"Well done, youngster," said Don Luis, laughing, "you have put your finger on a weak point! If I had acted as you suggest, the tragedy would have been finished twelve or fifteen hours earlier. But think, would you have been released? Would the scoundrel have spoken and revealed your hiding-place? I don't think so. To loosen his tongue I had to keep him simmering. I had to make him dizzy, to drive him mad with apprehension and anguish and to convince him by means of a mass of proofs, that he was irretrievably defeated. Otherwise he would have held his tongue and we might perhaps not have found you… Besides, at that time, my plan was not very clear, I did not quite know how to wind up; and it was not until much later that I thought not of submitting him to violent torture – I am incapable of that – but of tying him to that tree on which he wanted to let your mother die. So that, in my perplexity and hesitation, I simply yielded, in the end, to the wish – the rather puerile wish, I blush to confess – to carry out the prophecy to the end, to see how the missionary would behave in the presence of the ancient Druid, in short to amuse myself. After all, the adventure was so dark and gloomy that a little fun seemed to me essential. And I laughed like blazes. That was wrong. I admit it and I apologize."
The boy was laughing too. Don Luis, who was holding him between his knees, kissed him and asked:
"Do you forgive me?"
"Yes, on condition that you answer two more questions. The first is not important."
"Ask away."
"It's about the ring. Where did you get that ring which you put first on mother's finger and afterwards on Elfride's?"
"I made it that same night, in a few minutes, out of an old wedding-ring and some coloured stones."
"But the scoundrel recognized it as having belonged to his mother."
"He thought he recognized it; and he thought it because the ring was like the other."
"But how did you know that? And how did you learn the story?"
"From himself."
"You don't mean that?"
"Certainly I do! From words that escaped him while he was sleeping under the Fairies' Dolmen. A drunkard's nightmare. Bit by bit he told the whole story of his mother. Elfride knew a good part of it besides. You see how simple it is and how my luck stood by me!"
"But the riddle of the God-Stone is not simple," François cried, "and you deciphered it! People have been trying for centuries and you took a few hours!"
"No, a few minutes, François. It was enough for me to read the letter which your grandfather wrote about it to Captain Belval. I sent your grandfather by post all the explanations as to the position and the marvellous nature of the God-Stone."
"Well," cried the boy, "it's those explanations that I'm asking of you, Don Luis. This is my last question, I promise you. What made people believe in the power of the God-Stone? And what did that so-called power consist of exactly?"
Stéphane and Patrice drew up their chairs. Véronique sat up and listened. They all understood that Don Luis had waited until they were together before rending the veil of the mystery before their eyes.
He began to laugh:
"You mustn't hope for anything sensational," he said. "A mystery is worth just as much as the darkness in which it is shrouded; and, as we have begun by dispelling the darkness, nothing remains but the fact itself in its naked reality. Nevertheless the facts in this case are strange and the reality is not denuded of a certain grandeur."
"It must needs be so," said Patrice Belval, "seeing that the reality left so miraculous a legend in the isle of Sarek and even all over Brittany."
"Yes," said Don Luis, "and a legend so persistent that it influences us to this day and that not one of you has escaped the obsession of the miraculous."
"What do you mean?" protested Patrice. "I don't believe in miracles."
"No more do I," said the boy.
"Yes, you do, you believe in them, you accept miracles as possible. If not, you would long ago have seen the whole truth."
"Why?"
Don Luis picked a magnificent rose from a tree by his side and asked François:
"Is it possible for me to transform this rose, whose proportions, as it is, are larger than those a rose often attains, into a flower double the size and this rose-tree into a shrub twice as tall?"
"Certainly not," said François.
"Then why did you admit, why did you all admit that Maguennoc could achieve that result, merely by digging up earth in certain parts of the island, at certain fixed hours? That was a miracle; and you accepted it without hesitation, unconsciously."
Stéphane objected:
"We accept what we saw with our eyes."
