"And lived poor, and died no richer?" Basterga rejoined in a tone of increasing scorn.
"Well, for the matter of that," the Syndic answered more slowly, "that may be explained."
"How?"
"They say, and you must have heard it, that the gold he made in that way turned in three days to egg-shells and parings of horn."
"Yet having it three days," Basterga asked with a sneer, "might he not buy all he wanted?"
"Well, I can only say that my father, who saw him more than once in the street, always told me—and I do not know any one who should have known better——"
"Pshaw, Messer Blondel, you amaze me!" the scholar struck in, rising from his seat and adopting a tone at once contemptuous and dictatorial. "Do you not know," he continued, "that the Philosopher's Stone was and is but a figure of speech, which stands as some say for the perfect element in nature, or as others say for the vital principle—that vivifying power which evades and ever must evade the search of men? Do you not know that the sages whose speculations took that direction were endangered by accusations of witchcraft; and that it was to evade these and to give their researches such an aspect as would command the confidence of the vulgar, that they gave out that they were seeking either the Philosopher's Stone, which would make all men rich, or the Elixir Vitæ, which would confer immortality. Believe me, they were themselves no slaves to these expressions; nor were the initiated among their followers. But as time went on, tyros, tempted by sounds, and caught by theories of transmutation, began to interpret them literally, and, straying aside, spent their lives in the vain pursuit of wealth or youth. Poor fools!"
Messer Blondel stared. Had Basterga, assailing him from a different side, broached the precise story to which, in the case of Agrippa or Albertus Magnus, the Syndic was prepared to give credence, he had certainly received the overture with suspicion if not with contempt. He had certainly been very far from staking good florins upon it. But when the experimenter in the midst of the apparatus of science, and surrounded by things which imposed on the vulgar, denied their value, and laughed at the legends of wealth and strength obtained by their means—this fact of itself went very far towards convincing him that Basterga had made a discovery and was keeping it back.
The vital principle, the essential element, the final good, these were fine phrases, though they had a pagan ring. But men, the Syndic argued, did not spend money, and read much and live laborious days, merely to coin phrases. Men did not surround themselves with costly apparatus only to prove a theory that had no practical value. "He has discovered something," Blondel concluded in his mind, "if it be not the Philosopher's Stone or the Elixir of Life. I am sure he has discovered something." And with eyes grown sharp and greedy, the magistrate raked the room.
The scholar stood thoughtful where he had paused, and did not seem to notice him.