Eco: Foucalt's Pendulum by eco foucault (ebook smartphone .txt) 📕

was also the period of the Man in theIron Mask¡Xbut they escaped through the excrement, followed thecurrent to the Seine, and sailed off in a boat, because nobody hadthe courage to confront those wretches covered with stinking slimeand swarms of flies...Then Colbert stationed gendarmes outside thevarious openings of the sewer, and the prisoners, forced to stay inthe passages, died. In three centuries the city engineers managedto map only three kilometers of sewers. But in the eighteenthcentury there were twenty-six kilometers of sewers, and on the veryeve of the Revolution. Does that suggest anything toyou?"

"Ah, you know,this¡X"

"New people were comingto power, and they knew something their predecessors didn't.Napoleon sent teams of men down into the darkness, through thedetritus of the capital. Those who had the courage to work therefound many things: gold, necklaces, jewels, rings, and God knowswhat else that had fallen into those passages. Some bravelyswallowed what they found, then came out, took a laxative, andbecame rich. It was discovered that many houses had cellartrapdoors that led directly to the sewer."

"Ca alors..."

"In a period when peopleemptied chamber pots out the window? And why did they have sewerswith sidewalks along them, and iron rings set in die wall, to hangon to? These passages were the equivalent of those tapis francswhere the lowlife gathered¡Xthe pegre, as it was called then¡Xandif the police arrived, they could escape and resurface somewhereelse."

"Legendes..."

"You think so? Whom areyou trying to protect? Under Napoleon III, Baron Haussmann requiredall the houses of Paris, by law, to construct an independentcesspool, then an underground corridor leading to the sewersystem...A tunnel two meters thirty centimeters high and a meterand a half wide. You understand? Every house in Paris was to beconnected by an underground corridor to the sewers. And you knowthe extent of the sewers of Paris today? Two thousand kilometers,and on various levels. And it all began with the man who designedthose gardens in Heidelberg..."

"So?"

"I see you do not wishto talk. You know something, but you won't tell me."

"Please, leave me. It'slate. I am expected at a meeting." A sound of footsteps.

I didn't understand whatSalon was getting at. Pressed against the rocaille by the ear, Ilooked around and felt that I was underground myself, and it seemedto me that the mouth of that phonurgic channel was but thebeginning of a descent into dark tunnels that went to the center ofthe earth, tunnels alive with Nibelungs. I felt cold. I was aboutto leave when I heard another voice: "Come. We're ready to begin.In the secret chamber. Call the others."

61

The Golden Fleece isguarded by a three-headed Dragon, whose first Head derives from theWaters, whose second Head derives from the Earth, and whose thirdHead derives from the Air. It is necessary that these three Headsbelong to a single and very powerful Dragon, who will devour allother Dragons.

¡XJean d'Espagnet,Arcanum Hermeticae Philosophiae Opus, 1623, p. 138

I found my group again,and told Aglie I had overheard something about ameeting.

"Aha," Aglie said, "whatcuriosity! But I understand. Having ventured into the hermeticmysteries, you want to find out all about them. Well, as far as Iknow, this evening there is the initiation of a new member of theAncient and Accepted Order of the Rosy Cross."

"Can we watch?" Garamondasked.

"You can't. You mustn't.You shouldn't. But we'll act like those characters in the Greekmyth who gazed upon what was forbidden them to see, and we'll riskthe wrath of the gods. I'll allow you one peek."

He led us up a narrowstairway to a dark corridor, drew aside a curtain, and through asealed window we could glance into the room below, which waslighted by burning braziers. The walls were covered with liliesembroidered on damask, and at the far end stood a throne under agilded canopy. On one side of the throne was a sun, on the other amoon, both set on tripods and cut out of cardboard on some plasticmaterial, crudely executed, covered with tinfoil or some metalleaf, gold and silver, of course, but effective, because eachluminary spun, set in motion by the flames of a brazier. Above thecanopy an enormous star hung from the ceiling, shining withprecious stones¡Xor bits of glass. The ceiling was covered withblue damask spangled with great silver stars.

Before the throne was along table decorated with palms. A sword had been placed on it, andbetween throne and table stood a stuffed lion, its jaws wide.Someone must have put a red light bulb inside the head, because theeyes shone, incandescent, and flames seemed to come from thethroat. This, I thought, must be the work of Signer Salon,remembering the odd customers he had referred to that day in theMunich coal mine.

At the table wasBramanti, decked out in a scarlet tunic and embroidered greenvestments, a white cape with gold fringe, a sparkling cross on hischest, and a hat vaguely resembling a miter, decorated with ared-and-white plume. Before him, hi-eratically deployed, were abouttwenty men, also in scarlet tunics but without vestments. On theirchests they all wore a gold medal that I thought I recognized: Iremembered a Renaissance portrait, the big Hapsburg nose, and thecurious lamb with legs dangling, hanging by the waist. They hadadorned themselves with imitations, not bad, of the Order of theGolden Fleece.

Bramanti was speaking,his arms upraised, as if uttering a litany, and the othersresponded from time to time. Then Bramanti raised the sword, andfrom their tunics the others drew stilettos or paper knives andheld them high. At this point Aglie lowered the curtain. We hadseen too much.

We stole away with thetread of the Pink Panther (as Diotallevi put it; he was remarkablyabreast of the perversions of popular culture) and found ourselvesback in the garden, slightly breathless.

Garamond wasoverwhelmed. "But are they...Masons?"

"And what," Agliereplied, "does Mason mean? They are the adepts of a chivalric orderinspired by the Rosicrucians, and indirectly by theTemplars."

"But what does that haveto do with the Masons?'' Garamond asked again.

"If what you saw hasanything in common with the Masons, it's the fact that Bramanti'srite is also a pastime for provincial politicians and professionalmen. It was thus from the beginning: Freemasonry was a weakexploitation of the Templar legend. And this is the