“The law of countersigns consists, when you know in advance the day and hour of the attack, in going away from home, thus throwing the spell off the track and neutralizing it, or in saying an hour beforehand, ’Here I am.  Strike!’ The last method is calculated to scatter the fluids to the wind and paralyze the powers of the assailant.  In magic, any act known and made public is lost.  As for the shock in return, one must also know beforehand of the attempt if one is to cast back the spells on the person sending them before one is struck by them.

“I was certain to perish.  A day had passed since I was bewitched.  Two days more and I should have been ready for the cemetery.”

“How’s that?”

“Every individual struck by magic has three days in which to take measures.  That time past, the ill is incurable.  So when Docre announced to me that he condemned me to death by his own authority and when, two hours later, on returning home, I felt desperately ill, I lost no time packing my grip and starting for Lyons.”

“And there?” asked Durtal.

“There I saw Dr. Johannes.  I told him of Docre’s threat and of my illness.  He said to me simply.  ’That priest can dress the most virulent poisons in the most frightful sacrileges.  The fight will be bitter, but I shall conquer,’ and he immediately called in a woman who lives in his house, a voyant.

“He hypnotized her and she, at his injunction, explained the nature of the sorcery of which I was the victim.  She reconstructed the scene.  She literally saw me being poisoned by food and drink mixed with menstrual fluid that had been reinforced with macerated sacramental wafers and drugs skilfully dosed.  That sort of spell is so terrible that aside from Dr. Johannes no thaumaturge in France dare try to cure it.

“So the doctor finally said to me, ’Your cure can be obtained only through an invincible power.  We must lose no time.  We must at once sacrifice to the glory of Melchisedek.’

“He raised an altar, composed of a table and a wooden tabernacle.  It was shaped like a little house surmounted by a cross and encircled, under the pediment, by the dial-like figure of the tetragram.  He brought the silver chalice, the unleavened bread and the wine.  He donned his sacerdotal habits, put on his finger the ring which has received the supreme benedictions, then he began to read from a special missal the prayers of the sacrifice.

“Almost at once the voyant cried, ’Here are the spirits evoked for the spell.  These are they which have carried the venefice, obedient to the command of the master of black magic, Canon Docre!’

“I was sitting beside the altar.  Dr. Johannes placed his left hand on my head and raising toward heaven his right he besought the Archangel Michael to assist him, and adjured the glorious legions of the invincible seraphim to dominate, to enchain, the spirits of Evil.

“I was already feeling greatly relieved.  The sensation of internal gnawing which tortured me in Paris was diminishing.  Dr. Johannes continued to recite his orisons, then when the moment came for the deprecatory prayer, he took my hand, laid it on the altar, and three times chanted: