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diff --git a/23678.txt b/23678.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..03598d9 --- /dev/null +++ b/23678.txt @@ -0,0 +1,4617 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Tales of Fantasy and Fact, by Brander Matthews + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Tales of Fantasy and Fact + +Author: Brander Matthews + +Release Date: December 2, 2007 [EBook #23678] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TALES OF FANTASY AND FACT *** + + + + +Produced by Bethanne M. Simms and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + +Transcriber's Note: Minor typographical errors have been corrected +without note. Dialect spellings, contractions and discrepancies have +been retained. + + +[Illustration: LOST AGAIN + P. 136] + + + + +TALES OF FANTASY AND FACT + + + +By + +BRANDER MATTHEWS + + + +NEW YORK +HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS +1896 + + + +BOOKS BY BRANDER MATTHEWS. + +THE THEATRES OF PARIS. +FRENCH DRAMATISTS OF THE 19TH CENTURY. +THE LAST MEETING, a Story. +A SECRET OF THE SEA, and Other Stories. +PEN AND INK: Essays on Subjects of More or Less Importance. +A FAMILY TREE, and Other Stories. +WITH MY FRIENDS: Tales Told in Partnership. +A TALE OF TWENTY-FIVE HOURS. +TOM PAULDING, a Story for Boys. +IN THE VESTIBULE LIMITED, a Story. +AMERICANISMS AND BRITICISMS, with Other Essays on Other Isms. +THE STORY OF A STORY, and Other Stories. +THE DECISION OF THE COURT, a Comedy. +STUDIES OF THE STAGE. +THIS PICTURE AND THAT, a Comedy. +VIGNETTES OF MANHATTAN. +THE ROYAL MARINE, an Idyl of Narragansett. +BOOK-BINDINGS, Old and New; Notes of a Book-Lover. +HIS FATHER'S SON, a Novel of New York. +AN INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY OF AMERICAN LITERATURE. +TALES OF FANTASY AND FACT. +ASPECTS OF FICTION, and Other Ventures in Criticism. (In Press.) + +Copyright, 1896, by HARPER & BROTHERS. +_All rights reserved._ + + + + +TO +THE MEMORY OF MY FRIEND +H. C. BUNNER + + + + +CONTENTS + + + Page + +A PRIMER OF IMAGINARY GEOGRAPHY 3 + +THE KINETOSCOPE OF TIME 27 + +THE DREAM-GOWN OF THE JAPANESE AMBASSADOR 57 + +THE RIVAL GHOSTS 93 + +SIXTEEN YEARS WITHOUT A BIRTHDAY 131 + +THE TWINKLING OF AN EYE 143 + +A CONFIDENTIAL POSTSCRIPT 207 + + + + +A PRIMER OF IMAGINARY GEOGRAPHY + + +"Ship ahoy!" + +There was an answer from our bark--for such it seemed to me by this +time--but I could not make out the words. + +"Where do you hail from?" was the next question. + +I strained my ears to catch the response, being naturally anxious to +know whence I had come. + +"From the City of Destruction!" was what I thought I heard; and I +confess that it surprised me not a little. + +"Where are you bound?" was asked in turn. + +Again I listened with intensest interest, and again did the reply +astonish me greatly. + +"Ultima Thule!" was the answer from our boat, and the voice of the man +who answered was deep and melancholy. + +Then I knew that I had set out strange countries for to see, and that I +was all unequipped for so distant a voyage. Thule I knew, or at least I +had heard of the king who reigned there once and who cast his goblet +into the sea. But Ultima Thule! was not that beyond the uttermost +borders of the earth? + +"Any passengers?" was the next query, and I noted that the voice came +now from the left and was almost abreast of us. + +"One only," responded the captain of our boat. + +"Where bound?" was the final inquiry. + +"To the Fortunate Islands!" was the answer; and as I heard this my +spirits rose again, and I was glad, as what man would not be who was on +his way to the paradise where the crimson-flowered meadows are full of +the shade of frankincense-trees and of fruits of gold? + +Then the boat bounded forward again, and I heard the wash of the waves. + +All this time it seemed as though I were in darkness; but now I began +dimly to discern the objects about me. I found that I was lying on a +settee in a state-room at the stern of the vessel. Through the small +round window over my head the first rays of the rising sun darted and +soon lighted the little cabin. + +As I looked about me with curiosity, wondering how I came to be a +passenger on so unexpected a voyage, I saw the figure of a man framed +in the doorway at the foot of the stairs leading to the deck above. + +How it was I do not know, but I made sure at once that he was the +captain of the ship, the man whose voice I had heard answering the +hail. + +He was tall and dark, with a scant beard and a fiery and piercing gaze, +which penetrated me as I faced him. Yet the expression of his +countenance was not unfriendly; nor could any man lay eyes upon him +without a movement of pity for the sadness written on his visage. + +I rose to my feet as he came forward. + +"Well," he said, holding out his hand, "and how are you after your +nap?" + +He spoke our language with ease and yet with a foreign accent. Perhaps +it was this which betrayed him to me. + +"Are you not Captain Vanderdecken?" I asked as I took his hand +heartily. + +"So you know me?" he returned, with a mournful little laugh, as he +motioned to me to sit down again. + +Thus the ice was broken, and he took his seat by my side, and we were +soon deep in talk. + +When he learned that I was a loyal New-Yorker, his cordiality +increased. + +"I have relatives in New Amsterdam," he cried; "at least I had once. +Diedrich Knickerbocker was my first cousin. And do you know Rip Van +Winkle?" + +Although I could not claim any close friendship with this gentleman, I +boasted myself fully acquainted with his history. + +"Yes, yes," said Captain Vanderdecken, "I suppose he was before your +time. Most people are so short-lived nowadays; it's only with that +Wandering Jew now that I ever have a chat over old times. Well, well, +but you have heard of Rip? Were you ever told that I was on a visit to +Hendrik Hudson the night Rip went up the mountain and took a drop too +much?" + +I had to confess that here was a fact I had not before known. + +"I ran up the river," said the Hollander, "to have a game of bowls with +the Englishman and his crew, nearly all of them countrymen of mine; +and, by-the-way, Hudson always insists that it was I who brought the +storm with me that gave poor Rip Van Winkle the rheumatism as he slept +off his intoxication on the hillside under the pines. He was a good +fellow, Rip, and a very good judge of schnapps, too." + +Seeing him smile with the pleasant memories of past companionship, I +marvelled when the sorrowful expression swiftly covered his face again +as a mask. + +"But why talk of those who are dead and gone and are happy?" he asked +in his deep voice. "Soon there will be no one left, perhaps, but +Ahasuerus and Vanderdecken--the Wandering Jew and the Flying Dutchman." + +He sighed bitterly, and then he gave a short, hard laugh. + +"There's no use talking about these things, is there?" he cried. "In an +hour or two, if the wind holds, I can show you the house in which +Ahasuerus has established his museum, the only solace of his lonely +life. He has the most extraordinary gathering of curiosities the world +has ever seen--truly a virtuoso's collection. An American reporter came +on a voyage with me fifty or sixty years ago, and I took him over +there. His name was Hawthorne. He interviewed the Jew, and wrote up the +collection in the American papers, so I've been told." + +"I remember reading the interview," I said, "and it was indeed a most +remarkable collection." + +"It's all the more curious now for the odds and ends I've been able to +pick up here and there for my old friend," Vanderdecken declared; "I +got him the horn of Hernani, the harpoon with which Long Tom Coffin +pinned the British officer to the mast, the long rifle of Natty Bumppo, +the letter A in scarlet cloth embroidered in gold by Hester Prynne, the +banner with the strange device 'Excelsior,' the gold bug which was once +used as a plummet, Maud Muller's rake, and the jack-knives of Hosea +Biglow and Sam Lawson." + +"You must have seen extraordinary things yourself," I ventured to +suggest. + +"No man has seen stranger," he answered, promptly. "No man has ever +been witness to more marvellous deeds than I--not even Ahasuerus, I +verily believe, for he has only the land, and I have the boundless sea. +I survey mankind from China to Peru. I have heard the horns of elfland +blowing, and I could tell you the song the sirens sang. I have dropped +anchor at the No Man's Land, and off Lyonesse, and in Xanadu, where +Alph the sacred river ran. I have sailed from the still-vexed +Bermoothes to the New Atlantis, of which there is no mention even until +the year 1629." + +"In which year there was published an account of it written in the +Latin tongue, but by an Englishman," I said, desirous to reveal my +acquirements. + +"I have seen every strange coast," continued the Flying Dutchman. "The +Island of Bells and Robinson Crusoe's Island and the Kingdoms of +Brobdingnag and Lilliput. But it is not for me to vaunt myself for my +voyages. And of a truth there are men I should like to have met and +talked with whom I have yet failed to see. Especially is there one +Ulysses, a sailor-man of antiquity who called himself Outis, whence I +have sometimes suspected that he came from the town of Weissnichtwo." + +Just to discover what Vanderdecken would say, I inquired innocently +whether this was the same person as one Captain Nemo of whose submarine +exploits I had read. + +"Captain Nemo?" the Flying Dutchman repeated scornfully. "I never heard +of him. Are you sure there is such a fellow?" + +I tried to turn the conversation by asking if he had ever met another +ancient mariner named Charon. + +"Oh, yes," was his answer. "Charon keeps the ferry across the Styx to +the Elysian Fields, past the sunless marsh of Acheron. Yes--I've met +him more than once. I met him only last month, and he was very proud of +his new electric launch with its storage battery." + +When I expressed my surprise at this, he asked me if I did not know +that the underworld was now lighted by electricity, and that Pluto had +put in all the modern improvements. Before I had time to answer, he +rose from his seat and slapped me on the shoulder. + +"Come up with me!--if you want to behold things for yourself," he +cried. "So far, it seems to me, you have never seen the sights!" + +I followed him on deck. The sun was now two hours high, and I could +just make out a faint line of land on the horizon. + +"That rugged coast is Bohemia, which is really a desert country by the +sea, although ignorant and bigoted pedants have dared to deny it," and +the scorn of my companion as he said this was wonderful to see. "Its +borders touch Alsatia, of which the chief town is a city of refuge. Not +far inland, but a little to the south, is the beautiful Forest of +Arden, where men and maids dwell together in amity, and where clowns +wander, making love to shepherdesses. Some of these same pestilent +pedants have pretended to believe that this forest of Arden was +situated in France, which is absurd, as there are no serpents and no +lions in France, while we have the best of evidence as to the existence +of both in Arden--you know that, don't you?" + +I admitted that a green and gilded snake and a lioness with udders all +drawn dry were known to have been seen there both on the same day. I +ventured to suggest further that possibly this Forest of Arden was the +Wandering Wood where Una met her lion. + +"Of course," was the curt response; "everybody knows that Arden is a +most beautiful region; even the toads there have precious jewels in +their heads. And if you range the forest freely you may chance to find +also the White Doe of Rylstone and the goat with the gilded horns that +told fortunes in Paris long ago by tapping with his hoof on a +tambourine." + +"These, then, are the Happy Hunting-Grounds?" I suggested with a light +laugh. + +"Who would chase a tame goat?" he retorted with ill-concealed contempt +for my ill-advised remark. + +I thought it best to keep silence; and after a minute or two he resumed +the conversation, like one who is glad of a good listener. + +"In the outskirts of the Forest of Arden," he began again, "stands +the Abbey of Thelema--the only abbey which is bounded by no wall +and in which there is no clock at all nor any dial. And what need is +there of knowing the time when one has for companions only comely and +well-conditioned men and fair women of sweet disposition? And the motto +of the Abbey of Thelema is _Fais ce que voudra_--Do what you will; and +many of those who dwell in the Forest of Arden will tell you that they +have taken this also for their device, and that if you live under the +greenwood tree you may spend your life--as you like it." + +I acknowledged that this claim was probably well founded, since I +recalled a song of the foresters in which they declared themselves +without an enemy but winter and rough weather. + +"Yes," he went on, "they are fond of singing in the Forest of Arden, +and they sing good songs. And so they do in the fair land beyond where +I have never been, and which I can never hope to go to see for myself, +if all that they report be true--and yet what would I not give to see +it and to die there." + +And as he said this sadly, his voice sank into a sigh. + +"And where does the road through the forest lead, that you so much wish +to set forth upon it?" I asked. + +"That's the way to Arcady," he said--"to Arcady where all the leaves +are merry. I may not go there, though I long for it. Those who attain +to its borders never come back again--and why should they leave it? Yet +there are tales told, and I have heard that this Arcady is the +veritable El Dorado, and that in it is the true Fountain of Youth, +gushing forth unfailingly for the refreshment of all who may reach it. +But no one may find the entrance who cannot see it by the light that +never was on land or sea." + +"It must be a favored region," I remarked. + +"Of a truth it is," he answered; "and on the way there is the orchard +where grow the golden apples of Hesperides, and the dragon is dead now +that used to guard them, and so any one may help himself to the +beautiful fruit. And by the side of the orchard flows the river Lethe, +of which it is not well for man to drink, though many men would taste +it gladly." And again he sighed. + +I knew not what to say, and so waited for him to speak once more. + +"That promontory there on the weather bow," he began again after a few +moments' silence, "that is Barataria, which was long supposed to be an +island by its former governor, Don Sancho Panza, but which is now known +by all to be connected with the mainland. Pleasant pastures slope down +to the water, and if we were closer in shore you might chance to see +Rozinante, the famous charger of Don Quixote de la Mancha, grazing +amicably with the horse that brought the good news from Ghent to Aix." + +"I wish I could see them!" I cried, enthusiastically; "but there is +another horse I would rather behold than any--the winged steed +Pegasus." + +Before responding, my guide raised his hand and shaded his eyes and +scanned the horizon. + +"No," he said at last. "I cannot descry any this afternoon. Sometimes +in these latitudes I have seen a dozen hippogriffs circling about the +ship, and I should like to have shown them to you. Perhaps they are all +in the paddock at the stock-farm, where Apollo is now mating them with +night-mares in the hope of improving the breed from which he selects +the coursers that draw the chariot of the sun. They say that the +experiment would have more chance of success if it were easier to find +the night-mares' nests." + +"It was not a hippogriff I desired to see especially," I returned when +he paused, "although that would be interesting, no doubt. It was the +renowned Pegasus himself." + +"Pegasus is much like the other hippogriffs," he retorted, "although +perhaps he has a little better record than any of them. But they say he +has not won a single aerial handicap since that American professor of +yours harnessed him to a one-hoss shay. That seemed to break his +spirit, somehow; and I'm told he would shy now even at a broomstick +train." + +"Even if he is out of condition," I declared, "Pegasus is still the +steed I desire to see above all." + +"I haven't set eyes on him for weeks," was the answer, "so he is +probably moulting; this is the time of year. He has a roomy boxstall in +the new Augean stable at the foot of Mount Parnassus. You know they +have turned the spring of Castaly so that it flows through the +stable-yard now, and so it is easy enough to keep the place clean." + +"If I may not see Pegasus," I asked, "is there any chance of my being +taken to the Castle of the Sleeping Beauty?" + +"I have never seen it myself," he replied, "and so I cannot show it to +you. Rarely indeed may I leave the deck of my ship to go ashore; and +this castle that you ask about is very far inland. I am told that it is +in a country which the French travellers call _La Scribie_, a curious +land, wherein the scene is laid of many a play, because its laws and +its customs are exactly what every playwright has need of; but no poet +has visited it for many years. Yet the Grand Duchess of Gerolstein, +whose domains lie partly within the boundaries of Scribia, is still a +subscriber to the _Gazette de Hollande_--the only newspaper I take +himself, by the way." + +This last remark of the Captain's explained how it was that he had +been able to keep up with the news of the day, despite his constant +wanderings over the waste of waters; and what more natural in fact than +that the Flying Dutchman should be a regular reader of the _Holland +Gazette_? + +Vanderdecken went forward into the prow of the vessel, calling to me to +follow. + +"Do you see those peaks afar in the distance?" he asked, pointing over +the starboard bow. + +I could just make out a saw-like outline in the direction indicated. + +"Those are the Delectable Mountains," he informed me; "and down on a +hollow between the two ranges is the Happy Valley." + +"Where Rasselas lived?" + +"Yes," he replied, "and beyond the Delectable Mountains, on the far +slope, lies Prester John's Kingdom, and there dwell anthropophagi, and +men whose heads do grow beneath their shoulders. At least, so they say. +For my part, I have never seen any such. And I have now no desire to go +to Prester John's Kingdom, since I have been told that he has lately +married Pope Joan. Do you see that grove of trees there at the base of +the mountains?" + +I answered that I thought I could distinguish weirdly contorted +branches and strangely shivering foliage. + +"That is the deadly upas-tree," he explained, "and it is as much as a +man's life is worth to lie down in the shade of its twisted limbs. I +slept there, on that point where the trees are the thickest, for a +fortnight a century or so ago--but all I had for my pains was a +headache. Still I should not advise you to adventure yourself under the +shadow of those melancholy boughs." + +I confess at once that I was little prompted to a visit so dangerous +and so profitless. + +"Profitless?" he repeated. "As to that I am not so certain, for if you +have a mind to see the rarest animals in the world, you could there +sate your curiosity. On the shore, between the foot-hills and the grove +of upas, is a park of wild beasts, the like of which no man has looked +upon elsewhere. Even from the deck of this ship I have seen more than +once a drove of unicorns, or a herd of centaurs, come down to the water +to drink; and sometimes I have caught a pleasant glimpse of satyrs and +fauns dancing in the sunlight. And once indeed--I shall never forget +that extraordinary spectacle--as I sped past with every sail set and a +ten-knot breeze astern, I saw the phoenix blaze up in its new birth, +while the little salamanders frisked in the intense flame." + +"The phoenix?" I cried. "You have seen the phoenix?" + +"In just this latitude," he answered, "but it was about nine o'clock in +the evening and I remember that the new moon was setting behind the +mountains when I happened to come on deck." + +"And what was the phoenix like?" I asked. + +"Really," he replied, "the bird was almost as Herodotus described her, +of the make and size of the eagle, with a plumage partly red and partly +golden. If we go by the point by noon, perhaps you may see her for +yourself." + +"Is she there still?" I asked, in wonder. + +"Why not?" he returned. "All the game of this sort is carefully +preserved and the law is off on phoenixes only once in a century. +Why, if it were not for the keepers, there soon would not be a single +griffin or dragon left, not a single sphinx, not a single chimaera. Even +as it is, I am told they do not breed as freely now as when they could +roam the whole world in safety. That is why the game laws are so +rigorous. Indeed, I am informed and believe that it is not permitted to +kill the were-wolves even when their howling, as they run at large at +night, prevents all sleep. It is true, of course, that very few people +care to remain in such a neighborhood." + +"I should think not," I agreed. "And what manner of people are they who +dare to live here?" + +"Along the shore there are a few harpies," he answered; "and now and +then I have seen a mermaid on the rocks combing her hair with a golden +comb as she sang to herself." + +"Harpies?" I repeated, in disgust. "Why not the sea-serpent also?" + +"There was a sea-serpent which lived for years in that cove yonder," +said the Captain, pointing to a pleasant bay on the starboard, "but I +have not seen it lately. Unless I am in error, it had a pitched battle +hereabouts with a kraken. I don't remember who got the better of the +fight--but I haven't seen the snake since." + +As I scanned the surface of the water to see if I might not detect some +trace of one or another of these marvellous beasts of the sea, I +remarked a bank of fog lying across our course. + +"And what is this that we are coming to?" I inquired. + +"That?" Captain Vanderdecken responded, indicating the misty outline +straight before us. "That is Altruria--at least it is so down in the +charts, but I have never set eyes on it actually. It belongs to Utopia, +you know; and they say that, although it is now on the level of the +earth, it used once to be a flying island--the same which was formerly +known as Laputa, and which was first visited and described by Captain +Lemuel Gulliver about the year 1727, or a little earlier." + +"So that is Altruria," I said, trying in vain to see it more clearly. +"There was an Altrurian in New York not long ago, but I had no chance +of speech with him." + +"They are pleasant folk, those Altrurians," said the Captain, "although +rather given to boasting. And they have really little enough to brag +about, after all. Their climate is execrable--I find it ever windy +hereabouts, and when I get in sight of that bank of fog, I always look +out for squalls. I don't know just what the population is now, but I +doubt if it is growing. You see, people talk about moving there to +live, but they are rarely in a hurry to do it, I notice. Nor are the +manufactures of the Altrurians as many as they were said to be. Their +chief export now is the famous Procrustean bed; although the old house +of Damocles & Co. still does a good business in swords. Their tonnage +is not what it used to be, and I'm told that they are issuing a good +deal of paper money now to try and keep the balance of trade in their +favor." + +"Are there not many poets among the inhabitants of Altruria?" I asked. + +"They are all poets and romancers of one kind or another," declared the +Captain. "Come below again into the cabin, and I will show you some of +their books." + +The sky was now overcast and there was a chill wind blowing, so I was +not at all loath to leave the deck, and to follow Vanderdecken down the +steps into the cabin. + +He took a thin volume from the table. "This," he said, "is one of their +books--'News from Nowhere,' it is called." + +He extended it towards me, and I held out my hand for it, but it +slipped through my fingers. I started forward in a vain effort to seize +it. + +As I did so, the walls and the floor of the cabin seemed to melt away +and to dissolve in air, and beyond them and taking their place were the +walls and floor of my own house. Then suddenly the clock on the +mantelpiece struck five, and I heard a bob-tail car rattling and +clattering past the door on its way across town to Union Square, and +thence to Greenwich Village, and so on down to the Hoboken Ferry. + +Then I found myself on my own sofa, bending forward to pick up the +volume of Cyrano de Bergerac, which lay on the carpet at my feet. I sat +up erect and collected my thoughts as best I could after so strange a +journey. And I wondered why it was that no one had ever prepared a +primer of imaginary geography, giving to airy nothings a local +habitation and a name, and accompanying it with an atlas of maps in the +manner of the _Carte du Pays de Tendre_. + +(1894.) + + + + +THE KINETOSCOPE OF TIME + + +As the twelfth stroke of the bell in the tower at the corner tolled +forth slowly, the midnight wind blew chill down the deserted avenue, +and swept it clear of all belated wayfarers. The bare trees in the thin +strip of park clashed their lifeless branches; the river far below +slipped along silently. There was no moon, and the stars were shrouded. +It was a black night. Yet far in the distance there was a gleam of +cheerful light which lured me on and on. I could not have said why it +was that I had ventured forth at that hour on such a night. It seemed +to me as though the yellow glimmer I beheld afar off was the goal of my +excursion. Something within whispered to me then that I need go no +farther when once I had come to the spot whence the soft glare +proceeded. + +The pall of darkness was so dense that I could not see the sparse +houses I chanced to pass, nor did I know where I was any more. I urged +forward blindly, walking towards the light, which