"But you accepted it as a miracle, that is to say, as a phenomenon which Maguennoc produced by special and, truth to tell, by supernatural means. Whereas I, when I read this detail in M. d'Hergemont's letter, at once – what shall I say? – caught on. I at once established the connection between those monstrous blossoms and the name borne by the Calvary of the flowers. And my conviction was immediate: 'No, Maguennoc is not a wizard. He simply cleared a piece of uncultivated land around the Calvary; and all he had to do, to produce abnormal flowers, was to bring along a layer of mould. So the God-Stone is underneath; the God-Stone which, in the middle-ages, produced the same abnormal flowers; the God-Stone, which, in the days of the Druids, healed the sick and strengthened children.'"
"Therefore," said Patrice, "there is a miracle."
"There is a miracle if we accept the supernatural explanation. There is a natural phenomenon if we look for it and if we find the physical cause capable of giving rise to the apparent miracle."
"But those physical causes don't exist! They are not present."
"They exist, because you have seen monstrous flowers."
"Then there is a stone," asked Patrice, almost chaffingly, "which can naturally give health and strength? And that stone is the God-Stone?"
"There is not a particular, individual stone. But there are stones, blocks of stone, rocks, hills and mountains of rock, which contain mineral veins formed of various metals, oxides of uranium, silver, lead, copper, nickel, cobalt and so on. And among these metals are some which emit a special radiation, endowed with peculiar properties known as radioactivity. These veins are veins of pitchblende which are found hardly anywhere in Europe except in the north of Bohemia and which are worked near the little town of Joachimsthal. And those radioactive bodies are uranium, thorium, helium and chiefly, in the case which we are considering."
"Radium," François interrupted.
"You've said it, my boy: radium. Phenomena of radioactivity occur more or less everywhere; and we may say that they are manifested throughout nature, as in the healing action of thermal springs. But plainly radioactive bodies like radium possess more definite properties. For instance, there is no doubt that the rays and the emanation of radium exercise a power over the life of plants, a power similar to that caused by the passage of an electric current. In both cases, the stimulation of the nutritive centres makes the elements required by the plant more easy to assimilate and promotes its growth. In the same way, there is no doubt that the radium rays are capable of exercising a physiological action on living tissues, by producing more or less profound modifications, destroying certain cells and contributing to develop other cells and even to control their evolution. Radiotherapy claims to have healed or improved numerous cases of rheumatism of the joints, nervous troubles, ulceration, eczema, tumours and adhesive cicatrices. In short radium is a really effective therapeutic agent."
"So," said Stéphane, "you regard the God-Stone."
"I regard the God-Stone as a block of radiferous pitchblende originating from the Joachimsthal lodes. I have long known the Bohemian legend which speaks of a miraculous stone that was once removed from the side of a hill; and, when I was travelling in Bohemia, I saw the hole left by the stone. It corresponds pretty accurately with the dimensions of the God-Stone."
"But," Stéphane objected, "radium is contained in rocks only in the form of infinitesimal particles. Remember that, after a mass of fourteen hundred tons of rock have been duly mined and washed and treated, there remains at the end of it all only a filtrate of some fifteen grains of radium. And you attribute a miraculous power to the God-Stone, which weighs two tons at most!"
"But it evidently contains radium in appreciable quantities. Nature has not pledged herself to be always niggardly and invariably to dilute the radium. She was pleased to accumulate in the God-Stone a generous supply which enabled it to produce the apparently extraordinary phenomena which we know of.. not forgetting that we have to allow for popular exaggeration."
Stéphane seemed to be yielding to conviction. Nevertheless he said:
"One last point. Apart from the God-Stone, there was the little chip of stone which Maguennoc found in the leaden sceptre, the prolonged touch of which burnt his hand. According to you, this was a particle of radium?"
"Undoubtedly. And it is this perhaps that most clearly reveals the presence and the power of radium in all this adventure. When Henri Becquerel, the great physicist, kept a tube containing a salt of radium in his waistcoat-pocket, his skin became covered in a few days with suppurating ulcers. Curie repeated the experiment, with the same result. Maguennoc's case was more serious, because he held the particle of radium in his hand. A wound formed which had a cancerous appearance. Scared by all that he knew and all that he himself had said about the miraculous stone which burns like hell-fire and 'gives life or death,' he chopped off his hand."
