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diff --git a/42989-0.txt b/42989-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..bda4b34 --- /dev/null +++ b/42989-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8311 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42989 *** + + THE + PLATTNER STORY + + AND OTHERS + + + + + BY THE SAME AUTHOR + + + THE STOLEN BACILLUS + THE WONDERFUL VISIT + THE WHEELS OF CHANCE + THE ISLAND OF DOCTOR MOREAU + THE TIME MACHINE + + + + + THE + PLATTNER STORY + + AND OTHERS + + BY + H. G. WELLS + + METHUEN & CO. + 36 ESSEX STREET, W.C. + LONDON + 1897 + + + + + TO + MY FATHER + + + + +CONTENTS + + + PAGE + THE PLATTNER STORY 2 + THE ARGONAUTS OF THE AIR 29 + THE STORY OF THE LATE MR. ELVESHAM 47 + IN THE ABYSS 71 + THE APPLE 94 + UNDER THE KNIFE 106 + THE SEA-RAIDERS 126 + POLLOCK AND THE PORROH MAN 142 + THE RED ROOM 165 + THE CONE 179 + THE PURPLE PILEUS 196 + THE JILTING OF JANE 213 + IN THE MODERN VEIN 224 + A CATASTROPHE 239 + THE LOST INHERITANCE 252 + THE SAD STORY OF A DRAMATIC CRITIC 262 + A SLIP UNDER THE MICROSCOPE 274 + + + + +THE PLATTNER STORY + + +Whether the story of Gottfried Plattner is to be credited or not, is +a pretty question in the value of evidence. On the one hand, we have +seven witnesses--to be perfectly exact, we have six and a half pairs +of eyes, and one undeniable fact; and on the other we have--what is +it?--prejudice, common sense, the inertia of opinion. Never were there +seven more honest-seeming witnesses; never was there a more undeniable +fact than the inversion of Gottfried Plattner's anatomical structure, +and--never was there a more preposterous story than the one they +have to tell! The most preposterous part of the story is the worthy +Gottfried's contribution (for I count him as one of the seven). Heaven +forbid that I should be led into giving countenance to superstition by +a passion for impartiality, and so come to share the fate of Eusapia's +patrons! Frankly, I believe there is something crooked about this +business of Gottfried Plattner; but what that crooked factor is, I +will admit as frankly, I do not know. I have been surprised at the +credit accorded to the story in the most unexpected and authoritative +quarters. The fairest way to the reader, however, will be for me to +tell it without further comment. + +Gottfried Plattner is, in spite of his name, a free-born Englishman. +His father was an Alsatian who came to England in the Sixties, married +a respectable English girl of unexceptionable antecedents, and died, +after a wholesome and uneventful life (devoted, I understand, chiefly +to the laying of parquet flooring), in 1887. Gottfried's age is +seven-and-twenty. He is, by virtue of his heritage of three languages, +Modern Languages Master in a small private school in the South of +England. To the casual observer he is singularly like any other Modern +Languages Master in any other small private school. His costume is +neither very costly nor very fashionable, but, on the other hand, it +is not markedly cheap or shabby; his complexion, like his height and +his bearing, is inconspicuous. You would notice, perhaps, that, like +the majority of people, his face was not absolutely symmetrical, his +right eye a little larger than the left, and his jaw a trifle heavier +on the right side. If you, as an ordinary careless person, were to bare +his chest and feel his heart beating, you would probably find it quite +like the heart of anyone else. But here you and the trained observer +would part company. If you found his heart quite ordinary, the trained +observer would find it quite otherwise. And once the thing was pointed +out to you, you too would perceive the peculiarity easily enough. It is +that Gottfried's heart beats on the right side of his body. + +Now, that is not the only singularity of Gottfried's structure, +although it is the only one that would appeal to the untrained mind. +Careful sounding of Gottfried's internal arrangements, by a well-known +surgeon, seems to point to the fact that all the other unsymmetrical +parts of his body are similarly misplaced. The right lobe of his liver +is on the left side, the left on his right; while his lungs, too, are +similarly contraposed. What is still more singular, unless Gottfried is +a consummate actor, we must believe that his right hand has recently +become his left. Since the occurrences we are about to consider (as +impartially as possible), he has found the utmost difficulty in +writing, except from right to left across the paper with his left hand. +He cannot throw with his right hand, he is perplexed at meal times +between knife and fork, and his ideas of the rule of the road--he is +a cyclist--are still a dangerous confusion. And there is not a scrap +of evidence to show that before these occurrences Gottfried was at all +left-handed. + +There is yet another wonderful fact in this preposterous business. +Gottfried produces three photographs of himself. You have him at the +age of five or six, thrusting fat legs at you from under a plaid frock, +and scowling. In that photograph his left eye is a little larger than +his right, and his jaw is a trifle heavier on the left side. This +is the reverse of his present living conditions. The photograph of +Gottfried at fourteen seems to contradict these facts, but that is +because it is one of those cheap "Gem" photographs that were then in +vogue, taken direct upon metal, and therefore reversing things just +as a looking-glass would. The third photograph represents him at +one-and-twenty, and confirms the record of the others. There seems here +evidence of the strongest confirmatory character that Gottfried has +exchanged his left side for his right. Yet how a human being can be so +changed, short of a fantastic and pointless miracle, it is exceedingly +hard to suggest. + +In one way, of course, these facts might be explicable on the +supposition that Plattner has undertaken an elaborate mystification, +on the strength of his heart's displacement. Photographs may be +fudged, and left-handedness imitated. But the character of the man +does not lend itself to any such theory. He is quiet, practical, +unobtrusive, and thoroughly sane, from the Nordau standpoint. He +likes beer, and smokes moderately, takes walking exercise daily, and +has a healthily high estimate of the value of his teaching. He has a +good but untrained tenor voice, and takes a pleasure in singing airs +of a popular and cheerful character. He is fond, but not morbidly +fond, of reading,--chiefly fiction pervaded with a vaguely pious +optimism,--sleeps well, and rarely dreams. He is, in fact, the very +last person to evolve a fantastic fable. Indeed, so far from forcing +this story upon the world, he has been singularly reticent on the +matter. He meets inquirers with a certain engaging--bashfulness is +almost the word, that disarms the most suspicious. He seems genuinely +ashamed that anything so unusual has occurred to him. + +It is to be regretted that Plattner's aversion to the idea of +post-mortem dissection may postpone, perhaps for ever, the positive +proof that his entire body has had its left and right sides +transposed. Upon that fact mainly the credibility of his story hangs. +There is no way of taking a man and moving him about _in space_, as +ordinary people understand space, that will result in our changing +his sides. Whatever you do, his right is still his right, his left +his left. You can do that with a perfectly thin and flat thing, of +course. If you were to cut a figure out of paper, any figure with a +right and left side, you could change its sides simply by lifting it +up and turning it over. But with a solid it is different. Mathematical +theorists tell us that the only way in which the right and left sides +of a solid body can be changed is by taking that body clean out of +space as we know it,--taking it out of ordinary existence, that is, +and turning it somewhere outside space. This is a little abstruse, +no doubt, but anyone with any knowledge of mathematical theory will +assure the reader of its truth. To put the thing in technical language, +the curious inversion of Plattner's right and left sides is proof +that he has moved out of our space into what is called the Fourth +Dimension, and that he has returned again to our world. Unless we +choose to consider ourselves the victims of an elaborate and motiveless +fabrication, we are almost bound to believe that this has occurred. + +So much for the tangible facts. We come now to the account of the +phenomena that attended his temporary disappearance from the world. +It appears that in the Sussexville Proprietary School, Plattner not +only discharged the duties of Modern Languages Master, but also taught +chemistry, commercial geography, book-keeping, shorthand, drawing, and +any other additional subject to which the changing fancies of the +boys' parents might direct attention. He knew little or nothing of +these various subjects, but in secondary as distinguished from Board +or elementary schools, knowledge in the teacher is, very properly, by +no means so necessary as high moral character and gentlemanly tone. +In chemistry he was particularly deficient, knowing, he says, nothing +beyond the Three Gases (whatever the three gases may be). As, however, +his pupils began by knowing nothing, and derived all their information +from him, this caused him (or anyone) but little inconvenience for +several terms. Then a little boy named Whibble joined the school, who +had been educated (it seems) by some mischievous relative into an +inquiring habit of mind. This little boy followed Plattner's lessons +with marked and sustained interest, and in order to exhibit his zeal +on the subject, brought, at various times, substances for Plattner to +analyse. Plattner, flattered by this evidence of his power of awakening +interest, and trusting to the boy's ignorance, analysed these, and even +made general statements as to their composition. Indeed, he was so far +stimulated by his pupil as to obtain a work upon analytical chemistry, +and study it during his supervision of the evening's preparation. He +was surprised to find chemistry quite an interesting subject. + +So far the story is absolutely commonplace. But now the greenish +powder comes upon the scene. The source of that greenish powder seems, +unfortunately, lost. Master Whibble tells a tortuous story of finding +it done up in a packet in a disused limekiln near the Downs. It would +have been an excellent thing for Plattner, and possibly for Master +Whibble's family, if a match could have been applied to that powder +there and then. The young gentleman certainly did not bring it to +school in a packet, but in a common eight-ounce graduated medicine +bottle, plugged with masticated newspaper. He gave it to Plattner at +the end of the afternoon school. Four boys had been detained after +school prayers in order to complete some neglected tasks, and Plattner +was supervising these in the small classroom in which the chemical +teaching was conducted. The appliances for the practical teaching of +chemistry in the Sussexville Proprietary School, as in most small +schools in this country, are characterised by a severe simplicity. They +are kept in a small cupboard standing in a recess, and having about the +same capacity as a common travelling trunk. Plattner, being bored with +his passive superintendence, seems to have welcomed the intervention of +Whibble with his green powder as an agreeable diversion, and, unlocking +this cupboard, proceeded at once with his analytical experiments. +Whibble sat, luckily for himself, at a safe distance, regarding him. +The four malefactors, feigning a profound absorption in their work, +watched him furtively with the keenest interest. For even within the +limits of the Three Gases, Plattner's practical chemistry was, I +understand, temerarious. + +They are practically unanimous in their account of Plattner's +proceedings. He poured a little of the green powder into a test-tube, +and tried the substance with water, hydrochloric acid, nitric acid, +and sulphuric acid in succession. Getting no result, he emptied out a +little heap--nearly half the bottleful, in fact--upon a slate and tried +a match. He held the medicine bottle in his left hand. The stuff began +to smoke and melt, and then--exploded with deafening violence and a +blinding flash. + +The five boys, seeing the flash and being prepared for catastrophes, +ducked below their desks, and were none of them seriously hurt. The +window was blown out into the playground, and the blackboard on its +easel was upset. The slate was smashed to atoms. Some plaster fell +from the ceiling. No other damage was done to the school edifice or +appliances, and the boys at first, seeing nothing of Plattner, fancied +he was knocked down and lying out of their sight below the desks. They +jumped out of their places to go to his assistance, and were amazed to +find the space empty. Being still confused by the sudden violence of +the report, they hurried to the open door, under the impression that +he must have been hurt, and have rushed out of the room. But Carson, +the foremost, nearly collided in the doorway with the principal, Mr. +Lidgett. + +Mr. Lidgett is a corpulent, excitable man with one eye. The boys +describe him as stumbling into the room mouthing some of those tempered +expletives irritable schoolmasters accustom themselves to use--lest +worse befall. "Wretched mumchancer!" he said. "Where's Mr. Plattner?" +The boys are agreed on the very words. ("Wobbler," "snivelling puppy," +and "mumchancer" are, it seems, among the ordinary small change of Mr. +Lidgett's scholastic commerce.) + +Where's Mr. Plattner? That was a question that was to be repeated many +times in the next few days. It really seemed as though that frantic +hyperbole, "blown to atoms," had for once realised itself. There was +not a visible particle of Plattner to be seen; not a drop of blood nor +a stitch of clothing to be found. Apparently he had been blown clean +out of existence and left not a wrack behind. Not so much as would +cover a sixpenny piece, to quote a proverbial expression! The evidence +of his absolute disappearance, as a consequence of that explosion, is +indubitable. + +It is not necessary to enlarge here upon the commotion excited in the +Sussexville Proprietary School, and in Sussexville and elsewhere, by +this event. It is quite possible, indeed, that some of the readers of +these pages may recall the hearing of some remote and dying version +of that excitement during the last summer holidays. Lidgett, it would +seem, did everything in his power to suppress and minimise the story. +He instituted a penalty of twenty-five lines for any mention of +Plattner's name among the boys, and stated in the schoolroom that he +was clearly aware of his assistant's whereabouts. He was afraid, he +explains, that the possibility of an explosion happening, in spite of +the elaborate precautions taken to minimise the practical teaching of +chemistry, might injure the reputation of the school; and so might any +mysterious quality in Plattner's departure. Indeed, he did everything +in his power to make the occurrence seem as ordinary as possible. In +particular, he cross-examined the five eye-witnesses of the occurrence +so searchingly that they began to doubt the plain evidence of their +senses. But, in spite of these efforts, the tale, in a magnified +and distorted state, made a nine days' wonder in the district, and +several parents withdrew their sons on colourable pretexts. Not the +least remarkable point in the matter is the fact that a large number +of people in the neighbourhood dreamed singularly vivid dreams of +Plattner during the period of excitement before his return, and that +these dreams had a curious uniformity. In almost all of them Plattner +was seen, sometimes singly, sometimes in company, wandering about +through a coruscating iridescence. In all cases his face was pale and +distressed, and in some he gesticulated towards the dreamer. One or +two of the boys, evidently under the influence of nightmare, fancied +that Plattner approached them with remarkable swiftness, and seemed to +look closely into their very eyes. Others fled with Plattner from the +pursuit of vague and extraordinary creatures of a globular shape. But +all these fancies were forgotten in inquiries and speculations when, on +the Wednesday next but one after the Monday of the explosion, Plattner +returned. + +The circumstances of his return were as singular as those of his +departure. So far as Mr. Lidgett's somewhat choleric outline can be +filled in from Plattner's hesitating