Antony Ferrara

“ Robert Cairn gave him an account of the morning's incidents, describing Ferrara's chambers with a minute exactness which revealed how deep, how indelible an impression their strangeness had made upon his mind.
"There is one thing," he concluded, "against which I am always coming up, I puzzled over it at Oxford, and others did, too; I came against it to-day. Who is Antony Ferrara? Where did Sir Michael find him? What kind of woman bore such a son?" ”

“ Cairn leaned forward across the table. “To shoot the fellow, Sime—to shoot him on sight, as one shoots a mad dog!”
“Are you serious?”
“As God is my witness, if Antony Ferrara had been in his rooms that night, my father would have killed him!”
“It would have been a most shocking scandal!”
“It would have been an act of self-devotion. The man who removes Antony Ferrara from the earth will be doing mankind a service worthy of the highest reward. ”

“ His face was pale, as was apparent even in that vague light, and his eyes gleamed like steel.
"You raise other forces," he said—and his voice, though steady was very low; "evil forces, also."
Antony Ferrara, invoker of nameless horrors, shrank before him—before the primitive Celtic man whom unwittingly he had invoked. Dr. Cairn was spare and lean, but in perfect physical condition. Now he was strong, with the strength of a just cause. Moreover, he was dangerous, and Ferrara knew it well.
"I fear—" began the latter huskily. ”

“ His soul was up in arms against the man whose evil schemes had led to his presence in Port Said, at a time when many sufferers required his ministrations in Half-Moon Street. He was haunted by a phantom, a ghoul in human shape; Antony Ferrara, the adopted son of his dear friend, the adopted son, who had murdered his adopter, who whilst guiltless in the eyes of the law, was blood-guilty in the eyes of God! ”

“ The carefully planned incident at the museum, whereby the policeman had become possessed of Cairn's card; the distinct possibility that a detective might knock upon his door at any moment—with the inevitable result of his detention pending inquiries—formed a chain which had seemed complete, save that Antony Ferrara was the schemer. For another to have compassed so much would have been a notable victory; for Ferrara, such a success would be trivial. ”

“ I yielded myself to the soothing influence, and thus deliberately—deliberately—placed myself in the power of—Antony Ferrara—"
"You think that he is here, in this hotel?"
"I cannot doubt that he is in the neighbourhood. The influence was too strong to have emanated from a mind at a great distance removed. I will tell you exactly what I dreamt." ”

“ In his gait, as he crossed the pavement to enter the photographer's shop, there was something revoltingly effeminate—a sort of catlike grace which would have been noticeable in a woman, but which was unnatural, and, for some obscure reason, sinister, in a man.
It was Antony Ferrara!
Even at that distance and in that brief time, Robert Cairn could see the ivory face, the abnormal red lips, and the long black eyes of this arch fiend, this monster masquerading as a man. He had much ado to restrain his rising passion ”

“ With no recollection of having traversed the intervening streets, he found himself walking under the archway leading to the court in which his chambers were situated; in the far corner, shadowed by the tall plane tree, where the worn iron railings of the steps and the small panes of glass in the solicitor's window on the ground floor called up memories of Charles Dickens, he paused, filled with a sort of wonderment. It seemed strange to him that such an air of peace could prevail, anywhere, whilst Antony Ferrara lived and remained at large. ”

“ I know that Myra's dreams are not ordinary, meaningless dreams. I have had other evidence. I don't want to analyse these things; I confess that my mind is not capable of the task. I do not even want to know the meaning of it all; at the present moment, I only want to know one thing: Who is Antony Ferrara? ”

“ Antony Ferrara faced around; his mouth was oddly twisted.
"She is troubled with strange dreams," he said, very huskily.
"Clairvoyant dreams!" Dr. Cairn addressed him for the first time. "Do not glare at me in that way, for it may be that I know you, too! Come, Rob."
"But Myra—"
Dr. Cairn laid his hand upon his son's shoulder, fixing his eyes upon him steadily.
"Nothing in this house can injure Myra," he replied quietly; "for Good is higher than Evil. For the present we can only go."
Antony Ferrara stood aside, as the two walked out of the library.
[25]
CHAPTER IV AT FERRARA'S CHAMBERS
Dr. ”

