John, to whom men were but matter for drawings, and well-born to boot (since he was a de Sanford on his mother’s side), looked the Abbot full in the face and—“Did you find it so?” said he.
“No. They were in Cairo too. But what’s your special need of ’em?”
“For my Great Luke. He’s the master-hand of all Four when it comes to devils.”
“No wonder. He was a physician. You’re not.”
“Heaven forbid! But I’m weary of our Church-pattern devils. They’re only apes and goats and poultry conjoined. ’Good enough for plain red-and-black Hells and Judgment Days—but not for me.”
“What makes you so choice in them?”
“Because it stands to reason and Art that there are all musters of devils in Hell’s dealings. Those Seven, for example, that were haled out of the Magdalene. They’d be she-devils—no kin at all to the beaked and horned and bearded devils-general.”
The Abbot laughed.
“And see again! The devil that came out of the dumb man. What use is snout or bill to him? He’d be faceless as a leper. Above all—God send I live to do it!—the devils that entered the Gadarene swine. They’d be—they’d be—I know not yet what they’d be, but they’d be surpassing devils. I’d have ’em diverse as the Saints themselves. But now, they’re all one pattern, for wall, window, or picture-work.”
“Go on, John. You’re deeper in this mystery than I.”