He would not leave it to continue his formula, because no other spell he had used had moved the padlock at all; so he went on hopelessly repeating it while the dawn grew wider and chillier, and more and more objects appeared out of the dark with their shadows; and their shapes seemed to bring him back to his shadowless situation, and all these material things seemed to be triumphing over him one by one, like an army of victors marching by one of its prisoners. Amongst these fancies of despair he noticed at last that the quivering of the padlock occurred at one part of the spell he uttered, and not quite at the end of it. It occurred at the word Yung. He said the spell slowly then to make sure of this, for hitherto he had spoken rapidly. And sure enough, just as he said the word Yung, the padlock always quivered, and was quiet again as he said the word Ab.
A hope came to Ramon Alonzo, glorious and sudden as sunrise, but he would not acknowledge it in that chill hour, burdened by his despairs; yet he planned a change in his formula and went to bed and slept. And when he awoke in the broad and brilliant day the hope was still with him, and it had grown since dawn.
XXIV
Ramon Alonzo Dances with His Shadow
Ramon Alonzo descended, ate hungrily, and hastened to the room that was sacred to magic; and there was the Master in his usual place. There was reproach in the Master’s eye for the young man’s lateness, but words he did not waste, reserving them for that instruction in heathen spells which he immediately commenced. Every day the Master’s intention was growing clearer and the young man guessed it now: his was to be a name as revered, as dreaded, as his who had held the Chair of Magic at Saragossa; his wisdom, his loneliness, his aloofness, were to be as those of the dweller in the sombre house in the wood; his should be power at which the just should shudder; and mothers that could not call their children from play in the long evenings when they should be in bed would in the last resort shout Ramon Alonzo to them. Against this terrible fame the young man’s blood cried out, and the birds aided him, calling out of the wood, and the sunlight seemed on his side and against magic. Yesterday he had dared to make no protest against anything the Master might teach him, for he had seen in years of obsequiousness his only chance of ever recovering his shadow; but a new hope strengthened him now, and he asked a question that was in itself a protest. The Master was teaching him slowly a spell of terrible potency when Ramon Alonzo said: “Master, what chances of salvation hath a man that shall make use of this spell?”
“Salvation! Salvation!” said the Master. “A thing common to countless millions. The ordinary experience, hereafter, of half the human race. Is this to be put against knowledge of the hour of the return of the comet, against speech from these small fields, with spirits that wander from world to world, against strange tongues, runes and enchantments, and knowledge of ancient histories and visions of future wars; is this to be put against a hold upon the course of a star? Rather would I flame beside the Count of the Mountain, who held the Chair of Magic at Saragossa, and burn in that bright splendour that torments but cannot subdue him, than share with the ignorant populace any bliss that is common to vulgar righteousness. Aye, and upon the sulphur that he treads, damned if you will but held in reverence, kings have not hesitated to abase themselves in honour of his fame that resounds beyond time and far beyond earthly boundaries.”
Ramon Alonzo did not dare to say more: it was as though a student at work in a dingy classroom had claimed that some boyish game for which his own heart was longing was of more importance than the honoured learning that was being taught from the desk. The magician was growing angry: Ramon Alonzo bent his head to learn those Persian spells, but his mind was far from them with his hope and his formula. He learned in silence, while the magician bent to the work of making him his pupil and rendering him worthy of the terrible wisdom that had been brought down through the ages by the labour of the Dread Masters. And at last the black shape of the Master went out of the gloomy room and Ramon Alonzo was all alone with his hope.
His hope was that the first two syllables were right, that the quiver in the padlock was its preparation to open, as the spell thrilled through the brass, till the final syllable ab disappointed its expectation. He
