"Oh," said Hadrian, unimpassionately turning from the window, and speaking with extreme frigidity.
"Light some candles, please." He took the paper: put up His left hand to shade His eyes; and looked at the sheet. As He read His pontifical name and His secular name, His blood began to tingle: for He still loathed publicity. As He read on, His blood began to boil. It was a frightful tale which He was reading—frightful, because He saw at a glance that it was quite unanswerable. It was unanswerable because there are some things of which the merest whisper suffices to destroy—whose effect does not depend on truthfulness. It was unanswerable because it was anonymous. It was unanswerable because He never could bring Himself to condescend.... Who could have attacked Him with such malignant ingenuity? The names of half a dozen filthy hounds occurred to Him in as many seconds: but He was not able to recognise any particular paw. He read on. He was conscious that His face was a-flame with indignation: but it was in shadow. Coming to a clear chronological error, He chuckled. That taught Him that His voice was under control; and He remembered that the invidious eyes of Ragna were upon Him. From time to time thereafter, He produced a short contemptuous word or laugh by way of commentary as He came to excessive absurdities; and, so, gradually He possessed Himself again. Thus, He skimmed the article. At the end He looked up at the cardinal. "Yes," He said, "We appear to be a very disreputable character. Now We will go through the thing again, and note the actual errors of fact." He returned to the top of the first column: and began to read more analytically. In progress, He counted aloud "One, two,"—up to "thirty-three absolute and deliberate lies, exclusive of gratuitous or ignorant mispresentations of fact, in a column and three-quarters of print.—Well?" He inquired, with a full straight gaze at the attendant cardinal.
"What are You going to do now?"
"We will ponder the matter which Your Eminency has submitted to Us; and at a convenient time We will declare Our pleasure. The paper may be left with Us. Your Eminency has permission to retire." Ragna strode towards the door. At the threshold, he turned and bayed, "Abdicate!"
"No: We will not abdicate," said Hadrian.
The Secretary-of-State rushed away. As he went swishing, snarling at all and sundry, through the antechamber where the gentlemen were in waiting, Sir Iulo suddenly shot-out his arms straight and rectangularly level with his shoulders, swung-up a stiff right leg in a verisimilar fashion, rigidly sank on his left toes till he sat on his left heel, recovered his first position with a jerk, changed legs and repeated the performance with the right. It was done in a second of time; and his white teeth glittered in a grin as his muscles relaxed. There are few more nerve-shattering spectacles than this of a lithe and graceful young gentleman in scarlet behaving, without any warning whatever, exactly like a monkey on a stick, manifesting the same startling descendent and ascendent angularity, the same imperturbable inevitable intolerable agility. Cardinal Ragna denounced him as a devil where he stood; and swirled away in a vermilion billow of watered-silk.
As soon as He was left alone, Hadrian made the very firmest possible act of will determining neither to bend nor to break. This done, He ate His supper with careful deliberation; sent-away the tray; and ordered a large pot-full of black coffee. Then He locked all doors and allowed Himself a period of disintegration preparatory to redintegration, a period of slackness preparatory to intensification. Now He severely suffered. He read the article on the Strange Career of the Pope again and again, till His head swam with the horror of it. This was the worst thing which ever had happened to Him. His previous experience of newspaper libels was as nothing in comparison. All through the bitter bitter years of His struggle for life, He had known Himself for a fighter. As a fighter, He had expected blows in return for those which He gave. And, when all was said and done, his fighting had not been to Him a source of unmitigated pain. For one thing, He had had pleasure in knowing that He scrupulously fought unscrupulous foes, that He fought a losing battle, that he fought a million times His weight, that He fought bare-handed against armed champions all the time. That knowledge it was—the knowledge that He had contended (not as a hero but) as heroes have contended—which alone had upheld him. And now—— But this—— It depicted Him as simply contemptible. Inspection of the image of Himself, which the Catholic Hour with such ferocious flocculence delineated, brought Him to the verge of physical nausea. But it was not true, real. It was not Himself. No, no. It was an atrocious caricature. Oh yes, it was an atrocious caricature. Everybody would know it for that—— Would they? How many had known the previous libels for libels? How many had dared to proclaim the previous libels for libels? One—out of hundreds.—— Oh how beastly, how beastly! He read the thing again;—and dashed the paper to the ground. If it only had made Him look wicked—or even ridiculous! But no. He categorically was damned, as despicable, low, vulgar, abject, mean, everything which merited contempt. Only a strenuous effort kept Him from shrieking in hysteria. "God, God, am I really like that?" He moaned aloud, with His palms stretched upward and outward and His eyes intent in agony. He lost faith in Himself. Perhaps He was such an one. Perhaps His imagination after all had been deluding Him, and He really was an indefensible creature. It was possible. "Oh, have I ever been such a dirty—beast. Have I?" He moaned again. And then all the being of Him suffused—and whirled—and outraged Nature took Him in hand. The blow to His self-respect, the shattering onslaught on His sensibilities, were more than even His valid virile body could bear. He lay back in His low chair; and swooned into oblivion.
After the lapse of an hour, He began to revive. It would appear that He instantly knew what had happened: for He staggered to the open window that the cold night air might reinvigorate him. Full consciousness by slow degrees returned; and, with it, some measure of serenity. He took up the argument at the point where He had left it.
No: He was not like that. Before Jesus in the pyx on His breast, He was not like that. So He gradually calmed Himself. He had done desperate deeds and foolish deeds: but never ignoble deeds:—stay:—once:—that had nothing whatever to do with the present matter: nor was that one ignoble deed ignoble in the esteem of anyone except Himself: it was "smart" or "clever" in mundane phraseology: no one had been injured by it: it had been atoned-for: but, according to the ideal code which He had made for His Own guidance, it was ignoble. However it was not known, except to Himself, and God, and His angel-guardian: it was not even known to His confessor, for it was not even a venial sin. Well then—— No. No. He had not merited the gibbet of the world's contempt.
Who had gibbeted Him?