I pass the facade of theBeaubourg. During the day the place is a village fair; now theplaza is almost deserted. A few silent groups, sleeping, a fewlights from the brasseries opposite. It's all true. Giant air ductsthat absorb energy from the earth. Perhaps the crowds that comeduring the day serve to supply them with vibrations; perhaps thehermetic machine is fed on fresh meat.
The church ofSaint-Merri. Opposite, the Librairie la Vouivre, three-quartersoccultist. I must not give in to hysteria. I take rue des Lombards,to avoid an army of Scandinavian girls coming out of a bistrolaughing. Shut up; Lorenza is dead.
But is she? What if I amthe one who is dead? Rue des Lombards intersects, at right angles,rue Nicolas-Flamel, and at the end of that you can see, white, theTour Saint-Jacques. At the corner, the Librairie Arcane 22, tarotsand pendulums. Nicolas Flamel the alchemist, an alchemisticbookshop, and then the Tour Saint-Jacques, with those great whitelions at the base, a useless late-Gothic tower near the Seine,after which an esoteric review was named. Pascal conductedexperiments there on the weight of air, and even today, at a heightof fifty-two meters, the tower has a station for meteorologicalresearch. Maybe They began with the Tour Saint-Jacques, beforeerecting the Eiffel Tower. There are special locations. And no onenotices.
I go back towardSaint-Merri. More girls' laughter. I don't want to see people. Iskirt the church. Along rue du Cloitre-Saint-Merri, a transeptdoor, old, of rough wood. At the foot of the street, a squareextends, the end of the Beaubourg area, here brilliantly lit. Inthe open space, machines by Tinguely, and other multicoloredartifacts that float on the surface of a pool, a small artificiallake, their cogged wheels clanking insinuatingly. In the backgroundI see again the scaffolding of Dalmine pipes, the Beaubourg withits gaping mouths¡Xlike an abandoned 71-tanic near a wall devouredby ivy, a shipwreck in a crater of the moon. Where the cathedralsfailed, the great transatlantic ducts whisper, in contact with theBlack Virgins. They are discovered only by one who knows how tocircumnavigate Saint-Merri. And so I must go on; I have a clue, Imust expose Their plot in the very center of the Ville Lumiere, theplot of the Dark Ones.
I find myself at thefacade of Saint-Merri. Something impels me to train my flashlighton the portal. Flamboyant Gothic, arches in accolade.
And suddenly, findingwhat I didn't expect to find, on the archivolt of the portal I seeit.
The Baphomet. Where twocurves join. At the summit of the first, a dove of the Holy Spiritwith a glory of stone rays, but on the second, besieged by prayingangels, there he is, the Baphomet, with his awful wings. On thefacade of a church. Shameless.
Why here? Because wearen't far from the Temple. Where is the Temple, or what's left ofit? I retrace my steps, north, and find myself at the corner of ruede Montmorency. At number 51, the house of Nicolas Flamel. Betweenthe Baphomet and the Temple. The shrewd spagyric knew well withwhom he was dealing. Poubelles full of foul rubbish opposite ahouse of undefined period, Taverne Nicolas Flamel. The house isold, restored for the tourists, for Diabolicals of the lowestorder, hylics. Next door, an American shop with an Apple poster:"Secouez-vous les puces." Microsoft-Hermes. Directory,temurah.
Now I'm in rue duTemple, I walk along it and come to the corner of rue de Bretagne,and the Square du Temple, a garden blanched as a cemetery, thenecropolis of the martyred knights.
Rue de Bretagne to rueVieille du Temple. Rue Vieille du Temple, after rue Barbette, hasnovelty shops: electric bulbs in odd shapes, Jike ducks or ivyleaves. Too blatantly modern. They don't fool me.
Rue desFrancs-Bourgeois: I'm in the Marais, I know, and soon the oldkosher butcher shops will appear. What do the Jews have to do withthe Templars, now that we gave their place in the Plan to theAssassins of Alamut? Why am I here? Is it an answer I am lookingfor? Perhaps I'm only trying to get away from the Conservatoire.Unless I do have a destination, a place I'm going to. But it can'tbe here. I rack my brain to remember where it is, as Belbo huntedin a dream for a lost address.
An obscene groupapproaches. Laughing nastily, they march in open order, forcing meto step off the sidewalk. For a moment I fear they are agents ofthe Old Man of the Mountain, that they have come for me. Not so;they vanish into the night, but they speak a foreign language, asibilant Shiite, Talmudic, Coptic, like a serpent of thedesert.
Androgynous figuresloom, in long cloaks. Rosicrucian cloaks. They pass, turn into ruede Sevigne. It is late, very late. I fled the Conservatoire to findagain the city of all, but now I realize that the city of all is acatacomb with special paths for the initiated.
A drunk. But he may bepretending. Trust no one, no one. I pass a still-open bar; thewaiters, in aprons down to their ankles, are putting chairs ontables. I manage to enter just in time. I order a beer, drain it,ask for another. "A healthy thirst, eh?" one of them says. Butwithout cordiality, suspicious. Of course I'm thirsty; I've hadnothing to drink since five yesterday afternoon. A man can bethirsty without having spent the night under a pendulum. Fools. Ipay and leave before they can commit my features tomemory.
I'm at the corner ofPlace des Vosges. I walk along the arcades. What was that old moviein which the solitary footsteps of Mathias, the mad killer, echoedat night in Place des Vosges? I stop. Do I hear footsteps behindme? But I wouldn't, of course; the killer has stopped, too. Thesearcades¡Xall they need is a few glass cases, and they could berooms in the Conservatoire.
Low sixteenth-centuryceilings, round-headed arches, galleries selling prints, antiques,furniture. Place des Vosges, with its old