statements, it would appear that +on Wednesday evening, towards the hour of sunset, the former gentleman, +having dismissed evening preparation, was engaged in his garden, +picking and eating strawberries, a fruit of which he is inordinately +fond. It is a large old-fashioned garden, secured from observation, +fortunately, by a high and ivy-covered red-brick wall. Just as he was +stooping over a particularly prolific plant, there was a flash in the +air and a heavy thud, and before he could look round, some heavy body +struck him violently from behind. He was pitched forward, crushing the +strawberries he held in his hand, and that so roughly, that his silk +hat--Mr. Lidgett adheres to the older ideas of scholastic costume--was +driven violently down upon his forehead, and almost over one eye. +This heavy missile, which slid over him sideways and collapsed into a +sitting posture among the strawberry plants, proved to be our long-lost +Mr. Gottfried Plattner, in an extremely dishevelled condition. He +was collarless and hatless, his linen was dirty, and there was blood +upon his hands. Mr. Lidgett was so indignant and surprised that he +remained on all-fours, and with his hat jammed down on his eye, while +he expostulated vehemently with Plattner for his disrespectful and +unaccountable conduct. + +This scarcely idyllic scene completes what I may call the exterior +version of the Plattner story--its exoteric aspect. It is quite +unnecessary to enter here into all the details of his dismissal by Mr. +Lidgett. Such details, with the full names and dates and references, +will be found in the larger report of these occurrences that was laid +before the Society for the Investigation of Abnormal Phenomena. The +singular transposition of Plattner's right and left sides was scarcely +observed for the first day or so, and then first in connection with +his disposition to write from right to left across the blackboard. He +concealed rather than ostended this curious confirmatory circumstance, +as he considered it would unfavourably affect his prospects in a new +situation. The displacement of his heart was discovered some months +after, when he was having a tooth extracted under anæsthetics. He then, +very unwillingly, allowed a cursory surgical examination to be made of +himself, with a view to a brief account in the _Journal of Anatomy_. +That exhausts the statement of the material facts; and we may now go on +to consider Plattner's account of the matter. + +But first let us clearly differentiate between the preceding portion +of this story and what is to follow. All I have told thus far is +established by such evidence as even a criminal lawyer would approve. +Every one of the witnesses is still alive; the reader, if he have the +leisure, may hunt the lads out tomorrow, or even brave the terrors of +the redoubtable Lidgett, and cross-examine and trap and test to his +heart's content; Gottfried Plattner, himself, and his twisted heart and +his three photographs are producible. It may be taken as proved that he +did disappear for nine days as the consequence of an explosion; that +he returned almost as violently, under circumstances in their nature +annoying to Mr. Lidgett, whatever the details of those circumstances +may be; and that he returned inverted, just as a reflection returns +from a mirror. From the last fact, as I have already stated, it +follows almost inevitably that Plattner, during those nine days, must +have been in some state of existence altogether out of space. The +evidence to these statements is, indeed, far stronger than that upon +which most murderers are hanged. But for his own particular account +of where he had been, with its confused explanations and well-nigh +self-contradictory details, we have only Mr. Gottfried Plattner's word. +I do not wish to discredit that, but I must point out--what so many +writers upon obscure psychic phenomena fail to do--that we are passing +here from the practically undeniable to that kind of matter which any +reasonable man is entitled to believe or reject as he thinks proper. +The previous statements render it plausible; its discordance with +common experience tilts it towards the incredible. I would prefer not +to sway the beam of the reader's judgment either way, but simply to +tell the story as Plattner told it me. + +He gave me his narrative, I may state, at my house at Chislehurst, and +so soon as he had left me that evening, I went into my study and wrote +down everything as I remembered it. Subsequently he was good enough to +read over a type-written copy, so that its substantial correctness is +undeniable. + +He states that at the moment of the explosion he distinctly thought he +was killed. He felt lifted off his feet and driven forcibly backward. +It is a curious fact for psychologists that he thought clearly during +his backward flight, and wondered whether he should hit the chemistry +cupboard or the blackboard easel. His heels struck ground, and he +staggered and fell heavily into a sitting position on something soft +and firm. For a moment the concussion stunned him. He became aware at +once of a vivid scent of singed hair, and he seemed to hear the voice +of Lidgett asking for him. You will understand that for a time his +mind was greatly confused. + +At first he was distinctly under the impression that he was still in +the classroom. He perceived quite distinctly the surprise of the boys +and the entry of Mr. Lidgett. He is quite positive upon that score. +He did not hear their remarks; but that he ascribed to the deafening +effect of the experiment. Things about him seemed curiously dark and +faint, but his mind explained that on the obvious but mistaken idea +that the explosion had engendered a huge volume of dark smoke. Through +the dimness the figures of Lidgett and the boys moved, as faint and +silent as ghosts. Plattner's face still tingled with the stinging +heat of the flash. He was, he says, "all muddled." His first definite +thoughts seem to have been of his personal safety. He thought he was +perhaps blinded and deafened. He felt his limbs and face in a gingerly +manner. Then his perceptions grew clearer, and he was astonished to +miss the old familiar desks and other schoolroom furniture about him. +Only dim, uncertain, grey shapes stood in the place of these. Then came +a thing that made him shout aloud, and awoke his stunned faculties +to instant activity. _Two of the boys, gesticulating, walked one +after the other clean through him!_ Neither manifested the slightest +consciousness of his presence. It is difficult to imagine the sensation +he felt. They came against him, he says, with no more force than a wisp +of mist. + +Plattner's first thought after that was that he was dead. Having been +brought up with thoroughly sound views in these matters, however, he +was a little surprised to find his body still about him. His second +conclusion was that he was not dead, but that the others were: that the +explosion had destroyed the Sussexville Proprietary School and every +soul in it except himself. But that, too, was scarcely satisfactory. He +was thrown back upon astonished observation. + +Everything about him was extraordinarily dark: at first it seemed to +have an altogether ebony blackness. Overhead was a black firmament. +The only touch of light in the scene was a faint greenish glow at the +edge of the sky in one direction, which threw into prominence a horizon +of undulating black hills. This, I say, was his impression at first. +As his eye grew accustomed to the darkness, he began to distinguish a +faint quality of differentiating greenish colour in the circumambient +night. Against this background the furniture and occupants of the +classroom, it seems, stood out like phosphorescent spectres, faint +and impalpable. He extended his hand, and thrust it without an effort +through the wall of the room by the fireplace. + +He describes himself as making a strenuous effort to attract attention. +He shouted to Lidgett, and tried to seize the boys as they went to +and fro. He only desisted from these attempts when Mrs. Lidgett, whom +he (as an Assistant Master) naturally disliked, entered the room. He +says the sensation of being in the world, and yet not a part of it, +was an extraordinarily disagreeable one. He compared his feelings, +not inaptly, to those of a cat watching a mouse through a window. +Whenever he made a motion to communicate with the dim, familiar world +about him, he found an invisible, incomprehensible barrier preventing +intercourse. + +He then turned his attention to his solid environment. He found the +medicine bottle still unbroken in his hand, with the remainder of the +green powder therein. He put this in his pocket, and began to feel +about him. Apparently, he was sitting on a boulder of rock covered with +a velvety moss. The dark country about him he was unable to see, the +faint, misty picture of the schoolroom blotting it out, but he had a +feeling (due perhaps to a cold wind) that he was near the crest of a +hill, and that a steep valley fell away beneath his feet. The green +glow along the edge of the sky seemed to be growing in extent and +intensity. He stood up, rubbing his eyes. + +It would seem that he made a few steps, going steeply down hill, and +then stumbled, nearly fell, and sat down again upon a jagged mass of +rock to watch the dawn. He became aware that the world about him was +absolutely silent. It was as still as it was dark, and though there was +a cold wind blowing up the hill-face, the rustle of grass, the soughing +of the boughs that should have accompanied it, were absent. He could +hear, therefore, if he could not see, that the hillside upon which he +stood was rocky and desolate. The green grew brighter every moment, and +as it did so a faint, transparent blood-red mingled with, but did not +mitigate, the blackness of the sky overhead and the rocky desolations +about him. Having regard to what follows, I am inclined to think that +that redness may have been an optical effect due to contrast. Something +black fluttered momentarily against the livid yellow-green of the +lower sky, and then the thin and penetrating voice of a bell rose out +of the black gulf below him. An oppressive expectation grew with the +growing light. + +It is probable that an hour or more elapsed while he sat there, the +strange green light growing brighter every moment, and spreading +slowly, in flamboyant fingers, upward towards the zenith. As it grew, +the spectral vision of _our_ world became relatively or absolutely +fainter. Probably both, for the time must have been about that of our +earthly sunset. So far as his vision of our world went, Plattner, by +his few steps downhill, had passed through the floor of the classroom, +and was now, it seemed, sitting in mid-air in the larger schoolroom +downstairs. He saw the boarders distinctly, but much more faintly +than he had seen Lidgett. They were preparing their evening tasks, +and he noticed with interest that several were cheating with their +Euclid riders by means of a crib, a compilation whose existence he had +hitherto never suspected. As the time passed, they faded steadily, as +steadily as the light of the green dawn increased. + +Looking down into the valley, he saw that the light had crept far +down its rocky sides, and that the profound blackness of the abyss +was now broken by a minute green glow, like the light of a glow-worm. +And almost immediately the limb of a huge heavenly body of blazing +green rose over the basaltic undulations of the distant hills, and +the monstrous hill-masses about him came out gaunt and desolate, in +green light and deep, ruddy black shadows. He became aware of a vast +number of ball-shaped objects drifting as thistledown drifts over +the high ground. There were none of these nearer to him than the +opposite side of the gorge. The bell below twanged quicker and quicker, +with something like impatient insistence, and several lights moved +hither and thither. The boys at work at their desks were now almost +imperceptibly faint. + +This extinction of our world, when the green sun of this other universe +rose, is a curious point upon which Plattner insists. During the +Other-World night it is difficult to move about, on account of the +vividness with which the things of this world are visible. It becomes a +riddle to explain why, if this is the case, we in this world catch no +glimpse of the Other-World. It is due, perhaps, to the comparatively +vivid illumination of this world of ours. Plattner describes the +midday of the Other-World, at its brightest, as not being nearly so +bright as this world at full moon, while its night is profoundly +black. Consequently, the amount of light, even in an ordinary dark +room, is sufficient to render the things of the Other-World invisible, +on the same principle that faint phosphorescence is only visible in +the profoundest darkness. I have tried, since he told me his story, +to see something of the Other-World by sitting for a long space in a +photographer's dark room at night. I have certainly seen indistinctly +the form of greenish slopes and rocks, but only, I must admit, very +indistinctly indeed. The reader may possibly be more successful. +Plattner tells me that since his return he has dreamt and seen and +recognised places in the Other-World, but this is probably due to his +memory of these scenes. It seems quite possible that people with +unusually keen eyesight may occasionally catch a glimpse of this +strange Other-World about us. + +However, this is a digression. As the green sun rose, a long street +of black buildings became perceptible, though only darkly and +indistinctly, in the gorge, and, after some hesitation, Plattner began +to clamber down the precipitous descent towards them. The descent was +long and exceedingly tedious, being so not only by the extraordinary +steepness, but also by reason of the looseness of the boulders +with which the whole face of the hill was strewn. The noise of his +descent--now and then his heels struck fire from the rocks--seemed +now the only sound in the universe, for the beating of the bell had +ceased. As he drew nearer, he perceived that the various edifices had +a singular resemblance to tombs and mausoleums and monuments, saving +only that they were all uniformly black instead of being white, as +most sepulchres are. And then he saw, crowding out of the largest +building, very much as people disperse from church, a number of pallid, +rounded, pale-green figures. These dispersed in several directions +about the broad street of the place, some going through side alleys and +reappearing upon the steepness of the hill, others entering some of the +small black buildings which lined the way. + +At the sight of these things drifting up towards him, Plattner stopped, +staring. They were not walking, they were indeed limbless, and they +had the appearance of human heads, beneath which a tadpole-like body +swung. He was too astonished at their strangeness, too full, indeed, +of strangeness, to be seriously alarmed by them. They drove towards +him, in front of the chill wind that was blowing uphill, much as +soap-bubbles drive before a draught. And as he looked at the nearest +of those approaching, he saw it was indeed a human head, albeit with +singularly large eyes, and wearing such an expression of distress and +anguish as he had never seen before upon mortal countenance. He was +surprised to find that it did not turn to regard him, but seemed to be +watching and following some unseen moving thing. For a moment he was +puzzled, and then it occurred to him that this creature was watching +with its enormous eyes something that was happening in the world he had +just left. Nearer it came, and nearer, and he was too astonished to +cry out. It made a very faint fretting sound as it came close to him. +Then it struck his face with a gentle pat--its touch was very cold--and +drove past him, and upward towards the crest of the hill. + +An extraordinary conviction flashed across Plattner's mind that this +head had a strong likeness to Lidgett. Then he turned his attention +to the other heads that were now swarming thickly up the hillside. +None made the slightest sign of recognition. One or two, indeed, came +close to his head and almost followed the example of the first, but +he dodged convulsively out of the way. Upon most of them he saw the +same expression of unavailing regret he had seen upon the first, and +heard the same faint sounds of wretchedness from them. One or two wept, +and one rolling swiftly uphill wore an expression of diabolical rage. +But others were cold, and several had a look of gratified interest