"Very well," said Stéphane, "but where did that particle of pure radium come from? It can't have been a chip of the God-Stone, because, once again, however rich a mineral may be, radium is incorporated in it, not in isolated grains, but in a soluble form, which has to be dissolved and afterwards collected, by a series of mechanical operations, into a solution rich enough to enable successive crystallizations and concentrations to isolate the active product which the solution contains. All this and a number of other later operations demand an enormous plant, with workshops, laboratories, expert chemists, in short, a very different state of civilization, you must admit, from the state of barbarism in which our ancestors the Celts were immersed."
Don Luis smiled and tapped the young man on the shoulder:
"Hear, hear, Stéphane! I am glad to see that François' friend and tutor has a far-seeing and logical mind. The objection is perfectly valid and suggested itself to me at once. I might reply by putting forward some quite legitimate theory, I might presume a natural means of isolating radium and imagine that, in a geological fault occurring in the granite, at the bottom of a big pocket containing radiferous ore, a fissure has opened through which the waters of the river slowly trickle, carrying with them infinitesimal quantities of radium; that the waters so charged flow for a long time in a narrow channel, combine again, become concentrated and, after centuries upon centuries, filter through in little drops, which evaporate at once, and form at the point of emergence a tiny stalactite, exceedingly rich in radium, the tip of which is broken off one day by some Gallic warrior. But is there any need to seek so far and to have recourse to hypotheses? Cannot we rely on the unaided genius and the inexhaustible resources of nature? Does it call for a more wonderful effort on her part to evolve by her own methods a particle of pure radium than to make a cherry ripen or to make this rose bloom.. or to give life to our delightful All's Well? What do you say, young François? Do we agree?"
"We always agree," replied the boy.
"So you don't unduly regret the miracle of the God-Stone?"
"Why, the miracle still exists!"
"You're right, François, it still exists and a hundred times more beautiful and dazzling than before. Science does not kill miracles: it purifies them and ennobles them. What was that crafty, capricious, wicked, incomprehensible little power attached to the tip of a magic wand and acting at random, according to the ignorant fancy of a barbarian chief or Druid, what was it, I ask you, beside the beneficent, logical, reliable and quite as miraculous power which we behold to-day in a pinch of radium?"
Don Luis suddenly interrupted himself and began to laugh:
"Come, come, I'm allowing myself to be carried away and singing an ode to science! Forgive me, madame," he added, rising and going up to Véronique, "and tell me that I have not bored you too much with my explanations. I haven't, have I? Not too much? Besides, it's finished.. or nearly finished. There is only one more point to make clear, one decision to take."
He sat down beside her:
"It's this. Now that we have won the God-Stone, in other words, an actual treasure, what are we going to do with it?"
Véronique spoke with a heartfelt impulse:
"Oh, as to that, don't let us speak of it! I don't want anything that may come from Sarek, or anything that's found in the Priory. We will work."
"Still, the Priory belongs to you."
"No, no, Véronique d'Hergemont no longer exists and the Priory no longer belongs to any one. Let it all be put up to auction. I don't want anything of that accursed past."
"And how will you live?"
"As I used to by my work. I am sure that François approves, don't you, darling?"
And, with an instinctive movement, turning to Stéphane, as though he had a certain right to give his opinion, she added:
"You too approve, don't you, dear Stéphane?"
"Entirely," he said.
She at once went on:
"Besides, though I don't doubt my father's feelings of affection, I have no proof of his wishes towards me."
"I have the proofs," said Don Luis.
"How?"
"Patrice and I went back to Sarek. In a writing-desk in Maguennoc's room, in a secret drawer, we found a sealed, but unaddressed envelope, and opened it. It contained a bond worth ten thousand francs a year and a sheet of paper which read as follows:
"'After my death, Maguennoc will hand this bond to Stéphane Maroux, to whom I confide the charge of my grandson, François. When François is eighteen years of age, the bond will be his to do what he likes with. I hope and trust, however, that he will seek his mother and find her and that she will pray for my soul. I bless them both.'