“ The creature who is known to the world as Antony Ferrara holds that book—do you doubt it? Therefore you know now, as I have known long enough, with what manner of enemy we are fighting. You know that this time it is a fight to the death—”
He stopped abruptly, staring out of the window.
A man with a large photographic camera, standing upon the opposite pavement, was busily engaged in focusing the house.
“What is this?” muttered Robert Cairn, also stepping to the window.
“It is a link between sorcery and science,” replied the doctor. ”

“ He is unfit to live. Sometimes I cannot believe that he does live; I expect to wake up and find that he was a figure of a particularly evil dream.”
“This incident—the call at his rooms—occurred just before your illness?”
“The thing which he had attempted that night was the last straw, Sime. It broke me down. From the time that he left Oxford, Antony Ferrara has pursued a deliberate course of crime—of crime so cunning, so unusual, and based upon such amazing and unholy knowledge, that no breath of suspicion has touched him. ”

“ Sime shook his head wisely; this was in accordance with his ideas.
"You know Antony Ferrara?" continued Cairn. "Well, he has done this for me. His damnable practices are worse than any disease. Sime, the man is a pestilence! Although the law cannot touch him, although no jury can convict him—he is a murderer. He controls—forces—"
Sime was watching him intently. ”

“ Although you will find it hard to believe—and you have had dreadful opportunities to peer behind the veil—I hope very shortly to be able to answer that question, and to tell you who Antony Ferrara really is.”
Robert Cairn beat his fist upon the arm of the chair.
“I sometimes wonder,” he said, “that either of us has remained sane. Oh, what does it mean? What can we do? What can we do?”
“We must watch, Rob. To enlist the services of Saunderson would be almost impossible. He lives in his orchid houses; they are his world. ”

“ He ran up the stairs to the second landing, opened the door, and entered his chambers. He was oppressed to-day with a memory, the memory of certain gruesome happenings whereof these rooms had been the scene. Knowing the powers of Antony Ferrara he often doubted the wisdom of living there alone, but he was persuaded [173] that to allow these fears to make headway, would be to yield a point to the enemy. ”

“ Swathed in white wrappings, Antony Ferrara lay motionless before them.
The seconds passed one by one, until a whole minute was told, and still the two remained inert and the cold light shone full upon that ivory face.
“Is he dead?”
Robert Cairn spoke huskily, grasping his father's shoulders.
“I think not,” was the equally hoarse reply. “He is in the state of trance mentioned in—certain ancient writings. He is absorbing evil force from the sarcophagus of the witch queen.” [1]
There was a faint rustling sound in the cellar, which seemed to grow louder and more insistent; but Dr. ”

“ Antony, not only continues to dominate Padua from his vast monumental Church, and enjoy his three June days of Festa in his nominal city, but his tutelary grace extends far beyond. In the Church of San Spirito in the Via Ariosto of Ferrara, the famous preacher to the fishes was—after the earthquake of 1908—the target of three days of prayer. The house Ariosto built himself in the fifteenth century stands in the same street, but Ariosto’s world of mediæval chivalry is shattered into atoms while St. Antony still saves Ferrara from earthquake. ”

“ Ferrar, Robert, an English prelate, born at Halifax, was prior of the monastery of St. Oswald's, embraced the Reformation, and was made Bishop of St. David's by Edward VI.; suffered martyrdom under Mary in 1555.
Ferrara, a broadsword bearing the name of Andrea Ferrara, one of an Italian family famous in the 16th and 17th centuries for the quality of their swords.
Ferrara (31) , a fortified and walled Italian city, capital of the province of the name, situated on a low and marshy plain between the dividing branches of the Po, 30 m. from the Adriatic ”

“ The town remained a part of the states of the Church, the fortress being occupied by an Austrian garrison from 1832 until 1859, when it became part of the kingdom of Italy.
A considerable area within the walls of Ferrara is unoccupied by buildings, especially on the north, where, the handsome Renaissance church of S. Cristoforo, with the cemetery, stands; but modern times have brought a renewal of industrial activity. Ferrara is on the main line from Bologna to Padua and Venice, and has branches to Ravenna and Poggio Rusco (for Suzzara) . ”