was all that broke +the blackness before me; its faint illumination seemed to me somehow to +be kindly, inviting, irresistible. At last I came to a halt in front of +a building I had never before seen, although I thought myself well +acquainted with that part of the city. It was a circular edifice, or so +it seemed to me then; and I judged that it had but a single story, or +two, at the most. The door stood open to the street; and it was from +this that the light was cast. So dim was this illumination now I had +come to it that I marvelled I could have seen it at all afar off as I +was when first I caught sight of it. + +While I stood at the portal of the unsuspected edifice, peering +doubtfully within, wondering to what end I had been led thither, and +hesitating as to my next step, I felt again the impulse to go forward. +At that moment tiny darts of fire, as it were, glowed at the end of the +hall that opened before me, and they ran together rapidly and joined in +liquid lines and then faded as suddenly as they had come--but not too +soon for me to read the simple legend they had written in the air--an +invitation to me, so I interpreted it, to go forward again, to enter +the building, and to see for myself why I had been enticed there. + +Without hesitation I obeyed. I walked through the doorway, and I became +conscious that the door had closed behind me as I pressed forward. The +passage was narrow and but faintly lighted; it bent to the right with a +circular sweep as though it skirted the inner circumference of the +building; still curving, it sank by a gentle gradient; and then it rose +again and turned almost at right angles. Pushing ahead resolutely, +although in not a little doubt as to the meaning of my adventure, I +thrust aside a heavy curtain, soft to the hand. Then I found myself +just inside a large circular hall. Letting the hangings fall behind me, +I took three or four irresolute paces which brought me almost to the +centre of the room. I saw that the walls were continuously draped with +the heavy folds of the same soft velvet, so that I could not even guess +where it was I had entered. The rotunda was bare of all furniture; +there was no table in it, no chair, no sofa; nor was anything hanging +from the ceiling or against the curtained walls. All that the room +contained was a set of four curiously shaped narrow stands, placed over +against one another at the corners of what might be a square drawn +within the circle of the hall. These narrow stands were close to the +curtains; they were perhaps a foot wide, each of them, or it might be a +little more: they were twice or three times as long as they were wide; +and they reached a height of possibly three or four feet. + +Going towards one of these stands to examine it more curiously, I +discovered that there were two projections from the top, resembling +eye-pieces, as though inviting the beholder to gaze into the inside of +the stand. Then I thought I heard a faint metallic click above my head. +Raising my eyes swiftly, I read a few words written, as it were, +against the dark velvet of the heavy curtains in dots of flame that +flowed one into the other and melted away in a moment. When this +mysterious legend had faded absolutely, I could not recall the words I +had read in the fitful and flitting letters of fire, and yet I retained +the meaning of the message; and I understood that if I chose to peer +through the eye-pieces I should see a succession of strange dances. + +To gaze upon dancing was not what I had gone forth to do, but I saw no +reason why I should not do so, as I was thus strangely bidden. I +lowered my head until my eyes were close to the two openings at the top +of the stand. I looked into blackness at first, and yet I thought that +I could detect a mystic commotion of the invisible particles at which I +was staring. I made no doubt that, if I waited, in due season the +promise would be fulfilled. After a period of expectancy which I could +not measure, infinitesimal sparks darted hither and thither, and there +was a slight crackling sound. I concentrated my attention on what I was +about to see; and in a moment more I was rewarded. + +The darkness took shape and robed itself in color; and there arose out +of it a spacious banquet-hall, where many guests sat at supper. I could +not make out whether they were Romans or Orientals; the structure +itself had a Latin solidity, but the decorations were Eastern in their +glowing gorgeousness. The hall was illumined by hanging lamps, by the +light of which I tried to decide whether the ruler who sat in the seat +of honor was a Roman or an Oriental. The beautiful woman beside him +struck me as Eastern beyond all question. While I gazed intently he +turned to her and proffered a request. She smiled acquiescence, and +there was a flash of anticipated triumph in her eye as she beckoned to +a menial and sent him forth with a message. A movement as of expectancy +ran around the tables where the guests sat at meat. The attendants +opened wide the portals and a young girl came forward. She was perhaps +fourteen or fifteen years of age, but in the East women ripen young, +and her beauty was indisputable. She had large, deep eyes and a full +mouth; and there was a chain of silver and golden coins twisted into +her coppery hair. She was so like to the woman who sat beside the ruler +that I did not doubt them to be mother and daughter. At a word from the +elder the younger began to dance; and her dance was Oriental, slow at +first, but holding every eye with its sensual fascination. The girl was +a mistress of the art; and not a man in the room withdrew his gaze from +her till she made an end and stood motionless before the ruler. He said +a few words I could not hear, and then the daughter turned to the +mother for guidance; and again I caught the flash of triumph in the +elder woman's eye and on her face the suggestion of a hatred about to +be glutted. And then the light faded and the darkness settled down on +the scene and I saw no more. + +I did not raise my head from the stand, for I felt sure that this was +not all I was to behold; and in a few moments there was again a faint +scintillation. In time the light was strong enough for me to perceive +the irregular flames of a huge bonfire burning in an old square of some +mediaeval city. It was evening, and yet a throng of men and women and +children made an oval about the fire and about a slim girl who had +spread Persian carpet on the rough stones of the broad street. She was +a brunette, with dense black hair; she wore a striped skirt, and a +jacket braided with gold had slipped from her bare shoulders. She held +a tambourine in her hand and she was twisting and turning in cadence to +her own song. Then she went to one side where stood a white goat with +gilded horns and put down her tambourine and took up two swords; and +with these in her hands she resumed her dance. A man in the throng, a +man of scant thirty-five, but already bald, a man of stalwart frame, +fixed hot eyes upon her; and from time to time a smile and a sigh met +on his lips, but the smile was more dolorous than the sigh. And as the +gypsy girl ceased her joyous gyrations, the bonfire died out, and +darkness fell on the scene again, and I could no longer see anything. + +Again I waited, and after an interval no longer than the other there +came a faint glow that grew until I saw clearly as in the morning sun +the glade of a forest through which a brook rippled. A sad-faced woman +sat on a stone by the side of the streamlet; her gray garments set off +the strange ornament in the fashion of a single letter of the alphabet +that was embroidered in gold and in scarlet over her heart. Visible at +some distance was a little girl, like a bright-apparelled vision, in a +sunbeam, which fell down upon her through an arch of boughs. The ray +quivered to and fro, making her figure dim or distinct, now like a real +child, now like a child's spirit, as the splendor came and went. With +violets and anemones and columbines the little girl had decorated her +hair. The mother looked at the child and the child danced and sparkled +and prattled airily along the course of the streamlet, which kept up a +babble, kind, quiet, soothing, but melancholy. Then the mother raised +her head as though her ears had detected the approach of some one +through the wood. But before I could see who this newcomer might be, +once more the darkness settled down upon the scene. + +This time I knew the interval between the succeeding visions and I +waited without impatience; and in due season I found myself gazing at a +picture as different as might be from any I had yet beheld. + +In the broad parlor of a house that seemed to be spacious, a +middle-aged lady, of an appearance at once austere and kindly, was +looking at a smiling gentleman who was coming towards her pulling along +a little negro girl about eight or nine years of age. She was one of +the blackest of her race; and her round, shining eyes, glittering as +glass beads, moved with quick and restless glances over everything in +the room. Her woolly hair was braided in sundry little tails, which +stuck out in every direction. She was dressed in a single filthy, +ragged garment, made of bagging; and altogether there was something odd +and goblin-like about her appearance. The severe old maid examined this +strange creature in dismay and then directed a glance of inquiry at the +gentleman in white. He smiled again and gave a signal to the little +negro girl. Whereupon the black eyes glittered with a kind of wicked +drollery, and apparently she began to sing, keeping time with her hands +and feet, spinning round, clapping her hands, knocking her knees +together, in a wild, fantastic sort of time; and finally, turning a +somersault or two, she came suddenly down on the carpet, and stood with +her hands folded, and a most sanctimonious expression of meekness and +solemnity over her face, only broken by the cunning glances which she +shot askance from the corners of her eyes. The elderly lady stood +silent, perfectly paralyzed with amazement, while the smiling gentleman +in white was amused at her astonishment. + +Once more the vision faded. And when, after the same interval, the +darkness began to disappear again, even while everything was dim and +indistinct I knew that the scene was shifted from the South to the +North. I saw a room comfortably furnished, with a fire smouldering in a +porcelain stove. In a corner stood a stripped Christmas-tree, with its +candles burned out. Against the wall between the two doors was a piano, +on which a man was playing--a man who twisted his head now and again to +look over his shoulder, sometimes at another and younger man standing +by the stove, sometimes at a young woman who was dancing alone in the +centre of the room. This young woman had draped herself in a long +parti-colored shawl and she held a tambourine in her hand. There was in +her eyes a look of fear, as of one conscious of an impending +misfortune. As I gazed she danced more and more wildly. The man +standing by the porcelain stove was apparently making suggestions, to +which she paid no heed. At last her hair broke loose and fell over her +shoulders; and even this she did not notice, going on with her dancing +as though it were a matter of life and death. Then one of the doors +opened and another woman stood on the threshold. The man at the piano +ceased playing and left the instrument. The dancer paused unwillingly, +and looked pleadingly up into the face of the younger man as he came +forward and put his arm around her. + +And then once more the light died away and I found myself peering into +a void blackness. This time, though I waited long, there were no +crackling sparks announcing another inexplicable vision. I peered +intently into the stand, but I saw nothing. At last I raised my head +and looked about me. Then on the hangings over another of the four +stands, over the one opposite to that into which I had been looking, +there appeared another message, the letters melting one into another in +lines of liquid light; and this told me that in the other stand I +could, if I chose, gaze upon combats as memorable as the delectable +dances I had been beholding. + +I made no hesitation, but crossed the room and took my place before the +other stand and began at once to look through the projecting +eye-pieces. No sooner had I taken this position than the dots of fire +darted across the depth into which I was gazing; and then there came a +full clear light as of a cloudless sky, and I saw the walls of an +ancient city. At the gates of the city there stood a young man, and +toward him there ran a warrior, brandishing a spear, while the bronze +of his helmet and his armor gleamed in the sunlight. And trembling +seized the young man and he fled in fear; and the warrior darted after +him, trusting in his swift feet. Valiant was the flier, but far +mightier he who fleetingly pursued him. At last the young man took +heart and made a stand against the warrior. They faced each other in +light. The warrior hurled his spear and it went over the young man's +head. And the young man then hurled his spear in turn and it struck +fair upon the centre of the warrior's shield. Then the young man drew +his sharp sword that by his flank hung great and strong. But by some +magic the warrior had recovered his spear; and as the young man came +forward he hurled it again, and it drove through the neck of the young +man at the joint of his armor, and he fell in the dust. After that the +sun was darkened; and in a moment more I was looking into an empty +blackness. + +When again the light returned it was once more with the full blaze of +mid-day that the scene was illumined, and the glare of the sun was +reflected from the burning sands of the desert. Two or three palms +arose near a well, and there two horsemen faced each other warily. One +was a Christian knight in a coat of linked mail, over which he wore a +surcoat of embroidered cloth, much frayed and bearing more than once +the arms of the wearer--a couchant leopard. The other was a Saracen, +who was circling swiftly about the knight of the leopard. The crusader +suddenly seized the mace which hung at his saddle-bow, and with a +strong hand and unerring aim sent it crashing against the head of his +foe, who raised his buckler of rhinoceros-hide in time to save his +life, though the force of the blow bore him from the saddle. The knight +spurred his steed forward, but the Saracen leaped into his seat again +without touching the stirrup. While the Christian recovered his mace, +the infidel withdrew to a little distance and strung the short bow he +carried at his back. Then he circled about his foe, whose armor stood +him in good stead, until the seventh shaft apparently found a less +perfect part, and the Christian dropped heavily from his horse. But the +dismounted Oriental found himself suddenly in the grasp of the +European, who had recourse to this artifice to bring his enemy within +his reach. The Saracen was saved again by his agility; and loosing his +sword-belt, which the knight had grasped, he mounted his watching +horse. He had lost his sword and his arrows and his turban, and these +disadvantages seemed to incline him for a truce. He approached the +Christian with his right hand extended, but no longer in a menacing +attitude. What the result of this proffer of a parley might be I could +not observe, for the figures became indistinct, as though a cloud had +settled down on them; and in a few seconds more all was blank before +me. + +When the next scene grew slowly into view I thought for a moment it +might be a continuation of the preceding, for the country I beheld was +also soaking in the hot sunlight of the South, and there was also a +mounted knight in armor. A second glance undeceived me. This knight was +old and thin and worn, and his armor was broken and pieced, and his +helmet was but a barber's basin, and his steed was a pitiful skeleton. +His countenance was sorrowful indeed, but there was that in his manner +which would stop any man from denying his nobility. His eye was fired +with a high purpose and a lofty resolve. In the distance before him +were a group of windmills waving their arms in the air, and the knight +urged forward his wretched horse as though to charge them. Upon an ass +behind him was a fellow of the baser sort, a genial, simple follower, +seemingly serving him as his squire. As the knight pricked forward his +sorry steed and couched his lance, the attendant apparently appealed to +him, and tried to explain, and even ventured on expostulation. But the +knight gave no heed to the protests of the squire, who shook his head +and dutifully followed his master. What the issue of this unequal +combat was to be I could not see, for the inexorable veil of darkness +fell swiftly. + +Even after the stray sparks had again flitted through the blackness +into which I was gazing daylight did not return, and it was with +difficulty I was able at last to make out a vague street in a mediaeval +city doubtfully outlined by the hidden moon. From a window high above +the stones there came a faint glimmer. Under this window stood a +soldier worn with the wars, who carried himself as though glad now to +be at home again. He seemed to hear approaching feet, and he withdrew +into the shadow as two others advanced. One of these was a handsome +youth with an eager face, in which spirituality and sensuality +contended. The other was older, of an uncertain age, and his expression +was mocking and evil; he carried some sort of musical instrument, and +to this he seemed to sing while the younger man looked up at the +window. The soldier came forward angrily and dashed the instrument to +the ground with his sword. Then the newcomers drew also, and the elder +guarded while the younger thrust. There were a few swift passes, and +then the younger of the two lunged fiercely, and the soldier fell back +on the stones wounded to the death. Without a glance behind them, the +two who had withstood his onslaught withdrew, as the window above +opened and a fair-haired girl leaned forth. + +Then nothing was visible, until after an interval the light once more +returned and I saw a sadder scene than any yet. In a hollow of the bare +mountains a little knot of men in dark-blue uniforms were centred about +their commander, whose long locks floated from beneath his broad hat. +Around this small band of no more than a score of soldiers, thousands +of red Indians were raging, with exultant hate in their eyes. The +bodies of dead comrades lay in narrowing circles about the thinning +group of blue-coats. The red men were picking off their few surviving +foes, one by one; and the white men could do nothing, for their +cartridges were all gone. They stood at bay, valiant and defiant, +despite their many wounds; but the line of their implacable foemen was +drawn tighter and tighter about them, and one after another they fell +forward dying or dead, until at last only the long-haired commander was +left, sore wounded but unconquered in spirit. + +When this picture of strong men facing death fearlessly was at last +dissolved into darkness like the others that had gone before, I had an +inward monition that it was the last that would be shown me; and so it +was, for although I kept my place at the stand for two or three minutes +more, no warning sparks dispersed the opaque depth. + +When I raised my head from the eye-pieces, I became conscious that I +was not alone. Almost in the centre of the circular hall stood a +middle-aged man of distinguished appearance, whose eyes were fixed upon +me. I wondered who he was, and whence he had come, and how he had +entered, and what it might be that he wished with me. I caught a +glimpse of a smile that lurked vaguely on his lips. Neither this smile +nor the expression of his eyes was forbidding, though both were uncanny +and inexplicable. He seemed to be conscious of a remoteness which would +render futile any effort of his towards friendliness. + +How long we stood thus staring the one at the other I do not know. My +heart beat heavily and my tongue refused to move when at last I tried +to break the silence. + +Then he spoke, and his voice was low and strong and sweet. + +"You are welcome," he began, and I noted that the accent was slightly +foreign, Italian perhaps, or it might be French. "I am glad always to +show the visions I have under my control to those who will appreciate +them." + +I tried to stammer forth a few words of thanks and of praise for what I +had seen. + +"Did you recognize the strange scenes shown to you by these two +instruments?" he asked, after bowing gently in acknowledgment of my +awkward compliments. + +Then I plucked up courage and made bold to express to him the surprise +I had felt, not only at the marvellous vividness with which the actions +had been repeated before my eyes, like life itself in form and in color +and in motion, but also at the startling fact that some of the things I +had been shown were true and some were false. Some of them had happened +actually to real men and women of flesh and blood, while others were +but bits of vain imagining of those who tell tales as an art and as a +means of livelihood. + +I expressed myself as best I could, clumsily, no doubt; but he listened +patiently and with the smile of toleration on his lips. + +"Yes," he answered, "I understand your surprise that the facts and the +fictions are mingled together in these visions of mine as though there +was little to choose between them. You are not the first to wonder or +to express that wonder; and the rest of them were young like you. When +you are as old as I am--when you have lived as long as I--when you have +seen as much of life as I--then you will know, as I know, that fact is +often inferior to fiction, and that it is often also one and the same +thing; for what might hare been is often quite as true as what actually +was?" + +I did not know what to say in answer to this, and so I said nothing. + +"What would you say to me," he went on--and now it seemed to me that +his smile suggested rather pitying condescension than kindly +toleration--"what would you say to me, if I were to tell you that I +myself have seen all the many visions unrolled before you in these +instruments? What would you say, if I declared that I had gazed on the +dances of Salome and of Esmeralda? that I had beheld the combat of +Achilles and Hector and the mounted fight of Saladin and the Knight of +the Leopard?" + +"You are not Time himself?" I asked in amaze. + +He laughed lightly, and without bitterness or mockery. + +"No," he answered, promptly, "I am not Time himself. And why should you +think so? Have I a scythe? Have I an hour-glass? Have I a forelock? Do +I look so very old, then?" + +I examined him more carefully to answer this last question, and the +more I scrutinized him the more difficult I found it to declare his +age. At first I had thought him to be forty, perhaps, or of a certainty +less than fifty. But now, though his hair was black, though his eye was +bright, though his step was firm, though his gestures were free and +sweeping, I had my doubts; and I thought I could perceive, one after +another, many impalpable signs of extreme old age. + +Then, all at once, he grew restive under my fixed gaze. + +"But it is not about me that we need to waste time now," he said, +impatiently. "You have seen what two of my instruments contain; would +you like now to examine the contents of the other two?" + +I answered in the affirmative. + +"The two you have looked into are gratuitous," he continued. "For what +you beheld in them there is no charge. But a sight of the visions in +the other two or in either one of them must be paid for. So far, you +are welcome as my guest; but if you wish to see any more you must pay +the price." + +I asked what the charge was, as I thrust my hand into my pocket to be +certain that I had my purse with me. + +He saw my gesture, and he smiled once more. + +"The visions I can set before you in those two instruments you have not +yet looked into are visions of your own life," he said. "In that stand +there," and he indicated one behind my back, "you can see five of the +most important episodes of your past." + +I withdrew my hand from my pocket. "I thank you," I said, "but I know +my own past, and I have no wish to see it again, however cheap the +spectacle." + +"Then you will be more interested in the fourth of my instruments," he +said, as he waved his thin, delicate hand towards the stand which stood +in front of me. "In this you can see your future!" + +I made an involuntary step forward; and then, at a second thought, I +shrank back again. + +"The price of this is not high," he continued, "and it is not payable +in money." + +"How, then, should I buy it?" I asked, doubtingly. + +"In life!" he answered, gravely. "The vision of life must be paid for +in life itself. For every ten years of the future which I may unroll +before you here, you must assign me a year of life--twelve months--to +do with as I will." + +Strange as it seems to me now, I did not doubt that he could do as he +declared. I hesitated, and then I fixed my resolve. + +"Thank you," I said, and I saw that he was awaiting my decision +eagerly. "Thank you again for what I have already seen and for what you +proffer me. But my past I have lived once, and there is no need to turn +over again the leaves of that dead record. And the future I must face +as best I may, the more bravely, I think, that I do not know what it +holds in store for me." + +"The price is low," he urged. + +"It must be lower still," I answered; "it might be nothing at all, and +I should still decline. I cannot afford to be impatient now and to +borrow knowledge of the future. I shall know all in good time." + +He seemed not a little disappointed as I said this. + +Then he made a final appeal: "Would you not wish to know even the +matter of your end?" + +"No," I answered. "That is no temptation to me, for whatever it may be +I must find fortitude to