"Here is the bond," said Don Luis, "and here is the letter. It is dated April of this year."
Véronique was astounded. She looked at Don Luis and the thought occurred to her that all this was perhaps merely a story invented by that strange man to place her and her son beyond the reach of want. It was a passing thought. When all was considered, it was a natural consequence. Everything said, M. d'Hergemont's action was very reasonable; and, foreseeing the difficulties that would crop up after his death, it was only right that he should think of his grandson. She murmured:
"I have not the right to refuse."
"You have so much the less right," said Don Luis, "in that the transaction excludes you altogether. Your father's wishes affect François and Stéphane directly. So we are agreed. There remains the God-Stone; and I repeat my question. What are we to do with it? To whom does it belong?"
"To you," said Véronique, definitely.
"To me?"
"Yes, to you. You discovered it and you have given it a real signification."
"I must remind you," said Don Luis, "that this block of stone possesses, beyond a doubt, an incalculable value. However great the miracles wrought by nature may be, it is only through a wonderful concourse of circumstances that she was able to perform the miracle of collecting so much precious matter in so small a volume. There are treasures and treasures there."
"So much the better," said Véronique, "you will be able to make a better use of them than any one else."
Don Luis thought for a moment and added:
"You are quite right; and I confess that I prepared for this climax. First, because my right to the God-Stone seemed to me to be proved by adequate titles of ownership; and, next, because I have need of that block of stone. Yes, upon my word, the tombstone of the Kings of Bohemia has not exhausted its magic power; there are plenty of nations left on whom that power might produce as great an effect as on our ancestors the Gauls; and, as it happens, I am tackling a formidable undertaking in which an assistance of this kind will be invaluable to me. In a few years, when my task is completed, I will bring the God-Stone back to France and present it to a national laboratory which I intend to found. In this way science will purge any evil that the God-Stone may have done and the horrible adventure of Sarek will be atoned for. Do you approve, madame?"
She gave him her hand:
"With all my heart."
There was a fairly long pause. Then Don Luis said:
"Ah, yes, a horrible adventure, too terrible for words. I have had some gruesome adventures in my life which have left painful memories behind them. But this outdoes them all. It exceeds anything that is possible in reality or human in suffering. It was so excessively logical as to become illogical; and this because it was the act of a madman.. and also because it came to pass at a season of madness and bewilderment. It was the war which facilitated the safe silent committal of an obscure crime prepared and executed by a monster. In times of peace, monsters have not the time to realize their stupid dreams. To-day, in that solitary island, this particular monster found special, abnormal conditions."
"Please don't let us talk about all this," murmured Véronique, in a trembling voice.
Don Luis kissed her hand and then took All's Well and lifted him in his arms:
"You're right. Don't let's talk about it, or else tears would come and All's Well would be sad. Therefore, All's Well, my delightful All's Well, let us talk no more of the dreadful adventure. But all the same let us recall certain episodes which were beautiful and picturesque. For instance, Maguennoc's garden with the gigantic flowers; you will remember it as I shall, won't you, All's Well? And the legend of the God-Stone, the idyll of the Celtic tribes wandering with the memorial stone of their kings, the stone all vibrant with radium, emitting an incessant bombardment of vivifying and miraculous atoms; all that, All's Well, possesses a certain charm, doesn't it? Only, my most exquisite All's Well, if I were a novelist and if it were my duty to tell the story of Coffin Island, I should not trouble too much about the horrid truth and I should give you a much more important part. I should do away with the intervention of that phrase-mongering humbug of a Don Luis and you would be the fearless and silent rescuer. You would fight the abominable monster, you would thwart his machinations and, in the end, you, with your marvellous instinct, would punish vice and make virtue triumph. And it would be much better so, because none would be more capable than you, my delightful All's Well, of demonstrating by a thousand proofs, each more convincing than the other, that in this life of ours all things come right and all's well."