"One of the great ones of the earth," remarked Duprès, carefully locking away the notebook after having committed to memory the leading points in William's career. The spirits did not always prove tractable, and when they were dumb Duprès was always ready to satisfy the inquirer with a few judiciously vague replies of his own composition. He indeed cheated so often, so shamelessly, and so skilfully that Vanderlinden had lately lost all faith in him, and for this reason alone had been reluctant that Duprès should experiment before the young Princes.
The alchemist, whose position under the Elector was his sole revenue, was in constant fear of losing it through some trick or freakish jest on the part of his assistant.
He made, however, no further attempt to interfere (knowing well enough that it was hopeless), and towards the appointed hour Duprès, with the two apprentices—sour at having been summoned early from the tourney—behind him carrying the magic table, went forth into the sunny dusty streets filled with merry idle crowds in their best clothes, most of whom were discussing the prowess of the Elector at the jousts, His Grace having held the field against all comers, and shivered the spears of many a famous knight.
Reaching the Counts' lodging Duprès dismissed the two young men, and himself proceeded to unpack his table.
The cavaliers had not yet returned from the tourney, but Duprès was served very civilly with wine and comfits.
The room into which he had been admitted was a fairly small cabinet, panelled in dark oak, and looking on the garden. It could be lit by a lamp depending by a copper chain from the centre of the ceiling; there was neither fireplace nor candle sconces. The furniture was composed merely of a few black chairs, a table, and an armoir.
The spirit raiser declared himself satisfied with this chamber as the right setting for his experiment, as he modestly called it, but he desired the servants to remove the armoir, less he should be accused of having an accomplice within (it was large enough to hold a man), and also the table, as he wished to set up his own in place of it. When this was done he asked them to take away all the chairs but five, one for himself and the others for the four princes. He also requested that the shutters should be closed, the lamp lit, and silence kept without during the experience, lest some unusual noise should fright or vex the spirits.
His preparations being now complete, he set himself to nicely adjust the magic table in the interval of waiting.
This table was a curious and precious object, and Duprès had carried it with him through many adventures and over the greater part of Europe. It was of sweet wood, three feet high, and set on four legs, each of which was set on a seal of pure wax engraved with a mystical sign and the seven names of God, the whole put on a thick square of red and gold changeable silk; in the centre of the table was another of the seals, larger and more deeply imprinted, and over this was a red silk cover with knots of gold at the four corners; in the centre of this cloth was a large crystal ball, egg-shaped, and of a most special brightness.
Duprès now wrote certain characters with sacred oil on the legs of the table, and all was complete. The spirit raiser—or skryer, as he had been called in England—was himself attired in a plain black coat and breeches with velvet half-socks of a purple colour, a plain band and a black skull cap, an attire which he affected to give him an air of greater gravity.