in +their eyes. One, at least, was almost in an ecstasy of happiness. +Plattner does not remember that he recognised any more likenesses in +those he saw at this time. + +For several hours, perhaps, Plattner watched these strange things +dispersing themselves over the hills, and not till long after they +had ceased to issue from the clustering black buildings in the gorge, +did he resume his downward climb. The darkness about him increased so +much that he had a difficulty in stepping true. Overhead the sky was +now a bright, pale green. He felt neither hunger nor thirst. Later, +when he did, he found a chilly stream running down the centre of the +gorge, and the rare moss upon the boulders, when he tried it at last in +desperation, was good to eat. + +He groped about among the tombs that ran down the gorge, seeking +vaguely for some clue to these inexplicable things. After a long +time he came to the entrance of the big mausoleum-like building from +which the heads had issued. In this he found a group of green lights +burning upon a kind of basaltic altar, and a bell-rope from a belfry +overhead hanging down into the centre of the place. Round the wall +ran a lettering of fire in a character unknown to him. While he was +still wondering at the purport of these things, he heard the receding +tramp of heavy feet echoing far down the street. He ran out into the +darkness again, but he could see nothing. He had a mind to pull the +bell-rope, and finally decided to follow the footsteps. But, although +he ran far, he never overtook them; and his shouting was of no avail. +The gorge seemed to extend an interminable distance. It was as dark +as earthly starlight throughout its length, while the ghastly green +day lay along the upper edge of its precipices. There were none of the +heads, now, below. They were all, it seemed, busily occupied along the +upper slopes. Looking up, he saw them drifting hither and thither, some +hovering stationary, some flying swiftly through the air. It reminded +him, he said, of "big snowflakes"; only these were black and pale green. + +In pursuing the firm, undeviating footsteps that he never overtook, in +groping into new regions of this endless devil's dyke, in clambering up +and down the pitiless heights, in wandering about the summits, and in +watching the drifting faces, Plattner states that he spent the better +part of seven or eight days. He did not keep count, he says. Though +once or twice he found eyes watching him, he had word with no living +soul. He slept among the rocks on the hillside. In the gorge things +earthly were invisible, because, from the earthly standpoint, it was +far underground. On the altitudes, so soon as the earthly day began, +the world became visible to him. He found himself sometimes stumbling +over the dark green rocks, or arresting himself on a precipitous brink, +while all about him the green branches of the Sussexville lanes were +swaying; or, again, he seemed to be walking through the Sussexville +streets, or watching unseen the private business of some household. +And then it was he discovered, that to almost every human being in our +world there pertained some of these drifting heads: that everyone in +the world is watched intermittently by these helpless disembodiments. + +What are they--these Watchers of the Living? Plattner never learned. +But two, that presently found and followed him, were like his +childhood's memory of his father and mother. Now and then other faces +turned their eyes upon him: eyes like those of dead people who had +swayed him, or injured him, or helped him in his youth and manhood. +Whenever they looked at him, Plattner was overcome with a strange +sense of responsibility. To his mother he ventured to speak; but she +made no answer. She looked sadly, steadfastly, and tenderly--a little +reproachfully, too, it seemed--into his eyes. + +He simply tells this story: he does not endeavour to explain. We are +left to surmise who these Watchers of the Living may be, or if they are +indeed the Dead, why they should so closely and passionately watch a +world they have left for ever. It may be--indeed to my mind it seems +just--that, when our life has closed, when evil or good is no longer +a choice for us, we may still have to witness the working out of the +train of consequences we have laid. If human souls continue after +death, then surely human interests continue after death. But that is +merely my own guess at the meaning of the things seen. Plattner offers +no interpretation, for none was given him. It is well the reader should +understand this clearly. Day after day, with his head reeling, he +wandered about this strange-lit world outside the world, weary and, +towards the end, weak and hungry. By day--by our earthly day, that +is--the ghostly vision of the old familiar scenery of Sussexville, all +about him, irked and worried him. He could not see where to put his +feet, and ever and again with a chilly touch one of these Watching +Souls would come against his face. And after dark the multitude of +these Watchers about him, and their intent distress, confused his mind +beyond describing. A great longing to return to the earthly life that +was so near and yet so remote consumed him. The unearthliness of things +about him produced a positively painful mental distress. He was worried +beyond describing by his own particular followers. He would shout at +them to desist from staring at him, scold at them, hurry away from +them. They were always mute and intent. Run as he might over the uneven +ground, they followed his destinies. + +On the ninth day, towards evening, Plattner heard the invisible +footsteps approaching, far away down the gorge. He was then wandering +over the broad crest of the same hill upon which he had fallen in his +entry into this strange Other-World of his. He turned to hurry down +into the gorge, feeling his way hastily, and was arrested by the sight +of the thing that was happening in a room in a back street near the +school. Both of the people in the room he knew by sight. The windows +were open, the blinds up, and the setting sun shone clearly into it, so +that it came out quite brightly at first, a vivid oblong of room, lying +like a magic-lantern picture upon the black landscape and the livid +green dawn. In addition to the sunlight, a candle had just been lit in +the room. + +On the bed lay a lank man, his ghastly white face terrible upon the +tumbled pillow. His clenched hands were raised above his head. A little +table beside the bed carried a few medicine bottles, some toast and +water, and an empty glass. Every now and then the lank man's lips +fell apart, to indicate a word he could not articulate. But the woman +did not notice that he wanted anything, because she was busy turning +out papers from an old-fashioned bureau in the opposite corner of the +room. At first the picture was very vivid indeed, but as the green dawn +behind it grew brighter and brighter, so it became fainter and more and +more transparent. + +As the echoing footsteps paced nearer and nearer, those footsteps +that sound so loud in that Other-World and come so silently in this, +Plattner perceived about him a great multitude of dim faces gathering +together out of the darkness and watching the two people in the room. +Never before had he seen so many of the Watchers of the Living. +A multitude had eyes only for the sufferer in the room, another +multitude, in infinite anguish, watched the woman as she hunted with +greedy eyes for something she could not find. They crowded about +Plattner, they came across his sight and buffeted his face, the noise +of their unavailing regrets was all about him. He saw clearly only +now and then. At other times the picture quivered dimly, through the +veil of green reflections upon their movements. In the room it must +have been very still, and Plattner says the candle flame streamed +up into a perfectly vertical line of smoke, but in his ears each +footfall and its echoes beat like a clap of thunder. And the faces! +Two, more particularly near the woman's: one a woman's also, white +and clear-featured, a face which might have once been cold and hard, +but which was now softened by the touch of a wisdom strange to earth. +The other might have been the woman's father. Both were evidently +absorbed in the contemplation of some act of hateful meanness, so it +seemed, which they could no longer guard against and prevent. Behind +were others, teachers, it may be, who had taught ill, friends whose +influence had failed. And over the man, too--a multitude, but none +that seemed to be parents or teachers! Faces that might once have +been coarse, now purged to strength by sorrow! And in the forefront +one face, a girlish one, neither angry nor remorseful, but merely +patient and weary, and, as it seemed to Plattner, waiting for relief. +His powers of description fail him at the memory of this multitude of +ghastly countenances. They gathered on the stroke of the bell. He saw +them all in the space of a second. It would seem that he was so worked +on by his excitement that, quite involuntarily, his restless fingers +took the bottle of green powder out of his pocket and held it before +him. But he does not remember that. + +Abruptly the footsteps ceased. He waited for the next, and there was +silence, and then suddenly, cutting through the unexpected stillness +like a keen, thin blade, came the first stroke of the bell. At that the +multitudinous faces swayed to and fro, and a louder crying began all +about him. The woman did not hear; she was burning something now in the +candle flame. At the second stroke everything grew dim, and a breath of +wind, icy cold, blew through the host of watchers. They swirled about +him like an eddy of dead leaves in the spring, and at the third stroke +something was extended through them to the bed. You have heard of a +beam of light. This was like a beam of darkness, and looking again at +it, Plattner saw that it was a shadowy arm and hand. + +The green sun was now topping the black desolations of the horizon, +and the vision of the room was very faint. Plattner could see that +the white of the bed struggled, and was convulsed; and that the woman +looked round over her shoulder at it, startled. + +The cloud of watchers lifted high like a puff of green dust before the +wind, and swept swiftly downward towards the temple in the gorge. Then +suddenly Plattner understood the meaning of the shadowy black arm that +stretched across his shoulder and clutched its prey. He did not dare +turn his head to see the Shadow behind the arm. With a violent effort, +and covering his eyes, he set himself to run, made, perhaps, twenty +strides, then slipped on a boulder, and fell. He fell forward on his +hands; and the bottle smashed and exploded as he touched the ground. + +In another moment he found himself, stunned and bleeding, sitting face +to face with Lidgett in the old walled garden behind the school. + + * * * * * + +There the story of Plattner's experiences ends. I have resisted, I +believe successfully, the natural disposition of a writer of fiction +to dress up incidents of this sort. I have told the thing as far as +possible in the order in which Plattner told it to me. I have carefully +avoided any attempt at style, effect, or construction. It would have +been easy, for instance, to have worked the scene of the death-bed +into a kind of plot in which Plattner might have been involved. +But, quite apart from the objectionableness of falsifying a most +extraordinary true story, any such trite devices would spoil, to my +mind, the peculiar effect of this dark world, with its livid green +illumination and its drifting Watchers of the Living, which, unseen and +unapproachable to us, is yet lying all about us. + +It remains to add, that a death did actually occur in Vincent Terrace, +just beyond the school garden, and, so far as can be proved, at +the moment of Plattner's return. Deceased was a rate-collector and +insurance agent. His widow, who was much younger than himself, married +last month a Mr. Whymper, a veterinary surgeon of Allbeeding. As the +portion of this story given here has in various forms circulated orally +in Sussexville, she has consented to my use of her name, on condition +that I make it distinctly known that she emphatically contradicts every +detail of Plattner's account of her husband's last moments. She burnt +no will, she says, although Plattner never accused her of doing so: +her husband made but one will, and that just after their marriage. +Certainly, from a man who had never seen it, Plattner's account of the +furniture of the room was curiously accurate. + +One other thing, even at the risk of an irksome repetition, I must +insist upon, lest I seem to favour the credulous superstitious view. +Plattner's absence from the world for nine days is, I think, proved. +But that does not prove his story. It is quite conceivable that even +outside space hallucinations may be possible. That, at least, the +reader must bear distinctly in mind. + + + + +THE ARGONAUTS OF THE AIR + + +One saw Monson's Flying Machine from the windows of the trains passing +either along the South-Western main line or along the line between +Wimbledon and Worcester Park,--to be more exact, one saw the huge +scaffoldings which limited the flight of the apparatus. They rose over +the tree-tops, a massive alley of interlacing iron and timber, and an +enormous web of ropes and tackle, extending the best part of two miles. +From the Leatherhead branch this alley was foreshortened and in part +hidden by a hill with villas; but from the main line one had it in +profile, a complex tangle of girders and curving bars, very impressive +to the excursionists from Portsmouth and Southampton and the West. +Monson had taken up the work where Maxim had left it, had gone on at +first with an utter contempt for the journalistic wit and ignorance +that had irritated and hampered his predecessor, and had spent (it was +said) rather more than half his immense fortune upon his experiments. +The results, to an impatient generation, seemed inconsiderable. When +some five years had passed after the growth of the colossal iron groves +at Worcester Park, and Monson still failed to put in a fluttering +appearance over Trafalgar Square, even the Isle of Wight trippers felt +their liberty to smile. And such intelligent people as did not consider +Monson a fool stricken with the mania for invention, denounced him as +being (for no particular reason) a self-advertising quack. + +Yet now and again a morning trainload of season-ticket holders would +see a white monster rush headlong through the airy tracery of guides +and bars, and hear the further stays, nettings, and buffers snap, +creak, and groan with the impact of the blow. Then there would be +an efflorescence of black-set white-rimmed faces along the sides of +the train, and the morning papers would be neglected for a vigorous +discussion of the possibility of flying (in which nothing new was ever +said by any chance), until the train reached Waterloo, and its cargo +of season-ticket holders dispersed themselves over London. Or the +fathers and mothers in some multitudinous train of weary excursionists +returning exhausted from a day of rest by the sea, would find the dark +fabric, standing out against the evening sky, useful in diverting some +bilious child from its introspection, and be suddenly startled by the +swift transit of a huge black flapping shape that strained upward +against the guides. It was a great and forcible thing beyond dispute, +and excellent for conversation; yet, all the same, it was but flying in +leading-strings, and most of those who witnessed it scarcely counted +its flight as flying. More of a switchback it seemed to the run of the +folk. + +Monson, I say, did not trouble himself very keenly about the opinions +of the press at first. But possibly he, even, had formed but a poor +idea of the time it would take before the tactics of flying were +mastered, the swift assured adjustment of the big soaring shape to +every gust and chance movement of the air; nor had he clearly reckoned +the money this prolonged struggle against gravitation would cost +him. And he was not so pachydermatous as he seemed. Secretly he had +his periodical bundles of cuttings sent him by Romeike, he had his +periodical reminders from his banker; and if he did not mind the +initial ridicule and scepticism, he felt the growing neglect as the +months went by and the money dribbled away. Time was when Monson had +sent the enterprising journalist, keen after readable matter, empty +from his gates. But when the enterprising journalist ceased from +troubling, Monson was anything but satisfied in his heart of hearts. +Still day by day the work went on, and the multitudinous subtle +difficulties of the steering diminished in number. Day by day, too, +the money trickled away, until his balance was no longer a matter of +hundreds of thousands, but of tens. And at last came an anniversary. + +Monson, sitting in the little drawing-shed, suddenly noticed the date +on Woodhouse's calendar. + +"It was five years ago to-day that we began," he said to Woodhouse +suddenly. + +"Is it?" said Woodhouse. + +"It's the alterations play the devil with us," said Monson, biting a +paper-fastener. + +The drawings for the new vans to the hinder screw lay on the table +before him as he spoke. He pitched the mutilated brass paper-fastener +into the waste-paper basket and drummed with his fingers. "These +alterations! Will the mathematicians ever be clever enough to save us +all this patching and experimenting? Five years--learning by rule of +thumb, when one might think that it was possible to calculate the whole +thing out beforehand. The cost of it! I might have hired three senior +wranglers for life. But they'd only have developed some beautifully +useless theorems in pneumatics. What a time it has been, Woodhouse!" + +"These mouldings will take three weeks," said Woodhouse. "At special +prices." + +"Three weeks!" said Monson, and sat drumming. + +"Three weeks certain," said Woodhouse, an excellent engineer, but no +good as a comforter. He drew the sheets towards him and began shading a +bar. + +Monson stopped drumming, and began to bite his finger-nails, staring +the while at Woodhouse's head. + +"How long have they been calling this Monson's Folly?" he said suddenly. + +"_Oh!