第 51 页

practical Bishop, who was in great need of money for the charities of his

diocese. And thus it was that during Abbe Peyramale's illness Father

Sempe succeeded in effecting a separation between the parish of Lourdes

and the domain of the Grotto, which last he was commissioned to manage at

the head of a few Fathers of the Immaculate Conception, over whom the

Bishop placed him as Father Superior.

The struggle soon began, one of those covert, desperate, mortal struggles

which are waged under the cloak of ecclesiastical discipline. There was a

pretext for rupture all ready, a field of battle on which the longer

purse would necessarily end by conquering. It was proposed to build a new

parish church, larger and more worthy of Lourdes than the old one already

in existence, which was admitted to have become too small since the

faithful had been flocking into the town in larger and larger numbers.

Moreover, it was an old idea of Abbe Peyramale, who desired to carry out

the Virgin's orders with all possible precision. Speaking of the Grotto,

she had said that people would go "thither in procession"; and the Abbe

had always seen the pilgrims start in procession from the town, whither

they were expected to return in the same fashion, as indeed had been the

practice on the first occasions after the apparitions. A central point, a

rallying spot, was therefore required, and the Abbe's dream was to erect

a magnificent church, a cathedral of gigantic proportions, which would

accommodate a vast multitude. Builder as he was by temperament,

impassioned artisan working for the glory of Heaven, he already pictured

this cathedral springing from the soil, and rearing its clanging belfry

in the sunlight. And it was also his own house that he wished to build,

the edifice which would be his act of faith and adoration, the temple

where he would be the pontiff, and triumph in company with the sweet

memory of Bernadette, in full view of the spot of which both he and she

had been so cruelly dispossessed. Naturally enough, bitterly as he felt

that act of spoliation, the building of this new parish church was in

some degree his revenge, his share of all the glory, besides being a task

which would enable him to utilise both his militant activity and the

fever that had been consuming him ever since he had ceased going to the

Grotto, by reason of his soreness of heart.

At the outset of the new enterprise there was again a flash of

enthusiasm. At the prospect of seeing all the life and all the money flow

into the new city which was springing from the ground around the

Basilica, the old town, which felt itself thrust upon one side, espoused

the cause of its priest. The municipal council voted a sum of one hundred

thousand francs, which, unfortunately, was not to be paid until the new

church should be roofed in. Abbe Peyramale had already accepted the plans

of his architect--plans which, he had insisted, should be on a grand

scale--and had also treated with a contractor of Chartres, who engaged to

complete the church in three or four years if the promised supplies of

funds should be regularly forthcoming. The Abbe believed that offerings

would assuredly continue raining down from all parts, and so he launched

into this big enterprise without any anxiety, overflowing with a careless

bravery, and fully expecting that Heaven would not abandon him on the

road. He even fancied that he could rely upon the support of Monseigneur

Jourdan, who had now succeeded Monseigneur Laurence as Bishop of Tarbes,

for this prelate, after blessing the foundation-stone of the new church,

had delivered an address in which he admitted that the enterprise was

necessary and meritorious. And it seemed, too, as though Father Sempe,

with his customary humility, had bowed to the inevitable and accepted

this vexatious competition, which would compel him to relinquish a share

of the plunder; for he now pretended to devote himself entirely to the

management of the Grotto, and even allowed a collection-box for

contributions to the building of the new parish church to be placed

inside the Basilica.

Then, however, the secret, rageful struggle began afresh. Abbe Peyramale,

who was a wretched manager, exulted on seeing his new church so rapidly

take shape. The work was being carried on at a fast pace, and he troubled

about nothing else, being still under the delusion that the Blessed

Virgin would find whatever money might be needed. Thus he was quite

stupefied when he at last perceived that the offerings were falling off,

that the money of the faithful no longer reached him, as though, indeed,

someone had secretly diverted its flow. And eventually the day came when

he was unable to make the stipulated payments. In all this there had been

so much skilfully combined strangulation, of which he only became aware

later on. Father Sempe, however, had once more prevailed on the Bishop to

grant his favour exclusively to the Grotto. There was even a talk of some

confidential circulars distributed through the various dioceses, so that

the many sums of money offered by the faithful should no longer be sent

to the parish. The voracious, insatiable Grotto was bent upon securing

everything, and to such a point were things carried that five hundred

franc notes slipped into the collection-box at the Basilica were kept

back; the box was rifled and the parish robbed. Abbe Peyramale, however,

in his passion for the rising church, his child, continued fighting most

desperately, ready if need were to give his blood. He had at first

treated with the contractor in the name of the vestry; then, when he was

at a loss how to pay, he treated in his own name. His life was bound up

in the enterprise, he wore himself out in the heroic efforts which he

made. Of the four hundred thousand francs that he had promised, he had

only been able to pay two hundred thousand; and the municipal council

still obstinately refused to hand over the hundred thousand francs which

it had voted, until the new church should be covered in. This was acting

against the town's real interests. However, it was said that Father Sempe

was trying to bring influence to bear on the contractor. And, all at

once, the work was stopped.