undergo it somehow, whether I am to pass away +in my sleep in my bed, or whether I shall have to withstand the chances +of battle and murder and sudden death." + +"That is your last word?" he inquired. + +"I thank you again for what I have seen," I responded, bowing again; +"but my decision is final." + +"Then I will detain you no longer," he said, haughtily, and he walked +towards the circling curtains and swept two of them aside. They draped +themselves back, and I saw before me an opening like that through which +I had entered. + +I followed him, and the curtains dropped behind me as I passed into the +insufficiently illuminated passage beyond. I thought that the +mysterious being with whom I had been conversing had preceded me, but +before I had gone twenty paces I found that I was alone. I pushed +ahead, and my path twisted and turned on itself and rose and fell +irregularly like that by means of which I had made my way into the +unknown edifice. At last I picked my steps down winding stairs, and at +the foot I saw the outline of a door. I pushed it back, and I found +myself in the open air. + +I was in a broad street, and over my head an electric light suddenly +flared out and white-washed the pavement at my feet. At the corner a +train of the elevated railroad rushed by with a clattering roar and a +trailing plume of white steam. Then a cable-car clanged past with +incessant bangs upon its gong. Thus it was that I came back to the +world of actuality. + +I turned to get my bearings, that I might find my way home again. I was +standing almost in front of a shop, the windows of which were filled +with framed engravings. + +One of these caught my eye, and I confess that I was surprised. It was +a portrait of a man--it was a portrait of the man with whom I had been +talking. + +I went close to the window, that I might see it better. The electric +light emphasized the lines of the high-bred face, with its sombre +searching eyes and the air of old-world breeding. There could be no +doubt whatever that the original of this portrait was the man from whom +I had just parted. By the costume I knew that the original had lived in +the last century; and the legend beneath the head, engraved in a +flowing script, asserted this to be a likeness of "_Monsieur le Comte +de Cagliostro_." + +(1895.) + + + + +THE DREAM-GOWN OF THE JAPANESE AMBASSADOR + + +I + +After arranging the Egyptian and Mexican pottery so as to contrast +agreeably with the Dutch and the German beer-mugs on the top of the +bookcase that ran along one wall of the sitting-room, Cosmo Waynflete +went back into the bedroom and took from a half-empty trunk the little +cardboard boxes in which he kept the collection of playing-cards, and +of all manner of outlandish equivalents for these simple instruments of +fortune, picked up here and there during his two or three years of +dilettante travelling in strange countries. At the same time he brought +out a Japanese crystal ball, which he stood upon its silver tripod, +placing it on a little table in one of the windows on each side of the +fireplace; and there the rays of the westering sun lighted it up at +once into translucent loveliness. + +The returned wanderer looked out of the window and saw on one side the +graceful and vigorous tower of the Madison Square Garden, with its +Diana turning in the December wind, while in the other direction he +could look down on the frozen paths of Union Square, only a block +distant, but as far below him almost as though he were gazing down from +a balloon. Then he stepped back into the sitting-room itself, and noted +the comfortable furniture and wood-fire crackling in friendly fashion +on the hearth, and his own personal belongings, scattered here and +there as though they were settling themselves for a stay. Having +arrived from Europe only that morning, he could not but hold himself +lucky to have found these rooms taken for him by the old friend to whom +he had announced his return, and with whom he was to eat his Christmas +dinner that evening. He had not been on shore more than six or seven +hours, and yet the most of his odds and ends were unpacked and already +in place as though they belonged in this new abode. It was true that he +had toiled unceasingly to accomplish this, and as he stood there in his +shirt-sleeves, admiring the results of his labors, he was conscious +also that his muscles were fatigued, and that the easy-chair before the +fire opened its arms temptingly. + +He went again into the bedroom, and took from one of his many trunks a +long, loose garment of pale-gray silk. Apparently this beautiful robe +was intended to serve as a dressing-gown, and as such Cosmo Waynflete +utilized it immediately. The ample folds fell softly about him, and the +rich silk itself seemed to be soothing to his limbs, so delicate was +its fibre and so carefully had it been woven. Around the full skirt +there was embroidery of threads of gold, and again on the open and +flowing sleeves. With the skilful freedom of Japanese art the pattern +of this decoration seemed to suggest the shrubbery about a spring, for +there were strange plants with huge leaves broadly outlined by the +golden threads, and in the midst of them water was seen bubbling from +the earth and lapping gently over the edge of the fountain. As the +returned wanderer thrust his arms into the dressing-gown with its +symbolic embroidery on the skirt and sleeves, he remembered distinctly +the dismal day when he had bought it in a little curiosity-shop in +Nuremberg; and as he fastened across his chest one by one the loops of +silken cord to the three coins which served as buttons down the front +of the robe, he recalled also the time and the place where he had +picked up each of these pieces of gold and silver, one after another. +The first of them was a Persian daric, which he had purchased from a +dealer on the Grand Canal in Venice; and the second was a Spanish peso +struck under Philip II. at Potosi, which he had found in a stall on the +embankment of the Quay Voltaire, in Paris; and the third was a York +shilling, which he had bought from the man who had turned it up in +ploughing a field that sloped to the Hudson near Sleepy Hollow. + +Having thus wrapped himself in this unusual dressing-gown with its +unexpected buttons of gold and silver, Cosmo Waynflete went back into +the front room. He dropped into the arm-chair before the fire. It was +with a smile of physical satisfaction that he stretched out his feet to +the hickory blaze. + +The afternoon was drawing on, and in New York the sun sets early on +Christmas day. The red rays shot into the window almost horizontally, +and they filled the crystal globe with a curious light. Cosmo Waynflete +lay back in his easy-chair, with his Japanese robe about him, and gazed +intently at the beautiful ball which seemed like a bubble of air and +water. His mind went back to the afternoon in April, two years before, +when he had found that crystal sphere in a Japanese shop within sight +of the incomparable Fugiyama. + + +II + +As he peered into its transparent depths, with his vision focused upon +the spot of light where the rays of the setting sun touched it into +flame, he was but little surprised to discover that he could make out +tiny figures in the crystal. For the moment this strange thing seemed +to him perfectly natural. And the movements of these little men and +women interested him so much that he watched them as they went to and +fro, sweeping a roadway with large brooms. Thus it happened that the +fixity of his gaze was intensified. And so it was that in a few minutes +he saw with no astonishment that he was one of the group himself, he +himself in the rich and stately attire of a samurai. From the instant +that Cosmo Waynflete discovered himself among the people whom he saw +moving before him, as his eyes were fastened on the illuminated dot in +the transparent ball, he ceased to see them as little figures, and he +accepted them as of the full stature of man. This increase in their +size was no more a source of wonderment to him than it had been to +discern himself in the midst of them. He accepted both of these +marvellous things without question--indeed, with no thought at all that +they were in any way peculiar or abnormal. Not only this, but +thereafter he seemed to have transferred his personality to the Cosmo +Waynflete who was a Japanese samurai and to have abandoned entirely the +Cosmo Waynflete who was an American traveller, and who had just +returned to New York that Christmas morning. So completely did the +Japanese identity dominate that the existence of the American identity +was wholly unknown to him. It was as though the American had gone to +sleep in New York at the end of the nineteenth century, and had waked a +Japanese in Nippon in the beginning of the eighteenth century. + +With his sword by his side--a Murimasa blade, likely to bring bad luck +to the wearer sooner or later--he had walked from his own house in the +quarter of Kioto which is called Yamashina to the quarter which is +called Yoshiwara, a place of ill repute, where dwell women of evil +life, and where roysterers and drunkards come by night. He knew that +the sacred duty of avenging his master's death had led him to cast off +his faithful wife so that he might pretend to riot in debauchery at the +Three Sea-Shores. The fame of his shameful doings had spread abroad, +and it must soon come to the ears of the man whom he wished to take +unawares. Now he was lying prone in the street, seemingly sunk in a +drunken slumber, so that men might see him and carry the news to the +treacherous assassin of his beloved master. As he lay there that +afternoon, he revolved in his mind the devices he should use to make +away with his enemy when the hour might be ripe at last for the +accomplishment of his holy revenge. To himself he called the roll of +his fellow-ronins, now biding their time, as he was, and ready always +to obey his orders and to follow his lead to the death, when at last +the sun should rise on the day of vengeance. + +So he gave no heed to the scoffs and the jeers of those who passed +along the street, laughing him to scorn as they beheld him lying there +in a stupor from excessive drink at that inordinate hour of the day. +And among those who came by at last was a man from Satsuma, who was +moved to voice the reproaches of all that saw this sorry sight. + +"Is not this Oishi Kuranosuke," said the man from Satsuma, "who was a +councillor of Asano Takumi no Kami, and who, not having the heart to +avenge his lord, gives himself up to women and wine? See how he lies +drunk in the public street! Faithless beast! Fool and craven! Unworthy +of the name of a samurai!" + +And with that the man from Satsuma trod on him as he lay there, and +spat upon him, and went away indignantly. The spies of Kotsuke no Suke +heard what the man from Satsuma had said, and they saw how he had +spurned the prostrate samurai with his foot; and they went their way to +report to their master that he need no longer have any fear of the +councillors of Asano Takumi no Kami. All this the man, lying prone in +the dust of the street, noted; and it made his heart glad, for then he +made sure that the day was soon coming when he could do his duty at +last and take vengeance for the death of his master. + + +III + +He lay there longer than he knew, and the twilight settled down at +last, and the evening stars came out. And then, after a while, and by +imperceptible degrees, Cosmo Waynflete became conscious that the scene +had changed and that he had changed with it. He was no longer in Japan, +but in Persia. He was no longer lying like a drunkard in the street of +a city, but slumbering like a weary soldier in a little oasis by the +side of a spring in the midst of a sandy desert. He was asleep, and his +faithful horse was unbridled that it might crop the grass at will. + +The air was hot and thick, and the leaves of the slim tree above him +were never stirred by a wandering wind. Yet now and again there came +from the darkness a faintly fetid odor. The evening wore on and still +he slept, until at length in the silence of the night a strange huge +creature wormed its way steadily out of its lair amid the trees, and +drew near the sleeping man to devour him fiercely. But the horse +neighed vehemently and beat the ground with his hoofs and waked his +master. Then the hideous monster vanished; and the man, aroused from +his sleep, saw nothing, although the evil smell still lingered in the +sultry atmosphere. He lay down again once more, thinking that for once +his steed had given a false alarm. Again the grisly dragon drew nigh, +and again the courser notified its rider, and again the man could make +out nothing in the darkness of the night; and again he was wellnigh +stifled by the foul emanation that trailed in the wake of the +misbegotten creature. He rebuked his horse and laid him down once more. + +A third time the dreadful beast approached, and a third time the +faithful charger awoke its angry master. But there came the breath of a +gentle breeze, so that the man did not fear to fill his lungs; and +there was a vague light in the heavens now, so that he could dimly +discern his mighty enemy; and at once he girded himself for the fight. +The scaly monster came full at him with dripping fangs, its mighty body +thrusting forward its huge and hideous head. The man met the attack +without fear and smote the beast full on the crest, but the blow +rebounded from its coat of mail. + +Then the faithful horse sprang forward and bit the dreadful creature +full upon the neck and tore away the scales, so that its master's sword +could pierce the armored hide. So the man was able to dissever the +ghastly head and thus to slay the monstrous dragon. The blackness of +night wrapped him about once more as he fell on his knees and gave +thanks for his victory; and the wind died away again. + + +IV + +Only a few minutes later, so it seemed to him, Cosmo Waynflete became +doubtfully aware of another change of time and place--of another +transformation of his own being. He knew himself to be alone once more, +and even without his trusty charger. Again he found himself groping in +the dark. But in a little while there was a faint radiance of light, +and at last the moon came out behind a tower. Then he saw that he was +not by the roadside in Japan or in the desert of Persia, but now in +some unknown city of Southern Europe, where the architecture was +hispano-moresque. By the silver rays of the moon he was able to make +out the beautiful design damascened upon the blade of the sword which +he held now in his hand ready drawn for self-defence. + +Then he heard hurried footfalls down the empty street, and a man rushed +around the corner pursued by two others, who had also weapons in their +hands. For a moment Cosmo Waynflete was a Spaniard, and to him it was a +point of honor to aid the weaker party. He cried to the fugitive to +pluck up heart and to withstand the enemy stoutly. But the hunted man +fled on, and after him went one of the pursuers, a tall, thin fellow, +with a long black cloak streaming behind him as he ran. + +The other of the two, a handsome lad with fair hair, came to a halt and +crossed swords with Cosmo, and soon showed himself to be skilled in the +art of fence. So violent was the young fellow's attack that in the +ardor of self-defence Cosmo ran the boy through the body before he had +time to hold his hand or even to reflect. + +The lad toppled over sideways. "Oh, my mother!" he cried, and in a +second he was dead. While Cosmo bent over the body, hasty footsteps +again echoed along the silent thoroughfare. Cosmo peered around the +corner, and by the struggling moonbeams he could see that it was the +tall, thin fellow in the black cloak, who was returning with half a +score of retainers, all armed, and some of them bearing torches. + +Cosmo turned and fled swiftly, but being a stranger in the city he soon +lost himself in its tortuous streets. Seeing a light in a window and +observing a vine that trailed from the balcony before it, he climbed up +boldly, and found himself face to face with a gray-haired lady, whose +visage was beautiful and kindly and noble. In a few words he told her +his plight and besought sanctuary. She listened to him in silence, with +exceeding courtesy of manner, as though she were weighing his words +before making up her mind. She raised the lamp on her table and let its +beams fall on his lineaments. And still she made no answer to his +appeal. + +Then came a glare of torches in the street below and a knocking at the +door. Then at last the old lady came to a resolution; she lifted the +tapestry at the head of her bed and told him to bestow himself there. +No sooner was he hidden than the tall, thin man in the long black cloak +entered hastily. He greeted the elderly lady as his aunt, and he told +her that her son had been set upon by a stranger in the street and had +been slain. She gave a great cry and never took her eyes from his face. +Then he said that a servant had seen an unknown man climb to the +balcony of her house. What if it were the assassin of her son? The +blood left her face and she clutched at the table behind her, as she +gave orders to have the house searched. + +When the room was empty at last she went to the head of the bed and +bade the man concealed there to come forth and begone, but to cover his +face, that she might not be forced to know him again. So saying, she +dropped on her knees before a crucifix, while he slipped out of the +window again and down to the deserted street. + +He sped to the corner and turned it undiscovered, and breathed a sigh +of relief and of regret. He kept on steadily, gliding stealthily along +in the shadows, until he found himself at the city gate as the bell of +the cathedral tolled the hour of midnight. + + +V + +How it was that he passed through the gate he could not declare with +precision, for seemingly a mist had settled about him. Yet a few +minutes later he saw that in some fashion he must have got beyond the +walls of the town, for he recognized the open country all around. And, +oddly enough, he now discovered himself to be astride a bony steed. He +could not say what manner of horse it was he was riding, but he felt +sure that it was not the faithful charger that had saved his life in +Persia, once upon a time, in days long gone by, as it seemed to him +then. He was not in Persia now--of that he was certain, nor in Japan, +nor in the Iberian peninsula. Where he was he did not know. + +In the dead hush of midnight he could hear the barking of a dog on the +opposite shore of a dusky and indistinct waste of waters that spread +itself far below him. The night grew darker and darker, the stars +seemed to sink deeper in the sky, and driving clouds occasionally hid +them from his sight. He had never felt so lonely and dismal. In the +centre of the road stood an enormous tulip-tree; its limbs were gnarled +and fantastic, large enough to form trunks for ordinary trees, twisting +down almost to the earth, and rising again into the air. As he +approached this fearful tree he thought he saw something white hanging +in the midst of it, but on looking more narrowly he perceived it was a +place where it had been scathed by lightning and the white wood laid +bare. About two hundred yards from the tree a small brook crossed the +road; and as he drew near he beheld--on the margin of this brook, and +in the dark shadow of the grove--he beheld something huge, misshapen, +black, and towering. It stirred not, but seemed gathered up in the +gloom like some gigantic monster ready to spring upon the traveller. + +He demanded, in stammering accents, "Who are you?" He received no +reply. He repeated his demand in a still more agitated voice. Still +there was no answer. And then the shadowy object of alarm put itself in +motion, and with a scramble and a bound stood in the middle of the +road. He appeared to be a horseman of large dimensions and mounted on a +black horse of powerful frame. Having no relish for this strange +midnight companion, Cosmo Waynflete urged on his steed in hopes of +leaving the apparition behind; but the stranger quickened his horse +also to an equal pace. And when the first horseman pulled up, thinking +to lag behind, the second did likewise. There was something in the +moody and dogged silence of this pertinacious companion that was +mysterious and appalling. It was soon fearfully accounted for. On +mounting a rising ground which brought the figure of his +fellow-traveller against the sky, gigantic in height and muffled in a +cloak, he was horror-struck to discover the stranger was headless!--but +his horror was still more increased in observing that the head which +should have rested on the shoulders was carried before the body on the +pommel of the saddle. + +The terror of Cosmo Waynflete rose to desperation, and he spurred his +steed suddenly in the hope of giving his weird companion the slip. But +the headless horseman started full jump with him. His own horse, as +though possessed by a demon, plunged headlong down the hill. He could +hear, however, the black steed panting and blowing close behind him; he +even fancied that he felt the hot breath of the pursuer. When he +ventured at last to cast a look behind, he saw the goblin rising in the +stirrups, and in the very act of hurling at him the grisly head. He +fell out of the saddle to the ground; and the black steed and the +goblin rider passed by him like a whirlwind. + + +VI + +How long he lay there by the roadside, stunned and motionless, he could +not guess; but when he came to himself at last the sun was already high +in the heavens. He discovered himself to be reclining on the tall grass +of a pleasant graveyard which surrounded a tiny country church in the +outskirts of a pretty little village. It was in the early summer, and +the foliage was green above him as the boughs swayed gently to and fro +in the morning breeze. The birds were singing gayly as they flitted +about over his head. The bees hummed along from flower to flower. At +last, so it seemed to him, he had come into a land of peace and quiet, +where there was rest and comfort and where no man need go in fear of +his life. It was a country where vengeance was not a duty and where +midnight combats were not a custom he found himself smiling as he +thought that a grisly dragon and a goblin rider would be equally out of +place in this laughing landscape. + +Then the bell in the steeple of the little church began to ring +merrily, and he rose to his feet in expectation. All of a sudden the +knowledge came to him why it was that they were ringing. He wondered +then why the coming of the bride was thus delayed. He knew himself to +be a lover, with life opening brightly before him; and the world seemed +to him sweeter than ever before and more beautiful. + +Then at last the girl whom he loved with his whole heart and who had +promised to marry him appeared in the distance, and he thought he had +never seen her look more lovely. As he beheld his bridal party +approaching, he slipped into the church to await her at the altar. The +sunshine fell full upon the portal and made a halo about the girl's +head as she crossed the threshold. + +But even when the bride stood by his side and the clergyman had begun +the solemn service of the church the bells kept on, and soon their +chiming became a clangor, louder and sharper and more insistent. + + +VII + +So clamorous and so persistent was the ringing that Cosmo Waynflete was +roused at last. He found himself suddenly standing on his feet, with +his hand clutching the back of the chair in which he had been sitting +before the fire when the rays of the setting sun had set long ago. The +room was dark, for it was lighted now only by the embers of the +burnt-out fire; and the electric bell was ringing steadily, as though +the man outside the door had resolved to waken the seven sleepers. + +Then Cosmo Waynflete was wide-awake again; and he knew where he was +once more--not in Japan, not in Persia, not in Lisbon, not in Sleepy +Hollow, but here in New York, in his own room, before his own fire. He +opened the door at once and admitted his friend, Paul Stuyvesant. + +"It isn't dinner-time, is it?" he asked. "I'm not late, am I? The fact +is, I've been asleep." + +"It is so good of you to confess that," his friend answered, laughing; +"although the length of time you kept me waiting and ringing might have +led me to suspect it. No, you are not late and it is not dinner-time. +I've come around to have another little chat with you before dinner, +that's all." + +"Take this chair, old man," said Cosmo, as he threw another +hickory-stick on the fire. Then he lighted the gas and sat down by the +side of his friend. + +"This chair is comfortable, for a fact," Stuyvesant declared, +stretching himself out luxuriously. "No wonder you went to sleep. What +did you dream of?