_ Year or so," said Woodhouse carelessly, without looking up. + +Monson sucked the air in between his teeth, and went to the window. The +stout iron columns carrying the elevated rails upon which the start of +the machine was made rose up close by, and the machine was hidden by +the upper edge of the window. Through the grove of iron pillars, red +painted and ornate with rows of bolts, one had a glimpse of the pretty +scenery towards Esher. A train went gliding noiselessly across the +middle distance, its rattle drowned by the hammering of the workmen +overhead. Monson could imagine the grinning faces at the windows of the +carriages. He swore savagely under his breath, and dabbed viciously at +a blowfly that suddenly became noisy on the window-pane. + +"What's up?" said Woodhouse, staring in surprise at his employer. + +"I'm about sick of this." + +Woodhouse scratched his cheek. "Oh!" he said, after an assimilating +pause. He pushed the drawing away from him. + +"Here these fools ... I'm trying to conquer a new element--trying to +do a thing that will revolutionise life. And instead of taking an +intelligent interest, they grin and make their stupid jokes, and call +me and my appliances names." + +"Asses!" said Woodhouse, letting his eye fall again on the drawing. + +The epithet, curiously enough, made Monson wince. "I'm about sick of +it, Woodhouse, anyhow," he said, after a pause. + +Woodhouse shrugged his shoulders. + +"There's nothing for it but patience, I suppose," said Monson, sticking +his hands in his pockets. "I've started. I've made my bed, and I've got +to lie on it. I can't go back. I'll see it through, and spend every +penny I have and every penny I can borrow. But I tell you, Woodhouse, +I'm infernally sick of it, all the same. If I'd paid a tenth part of +the money towards some political greaser's expenses--I'd have been a +baronet before this." + +Monson paused. Woodhouse stared in front of him with a blank expression +he always employed to indicate sympathy, and tapped his pencil-case on +the table. Monson stared at him for a minute. + +"Oh, _damn_!" said Monson suddenly, and abruptly rushed out of the room. + +Woodhouse continued his sympathetic rigour for perhaps half a minute. +Then he sighed and resumed the shading of the drawings. Something had +evidently upset Monson. Nice chap, and generous, but difficult to get +on with. It was the way with every amateur who had anything to do with +engineering--wanted everything finished at once. But Monson had usually +the patience of the expert. Odd he was so irritable. Nice and round +that aluminium rod did look now! Woodhouse threw back his head, and put +it, first this side and then that, to appreciate his bit of shading +better. + +"Mr. Woodhouse," said Hooper, the foreman of the labourers, putting his +head in at the door. + +"Hullo!" said Woodhouse, without turning round. + +"Nothing happened, sir?" said Hooper. + +"Happened?" said Woodhouse. + +"The governor just been up the rails swearing like a tornader." + +"_Oh!_" said Woodhouse. + +"It ain't like him, sir." + +"No?" + +"And I was thinking perhaps"-- + +"Don't think," said Woodhouse, still admiring the drawings. + +Hooper knew Woodhouse, and he shut the door suddenly with a vicious +slam. Woodhouse stared stonily before him for some further minutes, +and then made an ineffectual effort to pick his teeth with his pencil. +Abruptly he desisted, pitched that old, tried, and stumpy servitor +across the room, got up, stretched himself, and followed Hooper. + +He looked ruffled--it was visible to every workman he met. When a +millionaire who has been spending thousands on experiments that employ +quite a little army of people suddenly indicates that he is sick of +the undertaking, there is almost invariably a certain amount of mental +friction in the ranks of the little army he employs. And even before he +indicates his intentions there are speculations and murmurs, a watching +of faces and a study of straws. Hundreds of people knew before the day +was out that Monson was ruffled, Woodhouse ruffled, Hooper ruffled. A +workman's wife, for instance (whom Monson had never seen), decided to +keep her money in the savings-bank instead of buying a velveteen dress. +So far-reaching are even the casual curses of a millionaire. + +Monson found a certain satisfaction in going on the works and behaving +disagreeably to as many people as possible. After a time even +that palled upon him, and he rode off the grounds, to every one's +relief there, and through the lanes south-eastward, to the infinite +tribulation of his house steward at Cheam. + +And the immediate cause of it all, the little grain of annoyance that +had suddenly precipitated all this discontent with his life-work +was--these trivial things that direct all our great decisions!--half +a dozen ill-considered remarks made by a pretty girl, prettily +dressed, with a beautiful voice and something more than prettiness +in her soft grey eyes. And of these half-dozen remarks, two words +especially--"Monson's Folly." She had felt she was behaving charmingly +to Monson; she reflected the next day how exceptionally effective she +had been, and no one would have been more amazed than she, had she +learned the effect she had left on Monson's mind. I hope, considering +everything, that she never knew. + +"How are you getting on with your flying-machine?" she asked. ("I +wonder if I shall ever meet any one with the sense not to ask that," +thought Monson.) "It will be very dangerous at first, will it not?" +("Thinks I'm afraid.") "Jorgon is going to play presently; have you +heard him before?" ("My mania being attended to, we turn to rational +conversation.") Gush about Jorgon; gradual decline of conversation, +ending with--"You must let me know when your flying-machine is +finished, Mr. Monson, and then I will consider the advisability of +taking a ticket." ("One would think I was still playing inventions +in the nursery.") But the bitterest thing she said was not meant for +Monson's ears. To Phlox, the novelist, she was always conscientiously +brilliant. "I have been talking to Mr. Monson, and he can think of +nothing, positively nothing, but that flying-machine of his. Do you +know, all his workmen call that place of his 'Monson's Folly'? He is +quite impossible. It is really very, very sad. I always regard him +myself in the light of sunken treasure--the Lost Millionaire, you know." + +She was pretty and well educated,--indeed, she had written an +epigrammatic novelette; but the bitterness was that she was typical. +She summarised what the world thought of the man who was working +sanely, steadily, and surely towards a more tremendous revolution in +the appliances of civilisation, a more far-reaching alteration in the +ways of humanity than has ever been effected since history began. +They did not even take him seriously. In a little while he would be +proverbial. "I _must_ fly now," he said on his way home, smarting with +a sense of absolute social failure. "I must fly soon. If it doesn't +come off soon, by God! I shall run amuck." + +He said that before he had gone through his pass-book and his litter of +papers. Inadequate as the cause seems, it was that girl's voice and the +expression of her eyes that precipitated his discontent. But certainly +the discovery that he had no longer even one hundred thousand pounds' +worth of realisable property behind him was the poison that made the +wound deadly. + +It was the next day after this that he exploded upon Woodhouse and +his workmen, and thereafter his bearing was consistently grim for +three weeks, and anxiety dwelt in Cheam and Ewell, Malden, Morden, and +Worcester Park, places that had thriven mightily on his experiments. + +Four weeks after that first swearing of his, he stood with Woodhouse +by the reconstructed machine as it lay across the elevated railway, +by means of which it gained its initial impetus. The new propeller +glittered a brighter white than the rest of the machine, and a gilder, +obedient to a whim of Monson's, was picking out the aluminium bars +with gold. And looking down the long avenue between the ropes (gilded +now with the sunset), one saw red signals, and two miles away an +ant-hill of workmen busy altering the last falls of the run into a +rising slope. + +"I'll _come_," said Woodhouse. "I'll come right enough. But I tell you +it's infernally foolhardy. If only you would give another year"-- + +"I tell you I won't. I tell you the thing works. I've given years +enough"-- + +"It's not that," said Woodhouse. "We're all right with the machine. But +it's the steering"-- + +"Haven't I been rushing, night and morning, backwards and forwards, +through this squirrel's cage? If the thing steers true here, it will +steer true all across England. It's just funk, I tell you, Woodhouse. +We could have gone a year ago. And besides"-- + +"Well?" said Woodhouse. + +"The money!" snapped Monson over his shoulder. + +"Hang it! I never thought of the money," said Woodhouse, and then, +speaking now in a very different tone to that with which he had said +the words before, he repeated, "I'll come. Trust me." + +Monson turned suddenly, and saw all that Woodhouse had not the +dexterity to say, shining on his sunset-lit face. He looked for a +moment, then impulsively extended his hand. "Thanks," he said. + +"All right," said Woodhouse, gripping the hand, and with a queer +softening of his features. "Trust me." + +Then both men turned to the big apparatus that lay with its flat wings +extended upon the carrier, and stared at it meditatively. Monson, +guided perhaps by a photographic study of the flight of birds, and by +Lilienthal's methods, had gradually drifted from Maxim's shapes towards +the bird form again. The thing, however, was driven by a huge screw +behind in the place of the tail; and so hovering, which needs an almost +vertical adjustment of a flat tail, was rendered impossible. The body +of the machine was small, almost cylindrical, and pointed. Forward and +aft on the pointed ends were two small petroleum engines for the screw, +and the navigators sat deep in a canoe-like recess, the foremost one +steering, and being protected by a low screen, with two plate-glass +windows, from the blinding rush of air. On either side a monstrous flat +framework with a curved front border could be adjusted so as either to +lie horizontally, or to be tilted upward or down. These wings worked +rigidly together, or, by releasing a pin, one could be tilted through +a small angle independently of its fellow. The front edge of either +wing could also be shifted back so as to diminish the wing-area about +one-sixth. The machine was not only not designed to hover, but it was +also incapable of fluttering. Monson's idea was to get into the air +with the initial rush of the apparatus, and then to skim, much as a +playing-card may be skimmed, keeping up the rush by means of the screw +at the stern. Rooks and gulls fly enormous distances in that way with +scarcely a perceptible movement of the wings. The bird really drives +along on an aërial switchback. It glides slanting downward for a +space, until it has gained considerable momentum, and then altering +the inclination of its wings, glides up again almost to its original +altitude. Even a Londoner who has watched the birds in the aviary in +Regent's Park knows that. + +But the bird is practising this art from the moment it leaves its nest. +It has not only the perfect apparatus, but the perfect instinct to +use it. A man off his feet has the poorest skill in balancing. Even +the simple trick of the bicycle costs him some hours of labour. The +instantaneous adjustments of the wings, the quick response to a passing +breeze, the swift recovery of equilibrium, the giddy, eddying movements +that require such absolute precision--all that he must learn, learn +with infinite labour and infinite danger, if ever he is to conquer +flying. The flying-machine that will start off some fine day, driven +by neat "little levers," with a nice open deck like a liner, and all +loaded up with bombshells and guns, is the easy dreaming of a literary +man. In lives and in treasure the cost of the conquest of the empire of +the air may even exceed all that has been spent in man's great conquest +of the sea. Certainly it will be costlier than the greatest war that +has ever devastated the world. + +No one knew these things better than these two practical men. And they +knew they were in the front rank of the coming army. Yet there is +hope even in a forlorn hope. Men are killed outright in the reserves +sometimes, while others who have been left for dead in the thickest +corner crawl out and survive. + +"If we miss these meadows"--said Woodhouse presently in his slow way. + +"My dear chap," said Monson, whose spirits had been rising fitfully +during the last few days, "we mustn't miss these meadows. There's +a quarter of a square mile for us to hit, fences removed, ditches +levelled. We shall come down all right--rest assured. And if we don't"-- + +"Ah!" said Woodhouse. "If we don't!" + +Before the day of the start, the newspaper people got wind of the +alterations at the northward end of the framework, and Monson was +cheered by a decided change in the comments Romeike forwarded him. "He +will be off some day," said the papers. "He will be off some day," +said the South-Western season-ticket holders one to another; the +seaside excursionists, the Saturday-to-Monday trippers from Sussex +and Hampshire and Dorset and Devon, the eminent literary people from +Hazlemere, all remarked eagerly one to another, "He will be off +some day," as the familiar scaffolding came in sight. And actually, +one bright morning, in full view of the ten-past-ten train from +Basingstoke, Monson's flying-machine started on its journey. + +They saw the carrier running swiftly along its rail, and the white and +gold screw spinning in the air. They heard the rapid rumble of wheels, +and a thud as the carrier reached the buffers at the end of its run. +Then a whirr as the Flying-Machine was shot forward into the networks. +All that the majority of them had seen and heard before. The thing went +with a drooping flight through the framework and rose again, and then +every beholder shouted, or screamed, or yelled, or shrieked after his +kind. For instead of the customary concussion and stoppage, the Flying +Machine flew out of its five years' cage like a bolt from a crossbow, +and drove slantingly upward into the air, curved round a little, so as +to cross the line, and soared in the direction of Wimbledon Common. + +It seemed to hang momentarily in the air and grow smaller, then it +ducked and vanished over the clustering blue tree-tops to the east of +Coombe Hill, and no one stopped staring and gasping until long after it +had disappeared. + +That was what the people in the train from Basingstoke saw. If you had +drawn a line down the middle of that train, from engine to guard's +van, you would not have found a living soul on the opposite side to +the flying-machine. It was a mad rush from window to window as the +thing crossed the line. And the engine-driver and stoker never took +their eyes off the low hills about Wimbledon, and never noticed that +they had run clean through Coombe and Maiden and Raynes Park, until, +with returning animation, they found themselves pelting, at the most +indecent pace, into Wimbledon station. + +From the moment when Monson had started the carrier with a "_Now!