In the course of their brief conversation, the Man in Black disclosed to Ninon the manner in which his impudent imitator produced his Mumbo-Jumbo terrors. Like the Comte de Lude, he did not deny them effect; but he held them so essentially vulgar, that it seemed marvellous to him how the fellow succeeded in imposing on refined and educated clients. Moreover, they had not even the recommendation of novelty. Perditor had, he explained, contrived merely to get knowledge and possession of the tricks and traps of the long since strangled César, who during his incarceration in the Bastille had entertained his gaolers with an account of the way he played his tricks, performed apparently at Gentilly also at that time and therefore rendering the way the easier to his successor, since the old quarry he had utilised and patterned about with ditches still remained. Perditor’s ceremonial was identically the same with César’s. The frightful cries he uttered were the signal for six men hideously masked and garbed, he kept concealed in the cavern, to spring forward, flinging out flashes of flame, and waving torches of burning resin. Amid the flames was to be seen the monstrous goat, loaded with thick iron chains painted vermilion, to give the appearance of being red-hot. On each side, in the obscurity of the cavern, were placed two huge mastiffs, their heads fastened into wooden cases, wide at one end, and narrow at the other. Two men goaded and prodded these two poor animals, which caused them to utter the most dismal howling, filling the cavern with the appalling noise, while the goat, a most intelligent beast, and thoroughly understanding his part, played it to admiration, rattling his chains and butting his huge horns. The devil having thus shown himself, two of the men now rush upon the unfortunate individual, and belabour him black and blue with long bags of cloth filled full of sand, and then fling him, half-dead, outside the cavern. “Then the parting advice is given him not to wish to see the devil again, and he never does, concluded César.” CHAPTER VI Nemesis—Ninon’s Theories—Wits and Beaux of the Salons—Found at Last—“The Smart Set”—A Domestic Ménage—Scarron—The Fatal Carnival—The Bond of Ninon—Corneille and _The Cid_—The Cardinal’s Jealousy—Enlarging the Borders—Monsieur l’Abbé and the Capon Leg—The Grey Cardinal—A Faithful Servant.