--strange places you had seen in your travels or the +homely scenes of your native land." + +Waynflete looked at his friend for a moment without answering the +question. He was startled as he recalled the extraordinary series of +adventures which had fallen to his lot since he had fixed his gaze on +the crystal ball. It seemed to him as though he had been whirled +through space and through time. + +"I suppose every man is always the hero of his own dreams," he began, +doubtfully. + +"Of course," his friend returned; "in sleep our natural and healthy +egotism is absolutely unrestrained. It doesn't make any matter where +the scene is laid or whether the play is a comedy or a tragedy, the +dreamer has always the centre of the stage, with the calcium light +turned full on him." + +"That's just it," Waynflete went on; "this dream of mine makes me feel +as if I were an actor, and as if I had been playing many parts, one +after the other, in the swiftest succession. They are not familiar to +me, and yet I confess to a vague feeling of unoriginality. It is as +though I were a plagiarist of adventure--if that be a possible +supposition. I have just gone through these startling situations +myself, and yet I'm sure that they have all of them happened +before--although, perhaps, not to any one man. Indeed, no one man could +have had all these adventures of mine, because I see now that I have +been whisked through the centuries and across the hemispheres with a +suddenness possible only in dreams. Yet all my experiences seem somehow +second-hand, and not really my own." + +"Picked up here and there--like your bric-a-brac?" suggested +Stuyvesant. "But what are these alluring adventures of yours that +stretched through the ages and across the continents?" + +Then, knowing how fond his friend was of solving mysteries and how +proud he was of his skill in this art, Cosmo Waynflete narrated his +dream as it has been set down in these pages. + +When he had made an end, Paul Stuyvesant's first remark was: "I'm sorry +I happened along just then and waked you up before you had time to get +married." + +His second remark followed half a minute later. + +"I see how it was," he said; "you were sitting in this chair and +looking at that crystal ball, which focussed the level rays of the +setting sun, I suppose? Then it is plain enough--you hypnotized +yourself!" + +"I have heard that such a thing is possible," responded Cosmo." + +"Possible?" Stuyvesant returned, "it is certain! But what is more +curious is the new way in which you combined your self-hypnotism with +crystal-gazing. You have heard of scrying, I suppose?" + +"You mean the practice of looking into a drop of water or a crystal +ball or anything of that sort," said Cosmo, "and of seeing things in +it--of seeing people moving about?" + +"That's just what I do mean," his friend returned. "And that's just +what you have been doing. You fixed your gaze on the ball, and so +hypnotized yourself; and then, in the intensity of your vision, you +were able to see figures in the crystal--with one of which visualized +emanations you immediately identified yourself. That's easy enough, I +think. But I don't see what suggested to you your separate experiences. +I recognize them, of course----" + +"You recognize them?" cried Waynflete, in wonder. + +"I can tell you where you borrowed every one of your adventures," +Stuyvesant replied, "But what I'd like to know now is what suggested to +you just those particular characters and situations, and not any of the +many others also stored away in your subconsciousness." + +So saying, he began to look about the room. + +"My subconsciousness?" repeated Waynflete. "Have I ever been a samurai +in my subconsciousness?" + +Paul Stuyvesant looked at Cosmo Waynflete for nearly a minute without +reply. Then all the answer he made was to say: "That's a queer +dressing-gown you have on." + +"It is time I took it off," said the other, as he twisted himself out +of its clinging folds. "It is a beautiful specimen of weaving, isn't +it? I call it the dream-gown of the Japanese ambassador, for although I +bought it in a curiosity-shop in Nuremberg, it was once, I really +believe, the slumber-robe of an Oriental envoy." + +Stuyvesant took the silken garment from his friend's hand. + +"Why did the Japanese ambassador sell you his dream-gown in a Nuremberg +curiosity-shop?" he asked. + +"He didn't," Waynflete explained. "I never saw the ambassador, and +neither did the old German lady who kept the shop. She told me she +bought it from a Japanese acrobat who was out of an engagement and +desperately hard up. But she told me also that the acrobat had told her +that the garment had belonged to an ambassador who had given it to him +as a reward of his skill, and that he never would have parted with it +if he had not been dead-broke." + +Stuyvesant held the robe up to the light and inspected the embroidery +on the skirt of it. + +"Yes," he said, at last, "this would account for it, I suppose. This +bit here was probably meant to suggest 'the well where the head was +washed,'--see?" + +"I see that those lines may be meant to represent the outline of a +spring of water, but I don't see what that has to do with my dream," +Waynflete answered. + +"Don't you?" Stuyvesant returned. "Then I'll show you. You had on this +silk garment embroidered here with an outline of the well in which was +washed the head of Kotsuke no Suke, the man whom the Forty-Seven Ronins +killed. You know the story?" + +"I read it in Japan, but----" began Cosmo. + +"You had that story stored away in your subconsciousness," interrupted +his friend. "And when you hypnotized yourself by peering into the +crystal ball, this embroidery it was which suggested to you to see +yourself as the hero of the tale--Oishi Kuranosuke, the chief of the +Forty-Seven Ronins, the faithful follower who avenged his master by +pretending to be vicious and dissipated--just like Brutus and +Lorenzaccio--until the enemy was off his guard and open to attack." + +"I think I do recall the tale of the Forty-Seven Ronins, but only very +vaguely," said the hero of the dream. "For all I know I may have had +the adventure of Oishi Kuranosuke laid on the shelf somewhere in my +subconsciousness, as you want me to believe. But how about my Persian +dragon and my Iberian noblewoman?" + +Paul Stuyvesant was examining the dream-gown of the Japanese ambassador +with minute care. Suddenly he said, "Oh!" and then he looked up at +Cosmo Waynflete and asked: "What are those buttons? They seem to be old +coins." + +"They are old coins," the other answered; "it was a fancy of mine to +utilize them on that Japanese dressing-gown. They are all different, +you see. The first is----" + +"Persian, isn't it?" interrupted Stuyvesant. + +"Yes," Waynflete explained, "it is a Persian daric. And the second is a +Spanish peso made at Potosi under Philip II. for use in America. And +the third is a York shilling, one of the coins in circulation here in +New York at the time of the Revolution--I got that one, in fact, from +the farmer who ploughed it up in a field at Tarrytown, near Sunnyside." + +"Then there are three of your adventures accounted for, Cosmo, and +easily enough," Paul commented, with obvious satisfaction at his own +explanation. "Just as the embroidery on the silk here suggested to +you--after you had hypnotized yourself--that you were the chief of the +Forty-Seven Ronins, so this first coin here in turn suggested to you +that you were Rustem, the hero of the 'Epic of Kings.' You have read +the 'Shah-Nameh?'" + +"I remember Firdausi's poem after a fashion only," Cosmo answered. "Was +not Rustem a Persian Hercules, so to speak?" + +"That's it precisely," the other responded, "and he had seven labors to +perform; and you dreamed the third of them, the slaying of the grisly +dragon. For my own part, I think I should have preferred the fourth of +them, the meeting with the lovely enchantress; but that's neither here +nor there." + +"It seems to me I do recollect something about that fight of Rustem and +the strange beast. The faithful horse's name was Rakush, wasn't it?" +asked Waynflete. + +"If you can recollect the 'Shah-Nameh,'" Stuyvesant pursued, "no doubt +you can recall also Beaumont and Fletcher's 'Custom of the Country?' +That's where you got the midnight duel in Lisbon and the magnanimous +mother, you know." + +"No, I didn't know," the other declared. + +"Well, you did, for all that," Paul went on. "The situation is taken +from one in a drama of Calderon's, and it was much strengthened in the +taking. You may not now remember having read the play, but the incident +must have been familiar to you, or else your subconsciousness couldn't +have yielded it up to you so readily at the suggestion of the Spanish +coin, could it?" + +"I did read a lot of Elizabethan drama in my senior year at college," +admitted Cosmo, "and this piece of Beaumont and Fletcher's may have +been one of those I read; but I totally fail to recall now what it was +all about." + +"You won't have the cheek to declare that you don't remember the +'Legend of Sleepy Hollow,' will you?" asked Stuyvesant. "Very obviously +it was the adventure of Ichabod Crane and the Headless Horseman that +the York shilling suggested to you." + +"I'll admit that I do recollect Irving's story now," the other +confessed. + +"So the embroidery on the dream-gown gives the first of your strange +situations; and the three others were suggested by the coins you have +been using as buttons," said Paul Stuyvesant. "There is only one thing +now that puzzles me: that is the country church and the noon wedding +and the beautiful bride." + +And with that he turned over the folds of the silken garment that hung +over his arm. + +Cosmo Waynflete hesitated a moment and a blush mantled his cheek. Then +he looked his friend in the face and said: "I think I can account for +my dreaming about her--I can account for that easily enough." + +"So can I," said Paul Stuyvesant, as he held up the photograph of a +lovely American girl that he had just found in the pocket of the +dream-gown of the Japanese ambassador. + +(1896.) + + + + +THE RIVAL GHOSTS + + +The good ship sped on her way across the calm Atlantic. It was an +outward passage, according to the little charts which the company had +charily distributed, but most of the passengers were homeward bound, +after a summer of rest and recreation, and they were counting the days +before they might hope to see Fire Island Light. On the lee side of the +boat, comfortably sheltered from the wind, and just by the door of the +captain's room (which was theirs during the day), sat a little group of +returning Americans. The Duchess (she was down on the purser's list as +Mrs. Martin, but her friends and familiars called her the Duchess of +Washington Square) and Baby Van Rensselaer (she was quite old enough to +vote, had her sex been entitled to that duty, but as the younger of two +sisters she was still the baby of the family)--the Duchess and Baby Van +Rensselaer were discussing the pleasant English voice and the not +unpleasant English accent of a manly young lordling who was going to +America for sport. Uncle Larry and Dear Jones were enticing each other +into a bet on the ship's run of the morrow. + +"I'll give you two to one she don't make 420," said Dear Jones. + +"I'll take it," answered Uncle Larry. "We made 427 the fifth day last +year." It was Uncle Larry's seventeenth visit to Europe, and this was +therefore his thirty-fourth voyage. + +"And when did you get in?" asked Baby Van Rensselaer. "I don't care a +bit about the run, so long as we get in soon." + +"We crossed the bar Sunday night, just seven days after we left +Queenstown, and we dropped anchor off Quarantine at three o'clock on +Monday morning." + +"I hope we sha'n't do that this time. I can't seem to sleep any when +the boat stops." + +"I can, but I didn't," continued Uncle Larry, "because my state-room +was the most for'ard in the boat, and the donkey-engine that let down +the anchor was right over my head." + +"So you got up and saw the sun rise over the bay," said Dear Jones, +"with the electric lights of the city twinkling in the distance, and +the first faint flush of the dawn in the east just over Fort Lafayette, +and the rosy tinge which spread softly upward, and----" + +"Did you both come back together?" asked the Duchess. + +"Because he has crossed thirty-four times you must not suppose he has a +monopoly in sunrises," retorted Dear Jones. "No; this was my own +sunrise; and a mighty pretty one it was too." + +"I'm not matching sunrises with you," remarked Uncle Larry calmly; "but +I'm willing to back a merry jest called forth by my sunrise against any +two merry jests called forth by yours." + +"I confess reluctantly that my sunrise evoked no merry jest at all." +Dear Jones was an honest man, and would scorn to invent a merry jest on +the spur of the moment. + +"That's where my sunrise has the call," said Uncle Larry, complacently. + +"What was the merry jest?" was Baby Van Rensselaer's inquiry, the +natural result of a feminine curiosity thus artistically excited. + +"Well, here it is. I was standing aft, near a patriotic American and a +wandering Irishman, and the patriotic American rashly declared that you +couldn't see a sunrise like that anywhere in Europe, and this gave the +Irishman his chance, and he said, 'Sure ye don't have 'm here till we're +through with 'em over there.'" + +"It is true," said Dear Jones, thoughtfully, "that they do have some +things over there better than we do; for instance, umbrellas." + +"And gowns," added the Duchess. + +"And antiquities"--this was Uncle Larry's contribution. + +"And we do have some things so much better in America!" protested Baby +Van Rensselaer, as yet uncorrupted by any worship of the effete +monarchies of despotic Europe. "We make lots of things a great deal +nicer than you can get them in Europe--especially ice-cream." + +"And pretty girls," added Dear Jones; but he did not look at her. + +"And spooks," remarked Uncle Larry, casually. + +"Spooks?" queried the Duchess. + +"Spooks. I maintain the word. Ghost, if you like that better, or +spectres. We turn out the best quality of spook----" + +"You forget the lovely ghost stories about the Rhine and the Black +Forest," interrupted Miss Van Rensselaer, with feminine inconsistency. + +"I remember the Rhine and the Black Forest and all the other haunts of +elves and fairies and hobgoblins; but for good, honest spooks there is +no place like home. And what differentiates our spook--_spiritus +Americanus_--from the ordinary ghost of literature is that it +responds to the American sense of humor. Take Irving's stories, for +example. The 'Headless Horseman'--that's a comic ghost story. And Rip +Van Winkle--consider what humor, and what good humor, there is in the +telling of his meeting with the goblin crew of Hendrik Hudson's men! A +still better example of this American way of dealing with legend and +mystery is the marvellous tale of the rival ghosts." + +"The rival ghosts!" queried the Duchess and Baby Van Rensselaer +together. "Who were they?" + +"Didn't I ever tell you about them?" answered Uncle Larry, a gleam of +approaching joy flashing from his eye. + +"Since he is bound to tell us sooner or later, we'd better be resigned +and hear it now," said Dear Jones. + +"If you are not more eager, I won't tell it at all." + +"Oh, do, Uncle Larry! you know I just dote on ghost stories," pleaded +Baby Van Rensselaer. + +"Once upon a time," began Uncle Larry--"in fact, a very few years +ago--there lived in the thriving town of New York a young American +called Duncan--Eliphalet Duncan. Like his name, he was half Yankee +and half Scotch, and naturally he was a lawyer, and had come to New +York to make his way. His father was a Scotchman who had come over +and settled in Boston and married a Salem girl. When Eliphalet Duncan +was about twenty he lost both of his parents. His father left him +enough money to give him a start, and a strong feeling of pride in +his Scotch birth; you see there was a title in the family in +Scotland, and although Eliphalet's father was the younger son of a +younger son, yet he always remembered, and always bade his only son +to remember, that this ancestry was noble. His mother left him her +full share of Yankee grit and a little old house in Salem which had +belonged to her family for more than two hundred years. She was a +Hitchcock, and the Hitchcocks had been settled in Salem since the +year 1. It was a great-great-grandfather of Mr. Eliphalet Hitchcock +who was foremost in the time of the Salem witchcraft craze. And this +little old house which she left to my friend Eliphalet Duncan was +haunted." + +"By the ghost of one of the witches, of course?" interrupted Dear +Jones. + +"Now how could it be the ghost of a witch, since the witches were all +burned at the stake? You never heard of anybody who was burned having a +ghost, did you?" asked Uncle Larry. + +"That's an argument in favor of cremation, at any rate," replied Dear +Jones, evading the direct question. + +"It is, if you don't like ghosts. I do," said Baby Van Rensselaer. + +"And so do I," added Uncle Larry. "I love a ghost as dearly as an +Englishman loves a lord." + +"Go on with your story," said the Duchess, majestically overruling all +extraneous discussion. + +"This little old house at Salem was haunted," resumed Uncle Larry. "And +by a very distinguished ghost--or at least by a ghost with very +remarkable attributes." + +"What was he like?" asked Baby Van Rensselaer, with a premonitory +shiver of anticipatory delight. + +"It had a lot of peculiarities. In the first place, it never appeared +to the master of the house. Mostly it confined its visitations to +unwelcome guests. In the course of the last hundred years it had +frightened away four successive mothers-in-law, while never intruding +on the head of the household." + +"I guess that ghost had been one of the boys when he was alive and in +the flesh." This was Dear Jones's contribution to the telling of the +tale. + +"In the second place," continued Uncle Larry, "it never frightened +anybody the first time it appeared. Only on the second visit were the +ghost-seers scared; but then they were scared enough for twice, and +they rarely mustered up courage enough to risk a third interview. One +of the most curious characteristics of this well-meaning spook was that +it had no face--or at least that nobody ever saw its face." + +"Perhaps he kept his countenance veiled?" queried the Duchess, who was +beginning to remember that she never did like ghost stories. + +"That was what I was never able to find out. I have asked several +people who saw the ghost, and none of them could tell me anything about +its face, and yet while in its presence they never noticed its +features, and never remarked on their absence or concealment. It was +only afterwards when they tried to recall calmly all the circumstances +of meeting with the mysterious stranger that they became aware that +they had not seen its face. And they could not say whether the features +were covered, or whether they were wanting, or what the trouble was. +They knew only that the face was never seen. And no matter how often +they might see it, they never fathomed this mystery. To this day nobody +knows whether the ghost which used to haunt the little old house in +Salem had a face, or what manner of face it had." + +"How awfully weird!" said Baby Van Rensselaer. "And why did the ghost +go away?" + +"I haven't said it went away," answered Uncle Larry, with much dignity. + +"But you said it _used_ to haunt the little old house at Salem, so +I supposed it had moved. Didn't it?" the young lady asked. + +"You shall be told in due time. Eliphalet Duncan used to spend most of +his summer vacations at Salem, and the ghost never bothered him at all, +for he was the master of the house--much to his disgust, too, because +he wanted to see for himself the mysterious tenant at will of his +property. But he never saw it, never. He arranged with friends to call +him whenever it might appear, and he slept in the next room with the +door open; and yet when their frightened cries waked him the ghost was +gone, and his only reward was to hear reproachful sighs as soon as he +went back to bed. You see, the ghost thought it was not fair of +Eliphalet to seek an introduction which was plainly unwelcome." + +Dear Jones interrupted the story-teller by getting up and tucking a +heavy rug more snugly around Baby Van Rensselaer's feet, for the sky +was now overcast and gray, and the air was damp and penetrating. + +"One fine spring morning," pursued Uncle Larry, "Eliphalet Duncan +received great news. I told you that there was a title in the family in +Scotland, and that Eliphalet's father was the younger son of a younger +son. Well, it happened that all Eliphalet's father's brothers and +uncles had died off without male issue except the eldest son of the +eldest son, and he, of course, bore the title, and was Baron Duncan of +Duncan. Now the great news that Eliphalet Duncan received in New York +one fine spring morning was that Baron Duncan and his only son had been +yachting in the Hebrides, and they had been caught in a black squall, +and they were both dead. So my friend Eliphalet Duncan inherited the +title and the estates." + +"How romantic!" said the Duchess. "So he was a baron!" + +"Well," answered Uncle Larry, "he was a baron if he chose. But he +didn't choose." + +"More fool he!" said Dear Jones, sententiously. + +"Well," answered Uncle Larry, "I'm not so sure of that. You see, +Eliphalet Duncan was half Scotch and half Yankee, and he had two eyes +to the main chance. He held his tongue about his windfall of luck until +he could find out whether the Scotch estates were enough to keep up the +Scotch title. He soon discovered that they were not, and that the late +Lord Duncan, having married money, kept up such state as he could out +of the revenues of the dowry of Lady Duncan. And Eliphalet, he decided +that he would rather be a well-fed lawyer in New York, living +comfortably on his practice, than a starving lord in Scotland, living +scantily on his title." + +"But he kept his title?" asked the Duchess. + +"Well," answered Uncle Larry, "he kept it quiet. I knew it, and a +friend or two more. But Eliphalet was a sight too smart to put 'Baron +Duncan of Duncan, Attorney and Counsellor at Law,' on his shingle." + +"What has all this got to do with your ghost?" asked Dear Jones, +pertinently. + +"Nothing with that ghost, but a good deal with another ghost. Eliphalet +was very learned in spirit lore--perhaps because he owned the haunted +house at Salem, perhaps because he was a Scotchman by descent. At all +events, he had made a special study of the wraiths and white ladies and +banshees and bogies of all kinds whose sayings and doings and warnings +are recorded in the annals of the Scottish nobility. In fact, he was +acquainted with the habits of every reputable spook in the Scotch +peerage. And he knew that there was a Duncan ghost attached to the +person of the holder of the title of Baron Duncan of Duncan." + +"So, besides being the owner of a haunted house in Salem, he was also a +haunted man in Scotland?" asked Baby Van Rensselaer. + +"Just so. But the Scotch ghost was not unpleasant, like the Salem +ghost, although it had one peculiarity in common with its +trans-atlantic fellow-spook. It never appeared to the holder of the +title, just as the other never was visible to the owner of the house. +In fact, the Duncan ghost was never seen at all. It was a guardian +angel only. Its sole duty was to be in personal attendance on Baron +Duncan of Duncan, and to warn him of impending evil. The traditions of +the house told that the Barons of Duncan had again and again felt a +premonition of ill fortune. Some of them had yielded and withdrawn from +the venture they had undertaken, and it had failed dismally. Some had +been obstinate, and had hardened their hearts, and had gone on reckless +to defeat and to death. In no case had a Lord Duncan been exposed to +peril without fair warning." + +"Then how came it that the father and son were lost in the yacht off +the Hebrides?" asked Dear Jones. + +"Because they were too enlightened to yield to superstition. There is +extant now a letter of Lord Duncan, written to his wife a few minutes +before he and his son set sail, in which he tells her how hard he has +had to struggle with an almost overmastering desire to give up the +trip. Had he obeyed the friendly warning of the family ghost, the +letter would have been spared a journey across the Atlantic." + +"Did the ghost leave Scotland for America as soon as the old baron +died?" asked Baby Van Rensselaer, with much interest. + +"How did he come over," queried Dear Jones--"in the steerage, or as a +cabin passenger?" + +"I don't know," answered Uncle Larry, calmly, "and Eliphalet didn't +know. For as he was in no danger, and stood in no need of warning, he +couldn't tell whether the ghost was on duty or not. Of course he was on +the watch for it all the time. But he never got any proof of its +presence until he went down to the little old house of Salem, just +before the Fourth of July. He took a friend down with him--a young +fellow who had been in the regular army since the day Fort Sumter was +fired on, and who thought that after four years of the little +unpleasantness down South, including six months in Libby, and after ten +years of fighting the bad Indians on the plains, he wasn't likely to be +much frightened by a ghost. Well, Eliphalet and the officer sat out on +the porch all the evening smoking and talking over points in military +law. A little after twelve o'clock, just as they began to think it was +about time to turn in, they heard the most ghastly noise in the house. +It wasn't a shriek, or a howl, or a yell, or anything they could put a +name to. It was an undeterminate, inexplicable shiver and shudder of +sound, which went wailing out of the window. The officer had been at +Cold Harbor, but he felt himself getting colder this time. Eliphalet +knew it was the ghost who haunted the house. As this weird sound died +away, it was followed by another, sharp, short, blood-curdling in its +intensity. Something in this cry seemed familiar to Eliphalet, and he +felt sure that it proceeded from the family ghost, the warning wraith +of the Duncans." + +"Do I understand you to intimate that both ghosts were there together?" +inquired the Duchess, anxiously. + +"Both of them were there," answered Uncle Larry. "You see, one of them +belonged to the house, and had to be there all the time, and the other +was attached to the person of Baron Duncan, and had to follow him +there; wherever he was, there was that ghost also. But Eliphalet, he +had scarcely time to think this out when he heard both sounds again, +not one after another, but both together, and something told him--some +sort of an instinct he had--that those two ghosts didn't agree, didn't +get on together, didn't exactly hit it off; in fact, that they were +quarrelling." + +"Quarrelling ghosts! Well, I never!" was Baby Van Rensselaer's remark. + +"It is a blessed thing to see ghosts dwell together in