_" +neither he nor Woodhouse said a word. Both men sat with clenched +teeth. Monson had crossed the line with a curve that was too sharp, +and Woodhouse had opened and shut his white lips; but neither spoke. +Woodhouse simply gripped his seat, and breathed sharply through his +teeth, watching the blue country to the west rushing past, and down, +and away from him. Monson knelt at his post forward, and his hands +trembled on the spoked wheel that moved the wings. He could see +nothing before him but a mass of white clouds in the sky. + +The machine went slanting upward, travelling with an enormous speed +still, but losing momentum every moment. The land ran away underneath +with diminishing speed. + +"_Now!_" said Woodhouse at last, and with a violent effort Monson +wrenched over the wheel and altered the angle of the wings. The machine +seemed to hang for half a minute motionless in mid-air, and then he +saw the hazy blue house-covered hills of Kilburn and Hampstead jump +up before his eyes and rise steadily, until the little sunlit dome of +the Albert Hall appeared through his windows. For a moment he scarcely +understood the meaning of this upward rush of the horizon, but as the +nearer and nearer houses came into view, he realised what he had done. +He had turned the wings over too far, and they were swooping steeply +downward towards the Thames. + +The thought, the question, the realisation were all the business of a +second of time. "Too much!" gasped Woodhouse. Monson brought the wheel +half-way back with a jerk, and forthwith the Kilburn and Hampstead +ridge dropped again to the lower edge of his windows. They had been +a thousand feet above Coombe and Maiden station; fifty seconds after +they whizzed, at a frightful pace, not eighty feet above the East +Putney station, on the Metropolitan District line, to the screaming +astonishment of a platformful of people. Monson flung up the vans +against the air, and over Fulham they rushed up their atmospheric +switchback again, steeply--too steeply. The 'buses went floundering +across the Fulham Road, the people yelled. + +Then down again, too steeply still, and the distant trees and houses +about Primrose Hill leapt up across Monson's window, and then suddenly +he saw straight before him the greenery of Kensington Gardens and the +towers of the Imperial Institute. They were driving straight down upon +South Kensington. The pinnacles of the Natural History Museum rushed up +into view. There came one fatal second of swift thought, a moment of +hesitation. Should he try and clear the towers, or swerve eastward? + +He made a hesitating attempt to release the right wing, left the catch +half released, and gave a frantic clutch at the wheel. + +The nose of the machine seemed to leap up before him. The wheel pressed +his hand with irresistible force, and jerked itself out of his control. + +Woodhouse, sitting crouched together, gave a hoarse cry, and sprang up +towards Monson. "Too far!" he cried, and then he was clinging to the +gunwale for dear life, and Monson had been jerked clean overhead, and +was falling backwards upon him. + +So swiftly had the thing happened that barely a quarter of the people +going to and fro in Hyde Park, and Brompton Road, and the Exhibition +Road saw anything of the aërial catastrophe. A distant winged shape +had appeared above the clustering houses to the south, had fallen +and risen, growing larger as it did so; had swooped swiftly down +towards the Imperial Institute, a broad spread of flying wings, had +swept round in a quarter circle, dashed eastward, and then suddenly +sprang vertically into the air. A black object shot out of it, and +came spinning downward. A man! Two men clutching each other! They came +whirling down, separated as they struck the roof of the Students' Club, +and bounded off into the green bushes on its southward side. + +For perhaps half a minute, the pointed stem of the big machine still +pierced vertically upward, the screw spinning desperately. For one +brief instant, that yet seemed an age to all who watched, it had hung +motionless in mid-air. Then a spout of yellow flame licked up its +length from the stern engine, and swift, swifter, swifter, and flaring +like a rocket, it rushed down upon the solid mass of masonry which was +formerly the Royal College of Science. The big screw of white and gold +touched the parapet, and crumpled up like wet linen. Then the blazing +spindle-shaped body smashed and splintered, smashing and splintering in +its fall, upon the north-westward angle of the building. + +But the crash, the flame of blazing paraffin that shot heavenward from +the shattered engines of the machine, the crushed horrors that were +found in the garden beyond the Students' Club, the masses of yellow +parapet and red brick that fell headlong into the roadway, the running +to and fro of people like ants in a broken ant-hill, the galloping of +fire-engines, the gathering of crowds--all these things do not belong +to this story, which was written only to tell how the first of all +successful flying-machines was launched and flew. Though he failed, and +failed disastrously, the record of Monson's work remains--a sufficient +monument--to guide the next of that band of gallant experimentalists +who will sooner or later master this great problem of flying. And +between Worcester Park and Malden there still stands that portentous +avenue of iron-work, rusting now, and dangerous here and there, to +witness to the first desperate struggle for man's right of way through +the air. + + + + +THE STORY OF THE LATE MR. ELVESHAM + + +I set this story down, not expecting it will be believed, but, if +possible, to prepare a way of escape for the next victim. He, perhaps, +may profit by my misfortune. My own case, I know, is hopeless, and I am +now in some measure prepared to meet my fate. + +My name is Edward George Eden. I was born at Trentham, in Staffordshire, +my father being employed in the gardens there. I lost my mother when +I was three years old, and my father when I was five, my uncle, +George Eden, then adopting me as his own son. He was a single man, +self-educated, and well-known in Birmingham as an enterprising +journalist; he educated me generously, fired my ambition to succeed +in the world, and at his death, which happened four years ago, left +me his entire fortune, a matter of about five hundred pounds after +all outgoing charges were paid. I was then eighteen. He advised me +in his will to expend the money in completing my education. I had +already chosen the profession of medicine, and through his posthumous +generosity, and my good fortune in a scholarship competition, I became +a medical student at University College, London. At the time of the +beginning of my story I lodged at 11A University Street, in a little +upper room, very shabbily furnished, and draughty, overlooking the back +of Shoolbred's premises. I used this little room both to live in and +sleep in, because I was anxious to eke out my means to the very last +shillingsworth. + +I was taking a pair of shoes to be mended at a shop in the Tottenham +Court Road when I first encountered the little old man with the yellow +face, with whom my life has now become so inextricably entangled. He +was standing on the kerb, and staring at the number on the door in +a doubtful way, as I opened it. His eyes--they were dull grey eyes, +and reddish under the rims--fell to my face, and his countenance +immediately assumed an expression of corrugated amiability. + +"You come," he said, "apt to the moment. I had forgotten the number of +your house. How do you do, Mr. Eden?" + +I was a little astonished at his familiar address, for I had never set +eyes on the man before. I was a little annoyed, too, at his catching me +with my boots under my arm. He noticed my lack of cordiality. + +"Wonder who the deuce I am, eh? A friend, let me assure you. I have +seen you before, though you haven't seen me. Is there anywhere where I +can talk to you?" + +I hesitated. The shabbiness of my room upstairs was not a matter for +every stranger. "Perhaps," said I, "we might walk down the street. I'm +unfortunately prevented"--My gesture explained the sentence before I +had spoken it. + +"The very thing," he said, and faced this way and then that. "The +street? Which way shall we go?" I slipped my boots down in the passage. +"Look here!" he said abruptly; "this business of mine is a rigmarole. +Come and lunch with me, Mr. Eden. I'm an old man, a very old man, and +not good at explanations, and what with my piping voice and the clatter +of the traffic"-- + +He laid a persuasive skinny hand that trembled a little upon my arm. + +I was not so old that an old man might not treat me to a lunch. Yet at +the same time I was not altogether pleased by this abrupt invitation. +"I had rather"--I began. "But _I_ had rather," he said, catching me +up, "and a certain civility is surely due to my grey hairs." And so I +consented, and went with him. + +He took me to Blavitski's; I had to walk slowly to accommodate myself +to his paces; and over such a lunch as I had never tasted before, +he fended off my leading questions, and I took a better note of his +appearance. His clean-shaven face was lean and wrinkled, his shrivelled +lips fell over a set of false teeth, and his white hair was thin and +rather long; he seemed small to me,--though, indeed, most people seemed +small to me,--and his shoulders were rounded and bent. And watching +him, I could not help but observe that he too was taking note of me, +running his eyes, with a curious touch of greed in them, over me, from +my broad shoulders to my sun-tanned hands, and up to my freckled face +again. "And now," said he, as we lit our cigarettes, "I must tell you +of the business in hand. + +"I must tell you, then, that I am an old man, a very old man." He +paused momentarily. "And it happens that I have money that I must +presently be leaving, and never a child have I to leave it to." I +thought of the confidence trick, and resolved I would be on the alert +for the vestiges of my five hundred pounds. He proceeded to enlarge on +his loneliness, and the trouble he had to find a proper disposition +of his money. "I have weighed this plan and that plan, charities, +institutions, and scholarships, and libraries, and I have come to this +conclusion at last,"--he fixed his eyes on my face,--"that I will find +some young fellow, ambitious, pure-minded, and poor, healthy in body +and healthy in mind, and, in short, make him my heir, give him all +that I have." He repeated, "Give him all that I have. So that he will +suddenly be lifted out of all the trouble and struggle in which his +sympathies have been educated, to freedom and influence." + +I tried to seem disinterested. With a transparent hypocrisy, I said, +"And you want my help, my professional services, maybe, to find that +person." + +He smiled, and looked at me over his cigarette, and I laughed at his +quiet exposure of my modest pretence. + +"What a career such a man might have!" he said. "It fills me with envy +to think how I have accumulated that another man may spend-- + +"But there are conditions, of course, burdens to be imposed. He must, +for instance, take my name. You cannot expect everything without some +return. And I must go into all the circumstances of his life before I +can accept him. He _must_ be sound. I must know his heredity, how his +parents and grandparents died, have the strictest inquiries made into +his private morals"-- + +This modified my secret congratulations a little. "And do I understand," +said I, "that I--?" + +"Yes," he said, almost fiercely. "You. _You._" + +I answered never a word. My imagination was dancing wildly, my innate +scepticism was useless to modify its transports. There was not a +particle of gratitude in my mind--I did not know what to say nor how to +say it. "But why me in particular?" I said at last. + +He had chanced to hear of me from Professor Haslar, he said, as a +typically sound and sane young man, and he wished, as far as possible, +to leave his money where health and integrity were assured. + +That was my first meeting with the little old man. He was mysterious +about himself; he would not give his name yet, he said, and after I had +answered some questions of his, he left me at the Blavitski portal. +I noticed that he drew a handful of gold coins from his pocket when +it came to paying for the lunch. His insistence upon bodily health +was curious. In accordance with an arrangement we had made I applied +that day for a life policy in the Loyal Insurance Company for a large +sum, and I was exhaustively overhauled by the medical advisers of that +company in the subsequent week. Even that did not satisfy him, and he +insisted I must be re-examined by the great Doctor Henderson. It was +Friday in Whitsun week before he came to a decision. He called me +down, quite late in the evening,--nearly nine it was,--from cramming +chemical equations for my Preliminary Scientific examination. He was +standing in the passage under the feeble gas-lamp, and his face was a +grotesque interplay of shadows. He seemed more bowed than when I had +first seen him, and his cheeks had sunk in a little. + +His voice shook with emotion. "Everything is satisfactory, Mr. Eden," +he said. "Everything is quite, quite satisfactory. And this night of +all nights, you must dine with me and celebrate your--accession." He +was interrupted by a cough. "You won't have long to wait, either," he +said, wiping his handkerchief across his lips, and gripping my hand +with his long bony claw that was disengaged. "Certainly not very long +to wait." + +We went into the street and called a cab. I remember every incident of +that drive vividly, the swift, easy motion, the vivid contrast of gas +and oil and electric light, the crowds of people in the streets, the +place in Regent Street to which we went, and the sumptuous dinner we +were served with there. I was disconcerted at first by the well-dressed +waiter's glances at my rough clothes, bothered by the stones of the +olives, but as the champagne warmed my blood, my confidence revived. At +first the old man talked of himself. He had already told me his name in +the cab; he was Egbert Elvesham, the great philosopher, whose name I +had known since I was a lad at school. It seemed incredible to me that +this man, whose intelligence had so early dominated mine, this great +abstraction, should suddenly realise itself as this decrepit, familiar +figure. I daresay every young fellow who has suddenly fallen among +celebrities has felt something of my disappointment. He told me now of +the future that the feeble streams of his life would presently leave +dry for me, houses, copyrights, investments; I had never suspected that +philosophers were so rich. He watched me drink and eat with a touch of +envy. "What a capacity for living you have!" he said; and then, with a +sigh, a sigh of relief I could have thought it, "It will not be long." + +"Ay," said I, my head swimming now with champagne; "I have a future +perhaps--of a passing agreeable sort, thanks to you. I shall now have +the honour of your name. But you have a past. Such a past as is worth +all my future." + +He shook his head and smiled, as I thought, with half-sad appreciation +of my flattering admiration. "That future," he said, "would you +in truth change it?" The waiter came with liqueurs. "You will not +perhaps mind taking my name, taking my position, but would you +indeed--willingly--take my years?" + +"With your achievements," said I gallantly. + +He smiled again. "Kummel--both," he said to the waiter, and turned +his attention to a little paper packet he had taken from his pocket. +"This hour," said he, "this after-dinner hour is the hour of small +things. Here is a scrap of my unpublished wisdom." He opened the packet +with his shaking yellow fingers, and showed a little pinkish powder +on the paper. "This," said he--"well, you must guess what it is. But +Kummel--put but a dash of this powder in it--is Himmel." His large +greyish eyes watched mine with an inscrutable expression. + +It was a bit of a shock to me to find this great teacher gave his mind +to the flavour of liqueurs. However, I feigned a great interest in his +weakness, for I was drunk enough for such small sycophancy. + +He parted the powder between the little glasses, and, rising suddenly, +with a strange unexpected dignity, held out his hand towards me. I +imitated his action, and the glasses rang. "To a quick succession," +said he, and raised his glass towards his lips. + +"Not that," I said hastily. "Not that." + +He paused, with the liqueur at the level of his chin, and his eyes +blazing into mine. + +"To a long life," said I. + +He hesitated. "To a long life," said he, with a sudden bark of +laughter, and with eyes fixed on one another we tilted the little +glasses. His eyes looked straight into mine, and as I drained the stuff +off, I felt a curiously intense sensation. The first touch of it set my +brain in a furious tumult; I seemed to feel an actual physical stirring +in my skull, and a seething humming filled my ears. I did not notice +the flavour in my mouth, the aroma that filled my throat; I saw only +the grey intensity of his gaze that burnt into mine. The draught, the +mental confusion, the noise and stirring in my head, seemed to last an +interminable time. Curious vague impressions of half-forgotten things +danced and vanished on the edge of my consciousness. At last he broke +the spell. With a sudden explosive sigh he put down his glass. + +"Well?" he said. + +"It's glorious," said I, though I had not tasted the stuff. + +My head was spinning. I sat down. My brain was chaos. Then my +perception grew clear and minute as though I saw things in a concave +mirror. His manner seemed to have changed into something nervous and +hasty. He pulled out his watch and grimaced at it. "Eleven-seven! And +to-night I must--Seven--twenty-five. Waterloo! I must go at once." He +called for the bill, and struggled with his coat. Officious waiters +came to our assistance. In another moment I was wishing him good-bye, +over the apron of a cab, and still with an absurd feeling of minute +distinctness, as though--how can I express it?