his cold
speech, each intonation of her own passionate outpourings. Her strong
memory had retained all, and there was not the slightest break in the
continuity of her recollections. But there was little comfort to be
derived from the certainty that she had not been dreaming, and that
everything had really taken place precisely as she remembered it. She
would have given all she possessed, which was much, to return to the
hour of noon on that same day.

In so far as a very unruly nature can understand itself, Unorna
understood the springs of the actions, she regretted and confessed
that in all likelihood she would do again as she had done at each
successive stage. Indeed, since the last great outbreak of her heart,
she realised more than ever the great proportions which her love had
of late assumed; and she saw that she was indeed ready, as she had
said, to dare everything and risk everything for the sake of
obtaining the very least show of passion in return. It was quite
clear to her, since she had failed so totally, that she should have
had patience, that she ought to have accepted gratefully the man's
offer of brotherly devotion, and trusted in time to bring about a
further and less platonic development. But she was equally sure that
she could never have found the patience, and that if she had
restrained herself to-day she would have given way to-morrow. She
possessed all the blind indifference to consequences which is a chief
characteristic of the Slav nature when dominated by passion. She had
shone it in her rash readiness to face Israel Kafka at the moment of
leaving her own home. If she could not have what she longed for, she
cared as little what became of her as she cared for Kafka's own fate.
She had but one object, one passion, one desire, and to all else her
indifference was supreme. Life and death, in this world or the next,
were less weighty than feathers in a scale that measures hundreds of
tons. The very idea of balance was for the moment beyond her
imagination. For a while indeed the pride of a woman at once young,
beautiful, and accustomed to authority, had kept her firm in the
determination to be loved for herself, as she believed that she
deserved to be loved; and just so long as that remained, she had held
her head high, confidently expecting that the mask of indifference
would soon be shivered, that the eyes she adored would soften with
warm light, that the hand she worshipped would tremble suddenly, as
though waking to life within her own. But that pride was gone, and
from its disappearance there had been but one step to the most utter
degradation of soul to which a woman can descend, and from that again
but one step more to a resolution almost stupid in its hardened
obstinacy. But as though to show how completely she was dominated by
the man whom she could not win even her last determination had
yielded under the slightest pressure from his will. She had left her
house beside him with the mad resolve never again to be parted from
him, cost what it might, reputation, fortune, life itself. And yet
ten minutes had not elapsed before she found herself alone, trusting
to a mere word of his for the hope of ever seeing him again. She
seemed to have no individuality left. He had spoken and she had
obeyed. He had commanded and she had done his bidding. She was even
more ashamed of this than of having wept, and sobbed, and dragged
herself at his feet. In the first moment she had submitted, deluding
herself with the idea she had expressed, that he was consigning her
to a prison and that her freedom was dependent on his will. The
foolish delusion vanished. She saw that she was free, when she chose,
to descend the steps she had just mounted, to go out through the gate
she had lately entered, and to go whithersoever she would, at the
mere risk of meeting Israel Kafka. And that risk she heartily
despised, being thoroughly brave by nature, and utterly indifferent
to death by force of circumstance.

She comforted herself with the thought that the Wanderer would
come to her, once at least, when she was pleased to send for him. She
had that loyal belief inseparable from true love until violently
overthrown by irrefutable evidence, and which sometimes has such
power as to return even then, overthrowing the evidence of the senses
themselves. Are there not men who trust women, and women who trust
men, in spite of the vilest betrayals? Love is indeed often the
inspirer of subjective visions, creating in the beloved object the
qualities it admires and the virtues it adores, powerless to accept
what it is not willing to see, dwelling in a fortress guarded by
intangible, and therefore indestructible, fiction and proof against
the artillery of facts. Unorna's confidence was, however, not
misplaced. The man whose promise she had received had told the truth
when he had said that he had never broken any promise whatsoever.