unity," said +Dear Jones. + +And the Duchess added, "It would certainly be setting a better +example." + +"You know," resumed Uncle Larry, "that two waves of light or of sound +may interfere and produce darkness or silence. So it was with these +rival spooks. They interfered, but they did not produce silence or +darkness. On the contrary, as soon as Eliphalet and the officer went +into the house, there began at once a series of spiritualistic +manifestations--a regular dark seance. A tambourine was played upon, a +bell was rung, and a flaming banjo went singing around the room." + +"Where did they get the banjo?" asked Dear Jones, sceptically. + +"I don't know. Materialized it, maybe, just as they did the tambourine. +You don't suppose a quiet New York lawyer kept a stock of musical +instruments large enough to fit out a strolling minstrel troupe just on +the chance of a pair of ghosts coming to give him a surprise party, do +you? Every spook has its own instrument of torture. Angels play on +harps, I'm informed, and spirits delight in banjos and tambourines. +These spooks of Eliphalet Duncan's were ghosts with all modern +improvements, and I guess they were capable of providing their own +musical weapons. At all events, they had them there in the little old +house at Salem the night Eliphalet and his friend came down. And they +played on them, and they rang the bell, and they rapped here, there, +and everywhere. And they kept it up all night." + +"All night?" asked the awe-stricken Duchess. + +"All night long," said Uncle Larry, solemnly; "and the next night too. +Eliphalet did not get a wink of sleep, neither did his friend. On the +second night the house ghost was seen by the officer; on the third +night it showed itself again; and the next morning the officer packed +his gripsack and took the first train to Boston. He was a New-Yorker, +but he said he'd sooner go to Boston than see that ghost again. +Eliphalet wasn't scared at all, partly because he never saw either the +domiciliary or the titular spook, and partly because he felt himself on +friendly terms with the spirit world, and didn't scare easily. But +after losing three nights' sleep and the society of his friend, he +began to be a little impatient, and to think that the thing had gone +far enough. You see, while in a way he was fond of ghosts, yet he liked +them best one at a time. Two ghosts were one too many. He wasn't bent +on making a collection of spooks. He and one ghost were company, but he +and two ghosts were a crowd." + +"What did he do?" asked Baby Van Rensselaer. + +"Well, he couldn't do anything. He waited awhile, hoping they would get +tired; but he got tired out first. You see, it comes natural to a spook +to sleep in the daytime, but a man wants to sleep nights, and they +wouldn't let him sleep nights. They kept on wrangling and quarrelling +incessantly; they manifested and they dark-seanced as regularly as the +old clock on the stairs struck twelve; they rapped and they rang bells +and they banged the tambourine and they threw the flaming banjo about +the house, and, worse than all, they swore." + +"I did not know that spirits were addicted to bad language," said the +Duchess. + +"How did he know they were swearing? Could he hear them?" asked Dear +Jones. + +"That was just it," responded Uncle Larry; "he could not hear them--at +least, not distinctly. There were inarticulate murmurs and stifled +rumblings. But the impression produced on him was that they were +swearing. If they had only sworn right out, he would not have minded it +so much, because he would have known the worst. But the feeling that +the air was full of suppressed profanity was very wearing, and after +standing it for a week he gave up in disgust and went to the White +Mountains." + +"Leaving them to fight it out, I suppose," interjected Baby Van +Rensselaer. + +"Not at all," explained Uncle Larry. "They could not quarrel unless he +was present. You see, he could not leave the titular ghost behind him, +and the domiciliary ghost could not leave the house. When he went away +he took the family ghost with him, leaving the house ghost behind. Now +spooks can't quarrel when they are a hundred miles apart any more than +men can." + +"And what happened afterwards?" asked Baby Van Rensselaer, with a +pretty impatience. + +"A most marvellous thing happened. Eliphalet Duncan went to the White +Mountains, and in the car of the railroad that runs to the top of Mount +Washington he met a classmate whom he had not seen for years, and this +classmate introduced Duncan to his sister, and this sister was a +remarkably pretty girl, and Duncan fell in love with her at first +sight, and by the time he got to the top of Mount Washington he was so +deep in love that he began to consider his own unworthiness, and to +wonder whether she might ever be induced to care for him a little--ever +so little." + +"I don't think that is so marvellous a thing," said Dear Jones, +glancing at Baby Van Rensselaer. + +"Who was she?" asked the Duchess, who had once lived in Philadelphia. + +"She was Miss Kitty Sutton, of San Francisco, and she was a daughter of +old Judge Sutton, of the firm of Pixley & Sutton." + +"A very respectable family," assented the Duchess. + +"I hope she wasn't a daughter of that loud and vulgar old Mrs. Sutton +whom I met at Saratoga one summer four or five years ago?" said Dear +Jones. + +"Probably she was," Uncle Larry responded. + +"She was a horrid old woman. The boys used to call her Mother Gorgon." + +"The pretty Kitty Sutton with whom Eliphalet Duncan had fallen in love +was the daughter of Mother Gorgon. But he never saw the mother, who was +in Frisco, or Los Angeles, or Santa Fe, or somewhere out West, and he +saw a great deal of the daughter, who was up in the White Mountains. +She was travelling with her brother and his wife, and as they journeyed +from hotel to hotel Duncan went with them, and filled out the +quartette. Before the end of the summer he began to think about +proposing. Of course he had lots of chances, going on excursions as +they were every day. He made up his mind to seize the first +opportunity, and that very evening he took her out for a moonlight row +on Lake Winipiseogee. As he handed her into the boat he resolved to do +it, and he had a glimmer of a suspicion that she knew he was going to +do it, too." + +"Girls," said Dear Jones, "never go out in a row-boat at night with a +young man unless you mean to accept him." + +"Sometimes it's best to refuse him, and get it over once for all," said +Baby Van Rensselaer, impersonally. + +"As Eliphalet took the oars he felt a sudden chill. He tried to shake +it off, but in vain. He began to have a growing consciousness of +impending evil. Before he had taken ten strokes--and he was a swift +oarsman--he was aware of a mysterious presence between him and Miss +Sutton." + +"Was it the guardian-angel ghost warning him off the match?" +interrupted Dear Jones. + +"That's just what it was," said Uncle Larry. "And he yielded to it, and +kept his peace, and rowed Miss Sutton back to the hotel with his +proposal unspoken." + +"More fool he," said Dear Jones. "It will take more than one ghost to +keep me from proposing when my mind is made up." And he looked at Baby +Van Rensselaer. + +"The next morning," continued Uncle Larry, "Eliphalet overslept +himself, and when he went down to a late breakfast he found that the +Suttons had gone to New York by the morning train. He wanted to follow +them at once, and again he felt the mysterious presence overpowering +his will. He struggled two days, and at last he roused himself to do +what he wanted in spite of the spook. When he arrived in New York it +was late in the evening. He dressed himself hastily, and went to the +hotel where the Suttons were, in the hope of seeing at least her +brother. The guardian angel fought every inch of the walk with him, +until he began to wonder whether, if Miss Sutton were to take him, the +spook would forbid the banns. At the hotel he saw no one that night, +and he went home determined to call as early as he could the next +afternoon, and make an end of it. When he left his office about two +o'clock the next day to learn his fate, he had not walked five blocks +before he discovered that the wraith of the Duncans had withdrawn his +opposition to the suit. There was no feeling of impending evil, no +resistance, no struggle, no consciousness of an opposing presence. +Eliphalet was greatly encouraged. He walked briskly to the hotel; he +found Miss Sutton alone. He asked her the question, and got his +answer." + +"She accepted him, of course?" said Baby Van Rensselaer. + +"Of course," said Uncle Larry. "And while they were in the first flush +of joy, swapping confidences and confessions, her brother came into the +parlor with an expression of pain on his face and a telegram in his +hand. The former was caused by the latter, which was from Frisco, and +which announced the sudden death of Mrs. Sutton, their mother." + +"And that was why the ghost no longer opposed the match?" questioned +Dear Jones. + +"Exactly. You see, the family ghost knew that Mother Gorgon was an +awful obstacle to Duncan's happiness, so it warned him. But the moment +the obstacle was removed, it gave its consent at once." + +The fog was lowering its thick, damp curtain, and it was beginning to +be difficult to see from one end of the boat to the other. Dear Jones +tightened the rug which enwrapped Baby Van Rensselaer, and then +withdrew again into his own substantial coverings. + +Uncle Larry paused in his story long enough to light another of the +tiny cigars he always smoked. + +"I infer that Lord Duncan"--the Duchess was scrupulous in the bestowal +of titles--"saw no more of the ghosts after he was married." + +"He never saw them at all, at any time, either before or since. But +they came very near breaking off the match, and thus breaking two young +hearts." + +"You don't mean to say that they knew any just cause or impediment why +they should not forever after hold their peace?" asked Dear Jones. + +"How could a ghost, or even two ghosts, keep a girl from marrying the +man she loved?" This was Baby Van Rensselaer's question. + +"It seems curious, doesn't it?" and Uncle Larry tried to warm himself +by two or three sharp pulls at his fiery little cigar. "And the +circumstances are quite as curious as the fact itself. You see, Miss +Sutton wouldn't be married for a year after her mother's death, so she +and Duncan had lots of time to tell each other all they knew. Eliphalet +got to know a good deal about the girls she went to school with; and +Kitty soon learned all about his family. He didn't tell her about the +title for a long time, as he wasn't one to brag. But he described to +her the little old house at Salem. And one evening towards the end of +the summer, the wedding-day having been appointed for early in +September, she told him that she didn't want a bridal tour at all; she +just wanted to go down to the little old house at Salem to spend her +honeymoon in peace and quiet, with nothing to do and nobody to bother +them. Well, Eliphalet jumped at the suggestion: it suited him down to +the ground. All of a sudden he remembered the spooks, and it knocked +him all of a heap. He had told her about the Duncan banshee, and the +idea of having an ancestral ghost in personal attendance on her husband +tickled her immensely. But he had never said anything about the ghost +which haunted the little old house at Salem. He knew she would be +frightened out of her wits if the house ghost revealed itself to her, +and he saw at once that it would be impossible to go to Salem on their +wedding trip. So he told her all about it, and how whenever he went to +Salem the two ghosts interfered, and gave dark seances and manifested +and materialized and made the place absolutely impossible. Kitty +listened in silence, and Eliphalet thought she had changed her mind. +But she hadn't done anything of the kind." + +"Just like a man--to think she was going to," remarked Baby Van +Rensselaer. + +"She just told him she could not bear ghosts herself, but she would not +marry a man who was afraid of them." + +"Just like a girl--to be so inconsistent," remarked Dear Jones. + +Uncle Larry's tiny cigar had long been extinct. He lighted a new one, +and continued: "Eliphalet protested in vain. Kitty said her mind was +made up. She was determined to pass her honeymoon in the little old +house at Salem, and she was equally determined not to go there as long +as there were any ghosts there. Until he could assure her that the +spectral tenant had received notice to quit, and that there was no +danger of manifestations and materializing, she refused to be married +at all. She did not intend to have her honeymoon interrupted by two +wrangling ghosts, and the wedding could be postponed until he had made +ready the house for her." + +"She was an unreasonable young woman," said the Duchess. + +"Well, that's what Eliphalet thought, much as he was in love with her. +And he believed he could talk her out of her determination. But he +couldn't. She was set. And when a girl is set, there's nothing to do +but to yield to the inevitable. And that's just what Eliphalet did. He +saw he would either have to give her up or to get the ghosts out; and +as he loved her and did not care for the ghosts, he resolved to tackle +the ghosts. He had clear grit, Eliphalet had--he was half Scotch and +half Yankee, and neither breed turns tail in a hurry. So he made his +plans and he went down to Salem. As he said good-bye to Kitty he had an +impression that she was sorry she had made him go; but she kept up +bravely, and put a bold face on it, and saw him off, and went home and +cried for an hour, and was perfectly miserable until he came back the +next day." + +"Did he succeed in driving the ghosts away?" asked Baby Van Rensselaer, +with great interest. + +"That's just what I'm coming to," said Uncle Larry, pausing at the +critical moment, in the manner of the trained story-teller. "You see, +Eliphalet had got a rather tough job, and he would gladly have had an +extension of time on the contract, but he had to choose between the +girl and the ghosts, and he wanted the girl. He tried to invent or +remember some short and easy way with ghosts, but he couldn't. He +wished that somebody had invented a specific for spooks--something that +would make the ghosts come out of the house and die in the yard. He +wondered if he could not tempt the ghosts to run in debt, so that he +might get the sheriff to help him. He wondered also whether the ghosts +could not be overcome with strong drink--a dissipated spook, a spook +with delirium tremens, might be committed to the inebriate asylum. But +none of these things seemed feasible." + +"What did he do?" interrupted Dear Jones. "The learned counsel will +please speak to the point." + +"You will regret this unseemly haste," said Uncle Larry, gravely, "when +you know what really happened." + +"What was it, Uncle Larry?" asked Baby Van Rensselaer. "I'm all +impatience." + +And Uncle Larry proceeded: + +"Eliphalet went down to the little old house at Salem, and as soon as +the clock struck twelve the rival ghosts began wrangling as before. +Raps here, there, and everywhere, ringing bells, banging tambourines, +strumming banjos sailing about the room, and all the other +manifestations and materializations followed one another just as they +had the summer before. The only difference Eliphalet could detect was a +stronger flavor in the spectral profanity; and this, of course, was +only a vague impression, for he did not actually hear a single word. He +waited awhile in patience, listening and watching. Of course he never +saw either of the ghosts, because neither of them could appear to him. +At last he got his dander up, and he thought it was about time to +interfere, so he rapped on the table, and asked for silence. As soon as +he felt that the spooks were listening to him he explained the +situation to them. He told them he was in love, and that he could not +marry unless they vacated the house. He appealed to them as old +friends, and he laid claim to their gratitude. The titular ghost had +been sheltered by the Duncan family for hundreds of years, and the +domiciliary ghost had had free lodging in the little old house at Salem +for nearly two centuries. He implored them to settle their differences, +and to get him out of his difficulty at once. He suggested that they +had better fight it out then and there, and see who was master. He had +brought down with him all needful weapons. And he pulled out his +valise, and spread on the table a pair of navy revolvers, a pair of +shot-guns, a pair of duelling-swords, and a couple of bowie-knives. He +offered to serve as second for both parties, and to give the word when +to begin. He also took out of his valise a pack of cards and a bottle +of poison, telling them that if they wished to avoid carnage they might +cut the cards to see which one should take the poison. Then he waited +anxiously for their reply. For a little space there was silence. Then +he became conscious of a tremulous shivering in one corner of the room, +and he remembered that he had heard from that direction what sounded +like a frightened sigh when he made the first suggestion of the duel. +Something told him that this was the domiciliary ghost, and that it was +badly scared. Then he was impressed by a certain movement in the +opposite corner of the room, as though the titular ghost were drawing +himself up with offended dignity. Eliphalet couldn't exactly see those +things, because he never saw the ghosts, but he felt them. After a +silence of nearly a minute a voice came from the corner where the +family ghost stood--a voice strong and full, but trembling slightly +with suppressed passion. And this voice told Eliphalet it was plain +enough that he had not long been the head of the Duncans, and that he +had never properly considered the characteristics of his race if now he +supposed that one of his blood could draw his sword against a woman. +Eliphalet said he had never suggested that the Duncan ghost should +raise his hand against a woman, and all he wanted was that the Duncan +ghost should fight the other ghost. And then the voice told Eliphalet +that the other ghost was a woman." + +"What?" said Dear Jones, sitting up suddenly. "You don't mean to tell +me that the ghost which haunted the house was a woman?" + +"Those were the very words Eliphalet Duncan used," said Uncle Larry; +"but he did not need to wait for the answer. All at once he recalled +the traditions about the domiciliary ghost, and he knew that what the +titular ghost said was the fact. He had never thought of the sex of a +spook, but there was no doubt whatever that the house ghost was a +woman. No sooner was this firmly fixed in Eliphalet's mind than he saw +his way out of the difficulty. The ghosts must be married!--for then +there would be no more interference, no more quarrelling, no more +manifestations and materializations, no more dark seances, with their +raps and bells and tambourines and banjos. At first the ghosts would +not hear of it. The voice in the corner declared that the Duncan wraith +had never thought of matrimony. But Eliphalet argued with them, and +pleaded and persuaded and coaxed, and dwelt on the advantages of +matrimony. He had to confess, of course, that he did not know how to +get a clergyman to marry them; but the voice from the corner gravely +told him that there need be no difficulty in regard to that, as there +was no lack of spiritual chaplains. Then, for the first time, the house +ghost spoke, a low, clear, gentle voice, and with a quaint, +old-fashioned New England accent, which contrasted sharply with the +broad Scotch speech of the family ghost. She said that Eliphalet Duncan +seemed to have forgotten that she was married. But this did not upset +Eliphalet at all; he remembered the whole case clearly, and he told her +she was not a married ghost, but a widow, since her husband had been +hanged for murdering her. Then the Duncan ghost drew attention to the +great disparity in their ages, saying that he was nearly four hundred +and fifty years old, while she was barely two hundred. But Eliphalet +had not talked to juries for nothing; he just buckled to, and coaxed +those ghosts into matrimony. Afterwards he came to the conclusion that +they were willing to be coaxed, but at the time he thought he had +pretty hard work to convince them of the advantages of the plan." + +"Did he succeed? asked Baby Van Rensselaer, with a woman's interest in +matrimony. + +"He did," said Uncle Larry. "He talked the wraith of the Duncans and +the spectre of the little old house at Salem into a matrimonial +engagement. And from the time they were engaged he had no more trouble +with them. They were rival ghosts no longer. They were married by their +spiritual chaplain the very same day that Eliphalet Duncan met Kitty +Sutton in front of the railing of Grace Church. The ghostly bride and +bridegroom went away at once on their bridal tour, and Lord and Lady +Duncan went down to the little old house at Salem to pass their +honeymoon." + +Uncle Larry stopped. His tiny cigar was out again. The tale of the +rival ghosts was told. A solemn silence fell on the little party on the +deck of the ocean steamer, broken harshly by the hoarse roar of the +fog-horn. + +(1883.) + + + + +SIXTEEN YEARS WITHOUT A BIRTHDAY + + +While the journalist deftly dealt with the lobster _a la_ Newburg, +as it bubbled in the chafing-dish before him, the deep-toned bell of +the church at the corner began to strike twelve. + +"Give me your plates, quick," he said, "and we'll drink Jack's health +before it's to-morrow." + +The artist and the soldier and the professor of mathematics did as they +were told; and then they filled their glasses. + +The journalist, still standing, looked the soldier in the eye, and +said: "Jack, this is the first time The Quartet has met since the old +school-days, ten years ago and more. That this reunion should take +place on your birthday doubles the pleasure of the occasion. We wish +you many happy returns of the day!" + +Then the artist and the mathematician rose also, and they looked at the +soldier, and repeated together, "Many happy returns of the day!" + +Whereupon they emptied their glasses and sat down, and the soldier rose +to his feet. + +"Thank you, boys," he began, "but I think you have already made me +enjoy this one birthday three times over. It was yesterday that I was +twenty-six, and----" + +"But I didn't meet you till last night," interrupted the journalist; +"and yesterday was Sunday; and I couldn't get a box for the theatre and +find the other half of The Quartet all on Sunday, could I?" + +"I'm not complaining because yesterday was my real birthday," the +soldier returned, "even if you have now protracted the celebration on +to the third day--it's just struck midnight, you know. All I have to +say is, that since you have given me a triplicate birthday this time, +any future anniversary will have to spread itself over four days if it +wants to beat the record, that's all." And he took his seat again. + +"Well," said the artist, who had recently returned from Paris, "that +won't happen till we see 'the week of the four Thursdays,' as the +French say." + +"And we sha'n't see that for a month of Sundays, I guess," the +journalist rejoined. + +There was a moment of silence, and then the mathematician spoke for the +first time. + +"A quadruplex birthday will be odd enough, I grant you," he began, "but +I don't think it quite as remarkable as the case of the lady who had no +birthday for sixteen years after she was born." + +The soldier and the artist and the journalist all looked at the +professor of mathematics, and they all smiled; but his face remained +perfectly grave. + +"What's that you say?" asked the journalist. "Sixteen years without a +birthday? Isn't that a very large order?" + +"Did you know the lady herself?" inquired the soldier. + +"She was my grandmother," the mathematician answered. "She had no +birthday for the first sixteen years of her life." + +"You mean that she did not celebrate her birthdays, I suppose," the +artist remarked. "That's nothing. I know lots of families where they +don't keep any anniversaries at all." + +"No," persisted the mathematician. "I meant what I said, and precisely +what I said. My grandmother did not keep her first fifteen birthdays +because she couldn't. She didn't have them to keep. They didn't happen. +The first time she had a chance to celebrate her birthday was when she +completed her sixteenth year--and I need not tell you that the family +made the most of the event." + +"This a real grandmother you are talking about," asked the journalist, +"and not a fairy godmother?" + +"I could understand her going without a birthday till she was four +years old," the soldier suggested, "if she was born on the 29th of +February." + +"That accounts for four years," the mathematician admitted, "since my +grandmother _was_ born on the 29th of February." + +"In what year?" the soldier pursued. "In 1796?" + +The professor of mathematics nodded. + +"Then that accounts for eight years," said the soldier. + +"I don't see that at all," exclaimed the artist. + +"It's easy enough," the soldier explained. "The year 1800 isn't a +leap-year, you know. We have a leap-year every four years, except the +final year of a century--1700, 1800, 1900." + +"I didn't know that," said the artist. + +"I'd forgotten it," remarked the journalist. "But that gets us over +only half of the difficulty. He says his grandmother didn't have a +birthday till she was sixteen. We can all see now how it was she went +without this annual luxury for the first eight years. But who robbed +her of the birthdays she was entitled to when she was eight and twelve. +That's what I want to know." + +"Born February 29, 1796, the Gregorian calendar deprives her of a +birthday in 1800," the soldier said. "But she ought to have had her +first chance February 29, 1804. I don't see how----" and he paused in +doubt. "Oh!" he