“ We need not bespeak the reader's interest in these "trivial fond" relics—these consecrated memorials—of one of the most celebrated poets of Italy. They are preserved with reverential care at Ferrara, the poet's favourite residence, though not his birthplace. The Ferrarese, however, claim him "exclusively as their own" Lord Byron, in the Notes1 to Childe Harold, canto 4, says, "the author of the Orlando is jealously claimed as the Homer, not of Italy, but Ferrara. ”

“ A thing more deadly than the plague is abroad here in London. Apart from the personal aspect of the matter—of which I dare not think—what do we know of Ferrara's activities? His record is damnable. To our certain knowledge, his victims are many. If the murder of his adoptive father, Sir Michael, was actually the first of his crimes, we know of three other poor souls who beyond any shadow of doubt were launched into eternity by the black arts of this ghastly villain. ”

“ If I had been murdered there, in some former life, I could not have seemed to remember the place more thoroughly, or with a more emphatic chilling of the blood; and the mere remembrance of it acquired in that minute, is so strengthened by the imaginary recollection, that I hardly think I could forget it.
More solitary, more depopulated, more deserted, old Ferrara, than any city of the solemn brotherhood! The grass so grows up in the silent streets, that any one might make hay there, literally, while the sun shines. ”

“ HOW THEY CAME TO FERRARA
That was a fair sight which greeted the travellers at the close of the next day—the towers of Ferrara rising stately out of a green thicket. The lovers trilled their happiness to each other: surely nothing but pleasure and a smooth life could come out of so treeful a place!
"In our Venice, you must know," said Bellaroba, "we set great store by green boughs, having so few of them. We think that harshness and clamour may hunt the canals, but that birds can sing in gardens of a world really joyful. What a cloud of green trees—look, look how near the sky comes to them! ”

“ Ferrara, formerly so much fretted by its women, its pleasures and its poets, is almost uninhabited: in places where the streets are wide, they are deserted and sheep could browse there. The dilapidated houses do not gather fresh life, as at Venice, from the architecture, the ships, the sea and the native gaiety of the place. ”

“ It is as timid as a nun's. Ferrara is the place of all the world for you. I look forward to your speedy establishment in a city where a girl may be like a flagstaff and yet not thought amiss."
Bellaroba looked humbly at herself in the glass; though she could see that she was pretty, it was not to be denied that she was thin. Ah, no; she did not take after her mother. Here she sighed to remember that her bosom friend, Olimpia Castaneve, took after hers only too well, and was to accompany her fortune-hunting in Ferrara for precisely opposite reasons. ”

“ Think of it, lady, think of it."
"I will," said Olimpia, who had already done so. There is no doubt that she and the Mosca understood each other.
They were now riding up the long lime-tree avenue which leads to the Sea-Gate of Ferrara; soon they entered Ferrara itself, that city of warm red brick, of broad eaves, of laughter, and, as it were, a fairy-tale, bowered in rustling green. The streets ran wide between garden walls and the massy fronts of great square houses; they were full of a traffic which seemed that of a prosperous people bent upon pleasure. ”

“ But no man avoids his destiny, because few draw wisdom from the past and none foresee the future. To Ferrara Tasso went with a blithe heart. Inclination, the custom of his country, the necessities of that poet's vocation for which he had abandoned a profession, poverty and ambition, vanity and the delights of life, combined to lure him to his ruin.
He found Ferrara far more magnificent than Urbino. ”

“ THE CASTELLO OF FERRARA
Is it possible that the patron saints of cities should mould the temper of the people to their own likeness? S. George, the chivalrous, is champion of Ferrara. His is the marble group above the Cathedral porch, so feudal in its medieval pomp. He and S. Michael are painted in fresco over the south portcullis of the Castle. His lustrous armour gleams with Giorgionesque brilliancy from Dossi's masterpiece in the Pinacoteca. That Ferrara, the only place in Italy where chivalry struck any root, should have had S. George for patron, is at any rate significant. ”