“And I believe in God,” said Planchette.

Raphael departed in a hard, bitter rage.  He was resolved to fight like a man against his strange fate.  He would follow the example of the former owner of the magic skin, and give himself up to study and meditation, and live his life in the tranquil acquisition of knowledge, undisturbed by passion and desire, and lust for power, and dominion and glory.  On receiving his vast inheritance, he bought a mansion in the Rue de Varenne, and engaged a crowd of intelligent, quiet servants to wait upon him.

But his first care had been to seek out his foster-father, Jonathan, the old and devoted servitor of his family.  To him he confided his dreadful secret.

“You must stand between the world and me, Jonathan,” he said.  “Treat me as a baby.  Never ask me for orders.  See that the servants feed me, and tend me, and care for me in absolute silence.  Above all things, never let anyone pester me.  Never let me form a wish of any kind.”

For some months, the eccentric Marquis de Valentin was the talk of Paris.  He lived in monastic silence and seclusion, and Jonathan never permitted any of his friends to enter the mansion.  But one morning his old tutor, Porriquet, called, and Jonathan thought he might cheer his young master.  He could not ask Raphael:  “Do you wish to see M. Porriquet?” But after some thought he found a way of putting the question:  “M.  Porriquet is here, my lord.  Do you think he ought to enter?”

Raphael nodded.  Porriquet was alarmed at the appearance of his pupil.  He looked like a plant bleached by darkness.  The fact was, Raphael had surrendered every right in life in order to live.  He had despoiled his soul of all the romance that lies in a wish.  The better to struggle with the cruel power that he had challenged, he had stifled his imagination.  He did not allow himself even the pleasures of fancy, lest they should awaken some desire.  He had become an automaton.

Porriquet, unfortunately, was now an irritating old proser.  He had failed in life and wanted to air all his grievances.  At the end of five minutes’ talk Raphael was about to wish that he would depart, when he caught sight of the magic skin hanging in a frame, with a red line drawn around it.  Suppressing, with a shudder, his secret desire, he patiently bore with the old man’s prolixity.  Porriquet wanted very much to ask him for money, but did not like to do so, and after complaining for quite an hour or more about things in general, he rose to depart.

“Perhaps,” he said, as he turned to leave the room, “I shall hear of a headmastership of a good school.”

“The very thing for you!” said Raphael.  “I wish you could get it.”

Then, with a sudden cry, he looked at the frame.  There was a thin white edge between the skin and the red line.

“Go, you fool!” he shouted.  “I have made you a headmaster.  Why didn’t you ask me for an annuity of a thousand pounds instead of using up ten years of my life on a silly wish?  I could have won Foedora at the price!  Conquered a kingdom!”