Abraham Merritt - Burn, Witch, Burn!

"But a thousand years before this there was a Prince whom Osiris and Isis loved greatly—for his beauty, his courage and his strength. Nowhere on earth, they thought, was there a woman fit for him. So they called Khnum, the Potter–God, to make one. He came, with long hands like those of…Madame Mandilip…like hers, each finger alive. He shaped the clay into a woman so beautiful that even the Goddess Isis felt a touch of envy. They were severely practical Gods, those of old Egypt, so they threw the Prince into a sleep, placed the woman beside him, and compared—the word in the ancient papyrus is 'fitted'—them. Alas! She was not harmonious. She was too small. So Khnum made another doll. But this was too large. And not until six were shaped and destroyed was true harmony attained, the Gods satisfied, the fortunate Prince given his perfect wife—who had been a doll.

"Ages after, in the time of Rameses III, it happened that there was a man who sought for and who found this secret of Khnum, the Potter–God. He had spent his whole life in seeking it. He was old and bent and withered; but the desire for women was still strong within him. All that he knew to do with that secret of Khnum was to satisfy that desire. But he felt the necessity of a model. Who were the fairest of women whom he could use as models? The wives of the Pharaoh, of course. So this man made certain dolls in the shape and semblance of those who accompanied the Pharaoh when he visited his wives. Also, he made a doll in the likeness of the Pharaoh himself; and into this he entered, animating it. His dolls then carried him into the royal harem, past the guards, who believed even as did the wives of Pharaoh, that he was the true Pharaoh. And entertained him accordingly.

"But, as he was leaving, the true Pharaoh entered. That must have been quite a situation, Ricori—suddenly, miraculously, in his harem, the Pharaoh doubled! But Khnum, seeing what had happened, reached down from Heaven and touched the dolls, withdrawing their life. And they dropped to the floor, and were seen to be only dolls.

"While where one Pharaoh had stood lay another doll and crouched beside it a shivering and wrinkled old man!

"You can find the story, and a fairly detailed account of the trial that followed, in a papyrus of the time; now, I think, in the Turin Museum. Also a catalogue of the tortures the magician underwent before he was burned. Now, there is no manner of doubt that there were such accusations, nor that there was such a trial; the papyrus is authentic. But what, actually, was at the back of it? Something happened—but what was it? Is the story only another record of superstition—or does it deal with the fruit of the dark wisdom?"

Ricori said: "You, yourself, watched that dark wisdom fruit. Are you still unconvinced of its reality?"

I did not answer; I continued: "The knotted cord—the Witch's Ladder. That, too, is most ancient. The oldest document of Frankish legislation, the Salic Law, reduced to written form about fifteen hundred years ago, provided the severest penalties for those who tied what it named the Witch's Knot—"

"La Ghana della strega," he said. "Well, do we know that cursed thing in my land—and to our black sorrow!"

I took startled note of his pallid face, his twitching fingers; I said, hastily: "But of course, Ricori, you realize that all I have been quoting is legend? Folklore. With no proven basis of scientific fact."

He thrust his chair back, violently, arose, stared at me, incredulously. He spoke, with effort: "You still hold that the devil– work we witnessed can be explained in terms of the science you know?"

I stirred, uncomfortably: "I did not say that, Ricori. I do say that Madame Mandilip was as extraordinary a hypnotist as she was a murderess—a mistress of illusion—"

He interrupted me, hands clenching the table's edge: "You think her dolls were illusions?"

I answered, obliquely: "You know how real was that illusion of a beautiful body. Yet we saw it dissolve in the true reality of the flames. It had seemed as veritable as the dolls, Ricori—"

Again he interrupted me: "The stab in my heart…the doll that killed Gilmore…the doll that murdered Braile…the blessed doll that slew the witch! You call them illusions?"

I answered, a little sullenly, the old incredulity suddenly strong within me: "It is entirely possible that, obeying a post–hypnotic command of the doll–maker, you, yourself, thrust the dagger–pin into your own heart! It is possible that obeying a similar command, given when and where and how I do not know, Peters' sister, herself, killed her husband. The chandelier fell on Braile when I was, admittedly, under the influence of those same post–hypnotic influences—and it is possible that it was a sliver of glass that cut his carotid. As for the doll–maker's own death, apparently at the hands of the Walters doll, well, it is also possible that the abnormal mind of Madame Mandilip was, at times, the victim of the same illusions she induced in the minds of others. The doll–maker was a mad genius, governed by a morbid compulsion to surround herself with the effigies of those she had killed by the unguent. Marguerite de Valois, Queen of Navarre, carried constantly with her the embalmed hearts of a dozen or more lovers who had died for her. She had not slain those men—but she knew she had been the cause of their deaths as surely as though she had strangled them with her own hands. The psychological principle involved in Queen Marguerite's collection of hearts and Madame Mandilip's collection of dolls is one and the same."

He had not sat down; still in that strained voice he repeated: "I asked you if you called the killing of the witch an illusion."

I said: "You make it very uncomfortable for me, Ricori—staring at me like that…and I am answering your question. I repeat it is possible that in her own mind she was at times the victim of the same illusions she induced in the minds of others. That at times she, herself, thought the dolls were alive. That in this strange mind was conceived a hatred for the doll of Walters. And, at the last, under the irritation of our attack, this belief reacted upon her. That thought was in my mind when, a while ago, I said it was curious that you should speak of the dark wisdom turning against those who possessed it. She tormented the doll; she expected the doll to avenge itself if it had the opportunity. So strong was this belief, or expectation, that when the favorable moment arrived, she dramatized it. Her thought became action! The doll–maker, like you, may well have plunged the dagger–pin into her own throat—"

"You fool!"

The words came from Ricori's mouth—and yet it was so like Madame Mandilip speaking in her haunted room and speaking through the dead lips of Laschna that I dropped back into my chair, shuddering.

Ricori was leaning over the table. His black eyes were blank, expressionless. I cried out, sharply, a panic shaking me: "Ricori— wake—"

The dreadful blankness in his eyes flicked away; their gaze sharpened, was intent upon me. He said, again in his own voice:

"I am awake, I am so awake—that I will listen to you no more! Instead—listen, you to me, Dr. Lowell. I say to you—to hell with your science! I tell you this—that beyond the curtain of the material at which your vision halts, there are forces and energies that hate us, yet which God in his inscrutable wisdom permits to be. I tell you that these powers can reach through the veil of matter and become manifest in creatures like the doll–maker. It is so! Witches and sorcerers hand in hand with evil! It is so! And there are powers friendly to us which make themselves manifest in their chosen ones.

"I say to you—Madame Mandilip was an accursed witch! An instrument of the evil powers! Whore of Satan! She burned as a witch should burn in hell—forever! I say to you that the little nurse was an instrument of the good powers. And she is happy today in Paradise— as she shall be forever!"