Darconville's Cat (86 page)

  —from Antonina Miliukova Tchaikovsky,

        the nieve,

  —from Queen Cecropia the hypersubtle,

  —from the Witch of Endor and her broth,

        menses, and
materials,

  —from Maria Beadnell, the pinchpin,

  —from La Belle Heaulmière,
la catin
,

  —from the Sibyl of Panzoult, who spoke

        lies,

  —from Valeria Messalina, the notorious

        stew,

  —from Dame van Winkle, the whiniling

        dastard,

  —from Mother Prat, the fat woman

        of
Brainford,

  —from all Troll Madams, Titifulls,

        and
Tattlers,

  —from Glycera, the painted trullabub,

  —from Diana Trapes, the walking mort,

  —from Lady Fricarelle, the duchess

        of
malfeasance,

  —from Una the Fairy Queen,

  —from Smêraldine and her hairpins,

  —from Catherine Alexeyevna Romanov I,

        called ‘Figgy,’
the
kozlonogaia
,

  —from Giralda, the weathercock,

  —from Berte au grant pié,
la conasse
,

  —from Old Mother Gothel and her

        gamps and
slatterns,

  —from Elizabeth Bathory,

        the
trugging-house truepenny,

  —from Hecate the Attic drench,

  —from Mahboobeh the slave-girl,

  —from Watere Wytches, crownede

        wythe
reytes,

  —from Fanfan la Tulipe and her

        bumrowls,

  —from Empress Agrippina, the orgiac,

  —from Notre-Dame des Parcs, the saint

        of the
smock-fair,

  —from Wjera Sassulitch, the human

        skate,

  —from Henda, the wife of Abu Sofian,

  —from La DuBarry and her ligbies

        and
lightskirts,

  —from Lynda Raxa, the rixatrix,

  —from La Sorellacia and her sausage

        legs,

  —from Dido and all her
dutzbetterins

        and
biltregerins
,

  —from Jane Medlar, the Dutch Widow,

  —from Pohjola’s Daughters,

  —from Madame Miracola, the zook of

        hell,

  —from Argante, the giantess of

        prostitution,

  —from Dame Wiggins of Lee, the female

        mandrake,

  —from Venus Pandemos, the queen of

        tarts,

  —from Naamah, Noah’s crosseyed wife,

  —from Senta the spiggot-wench,

  —from Paulina Bonaparte,
la pettegola

        
maligna
,

  —from Queen Aigle of Dreiviertelstein,

        who could
fly,

  —from Harriet Wilson, the blackmailing

        waistcoateer,

  —from the Mother of St. Edward

        of Corfe, the
mullipod of villainy,

  —from Queen Dollalolla, the slatterpiece,

  —from Isobel Gowdie the Strix,

  —from Akko and Alphito and all giglots

        and
jillivers,

  —from My Own Middle-Wicketed

        Mingwort of a
Mother . . .”

  Stung with anger, Crucifer went suddenly into a full
hue and cry, alive with self-inflicted hurt, and he rose up, grey,
like Banquo’s ghost, heaping even greater contumely on each and
every name he uttered with each dart of that sarcastic tongue that
looked like a foul pistil issuing from a huge calyx.