cried, suddenly; "where was she living in 1804?" + +"Most of the time in Russia," the mathematician answered. "Although the +family went to England for a few days early in the year." + +"What was the date when they left Russia?" asked the soldier, eagerly. + +"They sailed from St. Petersburg in a Russian bark on the 10th of +February," answered the professor of mathematics, "and owing to +head-winds they did not reach England for a fortnight." + +"Exactly," cried the soldier. "That's what I thought. That accounts for +it." + +"I don't see how," the artist declared; "that is, unless you mean to +suggest that the Czar confiscated the little American girl's birthday +and sent it to Siberia." + +"It's plain enough," the soldier returned. "We have the reformed +calendar, the Gregorian calendar, you know, and the Russians haven't. +They keep the old Julian calendar, and it's now ten days behind ours. +They celebrate Christmas three days after we have begun the new year. +So if the little girl left St. Petersburg in a Russian ship on February +10, 1804, by the old reckoning, and was on the water two weeks, she +would land in England after March 1st by the new calendar." + +"That is to say," the artist inquired, "the little girl came into an +English port thinking she was going to have her birthday the next week, +and when she set foot on shore she found out that her birthday was +passed the week before. Is that what you mean?" + +"Yes," answered the soldier; and the mathematician nodded also. + +"Then all I have to say," the artist continued, "is that it was a mean +trick to play on a child that had been looking forward to her first +birthday for eight years--to knock her into the middle of next week in +that fashion!" + +"And she had to go four years more for her next chance," said the +journalist. "Then she would be twelve. But you said she hadn't a +birthday till she was sixteen. How did she lose the one she was +entitled to in 1808? She wasn't on a Russian ship again, was she?" + +"No," the mathematician replied; "she was on an American ship that +time." + +"On the North Sea?" asked the artist. + +"No," was the calm answer; "on the Pacific." + +"Sailing east or west?" cried the soldier. + +"Sailing east," answered the professor of mathematics, smiling again. + +"Then I see how it might happen," the soldier declared. + +"Well, I don't," confessed the artist. + +The journalist said nothing, as it seemed unprofessional to admit +ignorance of anything. + +"It is simple enough," the soldier explained. "You see, the world is +revolving about the sun steadily, and it is always high noon somewhere +on the globe. The day rolls round unceasing, and it is not cut off into +twenty-four hours. We happen to have taken the day of Greenwich or +Paris as the day of civilization, and we say that it begins earlier in +China and later in California; but it is all the same day, we say. +Therefore there has to be some place out in the middle of the Pacific +Ocean where we lose or gain a day--if we are going east, we gain it; if +we are going west, we lose it. Now I suppose this little girl of twelve +was on her way from some Asiatic port to some American port, and they +stopped on their voyage at Honolulu. Perhaps they dropped anchor there +just before midnight on their February 28, 1808, thinking that the +morrow would be the 29th; but when they were hailed from the shore, +just after midnight, they found out that it was already March 1st." + +As the soldier finished, he looked at the mathematician for +confirmation of his explanation. + +Thus appealed to, the professor of mathematics smiled and nodded, and +said: "You have hit it. That's just how it was that my grandmother lost +the birthday she ought to have had when she was twelve, and had to go +four years more without one." + +"And so she really didn't have a birthday till she was sixteen!" the +artist observed. "Well, all I can say is, your great-grandfather took +too many chances. I don't think he gave the child a fair show. I hope +he made it up to her when she was sixteen--that's all!" + +An hour later The Quartet separated. The soldier and the artist walked +away together, but the journalist delayed the mathematician. + +"I say," he began, "that yarn about your grandmother was very +interesting. It is an extraordinary combination of coincidences. I +can see it in the Sunday paper with a scare-head-- + + 'SIXTEEN YEARS WITHOUT A BIRTHDAY!' + +Do you mind my using it?" + +"But it isn't true," said the professor. + +"Not true?" echoed the journalist. + +"No," replied the mathematician. "I made it up. I hadn't done my share +of the talking, and I didn't want you to think I had nothing to say for +myself." + +"Not a single word of truth in it?" the journalist returned. + +"Not a single word," was the mathematician's answer. + +"Well, what of that?" the journalist declared. "I don't want to file it +in an affidavit--I want to print it in a newspaper." + +(1894.) + + + + +THE TWINKLING OF AN EYE + + +I + +The telegraph messenger looked again at the address on the envelope in +his hand, and then scanned the house before which he was standing. It +was an old-fashioned building of brick, two stories high, with an attic +above; and it stood in an old-fashioned part of lower New York, not +far from the East River. Over the wide archway there was a small +weather-worn sign, "Ramapo Steel and Iron Works;" and over the smaller +door alongside was a still smaller sign, "Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co." + +When the messenger-boy had made out the name, he opened this smaller +door and entered the long, narrow store. Its sides and walls were +covered with bins and racks containing sample steel rails and iron +beams, and coils of wire of various sizes. Down at the end of the store +were desks where several clerks and book-keepers were at work. + +As the messenger drew near, a red-headed office-boy blocked the +passage, saying, somewhat aggressively, "Well?" + +"Got a telegram for Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co.," the messenger +explained, pugnaciously thrusting himself forward. + +"In there!" the office-boy returned, jerking his thumb over his +shoulder towards the extreme end of the building, an extension, roofed +with glass and separated by a glass screen from the space where the +clerks were at work. + +The messenger pushed open the glazed door of this private office, a +bell jingled over his head, and the three occupants of the room looked +up. + +"Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co.?" said the messenger, interrogatively, +holding out the yellow envelope. + +"Yes," responded Mr. Whittier, a tall, handsome old gentleman, taking +the telegram. "You sign, Paul." + +The youngest of the three, looking like his father, took the +messenger's book, and, glancing at an old-fashioned clock which stood +in the corner, he wrote the name of the firm and the hour of delivery. +He was watching the messenger go out. His attention was suddenly called +to subjects of more importance by a sharp exclamation from his father. + +"Well, well, well," said the elder Whittier with his eyes fixed on the +telegram he had just read. "This is very strange--very strange indeed!" + +"What's strange?" asked the third occupant of the office, Mr. +Wheatcroft, a short, stout, irascible-looking man with a shock of +grizzly hair. + +For all answer Mr. Whittier handed to Mr. Wheatcroft the thin slip of +paper. + +No sooner had the junior partner read the paper than he seemed angrier +than was usual with him. + +"Strange!" he cried. "I should think it was strange! confoundedly +strange--and deuced unpleasant, too." + +"May I see what it is that's so very strange?" asked Paul, picking up +the despatch. + +"Of course you may see it," growled Mr. Wheatcroft; "and let us see +what you can make of it." + +The young man read the message aloud: "Deal off. Can get quarter cent +better terms. Carkendale." + +Then he read it again to himself. At last he said, "I confess I don't +see anything so very mysterious in that. We've lost a contract, I +suppose; but that must have happened lots of times before, hasn't it?" + +"It's happened twice before, this fall," returned Mr. Wheatcroft, +fiercely, "after our bid had been practically accepted and just before +the signing of the final contract!" + +"Let me explain, Wheatcroft," interrupted the elder Whittier, gently. +"You must not expect my son to understand the ins and outs of this +business as we do. Besides, he has only been in the office ten days." + +"I don't expect him to understand," growled Wheatcroft. "How could he? +I don't understand it myself!" + +"Close that door, Paul," said Mr. Whittier. "I don't want any of the +clerks to know what we are talking about. Here are the facts in the +case, and I think you will admit that they are certainly curious: Twice +this fall, and now a third time, we have been the lowest bidders for +important orders, and yet, just before our bid was formally accepted, +somebody has cut under us by a fraction of a cent and got the job. +First we thought we were going to get the building of the Barataria +Central's bridge over the Little Makintosh River, but in the end it was +the Tuxedo Steel Company that got the contract. Then there was the +order for the fifty thousand miles of wire for the Trans-continental +Telegraph; we made an extraordinarily low estimate on that. We wanted +the contract, and we threw off, not only our profit, but even +allowances for office expenses; and yet five minutes before the last +bid had to be in, the Tuxedo Company put in an offer only a hundred and +twenty-five dollars less than ours. Now comes the telegram to-day. The +Methuselah Life Insurance Company is going to put up a big building; we +were asked to estimate on the steel framework. We wanted that +work--times are hard and there is little doing, as you know, and we +must get work for our men if we can. We meant to have this contract if +we could. We offered to do it at what was really actual cost of +manufacture--without profit, first of all, and then without any charge +at all for office expenses, for interest on capital, for depreciation +of plant. The vice-president of the Methuselah, the one who attends to +all their real estate, is Mr. Carkendale. He told me yesterday that our +bid was very low, and that we were certain to get the contract. And now +he sends me this." Mr. Whittier picked up the telegram again. + +"But if we were going to do it at actual cost of manufacture," said the +young man, "and somebody else underbids us, isn't somebody else losing +money on the job?" + +"That's no sort of satisfaction to our men," retorted Mr. Wheatcroft, +cooking himself before the fire. "Somebody else--confound him!--will be +able to keep his men together and to give them the wages we want for +our men. Do you think somebody else is the Tuxedo Company again?" + +"What of it?" asked Mr. Whittier. "Surely you don't suppose----" + +"Yes, I do," interrupted Mr. Wheatcroft, swiftly. "I do, indeed. I +haven't been in this business thirty years for nothing. I know how +hungry we get at all times for a big, fat contract; and I know we would +any of us give a hundred dollars to the man who could tell us what our +chief rival has bid. It would be the cheapest purchase of the year, +too." + +"Come, come, Wheatcroft," said the elder Whittier; "you know we've +never done anything of that sort yet, and I think you and I are too old +to be tempted now." + +"Nothing of the sort," snorted the fiery little man; "I'm open to +temptation this very moment. If I could know what the Tuxedo people are +going to bid on the new steel rails of the Springfield and Athens, I'd +give a thousand dollars." + +"If I understand you, Mr. Wheatcroft," Paul Whittier asked, "you are +suggesting that there has been something done that is not fair?" + +"That's just what I mean," Mr. Wheatcroft declared, vehemently. + +"Do you mean to say that the Tuxedo people have somehow been made +acquainted with our bids?" asked the young man. + +"That's what I'm thinking now," was the sharp answer. "I can't think of +anything else. For two months we haven't been successful in getting a +single one of the big contracts. We've had our share of the little +things, of course, but they don't amount to much. The big things that +we really wanted have slipped through our fingers. We've lost them by +the skin of our teeth every time. That isn't accident, is it? Of course +not! Then there's only one explanation--there's a leak in this office +somewhere." + +"You don't suspect any of the clerks, do you, Mr. Wheatcroft?" asked +the elder Whittier, sadly. + +"I don't suspect anybody in particular," returned the junior partner, +brushing his hair up the wrong way; "and I suspect everybody in +general. I haven't an idea who it is, but it's somebody! It must be +somebody--and if it is somebody, I'll do my best to get that somebody +into the clutches of the law." + +"Who makes up the bids on these important contracts?" asked Paul. + +"Wheatcroft and I," answered his father. "The specifications are +forwarded to the works, and the engineers make their estimates of the +actual cost of labor and material. These estimates are sent to us here, +and we add whatever we think best for interest, and for expenses, for +wear and tear, and for profit." + +"Who writes the letters making the offer--the one with actual figures I +mean?" the son continued. + +"I do," the elder Whittier explained; "I have always done it." + +"You don't dictate them to a typewriter?" Paul pursued. + +"Certainly not," the father responded; "I write them with my own hand, +and, what's more, I take the press-copy myself, and there is a special +letter-book for such things. This letter-book is always kept in the +safe in this office; in fact, I can say that this particular +letter-book never leaves my hands except to go into that safe. And, as +you know, nobody has access to that safe except Wheatcroft and me." + +"And the Major," corrected the junior partner. + +"No," Mr. Whittier explained, "Van Zandt has no need to go there now." + +"But he used to," Mr. Wheatcroft persisted. + +"He did once," the senior partner returned; "but when we bought those +new safes outside there in the main office, there was no longer any +need for the chief book-keeper to go to this smaller safe; and so, last +month--it was while you were away, Wheatcroft--Van Zandt came in here +one afternoon, and said that, as he never had occasion to go to this +safe, he would rather not have the responsibility of knowing the +combination. I told him we had perfect confidence in him." + +"I should think so!" broke in the explosive Wheatcroft. "The Major has +been with us for thirty years now. I'd suspect myself of petty larceny +as soon as him." + +"As I said," continued the elder Whittier; "I told him that we trusted +him perfectly, of course. But he urged me, and to please him I changed +the combination of this safe that afternoon. You will remember, +Wheatcroft, that I gave you the new word the day you came back." + +"Yes, I remember," said Mr. Wheatcroft. "But I don't see why the Major +did not want to know how to open that safe. Perhaps he is beginning to +feel his years now. He must be sixty, the Major; and I've been thinking +for some time that he looks worn." + +"I noticed the change in him," Paul remarked, "the first day I came +into the office. He seemed ten years older than he was last winter." + +"Perhaps his wound troubles him again," suggested Mr. Whittier. +"Whatever the reason, it is at his own request that he is now ignorant +of the combination. No one knows that but Wheatcroft and I. The letters +themselves I wrote myself, and copied myself, and put them myself in +the envelopes I directed myself. I don't recall mailing them myself, +but I may have done that too. So you see that there can't be any +foundation for your belief, Wheatcroft, that somebody had access to our +bids." + +"I can't believe anything else!" cried Wheatcroft, impulsively. "I +don't know how it was done--I'm not a detective--but it was done +somehow. And if it was done, it was done by somebody! And what I'd like +to do is to catch that somebody in the act--that's all! I'd make it hot +for him!" + +"You would like to have him out at the Ramapo Works," said Paul, +smiling at the little man's violence, "and put him under the +steam-hammer?" + +"Yes, I would," responded Mr. Wheatcroft. "I would indeed! Putting a +man under a steam-hammer may seem a cruel punishment, but I think it +would cure the fellow of any taste for prying into our business in the +future." + +"I think it would get him out of the habit of living," the elder +Whittier said, as the tall clock in the corner struck one. "But don't +let's be so brutal. Let's go to lunch and talk the matter over quietly. +I don't agree with your suspicion, Wheatcroft, but there may be +something in it." + +Five minutes later Mr. Whittier, Mr. Wheatcroft, and the only son of +the senior partner left the glass-framed private office, and, walking +leisurely through the long store, passed into the street. + +They did not notice that the old book-keeper, Major Van Zandt, whose +high desk was so placed that he could overlook the private office, had +been watching them ever since the messenger had delivered the despatch. +He could not read the telegram, he could not hear the comments, but he +could see every movement and every gesture and every expression. He +gazed from one speaker to the other almost as though he were able to +follow the course of the discussion; and when the three members of the +firm walked past his desk, he found himself staring at them as if in a +vain effort to read on their faces the secret of the course of action +they had resolved upon. + + +II + +After luncheon, as it happened, both the senior and the junior partner +of Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co. had to attend meetings, and they went +their several ways, leaving Paul to return to the office alone. + +When he came opposite to the house which bore the weather-beaten sign +of the firm he stood still for a moment, and looked across with mingled +pride and affection. The building was old-fashioned--so old-fashioned, +indeed, that only a long-established firm could afford to occupy it. It +was Paul Whittier's great-grandfather who had founded the Ramapo Works. +There had been cast the cannon for many of the ships of the little +American navy that gave so good an account of itself in the war of +1812. Again, in 1848, had the house of Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co.--the +present Mr. Wheatcroft's father having been taken into partnership by +Paul's grandfather--been able to be of service to the government of the +United States. All through the four years that followed the firing on +the flag in 1861 the Ramapo Works had been run day and night. When +peace came at last and the people had leisure to expand, a large share +of the rails needed by the new overland roads which were to bind the +East and West together in iron bonds had been rolled by Whittier, +Wheatcroft & Co. Of late years, as Paul knew, the old firm seemed to +have lost some of its early energy, and, having young and vigorous +competitors, it had barely held its own. + +That the Ramapo Works should once more take the lead was Paul Whittier's +solemn purpose, and to this end he had been carefully trained. He was +now a young man of twenty-five, a tall, handsome fellow, with a full +mustache over his firm mouth, and with clear, quick eyes below his +curly brown hair. He had spent four years in college, carrying off +honors in mathematics, was popular with his classmates, who made him +class poet, and in his senior year he was elected president of the +college photographic society. He had gone to a technological institute, +where he had made himself master of the theory and practice of +metallurgy. After a year of travel in Europe, where he had investigated +all the important steel and iron works he could get into, he had come +home to take a desk in the office. + +It was only for a moment that he stood on the sidewalk opposite, +looking at the old building. Then he threw away his cigarette and went +over. Instead of entering the long store he walked down the alleyway +left open for the heavy wagons. When he came opposite to the private +office in the rear of the store he examined the doors and the windows +carefully, to see if he could detect any means of ingress other than +those open to everybody. + +There was no door from the private office into the alleyway or into the +yard. There was a door from the alleyway into the store, opposite to +the desks of the clerks, and within a few feet of the door leading from +the store into the private office. + +Paul passed through this entrance, and found himself face to face with +the old book-keeper, Van Zandt, who was following all his movements +with a questioning gaze. + +"Good-afternoon, Major," said Paul, pleasantly. "Have you been out for +your lunch yet?" + +"I always get my dinner at noon," the book-keeper gruffly answered, +returning to his books. + +As Paul walked on he could not but think that the Major's manner was +ungracious. And the young man remembered how cheerful the old man had +been, and how courteous always, when the son of the senior partner, +while still a school-boy, used to come to the office on Saturdays. + +Paul had always delighted in the office, and the store, and the yard +behind, and he had spent many a holiday there, and Major Van Zandt had +always been glad to see him, and had willingly answered his myriad +questions. + +Paul wondered why the book-keeper's manner was now so different. Van +Zandt was older, but he was not so very old, not more than sixty, and +old age in itself is not sufficient to make a man surly and to sour his +temper. That the Major had had trouble in his family was well known. +His wife had been flighty and foolish, and it was believed that she had +run away from him; and his only son was a wild lad, who had been +employed by Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co., out of regard for the father, +and who had disgraced himself beyond forgiveness. Paul recalled vaguely +that the young fellow had gone West somewhere, and had been shot in a +mining-camp after a drunken brawl in a gambling-house. + +As Paul entered the private office he found the porter there, putting +coal on the fire. + +Stepping back to close the glass door behind him, that they might be +alone, he said: + +"Mike, who shuts up the office at night?" + +"Sure I do, Mr. Paul," was the prompt reply. + +"And you open it in the morning?" the young man asked. + +"I do that!" Mike responded. + +"Do you see that these windows are always fastened on the inside?" was +the next query. + +"Yes, Mr. Paul," the porter replied. + +"Well," and the inquirer hesitated briefly before putting this +question, "have you found any of these windows unfastened any morning +lately when you came here?" + +"And how did you know that?" Mike returned, in surprise. + +"What morning was it?" asked Paul, pushing his advantage. + +"It was last Monday mornin', Mr. Paul," the porter explained, "an' how +it was I dunno, for I had every wan of them windows tight on Saturday +night, an' Monday mornin' one of them was unfastened whin I wint to +open it to let a bit of air into the office here." + +"You sleep here always, don't you?" Paul proceeded. + +"I've slept here ivery night for three years now come Thanksgivin'," +Mike replied. "I've the whole top of the house to myself. It's an +illigant apartment I have there, Mr. Paul." + +"Who was here Sunday?" was the next question. + +"Sure nobody was here at all," responded the porter, "barrin' they came +while I took me a bit of a walk after dinner. An' they couldn't have +got in anyway, for I lock up always, and I wasn't gone for an hour, or +maybe an hour an' a half." + +"I hope you will be very careful hereafter," said Paul. + +"I will that," promised Mike, "an' I am careful now always." + +The porter took up the coal-scuttle, and then he turned to Paul. + +"How was it ye knew that the winder was not fastened that mornin'?" he +asked. + +"How did I know?" repeated the young man. "Oh, a little bird told me." + +When Mike had left the office Paul took a chair before the fire and +lighted a cigar. For half an hour he sat silently thinking. + +He came to the conclusion that Mr. Wheatcroft was right in his +suspicion. Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co. had lost important contracts +because of underbidding, due to knowledge surreptitiously obtained. He +believed that some one had got into the store on Sunday while Mike was +taking a walk, and that this somebody had somehow opened the safe. +There never was any money in that private safe; it was intended to +contain only important papers. It did contain the letter-book of the +firm's bids, and this is what was wanted by the man who had got into +the office, and who had let himself in by the window, leaving it +unfastened behind him. How this man had got in, and why he did not get +out by the way he entered, how he came to be able to open the private +safe, the combination of which was known only to the two +partners--these were questions for which Paul Whittier had no answer. + +What grieved him when he had come to the conclusion was that the +thief--for such the house-breaker was in reality--was probably one of +the men in the employ of the firm. It seemed to him almost certain that +the man who had broken in knew all the ins and outs of the office. And +how could this knowledge have been obtained except by an employee? Paul +was well acquainted with the clerks in the outer office. There were +five of them, including the old book-keeper, and although none of them +had been with the firm as long as the Major, no one of them had been +there less than ten years. Paul did not know which one to suspect. +There was, in fact, no reason to suspect any particular clerk. And yet +that one of the five men in the main office on the other side of the +glass partition within twenty feet of him--that one of those was the +guilty man Paul did not doubt. + +And therefore it seemed to him not so important to prevent the thing +from happening again as it was to catch the man who had done it. The +thief once caught, it would be easy thereafter for the firm to take +unusual precautions. But the first thing to do was to catch the thief. +He had come and gone, and left no trail. But he must have visited the +office at least three times in the past few weeks, since the firm had +lost three important contracts. Probably he had been there oftener than +three times. Certainly he would come again. Sooner or later he would +come once too often. All that needed to be done was to set a trap for +him. + +While Paul was sitting quietly in the private office, smoking a cigar +with all his mental faculties at their highest tension, the clock in +the corner suddenly struck three. + +Paul swiftly swung around in his chair and looked at it. An old +eight-day clock it was, which not only told the time of the day, but +pretended, also, to supply miscellaneous astronomical information. It +stood by itself in the corner. + +For a moment after it struck Paul stared at it with a fixed gaze, as +though he did not see what he was looking at. Then a light came into +his eyes and a smile flitted across his lips. + +He turned around slowly and measured with his eye the proportions of +the room, the distance between the desks and the safe and the clock. He +glanced up at the sloping glass roof above him. Then he smiled again, +and again sat silent for a minute. He rose to his feet and stood with +his back to the fire. Almost in front of him was the clock in the +corner. + +He took out his watch and compared its time with that of the clock. +Apparently he found that the clock was too fast, for he walked over to +it and turned the minute-hand back. It seemed that this was a more +difficult feat than he supposed or that he went about it carelessly, +for the minute-hand broke off short in his fingers. A spasmodic +movement of his, as the thin metal snapped, pulled the chain off its +cylinder, and the weight fell with a crash. + +All the clerks looked up; and the red-headed office-boy was prompt in +answer to the bell Paul rang a moment after. + +"Bobby," said the young man to the boy, as he took his hat and +overcoat, "I've just broken the clock. I know a shop where they make a +specialty of repairing timepieces like that. I'm going to tell them to +send for it at once. Give it to the man who will come this afternoon +with my card. Do you understand?" + +"Cert," the boy answered. "If he 'ain't got your card, he don't get the +clock." + +"That's what I mean," Paul responded, as he left the office. + +Before he reached the door he met Mr. Wheatcroft. + +"Paul," cried the junior partner, explosively, "I've been thinking +about that--about that--you know what I mean! And I have decided that +we had better put a detective on this thing at once!" + +"Yes," said Paul, "that's a good idea. In fact, I had just come to the +same conclusion. I----" + +Then he checked himself. He had turned round slightly to speak to Mr. +Wheatcroft; he saw that Major Van Zandt was standing within ten feet of +them, and he noticed that the old book-keeper's face was strangely +pale. + + +III + +During the next week the office of Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co. had its +usual aspect of prosperous placidity. The routine work was done in the +routine way; the porter opened the office every morning, and the +office-boy arrived a few minutes after it was opened; the clerks came +at nine, and a little later the partners were to be seen in the inner +office reading the morning's correspondence. + +The Whittiers, father and son, had had a discussion with Mr. Wheatcroft +as to the most advisable course to adopt to prevent the future leakage +of the trade secrets of the firm. The senior partner had succeeded in +dissuading the junior partner from the employment of detectives. + +"Not yet," he said, "not yet. These clerks have all served us +faithfully for years, and I don't want to submit them to the indignity +of being shadowed--that's what they call it, isn't it?--of being +shadowed by some cheap hireling who may try to distort the most +innocent acts into evidence of guilt, so that he can show us how smart +he is." + +"But this sort of thing can't go on forever," ejaculated Mr. +Wheatcroft. "If we are to be underbid on every contract worth having, +we might as well go out of the business!" + +"That's true, of course," Mr. Whittier admitted; "but we are not sure +that we are being underbid unfairly." + +"The Tuxedo Company have taken away three contracts from us in the past +two months," cried the junior partner; "we can be sure of that, can't +we?" + +"We have lost three contracts, of course," returned Mr. Whittier, in +his most conciliatory manner, "and the Tuxedo people have captured +them. But that may be only a coincidence, after all." + +"It is a pretty expensive coincidence for us," snorted Mr. Wheatcroft. + +"But because we have lost money," the senior partner rejoined gently, +laying his hand on Mr. Wheatcroft's arm, "that's no reason why we +should also lose our heads. It is no reason why we should depart from +our old custom of treating every man fairly. If there is any one in our +employ here who is selling us, why, if we give him rope enough he will +hang himself, sooner or later." + +"And before he suspends himself that way," cried Mr. Wheatcroft, "we +may be forced to suspend ourselves." + +"Come, come, Wheatcroft," said the senior partner, "I think we can +afford to stand the loss a little longer. What we can't afford to do is +to lose our self-respect by doing something irreparable. It may be that +we shall have to employ detectives, but I don't think the time has come +yet." + +"Very well," the junior partner declared, yielding an unwilling +consent. "I don't insist on it. I still think it would be best not to +waste any more time--but I don't insist. What will happen is that we +shall lose the rolling of those steel rails for the Springfield and +Athens road--that's all." + +Paul Whittier had taken no part in this discussion. He agreed with his +father, and saw he had no need to urge any further argument. + +Presently he asked when they intended to put in the bid for the rails. +His father then explained that they were expecting a special estimate +from the engineers at the Ramapo Works, and that it probably would be +Saturday before this could be discussed by the partners and the exact +figures of the proposed contract determined. + +"And if we don't want to lose that contract for sure," insisted Mr. +Wheatcroft, "I think we had better change the combination on that +safe." + +"May I suggest," said Paul, "that it seems to me to be better to leave +the combination as it is. What we want to do is not to get this +Springfield and Athens contract so much as to find out whether some one +really is getting at the letter-book. Therefore we mustn't make it any +harder for the some one to get at the letter-book." + +"Oh, very well," Mr. Wheatcroft assented, a little ungraciously, "have +it your own way. But I want you to understand now that I think you are +only postponing the inevitable!" + +And with that the subject was dropped. For several days the three men +who were together for hours in the office of the Ramapo Iron and Steel +Works refrained from any discussion of the question which was most +prominent in their minds. + +It was on Wednesday that the tall clock that Paul Whittier had broken +returned from the repairer's. Paul himself helped the men to set it in +its old place in the corner of the office, facing the safe, which +occupied the corner diagonally opposite. + +It so chanced that Paul came down late on Thursday morning, and perhaps +this was the reason that a pressure of delayed work kept him in the +office that evening long after every one else. The clerks had all gone, +even Major Van Zandt, always the last to leave--and the porter had come +in twice before the son of the senior partner was ready to go for the +night. The gas was lighted here and there in the long, narrow, deserted +store, as Paul walked through it from the office to the street. +Opposite, the swift twilight of a New York November had already settled +down on the city. + +"Can't I carry yer bag for ye, Mister Paul?" asked the porter, who was +showing him out. + +"No, thank you, Mike," was the young man's answer. "That bag has very +little in it. And, besides, I haven't got to carry it far." + +The next morning Paul was the first of the three to arrive. The clerks +were in their places already, but neither the senior nor the junior +partner had yet come. The porter happened to be standing under the +wagon archway as Paul Whittier was about to enter the store. + +The young man saw the porter, and a mischievous smile hovered about the +corners of his mouth. + +"Mike," he said, pausing on the door-step, "do you think you ought to +smoke while you are cleaning out our office in the morning?" + +"Sure, I haven't had me pipe in me mouth this mornin' at all," the +porter answered, taken by surprise. + +"But yesterday morning?" Paul pursued. + +"Yesterday mornin'!" Mike echoed, not a little puzzled. + +"Yesterday morning at ten minutes before eight you were in the private +office smoking a pipe." + +"But how did you see me, Mr. Paul?" cried Mike, in amaze. "Ye was late +in comin' down yesterday, wasn't ye?" + +Paul smiled pleasantly. + +"A little bird told me," he said. + +"If I had the bird I'd ring his neck for tellin' tales," the porter +remarked. + +"I don't mind your smoking, Mike," the young man went on, "that's your +own affair; but I'd rather you didn't smoke a pipe while you are +tidying up the private office." + +"Well, Mister Paul, I won't do it again," the porter promised. + +"And I wouldn't encourage Bob to smoke, either," Paul continued. + +"I encourage him?" inquired Mike. + +"Yes," Paul explained; "yesterday morning you let him light his +cigarette from your pipe--didn't you?" + +"Were you peekin' in thro' the winder, Mister Paul?" the porter asked, +eagerly. "Ye saw me, an' I never saw ye at all." + +"No," the young man answered, "I can't say that I saw you myself. A +little bird told me." + +And with that he left the wondering porter and entered the store. Just +inside the door was the office-boy, who hastily hid an unlighted +cigarette as he caught sight of the senior partner's son. + +When Paul saw the red-headed boy he smiled again, mischievously. + +"Bob," he began, "when you want to see who can stand on his head the +longest, you or Danny the boot-black, don't you think you could choose +a better place than the private office?" + +The office-boy was quite as much taken by surprise as the porter had +been, but he was younger and quicker-witted. + +"And when did I have Danny in the office?" he asked, defiantly. + +"Yesterday morning," Paul answered, still smiling, "a little before +half-past eight." + +"Yesterday mornin'?" repeated Bob, as though trying hard to recall all +the events of the day before. "Maybe Danny did come in for a minute." + +"He played leap-frog with you all the way into the private office," +Paul went on, while Bob looked at him with increasing wonder. + +"How did you know?" the office-boy asked, frankly. "Were you lookin' +through the window?" + +"How do I know that you and Danny stood on your heads in the corner of +the office with your heels against the safe, scratching off the paint? +Next time I'd try the yard, if I were you. Sports of that sort are more +fun in the open air." + +And with that parting shot Paul went on his way to his own desk, +leaving the office-boy greatly puzzled. + +Later in the day Bob and Mike exchanged confidences, and neither was +ready with an explanation. + +"At school," Bob declared, "we used to think teacher had eyes in the +back of her head. She was everlastingly catchin' me when I did things +behind her back. But Mr. Paul beats that, for he see me doin' things +when he wasn't here." + +"Mister Paul wasn't here, for sure, yesterday mornin'," Mike asserted; +"I'd take me oath o' that. An' if he wasn't here, how could he see me +givin' ye a light from me pipe? Answer me that! He says it's a little +bird told him; but that's not it, I'm thinkin'. Not but that they have +clocks with birds into 'em, that come out and tell the time o' day, +'Cuckoo! Cuckoo! Cuckoo!' An' if that big clock he broke last week had +a bird in it that could tell time that way, I'd break the thing +quick--so I would." + +"It ain't no bird," said Bob. "You can bet your life on that. No birds +can't tell him nothin' no more'n you can catch 'em by putting salt on +their tails. I know what it is Mr. Paul does--least, I know how he does +it. It's second-sight, that's what it is! I see a man onct at the +theayter, an' he----" + +But perhaps it is not necessary to set down here the office-boy's +recollection of the trick of an ingenious magician. + +About half an hour after Paul had arrived at the office Mr. Wheatcroft +appeared. The junior partner hesitated in the doorway for a second, and +then entered. + +Paul was watching him, and the same mischievous smile flashed over the +face of the young man. + +"You need not be alarmed to-day, Mr. Wheatcroft," he said. "There is no +fascinating female waiting for you this morning." + +"Confound the woman!" ejaculated Mr. Wheatcroft, testily. "I couldn't +get rid of her." + +"But you subscribed for the book at last," asserted Paul, "and she went +away happy." + +"I believe I did agree to take one copy of the work she showed me," +admitted Mr. Wheatcroft, a little sheepishly. Then he looked up +suddenly. "Why, bless my soul," he cried, "that was yesterday +morning----" + +"Allowing for differences of clocks," Paul returned, "it was about ten +minutes to ten yesterday morning." + +"Then how do you come to know anything about it? I should like to be +told that!" the junior partner inquired. "You did not get down till +nearly twelve." + +"I had an eye on you," Paul answered, as the smile again flitted across +his face. + +"But I thought you were detained all the morning by a sick friend," +insisted Mr. Wheatcroft. + +"So I was," Paul responded. "And if you won't believe I had an eye on +you, all I can say then is that a little bird told me." + +"Stuff and nonsense!" cried Mr. Wheatcroft. "Your little bird has two +legs, hasn't it?" + +"Most birds have," laughed Paul. + +"I mean two legs in a pair of trousers," explained the junior partner, +rumpling his grizzled hair with an impatient gesture. + +"You see how uncomfortable it is to be shadowed," said Paul, turning +the topic as his father entered the office. + +That Saturday afternoon Mr. Whittier and Mr. Wheatcroft agreed on the +bid to be made on the steel rails needed by the Springfield and Athens +road. While the elder Mr. Whittier wrote the letter to the railroad +with his own hand, his son manoeuvred the junior partner into the +outer office, where all the clerks happened to be at work, including +the old book-keeper. Then Paul managed his conversation with Mr. +Wheatcroft so that any one of the five employees who chose to listen to +the apparently careless talk should know that the firm had just made a +bid on another important contract. Paul also spoke as though his father +and himself would probably go out of town that Saturday night, to +remain away till Monday morning. + +And just before the store was closed for the night, Paul Whittier wound +up the eight-day clock that stood in the corner opposite the private +safe. + + +IV + +Although the Whittiers, father and son, spent Sunday out of town, Paul +made an excuse to the friends whom they were visiting, and returned to +the city by a midnight train. Thus he was enabled to present himself at +the office of the Ramapo Works very early on Monday morning. + +It was so early, indeed, that no one of the employees had arrived when +the son of the senior partner, bag in hand, pushed open the street door +and entered the long store, at the far end of which the porter was +still tidying up for the day's work. + +"An' is that you, Mister Paul?" Mike asked in surprise, as he came out +of the private office to see who the early visitor might be. "An' what +brought ye out o' your bed before breakfast like this?" + +"I always get out of bed before breakfast," Paul replied. "Don't you?" + +"Would I get up if I hadn't got to get up to get my livin'?" the porter +replied. + +Paul entered the office, followed by Mike, still wondering why the +young man was there at that hour. + +After a swift glance round the office Paul put down his bag on the +table and turned suddenly to the porter with a question. + +"When does Bob get down here?" + +Mike looked at the clock in the corner before answering. + +"It'll be ten minutes," he said, "or maybe twenty, before the boy does +be here to-day, seein' it's Monday mornin', an' he'll be tired with not +workin' of Sunday." + +"Ten minutes," repeated Paul, slowly. After a moment's thought he +continued, "Then I'll have to ask you to go out for me, Mike." + +"I can go anywhere ye want, Mister Paul," the porter responded. + +"I want you to go----" began Paul, "I want you to go----" and he +hesitated, as though he was not quite sure what it was he wished the +porter to do, "I want you to go to the office of the _Gotham Gazette_ +and get me two copies of yesterday's paper. Do you understand?" + +"Maybe they won't be open so early in the mornin'," said the Irishman. + +"That's no matter," said Paul, hastily correcting himself; "I mean that +I want you to go there now and get the papers if you can. Of course, if +the office isn't open I shall have to send again later." + +"I'll be goin' now, Mister Paul," and Mike took his hat from a chair +and started off at once. + +Paul walked through the store with the porter. When Mike had gone the +young man locked the front door and returned at once to the private +office in the rear. He shut himself in, and lowered all the shades so +that whatever he might do inside could not be seen by any one on the +outside. + +Whatever it was he wished to do he was able to do it swiftly, for in +less than a minute after he had closed the door of the office he opened +it again and came out into the main store with his bag in his hand. He +walked leisurely to the front of the store, arriving just in time to +unlock the door as the office-boy came around the corner smoking a +cigarette. + +When Bob, still puffing steadily, was about to open the door and enter +the store he looked up and discovered that Paul was gazing at him. The +boy pinched the cigarette out of his mouth and dropped it outside, and +then came in, his eyes expressing his surprise at the presence of the +senior partner's son down-town at that early hour in the morning. + +Paul greeted the boy pleasantly, but Bob got away from him as soon as +possible. Ever since the young man had told what had gone on in the +office when Bob was its only occupant, the office-boy was a little +afraid of the young man, as though somewhat mysterious, not to say +uncanny. + +Paul thought it best to wait for the porter's return, and he stood +outside under the archway for five minutes, smoking a cigar, with his +bag at his feet. + +When Mike came back with the two copies of the Sunday newspaper he had +been sent to get, Paul gave him the money for them and an extra quarter +for himself. Then the young man picked up his bag again. + +"When my father comes down, Mike," he said, "tell him I may be a little +late in getting back this morning." + +"An' are ye goin' away now, Mister Paul?" the porter asked. "What good +was it that ye got out o' bed before breakfast and come down here so +early in the mornin'?" + +Paul laughed a little. "I had a reason for coming here this morning," +he answered, briefly; and with that he walked away, his bag in one hand +and the two bulky, gaudy papers in the other. + +Mike watched him turn the corner, and then went into the store again, +where Bob greeted him promptly with the query why the old man's son had +been getting up by the bright light. + +"If I was the boss, or the boss's son either," said Bob, "I wouldn't +get up till I was good and ready. I'd have my breakfast in bed if I had +a mind to, an' my dinner too, an' my supper. An' I wouldn't do no work, +an' I'd go to the theayter every night, and twice on Saturdays." + +"I dunno why Mister Paul was down," Mike explained. "All he wanted was +two o' thim Sunday papers with pictures in thim. What did he want two +o' thim for I dunno. There's reading enough in one o' thim to last me a +month of Sundays." + +It may be surmised that Mike would have been still more in the dark as +to Paul Whittier's reasons for coming down-town so early that Monday +morning if he could have seen the young man throw the copies of the +_Gotham Gazette_ into the first ash-cart he passed after he was out of +range of the porter's vision. + +Paul was not the only member of Whittier, Wheatcroft & Co. to arrive at +the office early that morning. Mr. Wheatcroft was usually punctual, +taking his seat at his desk just as the clock struck half-past nine. On +this Monday morning he entered the store a little before nine. + +As he walked back to the office he looked over at the desks of the +clerks as though he was seeking some one. + +At the door of the office he met Bob. + +"Hasn't the Major come down yet?" he asked, shortly. + +"No, sir," the boy answered. "He don't never get here till nine." + +"H'm," grunted the junior partner. "When he does come, tell him I want +to see him at once--at once, do you understand?" + +"I ain't deaf and dumb and blind," Bob responded. "I'll steer him into +you as soon as ever he shows up." + +But, for a wonder, the old book-keeper was late that morning. +Ordinarily he was a model of exactitude. Yet the clock struck nine, and +half-past, and ten before he appeared in the store. + +Before he changed his coat Bob was at his side. + +"Mr. Wheatcroft he wants to see you now in a hurry," said the boy. + +Major Van Zandt paled swiftly, and steadied himself by a grasp of the +railing. + +"Does Mr. Wheatcroft wish to see me?" he asked, faintly. + +"You bet he does," the boy answered, "an' in a hurry, too. He came +bright an' early this morning a-purpose to see you, an' he's been +a-waiting for two hours. An' I guess he's got his mad up now." + +When the old book-keeper with his blanched face and his faltering step +entered the private office Mr. Wheatcroft wheeled around in his chair. + +"Oh, it's you, is it?" he cried. "At last!" + +"I regret that I was late this morning, Mr. Wheatcroft," Van Zandt +began. + +"That's no matter," said the employer;--"at least, I want to talk about +something else." + +"About something else?" echoed the old man, feebly. + +"Yes," responded Mr. Wheatcroft. "Shut the door behind you, please, so +that that red-headed cub out there can't hear what I am going to say, +and take a chair. Yes; there is something else I've got to say to you, +and I want you to be frank with me." + +Whatever it was that Mr. Wheatcroft had to say to Major Van Zandt it +had to be said under the eyes of the clerks on the other side of the +glass partition. And it took a long time saying, for it was evident to +any observer of the two men as they sat in the private office that Mr. +Wheatcroft was trying to force an explanation of some kind from the old +book-keeper, and that the Major was resisting his employer's entreaties +as best he could. Apparently the matter under discussion was of an +importance so grave as to make Mr. Wheatcroft resolutely retain his +self-control; and not once did he let his voice break out explosively, +as was his custom. + +Major Van Zandt was still closeted with Wheatcroft when Mr. Whittier +arrived. The senior partner stopped near the street door to speak to a +clerk, and he was joined almost immediately by his son. + +"Well, Paul," said the father, "have I got down here before you after +all, and in spite of your running away last night?" + +"No," the son responded, "I was the first to arrive this +morning--luckily." + +"Luckily?" echoed his father. "I suppose that means that you have been +able to accomplish your purpose--whatever it was. You didn't tell me, +you know." + +"I'm ready to tell you now, father," said Paul, "since I have +succeeded." + +Walking down the store together, they came to the private office. + +As the old book-keeper saw them he started up, and made as if to leave +the office. + +"Keep your seat, Major," cried Mr. Wheatcroft, sternly, but not +unkindly. "Keep your seat, please." + +Then he turned to Mr. Whittier. "I have something to tell you both," +he said, "and I want the Major here while I tell you. Paul, may I +trouble you to see that the door is closed so that we are out of +hearing?" + +"Certainly," Paul responded, as he closed the door. + +"Well, Wheatcroft," Mr. Whittier said, "what is all this mystery of +yours now?" + +The junior partner swung around in his chair and faced Mr. Whittier. + +"My mystery?" he cried. "It's the mystery that puzzled us all, and I've +solved it." + +"What do you mean?" asked the senior partner. + +"What I mean is, that somebody has been opening that safe there in the +corner, and reading our private letter-book, and finding out what we +were bidding on important contracts. What I mean is, that this man has +taken this information, filched from us, and sold it to our +competitors, who were not too scrupulous to buy stolen goods!" + +"We all suspected this, as you know," the elder Whittier said; "have +you anything new to add to it now?" + +"Haven't I?" returned Mr. Wheatcroft. "I've found the man! That's all!" + +"You, too?" ejaculated Paul. + +"Who is he?" asked the senior partner. + +"Wait a minute," Mr. Wheatcroft begged. "Don't be in a hurry and I'll +tell you. Yesterday afternoon, I don't know what possessed me, but I +felt drawn down-town for some reason. I wanted to see if anything was +going on down here. I knew we had made that bid Saturday, and I +wondered if anybody would try to get it on Sunday. So I came down about +four o'clock, and I