--I not only saw but +_felt_ through an inverted opera-glass. + +"That stuff," he said. He put his hand to his forehead. "I ought not +to have given it to you. It will make your head split to-morrow. +Wait a minute. Here." He handed me out a little flat thing like a +seidlitz-powder. "Take that in water as you are going to bed. The other +thing was a drug. Not till you're ready to go to bed, mind. It will +clear your head. That's all. One more shake--Futurus!" + +I gripped his shrivelled claw. "Good-bye," he said, and by the droop of +his eyelids I judged he too was a little under the influence of that +brain-twisting cordial. + +He recollected something else with a start, felt in his breast-pocket, +and produced another packet, this time a cylinder the size and shape of +a shaving-stick. "Here," said he. "I'd almost forgotten. Don't open +this until I come to-morrow--but take it now." + +It was so heavy that I well-nigh dropped it. "All ri'!" said I, and he +grinned at me through the cab window as the cabman flicked his horse +into wakefulness. It was a white packet he had given me, with red seals +at either end and along its edge. "If this isn't money," said I, "it's +platinum or lead." + +I stuck it with elaborate care into my pocket, and with a whirling +brain walked home through the Regent Street loiterers and the dark +back streets beyond Portland Road. I remember the sensations of that +walk very vividly, strange as they were. I was still so far myself +that I could notice my strange mental state, and wonder whether this +stuff I had had was opium--a drug beyond my experience. It is hard now +to describe the peculiarity of my mental strangeness--mental doubling +vaguely expresses it. As I was walking up Regent Street I found in my +mind a queer persuasion that it was Waterloo station, and had an odd +impulse to get into the Polytechnic as a man might get into a train. I +put a knuckle in my eye, and it was Regent Street. How can I express +it? You see a skilful actor looking quietly at you, he pulls a grimace, +and lo!--another person. Is it too extravagant if I tell you that it +seemed to me as if Regent Street had, for the moment, done that? Then, +being persuaded it was Regent Street again, I was oddly muddled about +some fantastic reminiscences that cropped up. "Thirty years ago," +thought I, "it was here that I quarrelled with my brother." Then I +burst out laughing, to the astonishment and encouragement of a group of +night prowlers. Thirty years ago I did not exist, and never in my life +had I boasted a brother. The stuff was surely liquid folly, for the +poignant regret for that lost brother still clung to me. Along Portland +Road the madness took another turn. I began to recall vanished shops, +and to compare the street with what it used to be. Confused, troubled +thinking is comprehensible enough after the drink I had taken, but what +puzzled me were these curiously vivid phantasm memories that had crept +into my mind, and not only the memories that had crept in, but also +the memories that had slipped out. I stopped opposite Stevens', the +natural history dealer's, and cudgelled my brains to think what he had +to do with me. A 'bus went by, and sounded exactly like the rumbling +of a train. I seemed to be dipped into some dark, remote pit for the +recollection. "Of course," said I, at last, "he has promised me three +frogs to-morrow. Odd I should have forgotten." + +Do they still show children dissolving views? In those I remember one +view would begin like a faint ghost, and grow and oust another. In +just that way it seemed to me that a ghostly set of new sensations was +struggling with those of my ordinary self. + +I went on through Euston Road to Tottenham Court Road, puzzled, and a +little frightened, and scarcely noticed the unusual way I was taking, +for commonly I used to cut through the intervening network of back +streets. I turned into University Street, to discover that I had +forgotten my number. Only by a strong effort did I recall 11A, and +even then it seemed to me that it was a thing some forgotten person +had told me. I tried to steady my mind by recalling the incidents of +the dinner, and for the life of me I could conjure up no picture of +my host's face; I saw him only as a shadowy outline, as one might see +oneself reflected in a window through which one was looking. In his +place, however, I had a curious exterior vision of myself sitting at a +table, flushed, bright-eyed, and talkative. + +"I must take this other powder," said I. "This is getting impossible." + +I tried the wrong side of the hall for my candle and the matches, and +had a doubt of which landing my room might be on. "I'm drunk," I said, +"that's certain," and blundered needlessly on the staircase to sustain +the proposition. + +At the first glance my room seemed unfamiliar. "What rot!" I said, and +stared about me. I seemed to bring myself back by the effort, and the +odd phantasmal quality passed into the concrete familiar. There was the +old glass still, with my notes on the albumens stuck in the corner of +the frame, my old everyday suit of clothes pitched about the floor. And +yet it was not so real after all. I felt an idiotic persuasion trying +to creep into my mind, as it were, that I was in a railway carriage in +a train just stopping, that I was peering out of the window at some +unknown station. I gripped the bed-rail firmly to reassure myself. +"It's clairvoyance, perhaps," I said. "I must write to the Psychical +Research Society." + +I put the rouleau on my dressing-table, sat on my bed and began to +take off my boots. It was as if the picture of my present sensations +was painted over some other picture that was trying to show through. +"Curse it!" said I; "my wits are going, or am I in two places at once?" +Half-undressed, I tossed the powder into a glass and drank it off. It +effervesced, and became a fluorescent amber colour. Before I was in bed +my mind was already tranquillised. I felt the pillow at my cheek, and +thereupon I must have fallen asleep. + + * * * * * + +I awoke abruptly out of a dream of strange beasts, and found myself +lying on my back. Probably everyone knows that dismal, emotional dream +from which one escapes, awake indeed, but strangely cowed. There was +a curious taste in my mouth, a tired feeling in my limbs, a sense of +cutaneous discomfort. I lay with my head motionless on my pillow, +expecting that my feeling of strangeness and terror would probably +pass away, and that I should then doze off again to sleep. But instead +of that, my uncanny sensations increased. At first I could perceive +nothing wrong about me. There was a faint light in the room, so faint +that it was the very next thing to darkness, and the furniture stood +out in it as vague blots of absolute darkness. I stared with my eyes +just over the bedclothes. + +It came into my mind that someone had entered the room to rob me of my +rouleau of money, but after lying for some moments, breathing regularly +to simulate sleep, I realised this was mere fancy. Nevertheless, the +uneasy assurance of something wrong kept fast hold of me. With an +effort I raised my head from the pillow, and peered about me at the +dark. What it was I could not conceive. I looked at the dim shapes +around me, the greater and lesser darknesses that indicated curtains, +table, fireplace, bookshelves, and so forth. Then I began to perceive +something unfamiliar in the forms of the darkness. Had the bed turned +round? Yonder should be the bookshelves, and something shrouded and +pallid rose there, something that would not answer to the bookshelves, +however I looked at it. It was far too big to be my shirt thrown on a +chair. + +Overcoming a childish terror, I threw back the bedclothes and thrust my +leg out of bed. Instead of coming out of my truckle-bed upon the floor, +I found my foot scarcely reached the edge of the mattress. I made +another step, as it were, and sat up on the edge of the bed. By the +side of my bed should be the candle, and the matches upon the broken +chair. I put out my hand and touched--nothing. I waved my hand in the +darkness, and it came against some heavy hanging, soft and thick in +texture, which gave a rustling noise at my touch. I grasped this and +pulled it; it appeared to be a curtain suspended over the head of my +bed. + +I was now thoroughly awake, and beginning to realise that I was +in a strange room. I was puzzled. I tried to recall the overnight +circumstances, and I found them now, curiously enough, vivid in my +memory: the supper, my reception of the little packages, my wonder +whether I was intoxicated, my slow undressing, the coolness to my +flushed face of my pillow. I felt a sudden distrust. Was that last +night, or the night before? At anyrate, this room was strange to +me, and I could not imagine how I had got into it. The dim, pallid +outline was growing paler, and I perceived it was a window, with the +dark shape of an oval toilet-glass against the weak intimation of the +dawn that filtered through the blind. I stood up, and was surprised +by a curious feeling of weakness and unsteadiness. With trembling +hands outstretched, I walked slowly towards the window, getting, +nevertheless, a bruise on the knee from a chair by the way. I fumbled +round the glass, which was large, with handsome brass sconces, to find +the blind-cord. I could not find any. By chance I took hold of the +tassel, and with the click of a spring the blind ran up. + +I found myself looking out upon a scene that was altogether strange +to me. The night was overcast, and through the flocculent grey of +the heaped clouds there filtered a faint half-light of dawn. Just at +the edge of the sky, the cloud-canopy had a blood-red rim. Below, +everything was dark and indistinct, dim hills in the distance, a vague +mass of buildings running up into pinnacles, trees like spilt ink, and +below the window a tracery of black bushes and pale grey paths. It was +so unfamiliar that for the moment I thought myself still dreaming. I +felt the toilet-table; it appeared to be made of some polished wood, +and was rather elaborately furnished--there were little cut-glass +bottles and a brush upon it. There was also a queer little object, +horse-shoe-shaped it felt, with smooth, hard projections, lying in a +saucer. I could find no matches nor candlestick. + +I turned my eyes to the room again. Now the blind was up, faint +spectres of its furnishing came out of the darkness. There was a huge +curtained bed, and the fireplace at its foot had a large white mantel +with something of the shimmer of marble. + +I leant against the toilet-table, shut my eyes and opened them again, +and tried to think. The whole thing was far too real for dreaming. I +was inclined to imagine there was still some hiatus in my memory, as a +consequence of my draught of that strange liqueur; that I had come into +my inheritance perhaps, and suddenly lost my recollection of everything +since my good fortune had been announced. Perhaps if I waited a little, +things would be clearer to me again. Yet my dinner with old Elvesham +was now singularly vivid and recent. The champagne, the observant +waiters, the powder, and the liqueurs--I could have staked my soul it +all happened a few hours ago. + +And then occurred a thing so trivial and yet so terrible to me that I +shiver now to think of that moment. I spoke aloud. I said, "How the +devil did I get here?" ... _And the voice was not my own._ + +It was not my own, it was thin, the articulation was slurred, the +resonance of my facial bones was different. Then, to reassure myself +I ran one hand over the other, and felt loose folds of skin, the +bony laxity of age. "Surely," I said, in that horrible voice that +had somehow established itself in my throat, "surely this thing is a +dream!" Almost as quickly as if I did it involuntarily, I thrust my +fingers into my mouth. My teeth had gone. My finger-tips ran on the +flaccid surface of an even row of shrivelled gums. I was sick with +dismay and disgust. + +I felt then a passionate desire to see myself, to realise at once in +its full horror the ghastly change that had come upon me. I tottered to +the mantel, and felt along it for matches. As I did so, a barking cough +sprang up in my throat, and I clutched the thick flannel nightdress I +found about me. There were no matches there, and I suddenly realised +that my extremities were cold. Sniffing and coughing, whimpering a +little, perhaps, I fumbled back to bed. "It is surely a dream," I +whimpered to myself as I clambered back, "surely a dream." It was a +senile repetition. I pulled the bedclothes over my shoulders, over my +ears, I thrust my withered hand under the pillow, and determined to +compose myself to sleep. Of course it was a dream. In the morning the +dream would be over, and I should wake up strong and vigorous again to +my youth and studies. I shut my eyes, breathed regularly, and, finding +myself wakeful, began to count slowly through the powers of three. + +But the thing I desired would not come. I could not get to sleep. +And the persuasion of the inexorable reality of the change that had +happened to me grew steadily. Presently I found myself with my eyes +wide open, the powers of three forgotten, and my skinny fingers upon +my shrivelled gums. I was, indeed, suddenly and abruptly, an old man. +I had in some unaccountable manner fallen through my life and come to +old age, in some way I had been cheated of all the best of my life, of +love, of struggle, of strength, and hope. I grovelled into the pillow +and tried to persuade myself that such hallucination was possible. +Imperceptibly, steadily, the dawn grew clearer. + +At last, despairing of further sleep, I sat up in bed and looked +about me. A chill twilight rendered the whole chamber visible. It +was spacious and well-furnished, better furnished than any room I +had ever slept in before. A candle and matches became dimly visible +upon a little pedestal in a recess. I threw back the bedclothes, +and, shivering with the rawness of the early morning, albeit it was +summer-time, I got out and lit the candle. Then, trembling horribly, +so that the extinguisher rattled on its spike, I tottered to the glass +and saw--_Elvesham's face!