Page:Devil stories - an anthology.djvu/195

 a sigh of relief; then, without losing a moment, he motioned to his clerk, or to him whom he supposed to be his clerk, and …

"Ting-a-ring … Ting-a-ring, a-ring!"

Now the second mass is beginning, and with it begins also Dom Balaguère's sin. "Quick, quick, let us make haste," Garrigou's bell cries out to him in its shrill little voice, and this time the unhappy celebrant, completely given over to the demon of gluttony, fastens upon the missal and devours its pages with the eagerness of his over-excited appetite. Frantically he bows down, rises up, merely indicates the sign of the cross and the genuflexions, and curtails all his gestures in order to get sooner finished. Scarcely has he stretched out his arms at the gospel, before he is striking his breast at the Confiteor. It is a contest between himself and the clerk as to who shall mumble the faster. Versicles and responses are hurried over and run one into another. The words, half pronounced, without opening the mouth, which would take up too much time, terminate in unmeaning murmurs.

"Oremus ps … ps … ps …"

"Mea culpa … pa … pa …"

Like vintagers in a hurry pressing grapes in the vat, these two paddle in the mass Latin, sending splashes in every direction.

"Dom … scum! …" says Balaguère.

"… Stutuo! …" replies Garrigou; and all the time the cursed little bell is tinkling there in their ears, like the jingles they put on post-horses to make them gallop fast. You may imagine at that speed a low mass is quickly disposed of. [173]