In this, at least, there was therefore comfort. On the morrow
she would see him again. The moment of complete despair had passed
when she had received that assurance from his lips, and as she
thought of it, sitting in the absolute stillness of her room, the
proportions of the storm grew less, and possible dimensions of a
future hope greater --just as the seafarer when his ship lies in a
flat calm of the oily harbour thinks half incredulously of the danger
past, despises himself for the anxiety he felt, and vows that on the
morrow he will face the waves again, though the winds blow ever so
fiercely. In Unorna the master passion was as strong as ever. In a
dim vision the wreck of her pride floated still in the stormy
distance, but she turned her eyes away, for it was no longer a part
of her. The spectre of her humiliation rose up and tried to taunt her
with her shame--she almost smiled at the thought that she could still
remember it. He lived, she lived, and he should yet be hers. As her
physical weariness began to disappear in the absolute quiet and rest,
her determination revived. Her power was not all gone yet. On the
morrow she would see him again. She might still fix her eyes on his,
and in an unguarded moment cast him into a deep sleep. She remembered
that look on his face in the old cemetery. She had guessed rightly;
it had been for the faint memory of Beatrice. But she would bring it
back again, and it should be for her, for he should never wake again.
Had she not done as much with the ancient scholar who for long years
had lain in her home in that mysterious state, who obeyed when she
commanded him to rise, and walk, to eat, to speak? Why not the
Wanderer, then? To outward eyes he would be alive and awake, calm,
natural, happy. And yet he would be sleeping. In that condition, at
least, she could command his actions, his thoughts, and his words.
How long could it be made to last? She did not know. Nature might
rebel in the end and throw off the yoke of the heavily-imposed will.
An interval might follow, full again of storm and passion and
despair; but it would pass, and he would again fall under her
influence. She had read, and Keyork Arabian had told her, of the
marvels done every day by physicians of common power in the great
hospitals and universities of the Empire, and elsewhere throughout
Europe. None of them appeared to be men of extraordinary natural
gifts. Their powers were but weakness compared with hers. Even with
miserable, hysteric women they often had to try again and again
before they could produce the hypnotic sleep for the first time. When
they had got as far as that, indeed, they could bring their learning,
their science, and their experience to bear--and they could make
foolish experiments, familiar to Unorna from her childhood as the
sights and sounds of her daily life. Few, if any of them, had even
the power necessary to hypnotise an ordinarily strong man in health.
She, on the contrary, had never failed in that, and at the first
trial, except with Keyork Arabian, a man of whom she said in her
heart, half in jest and half superstitiously, that he was not a man
at all, but a devil or a monster over whom earthly influences had no
control.

All her energy returned. The colour came back to her face, her
eyes sparkled, her strong white hands contracted and opened, and
closed again, as though she would grasp something. The room, too, had
become warmer and she had forgotten to lay aside her furs. She longed
for more air and, rising, walked across the room. It occurred to her
that the great corridor would be deserted and as quiet as her own
apartment, and she went out and began to pace the stone flags, her
head high, looking straight before her.

She wished that she had him there now, and she was angry at the
thought that she had not seen earlier how easily it could all be
done. However strong he might be, having twice been under her
influence before he could not escape it again. In those moments when
they had stood together before the great dark buildings of the
Clementinum, it might all have been accomplished; and now, she must
wait until the morning. But her mind was determined. It mattered not
how, it mattered not in what state, he should be hers. No one would
know what she had done. It was nothing to her that he would be wholly
unconscious of his past life--had she not already made him forget the
most important part of it? He would still be himself, and yet he
would love her, and speak lovingly to her, and act as she would have
him act. Everything could be done, and she would risk nothing, for
she would marry him and make him her lawful husband, and they would
spend their lives together, in peace, in the house wherein she had so
abased herself before him, foolishly believing that, as a mere woman,
she could win him.

She paced the corridor, passing and repassing beneath the light
of the single lamp that hung in the middle, walking quickly, with a
sensation of pleasure in the movement and in the cold draught that
fanned her cheek.