  “—from Libitana and her dead eyes,
libera nos,
Domine

  —from Dipsias and her flying wheels,

  —from Lady Alice Kyteler, virago and

        voriander,

  —from Aholibah the aplestous,

  —from Miss Farabutto, the quarrelsome

        fratcher,

  —from Pythia the oracularia,

  —from Ilmator, Creatrix of the World,

  —from Cybele, the Phrygian goddess

        of
fustilugging,

  —from Al Lat, the false idol,

  —from She Who Must Be Obeyed,

  —from Francesca Bassington, the

        belittling
bersatrix,

  —from Mary of Brabant, pavior and

        rumbold,

  —from Albertine Simonet,
la disparue
,

  —from Waila, the Koranic nag,

  —from the Wretched Magpies

        of King
Pieros,

  —from Hélène de Surgères and her cool

        hands,

  —from Evelyn Bedstead, the wanton

        bedswerver,

  —from Athalie, the child butcher,

  —from Columbine, the construpratress

        of all those
commode ladies who

        lend out their
beauty for hire,

  —from Madame Guyon, the gotch-bellied

        tart,

  —from Drusilla, the chamberer,

  —from Gagool, the evil crone of

        Zimbabwe,

  —from Anna Sage, the Lady in Red,

  —from Ninon de Lenclos,
notre dame

        
des
amours
,

  —from Elsche Nebelings, the

        Mouse-Maker,

  —from Dame La Voisin, philtre-seller

        and whore,

  —from Morgan le Fay, the fuxlady,

  —from Penelope Devereux, richest

        of bitches,

  —from Goody Rickby and her noisy

        forges,

  —from Herodias, the jewified bestialator,

  —from Mademoiselle de Maupin and her

        pet muggins,

  —from Philtra, the money stinkard,

  —from La, queen of the Atlantean colony

        of Opar,

  —from Acrasia and her bowery wiles,

  —from Ethel le Neve, snipe and mistress,

  —from Jane Nightwork, the pox-ridden

        fireship,

  —from Centectl, maize mother

        of Mexico,

  —from Syntyche, the sharny-faced

        scrubber,

  —from fierce Camilla, o’er the plain,

  —from Omm Jemil, the scoffing bardash,

  —from the American South and its

        stinking
girleries,

  —from Lady Clara Vere de Vere, the

        proud mincing
peat,

  —from Cunizza da Romano,
la zitella

        
inacidita
,

  —from Hilde Bobbe, the old witch

        of Haarlem,

  —from Mothers Twaddle and Twitchett

        and all weeping
culls and drabs,

  —from Gara Gertsoginia, the gueuse

        of Gazag,

  —from Gricka Vjestica, the Witch of

        Gric,

  —from Laverna, goddess of impostors,

  —from Cicely Yeovil, the yawde,

        the yode, the
yade, the yaud. . .”

  The select and cynically imaginative incantation
exceeded by far the black medieval hymn in conjuring, almost to
fantasm, the meaning of the day of wrath and yet the furious and
driving relentlessness of both proclaimed equally in the full moon
of Dr. Crucifer’s blowing face, its morphs of color increasingly
going to dark as he droned the long profanity out in dry
arundinaceous whistles.