saw a man sneak out of the front door of this +office. I followed him as swiftly as I could and as quietly, for I +didn't want to give the alarm until I knew more. The man did not see me +as he turned to go up the steps of the elevated railroad station. At +the corner I saw his face." + +"Did you recognize him?" asked Mr. Whittier. + +"Yes," was the answer. "And he did not see me. There were tears rolling +down his cheeks, perhaps that's the reason. This morning I called him +in here, and he has finally confessed the whole thing." + +"Who--who is it?" asked Mr. Whittier, dreading to look at the old +book-keeper, who had been in the employ of the firm for thirty years +and more. + +"It is Major Van Zandt!" Mr. Wheatcroft declared. + +There was a moment of silence; then the voice of Paul Whittier was +heard, saying, "I think there is some mistake!" + +"A mistake!" cried Mr. Wheatcroft. "What kind of a mistake?" + +"A mistake as to the guilty man," responded Paul. + +"Do you mean that the Major isn't guilty?" asked Mr. Wheatcroft. + +"That's what I mean," Paul returned. + +"But he has confessed," Mr. Wheatcroft retorted. + +"I can't help that," was the response. "He isn't the man who opened +that safe yesterday afternoon at half-past three and took out the +letter-book." + +The old book-keeper looked at the young man in frightened amazement. + +"I have confessed it," he said, piteously--"I have confessed it." + +"I know you have, Major," Paul declared, not unkindly. "And I don't +know why you have, for you were not the man." + +"And if the man who confesses is not the man who did it, who is?" asked +Wheatcroft, sarcastically. + +"I don't know who is, although I have my suspicions," said Paul; "but I +have his photograph--taken in the act!" + + +V + +When Paul Whittier said he had a photograph of the mysterious enemy of +the Ramapo Steel and Iron Works in the very act of opening the safe, +Mr. Whittier and Mr. Wheatcroft looked at each other in amazement. +Major Van Zandt stared at the young man with fear and shame struggling +together in his face. + +Without waiting to enjoy his triumph, Paul put his hand in his pocket +and took out two squares of bluish paper. + +"There," he said, as he handed one to his father, "there is a blue +print of the man taken in this office at ten minutes past three +yesterday afternoon, just as he was about to open the safe in the +corner. You see he is kneeling with his hand on the lock, but +apparently just then something alarmed him and he cast a hasty glance +over his shoulder. At that second the photograph was taken, and so we +have a full-face portrait of the man." + +Mr. Whittier had looked at the photograph, and he now passed it to the +impatient hand of the junior partner. + +"You see, Mr. Wheatcroft," Paul continued, "that although the face in +the photograph bears a certain family likeness to Major Van Zandt's, +all the same that is not a portrait of the Major. The man who was here +yesterday was a young man, a man young enough to be the Major's son!" + +The old book-keeper looked at the speaker. + +"Mr. Paul," he began, "you won't be hard on the----" then he paused +abruptly. + +"I confess I don't understand this at all!" declared Mr. Wheatcroft, +irascibly. + +"I am afraid that I do understand it," Mr. Whittier said, with a glance +of compassion at the Major. + +"There," Paul continued, handing his father a second azure square, +"there is a photograph taken here ten minutes after the first, at 3.20 +yesterday afternoon. That shows the safe open and the young man +standing before it with the private letter-book in his hand. As his +head is bent over the pages of the book, the view of the face is not so +good. But there can be no doubt that it is the same man. You see that, +don't you, Mr. Wheatcroft?" + +"I see that, of course," returned Mr. Wheatcroft, forcibly. "What I +don't see is why the Major here should confess if he isn't guilty!" + +"I think I know the reason for that," said Mr. Whittier, gently. + +"There haven't been two men at our books, have there?" asked Mr. +Wheatcroft--"the Major, and also the fellow who has been photographed?" + +Mr. Whittier looked at the book-keeper for a moment. + +"Major," he said, with compassion in his voice, "you won't tell me that +it was you who sold our secrets to our rivals? And you might confess it +again and again, I should never believe it. I know you better. I have +known you too long to believe any charge against your honesty, even if +you bring it yourself. The real culprit, the man who is photographed +here, is your son, isn't he? There is no use in your trying to conceal +the truth now, and there is no need to attempt it, because we shall be +lenient with him for your sake, Major." + +There was a moment's silence, broken by Wheatcroft suddenly saying: + +"The Major's son? Why, he's dead, isn't he? He was shot in a brawl +after a spree somewhere out West two or three years ago--at least, +that's what I understood at the time." + +"It is what I wanted everybody to understand at the time," said the +book-keeper, breaking silence at last. "But it wasn't so. The boy was +shot, but he wasn't killed. I hoped that it would be a warning to him, +and he would make a fresh start. Friends of mine got him a place in +Mexico, but luck was against him--so he wrote me--and he lost that. +Then an old comrade of mine gave him another chance out in Denver, and +for a while he kept straight and did his work well. Then he broke down +once more and he was discharged. For six months I did not know what had +become of him. I've found out since that he was a tramp for weeks, and +that he walked most of the way from Colorado to New York. This fall he +turned up in the city, ragged, worn out, sick. I wanted to order him +away, but I couldn't. I took him back and got him decent clothes and +took him to look for a place, for I knew that hard work was the only +thing that would keep him out of mischief. He did not find a place, +perhaps he did not look for one. But all at once I discovered that he +had money. He would not tell me how he got it. I knew he could not have +come by it honestly, and so I watched him. I spied after him, and at +last I found that he was selling you to the Tuxedo Company." + +"But how could he open the safe?" cried Mr. Wheatcroft. "You didn't +know the new combination." + +"I did not tell him the combination I did know," said the old +book-keeper, with pathetic dignity. "And I didn't have to tell him. He +can open almost any safe without knowing the combination. How he does +it, I don't know; it is his gift. He listens to the wheels as they +turn, and he sets first one and then the other; and in ten minutes the +safe is open." + +"How could he get into the store?" Mr. Whittier inquired. + +"He knew I had a key," responded the old book-keeper, "and he stole it +from me. He used to watch on Sunday afternoons till Mike went for a +walk, and then he unlocked the store, and slipped in and opened the +safe. Two weeks ago Mike came back unexpectedly, and he had just time +to get out of one of the rear windows of this office." + +"Yes," Paul remarked, as the Major paused, "Mike told me that he found +a window unfastened." + +"I heard you asking about it," Major Van Zandt explained, "and I knew +that if you were suspicious he was sure to be caught sooner or later. +So I begged him not to try to injure you again. I offered him money to +go away. But he refused my money; he said he could get it for himself +now, and I might keep mine until he needed it. He gave me the slip +yesterday afternoon. When I found he was gone I came here straight. The +front door was unlocked; I walked in and found him just closing the +safe here. I talked to him, and he refused to listen to me. I tried to +get him to give up his idea, and he struck me. Then I left him, and I +went out, seeing no one as I hurried home. That's when Mr. Wheatcroft +followed me, I suppose. The boy never came back all night. I haven't +seen him since; I don't know where he is, but he is my son, after +all--my only son! And when Mr. Wheatcroft accused me, I confessed at +last, thinking you might be easier on me than you would be on the boy." + +"My poor friend," said Mr. Whittier, sympathetically, holding out his +hand, which the Major clasped gratefully for a moment. + +"Now that we know who was selling us to the Tuxedo people, we can +protect ourselves hereafter," declared Mr. Wheatcroft. "And in spite of +your trying to humbug me into believing you guilty, Major, I'm willing +to let your son off easy." + +"I think I can get him a place where he will be out of temptation, +because he will be kept hard at work always," said Paul. + +The old book-keeper looked up as though about to thank the young man, +but there seemed to be a lump in his throat which prevented him from +speaking. + +Suddenly Mr. Wheatcroft began, explosively, "That's all very well! but +what I still don't understand is how Paul got those photographs!" + +Mr. Whittier looked at his son and smiled. "That is a little +mysterious, Paul," he said, "and I confess I'd like to know how you did +it." + +"Were you concealed here yourself?" asked Mr. Wheatcroft. + +"No," Paul answered. "If you will look round this room you will see +that there isn't a dark corner in which anybody could tuck himself." + +"Then where was the photographer hidden?" Mr. Wheatcroft inquired, with +increasing curiosity. + +"In the clock," responded Paul. + +"In the clock?" echoed Mr. Wheatcroft, greatly amazed. "Why, there +isn't room in the case of that clock for a thin midget, let alone a +man!" + +Paul enjoyed puzzling his father's partner. "I didn't say I had a man +there or a midget either," he explained. "I said that the photographer +was in the clock--and I might have said that the clock itself was the +photographer." + +Mr. Wheatcroft threw up his hands in disgust. "Well," he cried, "if you +want to go on mystifying us in this absurd way, go on as long as you +like! But your father and I are entitled to some consideration, I +think." + +"I'm not mystifying you at all; the clock took the pictures +automatically. I'll show you how," Paul returned, getting up from his +chair and going to the corner of the office. + +Taking a key from his pocket he opened the case of the clock and +revealed a small photographic apparatus inside, with the tube of the +objective opposite the round glass panel in the door of the case. At +the bottom of the case was a small electrical battery, and on a small +shelf over this was an electro-magnet. + +"I begin to see how you did it," Mr. Whittier remarked. "I am not an +expert in photography, Paul, and I'd like a full explanation. And make +it as simple as you can." + +"It's a very simple thing indeed," said the son. "One day while I was +wondering how we could best catch the man who was getting at the books, +that clock happened to strike, and somehow it reminded me that in our +photographic society at college we had once suggested that it would be +amusing to attach a detective camera to a timepiece and take snapshots +every few minutes all through the day. I saw that this clock of ours +faced the safe, and that it couldn't be better placed for the purpose. +So when I had thought out my plan, I came over here and pretended that +the clock was wrong, and in setting it right I broke off the +minute-hand. Then I had a man I know send for it for repairs; he is +both an electrician and an expert photographer. Together we worked out +this device. Here is a small snap-shot camera loaded with a hundred and +fifty films; and here is the electrical attachment which connects with +the clock so as to take a photograph every ten minutes from eight in +the morning to six at night. We arranged that the magnet should turn +the spool of film after every snap-shot." + +"Well!" cried Mr. Wheatcroft. "I don't know much about these things, +but I read the papers, and I suppose you mean that the clock 'pressed +the button,' and the electricity pulled the string." + +"That's it precisely," the young man responded. "Of course I wasn't +quite sure how it would work, so I thought I would try it first on a +week-day when we were all here. It did work all right, and I made +several interesting discoveries. I found that Mike smoked a pipe in +this office--and that Bob played leap-frog in the store and stood on +his head in the corner there up against the safe!" + +"The confounded young rascal!" interrupted Mr. Wheatcroft. + +Paul smiled as he continued. "I found also that Mr. Wheatcroft was +captivated by a pretty book-agent and bought two bulky volumes he +didn't want." + +Mr. Wheatcroft looked sheepish for a moment. + +"Oh, that's how you knew, is it?" he growled, running his hands +impatiently through his shock of hair. + +"That's how I knew," Paul replied. "I told you I had an eye on you. It +was the lone eye of the camera. And on Sunday it kept watch for us +here, winking every ten minutes. From eight o'clock in the morning to +three in the afternoon it winked forty-two times, and all it saw was +the same scene, the empty corner of the room here, with the safe in the +shadow at first and at last in the full light that poured down from the +glass roof over us. But a little after three a man came into the office +and made ready to open the safe. At ten minutes past three the clock +and the camera took his photograph--in the twinkling of an eye. At +twenty minutes past three a second record was made. Before half-past +three the man was gone, and the camera winked every ten minutes until +six o'clock quite in vain. I came down early this morning and got the +roll of negatives. One after another I developed them, disappointed +that I had almost counted fifty of them without reward. But the +forty-third and the forty-fourth paid for all my trouble." + +Mr. Whittier gave his son a look of pride. "That was very ingeniously +worked out, Paul; very ingeniously indeed," he said. "If it had not +been for your clock here I might have found it difficult to prove that +the Major was innocent--especially since he declared himself guilty." + +Mr. Wheatcroft rose to his feet, to close the conversation. + +"I'm glad we know the truth, anyhow," he asserted, emphatically. And +then, as though to relieve the strain on the old book-keeper, he added, +with a loud laugh at his own joke, "That clock had its hands before its +face all the time--but it kept its eyes open for all that!" + +"Don't forget that it had only one eye," said Whittier, joining in the +laugh; "it had an eye single to its duty." + +"You know the French saying, father," added Paul, "'In the realm of the +blind the one-eyed man is king.'" + +(1895.) + + + + +A CONFIDENTIAL POSTSCRIPT + + +It was pithily said by one of old that a bore is a man who insists upon +talking about himself when you want to talk about yourself. There is +some truth in the saying, no doubt; but surely it should not apply to +the relation of an author to his readers. So long, at least, as they +are holding his book in their hands, it is a fair inference that they +do not wish to talk about themselves just that moment; indeed, it is +not a violent hypothesis to suggest that perhaps they are then willing +enough to have him talk about himself. For the egotistic garrulity of +the author there is, in fact, no more fit occasion than in the final +pages of his book. At that stage of the game he may fairly enough count +on the good humor of his readers, since those who might be dissatisfied +with him would all have yielded to discouragement long before the +postscript was reached. + +The customary preface is not so pleasant a place for a confidential +chat as the unconventional postscript. The real value and the true +purpose of the preface is to serve as a telephone for the writer of the +book and to bear his message to the professional book-reviewers. On the +other hand, only truly devoted readers will track the author to his +lair in a distant postscript. While it might be presumptuous for him to +talk about himself before the unknown and anonymous book-reviewers, he +cannot but be rejoiced at the chance of a gossip with his old friends, +the gentle readers. + +Perhaps the present author cannot drop into conversation more easily +than by here venturing upon the expression of a purely personal +feeling--his own enjoyment in the weaving of the unsubstantial webs of +improbable adventure that fill the preceding pages. With an ironic +satisfaction was it that a writer who is not unaccustomed to be called +a mere realist here attempted fantasy, even though the results of his +effort may reveal invention only and not imagination. It may even be +that it was memory (mother of the muses) rather than invention +(daughter of necessity) which inspired the 'Primer of Imaginary +Geography.' I have an uneasy wonder whether I should ever have gone on +this voyage of discovery with Mynheer Vanderdecken, past the Bohemia +which is a desert country by the sea, if I had not in my youth been +allowed to visit 'A Virtuoso's Collection'; and yet, to the best of my +recollection, it was no recalling of Hawthorne's tale, but a casual +glance at the Carte du Pays de Tendre in a volume of Moliere, which +first set me upon collecting the material for an imaginary geography. + +In the second of these little fantasies the midnight wanderer saw +certain combats famous in all literature and certain dances. Where it +was possible use was made of the actual words of the great authors who +had described these combats and these dances, the descriptions being +condensed sometimes and sometimes their rhythm being a little modified +so that they should not be out of keeping with the more pedestrian +prose by which they were accompanied. Thus, as it happens, the dances +of little Pearl and of Topsy could be set forth, fortunately, almost in +the very phrases of Hawthorne and of Mrs. Stowe, while I was forced to +describe as best I could myself the gyrations of the wife who lived in +'A Doll's House' and of her remote predecessor as a "new woman," the +daughter of Herodias. The same method was followed in the writing of +the third of these tales, although the authors then drawn upon were +most of them less well known; and the only quotation of any length was +the one from Irving describing the mysterious deeds of the headless +horseman. + +Now it chanced that the 'Dream-Gown of the Japanese Ambassador,' +instead of appearing complete in one number of a magazine, as the two +earlier tales had done, was published in various daily newspapers in +three instalments. In the first of these divisions the returned +traveller fell asleep and saw himself in the crystal ball; in the +second he went through the rest of his borrowed adventures; and in the +third his friend awakened him and unravelled the mystery. When the +second part appeared a clergyman who had read the 'Sketch-Book' (even +though he had never heard of the 'Forty Seven Ronins,' or the +'Shah-Nameh,' or the 'Custom of the Country') took his pen and sat down +and wrote swiftly to a newspaper, declaring that this instalment of my +tale had been "cribbed bodily, and almost _verbatim et literatim_, +in one-third of its entire length, from the familiar 'Legend of Sleepy +Hollow.'" He asked sarcastically if the copyright notice printed at the +head of my story was meant to apply also to the passages plagiarized +from Irving. He declared also that "it is unfortunate for literary +persons of the stamp of the author of 'Vignettes of Manhattan' that +there still exist readers who do not forget what they have read that is +worth remembering. Such readers are not to be imposed on by the most +skilful bunglers (_sic_) who endeavor to pass off as their own the +work of greater men." + +The writer of this letter had given his address, Christ Church Rectory, +----, N.J. (I suppress the name of the village for the sake of his +parishioners as I suppress the name of the man for the sake of his +family). Therefore I wrote to him at once, telling him that if he had +read the third and final instalment of my story with the same attention +he had given to the second part he would understand why I was expecting +to receive from him an apology for the letter he had sent to the +newspaper. In time there reached me this inadequate and disingenuous +response, hardly worthy to be called even an apology for an apology: + + "In reply to your courteous communication, let me say that had I + seen the close of your short story, I should have grasped the + situation more fully, and should doubtless have refrained from + giving it any special attention. + + "When one considers, however, the manner in which your copy was + published by the paper, deferring the explanation until the + appearance of the third instalment, it must be acknowledged that + there was opportunity for surprise and criticism. The fault should + have been found with the way in which the article was published, + rather than with the story itself, that appearing at its conclusion + a self-confessed mosaic of quotations. Needless to add that its + author's aim to amuse, entertain, and instruct has been manifestly + subserved. + + "Yours most sincerely, + + "---- ----" + +Of another tale ('Sixteen Years without a Birthday') I have nothing to +say--except to record a friend's remark after he had finished it, that +he had "read something very like it not long before in a newspaper;" so +perhaps I may be permitted to declare that I had not read something +very like it anywhere, but had, to the best of my belief, "made it all +up out of my own head." Nor need I say anything about the 'Rival +Ghosts'--except to note that it is here reprinted from an earlier +collection of stories which has now for years been out of print. + +The last tale of all, the 'Twinkling of an Eye,' received the second +prize for the best detective story, offered by a newspaper +syndicate--the first prize being taken by a story written by Miss Mary +E. Wilkins and Mr. J. E. Chamberlain. The use of the camera as a +detective agency had been suggested to me by a brief newspaper +paragraph glanced at casually several years before. And I confess that +it was with not a little amusement that I employed this device, since I +had then recently seen my 'Vignettes of Manhattan' criticized as being +"photographic in method." Here again I had no reason to doubt the +originality of my plot; and here once more was my confidence shattered, +and I was forced to confess that fiction can never hope to keep ahead +of fact. + +After the 'Twinkling of an Eye' was published in the newspapers which +had joined in offering the prizes, it was printed again in one of the +smaller magazines. There it was read by a gentleman connected with a +hardware house in Grand Rapids, who wrote to me, informing me that the +story I had laboriously pieced together had--in some of its details, at +least--been anticipated by real life more than a year before I sat down +to write out my narrative. This gentleman has now kindly given me +permission to quote from his letter those passages which may be of +interest to readers of the 'Twinkling of an Eye': + +It appears that the cash-drawer of the hardware store, in which small +change was habitually left over night for use in the morning before the +banks open, was robbed three nights running, although only a few +dollars were taken at a time. "The large vault, in which are kept the +firm's papers, had not been tampered with, and the work was evidently +that of some petty thief. The night-watchman was a trusted employee, +and my father did not wish to accuse him unjustly. And, besides, he did +not wish to warn the thief. So nothing was said to the watchman. The +nights on which the till had been tapped were Thursday, Friday, and +Saturday. Father goes down to the store every Sunday morning for about +half an hour to open the mail, and it was then that he discovered the +Saturday night theft. Directly after Sunday dinner, father went down to +see an electrical friend of his, who executed a plan which my father +had devised. The cash-drawer was situated in one corner of the office +(quite a large one), in which both the wholesale and retail business is +transacted. He placed a large detective camera in the corner opposite +the till, and beside it, and a little behind, a quantity of flash-light +powder in a receptacle. This powder was connected by electric wires +with the till in such a manner, that when the drawer was opened the +circuit would be completed and the powder ignited. Everything worked to +perfection. The office is always left dark at night, so the shutter of +the camera could be left open without spoiling the film. The camera was +in place Sunday evening, but the thief stayed away. It was set again on +Monday night, and that time we got him. A small wire was attached to a +weight near the camera extending to the till. As the thief started to +open the drawer the weight made a slight noise. He glanced in the +direction of the noise, started, pulled the weight a little farther, +and we had his picture. Detectives had already been working on the +case, and the thief was identified and arrested on the strength of the +portrait. When he was informed that we had his picture, he made a full +confession. He said that when the flash-light went off he nearly +fainted from fright." + + * * * * * + +After this experience I am tempted to give up all hope that I can ever +invent anything which is not a fact, even before I make it up. I am now +prepared, therefore, to discover that I did really have an interview +with Count Cagliostro, and also that I was actually an unwilling +witness at the wedding of the rival ghosts. + +(1896.) + + +THE END + + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Tales of Fantasy and Fact, by Brander Matthews + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK TALES OF FANTASY AND FACT *** + +***** This file should be named 23678.txt or 23678.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/2/3/6/7/23678/ + +Produced by Bethanne M. Simms and the Online Distributed +Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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