Then she heard footsteps distinct from the echo of her own and
she stood still. Two women were coming towards her through the gloom.
She waited near her own door, supposing that they would pass her. As
they came near, she saw that the one was a nun, habited in the plain
gray robe and black and white head-dress of the order. The other was
a lady dressed, like herself, in black. The light burned so badly
that as the two stopped and stood for a moment conversing together,
Unorna could not clearly distinguish their faces. Then the lady
entered one of the rooms, the third or the fourth from Unorna's, and
the nun remained standing outside, apparently hesitating whether to
turn to the right or to the left, or asking herself in which
direction her occupations called her. Unorna made a movement, and at
the sound of her foot the nun came towards her.

"Sister Paul!" Unorna exclaimed, recognising her as her face
came under the glare of the lamp, and holding out her hands.

"Unorna!" cried the nun, with an intonation of surprise and
pleasure. "I did not know that you were here. What brings you back to
us?"

"A caprice, Sister Paul--nothing but a caprice. I shall perhaps
be gone to-morrow."

"I am sorry," answered the sister. "One night is but a short
retreat from the world." She shook her head rather sadly.

"Much may happen in a night," replied Unorna with a smile. "You
used to tell me that the soul knew nothing of time. Have you changed
your mind? Come into my room and let us talk. I have not forgotten
your hours. You can have nothing to do for the moment, unless it is
supper- time."

"We have just finished," said Sister Paul, entering readily
enough. "The other lady who is staying here insisted upon supping in
the guests' refectory--out of curiosity perhaps, poor thing--and I
met her on the stairs as she was coming up."

"Are she and I the only ones here?" Unorna asked carelessly.

"Yes. There is no one else, and she only came this morning. You
see it is still the carnival season in the world. It is in Lent that
the great ladies come to us, and then we have often not a room
free."

The nun smiled sadly, shaking her head again, in a way that
seemed habitual with her.

"After all," she added, as Unorna said nothing, "it is better
that they should come then, rather than not at all, though I often
think it would be better still if they spent carnival in the convent
and Lent in the world."

"The world you speak of would be a gloomy place if you had the
ordering of it, Sister Paul!" observed Unorna with a little laugh.

"Ah, well! I daresay it would seem so to you. I know little
enough of the world as you understand it, save for what our guests
tell me--and, indeed, I am glad that I do not know more."

"You know almost as much as I do."

The sister looked long and earnestly into Unorna's face as
though searching for something. She was a thin, pale woman over forty
years of age. Not a wrinkle marked her waxen skin, and her hair was
entirely concealed under the smooth head-dress, but her age was in
her eyes.

"What is your life, Unorna?" she asked suddenly. "We hear
strange tales of it sometimes, though we know also that you do great
works of charity. But we hear strange tales and strange words."

"Do you?" Unorna suppressed a smile of scorn. "What do people
say of me? I never asked."

"Strange things, strange things," repeated the nun with a shake
of the head.

"What are they? Tell me one of them, as an instance."

"I should fear to offend you--indeed I am sure I should, though
we were good friends once."

"And are still. The more reason why you should tell me what is
said. Of course I am alone in the world, and people will always tell
vile tales of women who have no one to protect them."

"No, no," Sister Paul hastened to assure her. "As a woman, no
word has reached us that touches your fair name. On the contrary, I
have heard worldly women say much more that is good of you in that
respect than they will say of each other. But there are other things,
Unorna--other things which fill me with fear for you. They call you
by a name that makes me shudder when I hear it."

"A name?" repeated Unorna in surprise and with considerable
curiosity.

"A name--a word--what you will--no, I cannot tell you, and
besides, it must be untrue."

Unorna was silent for a moment and then understood. She laughed
aloud with perfect unconcern.

"I know!" she cried. "How foolish of me! They call me the
Witch--of course."

Sister Paul's face grew very grave, and she immediately crossed
herself devoutly, looking askance at Unorna as she did so. But Unorna
only laughed again.

"Perhaps it is very foolish," said the nun, "but I cannot bear
to hear such a thing said of you."