  “—from Atropos and her glittering forfex,
libera
nos, Domine

  —from Empusa the succubus,

  —from Potiphar’s Wife, who hadn’t

        even a name,

  —from Linda Pallant, the finished

        product,

  —from Assma, the sheeny poetess,

  —from Mother Brownrigg, the despicable

        rudas,

  —from Giulia Farnese, concubine

        di Papa
Alessandro VI,

  —from Zipporah the Desertable,

  —from Kali the Black Mother,

  —from Mesdames Goursey and Barnes,

        the Abington
scrubbers,

  —from Anne Boleyn, the princess of

        plackets,

  —from Lady Pecunia and her encomium,

  —from Queen Tiy, who did her thutmose,

  —from Marozia,
la grande horizontale
,

  —from La Belle Dame Sans Merci,

        the terrible
frictrix,

  —from Madame la Mort and the xvi

        gromettes in her
stable,

  —from Lady Giacoma Rodogina,

        the
engastrimythion prophetess,

  —from Dame Trot and her basket of

        eggs,

  —from Aloysia Weber the Unavailable,

  —from the Wife of Bath and her yvel

        preef,

  —from Franceschina, tanakin of the

        Low
Countries,

  —from Miss Flannigan, the Winnipeg

        Whore,

  —from the Great Whore of Revelations,

  —from Signora Cianculli, the soapmaker

        of Reggio,

  —from Roxana, Countess of Wintelsheim,

  —from Mary Powell Milton,

        the troublesome
hindermate,

  —from Proserpina, Crowned Empress

        of the Nether
Clefts of Hell,

  —from Queen Athaliah, court wanton,

  —from Boadicea, the bullying bubble,

  —from Katherine de Vausselles,

        the
wheencat,

  —from Aerope the andromaniac,

  —from Mademoiselle Maximum

        the
maculate,

  —from Volumnia, iron-boweled mother

        of
Coriolanus,

  —from Penelope Whorehound, harlot

        of
Bridewell,

  —from Madeleine Amalaric, the nativity

        caster,

  —from The Red Queen and her scarlet

        queynt,

  —from Vidosava, wife of Vojvoda

        Momcilo,

  —from Procne, filiocide,

  —from Anna Keller Haydn,

        the
spoonpinching greedigut,

  —from Melusine, the kitchen malkin,

  —from Creseide, the cold-hearted

        
enjôleuse
,

  —from Tubby Ursula, the Fatness

        of the Fair,

  —from Erichtho the Karcist,

  —from bat-eyed Madame du Deffand,

        
notre dame
de lorette
,

  —from Vittoria Corombona, the devil

        in crystal,

  —from Lucilla and her curious curio,

  —from Mamaloi, the twigger of the

        West Indies,

  —from Athé, heron-thighed goddess

        of
peevishness,

  —from Livia Augusta, the leporine,

  —from Mother Laquedem the Yenta,

  —from Niphleseth, queen of the

        chitterlings,

  —from the Phrygian Cybele and her

        eunuch
pontifesses,

  —from Mademoiselle Scudéry, the urning,

  —from the Lady Dunya, the land-frigate,

  —from Isis, the female pope of secret

        religions,

  —from the Princess Badroulbadour,

        out of the
tomb,

  —from Madame de Maintenon

        and her beavroys
and

        ridinghoods. .
.”

  Then the “Lacrymosa” began: the grief in the musical
flats of the long mournful lament, like fatal heartache, repeatedly
sobbing themselves out like ancient questions, and Crucifer now,
almost as if turning away from himself, as if now leaving the
exequies involved in the burial of a thousand corpses to the
unearthly infection of the music alone, revolved, drifted, around
the room, almost hypnotized himself, his hands down by his sides as
though they were both dead, but he never stopped the murmuring. It
was incessant, brutal, eternal.

  “—from the Blue Hag of Leicester,
libera nos,
Domine

  —from Asenath Waite, the psychovore,

  —from Queen Hiera, the cuckquean,

  —from Ramping Alice and her riggish

        zooks and
mawks,

  —from Aello, Ocypete, and Celeno, the

        triple extract
of infamy,

  —from Roxalana, the quean

        of
bawdreaminy,

  —from Hélène Kuryagin, the
otorva
,

  —from the Women of the Sidhe,

  —from Queen Quintessence and her

        rhubarb
soul,

  —from Undine, the wayward watersprite,

  —from Baba Yaga, bronzestrops

        and blowze,

  —from Elizabeth Sawyer, the Witch

        of Edmonton,

  —from Alcina, the flatbacker,

  —from the Duchess of Wonderland,

  —from the bandit Lara and her cyprian

        patrol,

  —from Amine, the wicked inquisitrix,

  —from Lizzie Eustace, the sorceress

        unsorcelled,

  —from Termagant, Mohammed’s

        shrewish
wife,

  —from Julie de Lespinasse,
la
liaisonesse
,

  —from Europa who diddled a bull,

  —from Mutter Frauenwelt, die Herrinnen

        der Herren,

  —from the Yakshas of the Himalayas,

  —from Thel, the small-souled theme,

  —from the Lady Governors of the Old

        Men’s Home at
Haarlem,

  —from Gabrina the jillet,

  —from Mistress Alice Arden, stabfiend,

  —from Sappho, the silly
gousse
,

  —from Lucretia Estense Borgia,

        the
lycanthrophile,

  —from Alyona Ivanovna the pawnbroker,

  —from Yolara of the moon pool,

  —from the Comtesse d’Orgueil,

        the Duchesse
d’Argent, and Madame

        de Grandes
Titres, the unpartial

        daughters of
necessity,

  —from Gulfora, Queen of the Sabbat,

  —from Odette de Crécy and her

        cotqueanity,

  —from Ixtab, Mayan goddess of suicide,

  —from Minerva and her celestial trollops,

  —from Belphoebe, the perforated virgin,

  —from Gort à Bhaile, the femina of

        famine,

  —from Madame Anima and her firehaired