_ It was none the less horrible because I +had already dimly feared as much. He had already seemed physically +weak and pitiful to me, but seen now, dressed only in a coarse flannel +nightdress that fell apart and showed the stringy neck, seen now as +my own body, I cannot describe its desolate decrepitude. The hollow +cheeks, the straggling tail of dirty grey hair, the rheumy bleared +eyes, the quivering, shrivelled lips, the lower displaying a gleam of +the pink interior lining, and those horrible dark gums showing. You +who are mind and body together, at your natural years, cannot imagine +what this fiendish imprisonment meant to me. To be young and full of +the desire and energy of youth, and to be caught, and presently to be +crushed in this tottering ruin of a body.... + +But I wander from the course of my story. For some time I must have +been stunned at this change that had come upon me. It was daylight when +I did so far gather myself together as to think. In some inexplicable +way I had been changed, though how, short of magic, the thing had been +done, I could not say. And as I thought, the diabolical ingenuity of +Elvesham came home to me. It seemed plain to me that as I found myself +in his, so he must be in possession of _my_ body, of my strength, that +is, and my future. But how to prove it? Then, as I thought, the thing +became so incredible, even to me, that my mind reeled, and I had to +pinch myself, to feel my toothless gums, to see myself in the glass, +and touch the things about me, before I could steady myself to face the +facts again. Was all life hallucination? Was I indeed Elvesham, and he +me? Had I been dreaming of Eden overnight? Was there any Eden? But if +I was Elvesham, I should remember where I was on the previous morning, +the name of the town in which I lived, what happened before the dream +began. I struggled with my thoughts. I recalled the queer doubleness of +my memories overnight. But now my mind was clear. Not the ghost of any +memories but those proper to Eden could I raise. + +"This way lies insanity!" I cried in my piping voice. I staggered to my +feet, dragged my feeble, heavy limbs to the washhand-stand, and plunged +my grey head into a basin of cold water. Then, towelling myself, I +tried again. It was no good. I felt beyond all question that I was +indeed Eden, not Elvesham. But Eden in Elvesham's body! + +Had I been a man of any other age, I might have given myself up to my +fate as one enchanted. But in these sceptical days miracles do not pass +current. Here was some trick of psychology. What a drug and a steady +stare could do, a drug and a steady stare, or some similar treatment, +could surely undo. Men have lost their memories before. But to exchange +memories as one does umbrellas! I laughed. Alas! not a healthy laugh, +but a wheezing, senile titter. I could have fancied old Elvesham +laughing at my plight, and a gust of petulant anger, unusual to me, +swept across my feelings. I began dressing eagerly in the clothes I +found lying about on the floor, and only realised when I was dressed +that it was an evening suit I had assumed. I opened the wardrobe +and found some more ordinary clothes, a pair of plaid trousers, and +an old-fashioned dressing-gown. I put a venerable smoking-cap on my +venerable head, and, coughing a little from my exertions, tottered out +upon the landing. + +It was then, perhaps, a quarter to six, and the blinds were closely +drawn and the house quite silent. The landing was a spacious one, a +broad, richly-carpeted staircase went down into the darkness of the +hall below, and before me a door ajar showed me a writing-desk, a +revolving bookcase, the back of a study chair, and a fine array of +bound books, shelf upon shelf. + +"My study," I mumbled, and walked across the landing. Then at the sound +of my voice a thought struck me, and I went back to the bedroom and put +in the set of false teeth. They slipped in with the ease of old habit. +"That's better," said I, gnashing them, and so returned to the study. + +The drawers of the writing-desk were locked. Its revolving top was also +locked. I could see no indications of the keys, and there were none in +the pockets of my trousers. I shuffled back at once to the bedroom, +and went through the dress suit, and afterwards the pockets of all the +garments I could find. I was very eager, and one might have imagined +that burglars had been at work, to see my room when I had done. Not +only were there no keys to be found, but not a coin, nor a scrap of +paper--save only the receipted bill of the overnight dinner. + +A curious weariness asserted itself. I sat down and stared at the +garments flung here and there, their pockets turned inside out. My +first frenzy had already flickered out. Every moment I was beginning +to realise the immense intelligence of the plans of my enemy, to see +more and more clearly the hopelessness of my position. With an effort I +rose and hurried hobbling into the study again. On the staircase was a +housemaid pulling up the blinds. She stared, I think, at the expression +of my face. I shut the door of the study behind me, and, seizing a +poker, began an attack upon the desk. That is how they found me. The +cover of the desk was split, the lock smashed, the letters torn out of +the pigeon-holes and tossed about the room. In my senile rage I had +flung about the pens and other such light stationery, and overturned +the ink. Moreover, a large vase upon the mantel had got broken--I do +not know how. I could find no cheque-book, no money, no indications of +the slightest use for the recovery of my body. I was battering madly at +the drawers, when the butler, backed by two women-servants, intruded +upon me. + + * * * * * + +That simply is the story of my change. No one will believe my frantic +assertions. I am treated as one demented, and even at this moment I +am under restraint. But I am sane, absolutely sane, and to prove it I +have sat down to write this story minutely as the things happened to +me. I appeal to the reader, whether there is any trace of insanity in +the style or method of the story he has been reading. I am a young man +locked away in an old man's body. But the clear fact is incredible to +everyone. Naturally I appear demented to those who will not believe +this, naturally I do not know the names of my secretaries, of the +doctors who come to see me, of my servants and neighbours, of this +town (wherever it is) where I find myself. Naturally I lose myself in +my own house, and suffer inconveniences of every sort. Naturally I ask +the oddest questions. Naturally I weep and cry out, and have paroxysms +of despair. I have no money and no cheque-book. The bank will not +recognise my signature, for I suppose that, allowing for the feeble +muscles I now have, my handwriting is still Eden's. These people about +me will not let me go to the bank personally. It seems, indeed, that +there is no bank in this town, and that I have an account in some part +of London. It seems that Elvesham kept the name of his solicitor secret +from all his household--I can ascertain nothing. Elvesham was, of +course, a profound student of mental science, and all my declarations +of the facts of the case merely confirm the theory that my insanity +is the outcome of overmuch brooding upon psychology. Dreams of the +personal identity indeed! Two days ago I was a healthy youngster, +with all life before me; now I am a furious old man, unkempt, and +desperate, and miserable, prowling about a great luxurious strange +house, watched, feared, and avoided as a lunatic by everyone about me. +And in London is Elvesham beginning life again in a vigorous body, and +with all the accumulated knowledge and wisdom of threescore and ten. He +has stolen my life. + +What has happened I do not clearly know. In the study are volumes +of manuscript notes referring chiefly to the psychology of memory, +and parts of what may be either calculations or ciphers in symbols +absolutely strange to me. In some passages there are indications that +he was also occupied with the philosophy of mathematics. I take it he +has transferred the whole of his memories, the accumulation that makes +up his personality, from this old withered brain of his to mine, and, +similarly, that he has transferred mine to his discarded tenement. +Practically, that is, he has changed bodies. But how such a change +may be possible is without the range of my philosophy. I have been a +materialist for all my thinking life, but here, suddenly, is a clear +case of man's detachability from matter. + +One desperate experiment I am about to try. I sit writing here +before putting the matter to issue. This morning, with the help of a +table-knife that I had secreted at breakfast, I succeeded in breaking +open a fairly obvious secret drawer in this wrecked writing-desk. I +discovered nothing save a little green glass phial containing a white +powder. Round the neck of the phial was a label, and thereon was +written this one word, "_Release_." This may be--is most probably, +poison. I can understand Elvesham placing poison in my way, and I +should be sure that it was his intention so to get rid of the only +living witness against him, were it not for this careful concealment. +The man has practically solved the problem of immortality. Save for the +spite of chance, he will live in my body until it has aged, and then, +again, throwing that aside, he will assume some other victim's youth +and strength. When one remembers his heartlessness, it is terrible to +think of the ever-growing experience, that.... How long has he been +leaping from body to body?... But I tire of writing. The powder appears +to be soluble in water. The taste is not unpleasant. + + * * * * * + +There the narrative found upon Mr. Elvesham's desk ends. His dead body +lay between the desk and the chair. The latter had been pushed back, +probably by his last convulsions. The story was written in pencil, +and in a crazy hand, quite unlike his usual minute characters. There +remain only two curious facts to record. Indisputably there was some +connection between Eden and Elvesham, since the whole of Elvesham's +property was bequeathed to the young man. But he never inherited. When +Elvesham committed suicide, Eden was, strangely enough, already dead. +Twenty-four hours before, he had been knocked down by a cab and killed +instantly, at the crowded crossing at the intersection of Gower Street +and Euston Road. So that the only human being who could have thrown +light upon this fantastic narrative is beyond the reach of questions. +Without further comment I leave this extraordinary matter to the +reader's individual judgment. + + + + +IN THE ABYSS + + +The lieutenant stood in front of the steel sphere and gnawed a piece of +pine splinter. "What do you think of it, Steevens?" he asked. + +"It's an idea," said Steevens, in the tone of one who keeps an open +mind. + +"I believe it will smash--flat," said the lieutenant. + +"He seems to have calculated it all out pretty well," said Steevens, +still impartial. + +"But think of the pressure," said the lieutenant. "At the surface +of the water it's fourteen pounds to the inch, thirty feet down +it's double that; sixty, treble; ninety, four times; nine hundred, +forty times; five thousand, three hundred--that's a mile--it's two +hundred and forty times fourteen pounds; that's--let's see--thirty +hundredweight--a ton and a half, Steevens; _a ton and a half_ to the +square inch. And the ocean where he's going is five miles deep. That's +seven and a half"-- + +"Sounds a lot," said Steevens, "but it's jolly thick steel." + +The lieutenant made no answer, but resumed his pine splinter. The +object of their conversation was a huge ball of steel, having an +exterior diameter of perhaps nine feet. It looked like the shot +for some Titanic piece of artillery. It was elaborately nested in a +monstrous scaffolding built into the framework of the vessel, and +the gigantic spars that were presently to sling it overboard gave +the stern of the ship an appearance that had raised the curiosity +of every decent sailor who had sighted it, from the Pool of London +to the Tropic of Capricorn. In two places, one above the other, the +steel gave place to a couple of circular windows of enormously thick +glass, and one of these, set in a steel frame of great solidity, was +now partially unscrewed. Both the men had seen the interior of this +globe for the first time that morning. It was elaborately padded with +air cushions, with little studs sunk between bulging pillows to work +the simple mechanism of the affair. Everything was elaborately padded, +even the Myers apparatus which was to absorb carbonic acid and replace +the oxygen inspired by its tenant, when he had crept in by the glass +manhole, and had been screwed in. It was so elaborately padded that a +man might have been fired from a gun in it with perfect safety. And it +had need to be, for presently a man was to crawl in through that glass +manhole, to be screwed up tightly, and to be flung overboard, and to +sink down--down--down, for five miles, even as the lieutenant said. It +had taken the strongest hold of his imagination; it made him a bore at +mess; and he found Steevens, the new arrival aboard, a godsend to talk +to about it, over and over again. + +"It's my opinion," said the lieutenant, "that that glass will simply +bend in and bulge and smash, under a pressure of that sort. Daubrée +has made rocks run like water under big pressures--and, you mark my +words"-- + +"If the glass did break in," said Steevens, "what then?" + +"The water would shoot in like a jet of iron. Have you ever felt a +straight jet of high pressure water? It would hit as hard as a bullet. +It would simply smash him and flatten him. It would tear down his +throat, and into his lungs; it would blow in his ears"-- + +"What a detailed imagination you have!" protested Steevens, who saw +things vividly. + +"It's a simple statement of the inevitable," said the lieutenant. + +"And the globe?" + +"Would just give out a few little bubbles, and it would settle down +comfortably against the day of judgment, among the oozes and the bottom +clay--with poor Elstead spread over his own smashed cushions like +butter over bread." + +He repeated this sentence as though he liked it very much. "Like butter +over bread," he said. + +"Having a look at the jigger?" said a voice, and Elstead stood behind +them, spick and span in white, with a cigarette between his teeth, +and his eyes smiling out of the shadow of his ample hat-brim. "What's +that about bread and butter, Weybridge? Grumbling as usual about the +insufficient pay of naval officers? It won't be more than a day now +before I start. We are to get the slings ready to-day. This clean sky +and gentle swell is just the kind of thing for swinging off a dozen +tons of lead and iron; isn't it?" + +"It won't affect you much," said Weybridge. + +"No. Seventy or eighty feet down, and I shall be there in a dozen +seconds, there's not a particle moving, though the wind shriek itself +hoarse up above, and the water lifts halfway to the clouds. No. Down +there"-- He moved to the side of the ship and the other two followed +him. All three leant forward on their elbows and stared down into the +yellow-green water. + +"_Peace_," said Elstead, finishing his thought aloud. + +"Are you dead certain that clockwork will act?" asked Weybridge +presently. + +"It has worked thirty-five times," said Elstead. "It's bound to work." + +"But if it doesn't?" + +"Why shouldn't it?" + +"I wouldn't go down in that confounded thing," said Weybridge, "for +twenty thousand pounds." + +"Cheerful chap you are," said Elstead, and spat sociably at a bubble +below. + +"I don't understand yet how you mean to work the thing," said Steevens. + +"In the first place, I'm screwed into the sphere," said Elstead, "and +when I've turned the electric light off and on three times to show I'm +cheerful, I'm swung out over the stern by that crane, with all those +big lead sinkers slung below me. The top lead weight has a roller +carrying a hundred fathoms of strong cord rolled up, and that's all +that joins the sinkers to the sphere, except the slings that will be +cut when the affair is dropped. We use cord rather than wire rope +because it's easier to cut and more buoyant--necessary points, as you +will see. + +"Through each of these lead weights you notice there is a hole, and +an iron rod will be run through that and will project six feet on the +lower side. If that rod is rammed up from below, it knocks up a lever +and sets the clockwork in motion at the side of the cylinder on which +the cord winds. + +"Very well. The whole affair is lowered gently into the water, and the +slings are cut. The sphere floats,--with the air in it, it's lighter +than water,--but the lead weights go down straight and the cord runs +out. When the cord is all paid out, the sphere will go down too, pulled +down by the cord." + +"But why the cord?" asked Steevens. "Why not fasten the weights +directly to