"It is not said in earnest. Do you know why they call me the
Witch? It is very simple. It is because I can make people
sleep--people who are suffering or mad or in great sorrow, and then
they rest. That is all my magic."

"You can put people to sleep? Anybody?" Sister Paul opened her
faded eyes very wide. "But that is not natural," she added in a
perplexed tone. "And what is not natural cannot be right."

"And is all right that is natural?" asked Unorna
thoughtfully.

"It is not natural," repeated the other. "How do you do it? Do
you use strange words and herbs and incantations?"

Unorna laughed again, but the nun seemed shocked by her levity
and she forced herself to be grave.

"No, indeed!" she answered. "I look into their eyes and tell
them to sleep--and they do. Poor Sister Paul! You are behind the age
in the dear old convent here. The thing is done in half of the great
hospitals of Europe every day, and men and women are cured in that
way of diseases that paralyse them in body as well as in mind. Men
study to learn how it is done; it is as common to-day, as a means of
healing, as the medicines you know by name and taste. It is called
hypnotism."

Again the sister crossed herself.

"I have heard the word, I think," she said, as though she
thought there might be something diabolical in it. "And do you heal
the sick in this way by means of this--thing?"

"Sometimes," Unorna answered. "There is an old man, for
instance, whom I have kept alive for many years by making him
sleep--a great deal." Unorna smiled a little.

"But you have no words with it? Nothing?"

"Nothing. It is my will. That is all."

"But if it is of good, and not of the Evil One, there should be
a prayer with it. Could you not say a prayer with it, Unorna?"

"I daresay I could," replied the other, trying not to laugh.
"But that would be doing two things at once; my will would be
weakened."

"It cannot be of good," said the nun. "It is not natural, and it
is not true that the prayer can distract the will from the
performance of a good deed." She shook her head more energetically
than usual. "And it is not good either that you should be called a
witch, you who have lived here amongst us."

"It is not my fault!" exclaimed Unorna, somewhat annoyed by her
persistence. "And besides, Sister Paul, even if the devil is in it,
it would be right all the same."

The nun held up her hands in holy horror, and her jaw
dropped.

"My child! My child! How can you say such things to me!"

"It is very true," Unorna answered, quietly smiling at her
amazement. "If people who are ill are made well, is it not a real
good, even if the Evil One does it? Is it not good to make him do
good, if one can, even against his will?"

"No, no!" cried Sister Paul, in great distress. "Do not talk
like that --let us not talk of it at all! Whatever it is, it is bad,
and I do not understand it, and I am sure that none of us here could,
no matter how well you explained it. But if you will do it, Unorna,
my dear child, then say a prayer each time, against temptation and
the devil's works."

With that the good nun crossed herself a third time, and
unconsciously, from force of habit, began to tell her beads with one
hand, mechanically smoothing her broad, starched collar with the
other. Unorna was silent for a few minutes, plucking at the sable
lining of the cloak which lay beside her upon the sofa where she had
dropped it.

"Let us talk of other things," she said at last. "Talk of the
other lady who is here. Who is she? What brings her into retreat at
this time of year?"

"Poor thing--yes, she is very unhappy," answered Sister Paul.
"It is a sad story, so far as I have heard it. Her father is just
dead, and she is alone in the world. The Abbess received a letter
yesterday from the Cardinal Archbishop, requesting that we would
receive her, and this morning she came. His eminence knew her father,
it appears. She is only to be here for a short time, I believe, until
her relations come to take her home to her own country. Her father
was taken ill in a country place near the city, which he had hired
for the shooting season, and the poor girl was left all alone out
there. The Cardinal thought she would be safer and perhaps less
unhappy with us while she is waiting."

"Of course," said Unorna, with a faint interest. "How old is
she, poor child?"

"She is not a child, she must be five and twenty years old,
though perhaps her sorrow makes her look older than she is."

"And what is her name?"

"Beatrice. I cannot remember the name of the family."

Unorna started.