From that moment the death agony began. Wounded in the heart, the Abbe

Peyramale, the broad-shouldered mountaineer with the leonine face,

staggered and fell like an oak struck down by a thunderbolt. He took to

his bed, and never left it alive. Strange stories circulated: it was said

that Father Sempe had sought to secure admission to the parsonage under

some pious pretext, but in reality to see if his much-dreaded adversary

were really mortally stricken; and it was added, that it had been

necessary to drive him from the sick-room, where his presence was an

outrageous scandal. Then, when the unhappy priest, vanquished and steeped

in bitterness, was dead, Father Sempe was seen triumphing at the funeral,

from which the others had not dared to keep him away. It was affirmed

that he openly displayed his abominable delight, that his face was

radiant that day with the joy of victory. He was at last rid of the only

man who had been an obstacle to his designs, whose legitimate authority

he had feared. He would no longer be forced to share anything with

anybody now that both the founders of Our Lady of Lourdes had been

suppressed--Bernadette placed in a convent, and Abbe Peyramale lowered

into the ground. The Grotto was now his own property, the alms would come

to him alone, and he could do what he pleased with the eight hundred

thousand francs* or so which were at his disposal every year. He would

complete the gigantic works destined to make the Basilica a

self-supporting centre, and assist in embellishing the new town in order

to increase the isolation of the old one and seclude it behind its rock,

like an insignificant parish submerged beneath the splendour of its

all-powerful neighbour. All the money, all the sovereignty, would be his;

he henceforth would reign.

* About 145,000 dollars.

However, although the works had been stopped, and the new parish church

was slumbering inside its wooden fence, it was none the less more than

half built. The vaulted aisles were already erected. And the imperfect

pile remained there like a threat, for the town might some day attempt to

finish it. Like Abbe Peyramale, therefore, it must be killed for good,

turned into an irreparable ruin. The secret labour therefore continued, a

work of refined cruelty and slow destruction. To begin with, the new

parish priest, a simple-minded creature, was cowed to such a point that

he no longer opened the envelopes containing remittances for the parish;

all the registered letters were at once taken to the Fathers. Then the

site selected for the new parish church was criticised, and the diocesan

architect was induced to draw up a report stating that the old church was

still in good condition and of ample size for the requirements of the

community. Moreover, influence was brought to bear on the Bishop, and

representations were made to him respecting the annoying features of the

pecuniary difficulties which had arisen with the contractor. With a

little imagination poor Peyramale was transformed into a violent,

obstinate madman, through whose undisciplined zeal the Church had almost

been compromised. And, at last, the Bishop, forgetting that he himself

had blessed the foundation-stone, issued a pastoral letter laying the

unfinished church under interdict, and prohibiting all religious services

in it. This was the supreme blow. Endless lawsuits had already begun; the

contractor, who had only received two hundred thousand francs for the

five hundred thousand francs' worth of work which had been executed, had

taken proceedings against Abbe Peyramale's heir-at-law, the vestry, and

the town, for the last still refused to pay over the amount which it had

voted. At first the Prefect's Council declared itself incompetent to deal

with the case, and when it was sent back to it by the Council of State,

it rendered a judgment by which the town was condemned to pay the hundred

thousand francs and the heir-at-law to finish the church. At the same

time the vestry was put out of court. However, there was a fresh appeal

to the Council of State, which quashed this judgment, and condemned the

vestry, and, in default, the heir-at-law, to pay the contractor. Neither

party being solvent, matters remained in this position. The lawsuits had

lasted fifteen years. The town had now resignedly paid over the hundred

thousand francs, and only two hundred thousand remained owing to the

contractor. However, the costs and the accumulated interest had so

increased the amount of indebtedness that it had risen to six hundred

thousand francs; and as, on the other hand, it was estimated that four

hundred thousand francs would be required to finish the church, a million

was needed to save this young ruin from certain destruction. The Fathers

of the Grotto were thenceforth able to sleep in peace; they had

assassinated the poor church; it was as dead as Abbe Peyramale himself.

The bells of the Basilica rang out triumphantly, and Father Sempe reigned

as a victor at the conclusion of that great struggle, that dagger warfare

in which not only a man but stones also had been done to death in the

shrouding gloom of intriguing sacristies. And old Lourdes, obstinate and

unintelligent, paid a hard penalty for its mistake in not giving more

support to its minister, who had died struggling, killed by his love for

his parish, for now the new town did not cease to grow and prosper at the

expense of the old one. All the wealth flowed to the former: the Fathers

of the Grotto coined money, financed hotels and candle shops, and sold

the water of the source, although a clause of their agreement with the

municipality expressly prohibited them from carrying on any commercial

pursuits.

The whole region began to rot and fester; the triumph of the Grotto had

brought about such a passion for lucre, such a burning, feverish desire

to possess and enjoy, that extraordinary perversion set in, growing worse

and worse each day, and changing Bernadette's peaceful Bethlehem into a

perfect Sodom or Gomorrah. Father Sempe had ensured the triumph of his

Divinity by spreading human abominations all around and wrecking

thousands of souls. Gigantic buildings rose from the ground, five or six

millions of francs had already been expended, everything being sacrificed

to the stern determination to leave the poor parish out in the cold and

keep the entire plunder for self and friends. Those costly, colossal

gradient ways had only been erected in order to avoid compliance with the

Virgin's express desire that the faithful should come to the Grotto in

procession. For to go down from the Basilica by the incline on the left,

and climb up to it again by the incline on the right, could certainly not

be called going to the Grotto in procession: it was simply so much

revolving in a circle. However, the Fathers cared little about that; they

had succeeded in compelling people to start from their premises and

return to them, in order that they might be the sole proprietors of the

affair, the opulent farmers who garnered the whole harvest. Abbe

Peyramale lay buried in the crypt of his unfinished, ruined church, and

Bernadette, who had long since dragged out her life of suffering in the

depths of a convent far away, was now likewise sleeping the eternal sleep

under a flagstone in a chapel.

Deep silence fell when Doctor Chassaigne had finished this long

narrative. Then, with a painful effort, he rose to his feet again: "It

will soon be ten o'clock, my dear child," said he, "and I want you to

take a little rest. Let us go back."

Pierre followed him without speaking; and they retraced their steps

toward the town at a more rapid pace.

"Ah! yes," resumed the doctor, "there were great iniquities and great

sufferings in it all. But what else could you expect? Man spoils and

corrupts the most beautiful things. And you cannot yet understand all the