the sphere?" + +"Because of the smash down below. The whole affair will go rushing +down, mile after mile, at a headlong pace at last. It would be knocked +to pieces on the bottom if it wasn't for that cord. But the weights +will hit the bottom, and directly they do, the buoyancy of the sphere +will come into play. It will go on sinking slower and slower; come to a +stop at last, and then begin to float upward again. + +"That's where the clockwork comes in. Directly the weights smash +against the sea bottom, the rod will be knocked through and will kick +up the clockwork, and the cord will be rewound on the reel. I shall be +lugged down to the sea bottom. There I shall stay for half an hour, +with the electric light on, looking about me. Then the clockwork +will release a spring knife, the cord will be cut, and up I shall +rush again, like a soda-water bubble. The cord itself will help the +flotation." + +"And if you should chance to hit a ship?" said Weybridge. + +"I should come up at such a pace, I should go clean through it," said +Elstead, "like a cannon ball. You needn't worry about that." + +"And suppose some nimble crustacean should wriggle into your +clockwork"-- + +"It would be a pressing sort of invitation for me to stop," said +Elstead, turning his back on the water and staring at the sphere. + + * * * * * + +They had swung Elstead overboard by eleven o'clock. The day was +serenely bright and calm, with the horizon lost in haze. The electric +glare in the little upper compartment beamed cheerfully three times. +Then they let him down slowly to the surface of the water, and a sailor +in the stern chains hung ready to cut the tackle that held the lead +weights and the sphere together. The globe, which had looked so large +on deck, looked the smallest thing conceivable under the stern of the +ship. It rolled a little, and its two dark windows, which floated +uppermost, seemed like eyes turned up in round wonderment at the people +who crowded the rail. A voice wondered how Elstead liked the rolling. +"Are you ready?" sang out the commander. "Ay, ay, sir!" "Then let her +go!" + +The rope of the tackle tightened against the blade and was cut, and an +eddy rolled over the globe in a grotesquely helpless fashion. Someone +waved a handkerchief, someone else tried an ineffectual cheer, a middy +was counting slowly, "Eight, nine, ten!" Another roll, then with a jerk +and a splash the thing righted itself. + +It seemed to be stationary for a moment, to grow rapidly smaller, and +then the water closed over it, and it became visible, enlarged by +refraction and dimmer, below the surface. Before one could count three +it had disappeared. There was a flicker of white light far down in the +water, that diminished to a speck and vanished. Then there was nothing +but a depth of water going down into blackness, through which a shark +was swimming. + +Then suddenly the screw of the cruiser began to rotate, the water was +crickled, the shark disappeared in a wrinkled confusion, and a torrent +of foam rushed across the crystalline clearness that had swallowed up +Elstead. "What's the idee?" said one A.B. to another. + +"We're going to lay off about a couple of miles, 'fear he should hit us +when he comes up," said his mate. + +The ship steamed slowly to her new position. Aboard her almost everyone +who was unoccupied remained watching the breathing swell into which +the sphere had sunk. For the next half-hour it is doubtful if a word +was spoken that did not bear directly or indirectly on Elstead. The +December sun was now high in the sky, and the heat very considerable. + +"He'll be cold enough down there," said Weybridge. "They say that below +a certain depth sea water's always just about freezing." + +"Where'll he come up?" asked Steevens. "I've lost my bearings." + +"That's the spot," said the commander, who prided himself on his +omniscience. He extended a precise finger south-eastward. "And this, I +reckon, is pretty nearly the moment," he said. "He's been thirty-five +minutes." + +"How long does it take to reach the bottom of the ocean?" asked +Steevens. + +"For a depth of five miles, and reckoning--as we did--an acceleration +of two feet per second, both ways, is just about three-quarters of a +minute." + +"Then he's overdue," said Weybridge. + +"Pretty nearly," said the commander. "I suppose it takes a few minutes +for that cord of his to wind in." + +"I forgot that," said Weybridge, evidently relieved. + +And then began the suspense. A minute slowly dragged itself out, and no +sphere shot out of the water. Another followed, and nothing broke the +low oily swell. The sailors explained to one another that little point +about the winding-in of the cord. The rigging was dotted with expectant +faces. "Come up, Elstead!" called one hairy-chested salt impatiently, +and the others caught it up, and shouted as though they were waiting +for the curtain of a theatre to rise. + +The commander glanced irritably at them. + +"Of course, if the acceleration's less than two," he said, "he'll +be all the longer. We aren't absolutely certain that was the proper +figure. I'm no slavish believer in calculations." + +Steevens agreed concisely. No one on the quarter-deck spoke for a +couple of minutes. Then Steevens' watchcase clicked. + +When, twenty-one minutes after, the sun reached the zenith, they were +still waiting for the globe to reappear, and not a man aboard had +dared to whisper that hope was dead. It was Weybridge who first gave +expression to that realisation. He spoke while the sound of eight bells +still hung in the air. "I always distrusted that window," he said quite +suddenly to Steevens. + +"Good God!" said Steevens; "you don't think--?" + +"Well!" said Weybridge, and left the rest to his imagination. + +"I'm no great believer in calculations myself," said the commander +dubiously, "so that I'm not altogether hopeless yet." And at midnight +the gunboat was steaming slowly in a spiral round the spot where +the globe had sunk, and the white beam of the electric light fled +and halted and swept discontentedly onward again over the waste of +phosphorescent waters under the little stars. + +"If his window hasn't burst and smashed him," said Weybridge, "then +it's a cursed sight worse, for his clockwork has gone wrong, and he's +alive now, five miles under our feet, down there in the cold and dark, +anchored in that little bubble of his, where never a ray of light has +shone or a human being lived, since the waters were gathered together. +He's there without food, feeling hungry and thirsty and scared, +wondering whether he'll starve or stifle. Which will it be? The Myers +apparatus is running out, I suppose. How long do they last?" + +"Good heavens!" he exclaimed; "what little things we are! What daring +little devils! Down there, miles and miles of water--all water, and +all this empty water about us and this sky. Gulfs!" He threw his hands +out, and as he did so, a little white streak swept noiselessly up the +sky, travelled more slowly, stopped, became a motionless dot, as though +a new star had fallen up into the sky. Then it went sliding back again +and lost itself amidst the reflections of the stars and the white haze +of the sea's phosphorescence. + +At the sight he stopped, arm extended and mouth open. He shut his +mouth, opened it again, and waved his arms with an impatient gesture. +Then he turned, shouted "El-stead ahoy!" to the first watch, and +went at a run to Lindley and the search-light. "I saw him," he said. +"Starboard there! His light's on, and he's just shot out of the water. +Bring the light round. We ought to see him drifting, when he lifts on +the swell." + +But they never picked up the explorer until dawn. Then they almost ran +him down. The crane was swung out and a boat's crew hooked the chain +to the sphere. When they had shipped the sphere, they unscrewed the +manhole and peered into the darkness of the interior (for the electric +light chamber was intended to illuminate the water about the sphere, +and was shut off entirely from its general cavity). + +The air was very hot within the cavity, and the indiarubber at the lip +of the manhole was soft. There was no answer to their eager questions +and no sound of movement within. Elstead seemed to be lying motionless, +crumpled up in the bottom of the globe. The ship's doctor crawled in +and lifted him out to the men outside. For a moment or so they did not +know whether Elstead was alive or dead. His face, in the yellow light +of the ship's lamps, glistened with perspiration. They carried him down +to his own cabin. + +He was not dead, they found, but in a state of absolute nervous +collapse, and besides cruelly bruised. For some days he had to lie +perfectly still. It was a week before he could tell his experiences. + +Almost his first words were that he was going down again. The sphere +would have to be altered, he said, in order to allow him to throw off +the cord if need be, and that was all. He had had the most marvellous +experience. "You thought I should find nothing but ooze," he said. "You +laughed at my explorations, and I've discovered a new world!" He told +his story in disconnected fragments, and chiefly from the wrong end, so +that it is impossible to re-tell it in his words. But what follows is +the narrative of his experience. + +It began atrociously, he said. Before the cord ran out, the thing kept +rolling over. He felt like a frog in a football. He could see nothing +but the crane and the sky overhead, with an occasional glimpse of the +people on the ship's rail. He couldn't tell a bit which way the thing +would roll next. Suddenly he would find his feet going up, and try to +step, and over he went rolling, head over heels, and just anyhow, on +the padding. Any other shape would have been more comfortable, but +no other shape was to be relied upon under the huge pressure of the +nethermost abyss. + +Suddenly the swaying ceased; the globe righted, and when he had +picked himself up, he saw the water all about him greeny-blue, with +an attenuated light filtering down from above, and a shoal of little +floating things went rushing up past him, as it seemed to him, towards +the light. And even as he looked, it grew darker and darker, until +the water above was as dark as the midnight sky, albeit of a greener +shade, and the water below black. And little transparent things in the +water developed a faint glint of luminosity, and shot past him in faint +greenish streaks. + +And the feeling of falling! It was just like the start of a lift, he +said, only it kept on. One has to imagine what that means, that keeping +on. It was then of all times that Elstead repented of his adventure. He +saw the chances against him in an altogether new light. He thought of +the big cuttlefish people knew to exist in the middle waters, the kind +of things they find half digested in whales at times, or floating dead +and rotten and half eaten by fish. Suppose one caught hold and wouldn't +let go. And had the clockwork really been sufficiently tested? But +whether he wanted to go on or to go back mattered not the slightest now. + +In fifty seconds everything was as black as night outside, except where +the beam from his light struck through the waters, and picked out every +now and then some fish or scrap of sinking matter. They flashed by too +fast for him to see what they were. Once he thinks he passed a shark. +And then the sphere began to get hot by friction against the water. +They had underestimated this, it seems. + +The first thing he noticed was that he was perspiring, and then he +heard a hissing growing louder under his feet, and saw a lot of little +bubbles--very little bubbles they were--rushing upward like a fan +through the water outside. Steam! He felt the window, and it was hot. +He turned on the minute glow-lamp that lit his own cavity, looked at +the padded watch by the studs, and saw he had been travelling now for +two minutes. It came into his head that the window would crack through +the conflict of temperatures, for he knew the bottom water is very near +freezing. + +Then suddenly the floor of the sphere seemed to press against his feet, +the rush of bubbles outside grew slower and slower, and the hissing +diminished. The sphere rolled a little. The window had not cracked, +nothing had given, and he knew that the dangers of sinking, at anyrate, +were over. + +In another minute or so he would be on the floor of the abyss. He +thought, he said, of Steevens and Weybridge and the rest of them five +miles overhead, higher to him than the very highest clouds that ever +floated over land are to us, steaming slowly and staring down and +wondering what had happened to him. + +He peered out of the window. There were no more bubbles now, and the +hissing had stopped. Outside there was a heavy blackness--as black as +black velvet--except where the electric light pierced the empty water +and showed the colour of it--a yellow-green. Then three things like +shapes of fire swam into sight, following each other through the water. +Whether they were little and near or big and far off he could not tell. + +Each was outlined in a bluish light almost as bright as the lights of +a fishing smack, a light which seemed to be smoking greatly, and all +along the sides of them were specks of this, like the lighter portholes +of a ship. Their phosphorescence seemed to go out as they came into +the radiance of his lamp, and he saw then that they were little fish +of some strange sort, with huge heads, vast eyes, and dwindling bodies +and tails. Their eyes were turned towards him, and he judged they were +following him down. He supposed they were attracted by his glare. + +Presently others of the same sort joined them. As he went on down, +he noticed that the water became of a pallid colour, and that little +specks twinkled in his ray like motes in a sunbeam. This was probably +due to the clouds of ooze and mud that the impact of his leaden sinkers +had disturbed. + +By the time he was drawn down to the lead weights he was in a dense fog +of white that his electric light failed altogether to pierce for more +than a few yards, and many minutes elapsed before the hanging sheets +of sediment subsided to any extent. Then, lit by his light and by the +transient phosphorescence of a distant shoal of fishes, he was able to +see under the huge blackness of the super-incumbent water an undulating +expanse of greyish-white ooze, broken here and there by tangled +thickets of a growth of sea lilies, waving hungry tentacles in the air. + +Farther away were the graceful, translucent outlines of a group of +gigantic sponges. About this floor there were scattered a number of +bristling flattish tufts of rich purple and black, which he decided +must be some sort of sea-urchin, and small, large-eyed or blind things +having a curious resemblance, some to woodlice, and others to lobsters, +crawled sluggishly across the track of the light and vanished into the +obscurity again, leaving furrowed trails behind them. + +Then suddenly the hovering swarm of little fishes veered about and came +towards him as a flight of starlings might do. They passed over him +like a phosphorescent snow, and then he saw behind them some larger +creature advancing towards the sphere. + +At first he could see it only dimly, a faintly moving figure remotely +suggestive of a walking man, and then it came into the spray of light +that the lamp shot out. As the glare struck it, it shut its eyes, +dazzled. He stared in rigid astonishment. + +It was a strange vertebrated animal. Its dark purple head was dimly +suggestive of a chameleon, but it had such a high forehead and such a +braincase as no reptile ever displayed before; the vertical pitch of +its face gave it a most extraordinary resemblance to a human being. + +Two large and protruding eyes projected from sockets in chameleon +fashion, and it had a broad reptilian mouth with horny lips beneath its +little nostrils. In the position of the ears were two huge gill-covers, +and out of these floated a branching tree of coralline filaments, +almost like the tree-like gills that very young rays and sharks possess. + +But the humanity of the face was not the most extraordinary thing about +the creature. It was a biped; its almost globular body was poised on a +tripod of two frog-like legs and a long thick tail, and its fore limbs, +which grotesquely caricatured the human hand, much as a frog's do, +carried a long shaft of bone, tipped with copper. The colour of the +creature was variegated; its head, hands, and legs were purple; but +its skin, which hung loosely upon it, even as clothes might do, was a +phosphorescent grey. And it stood there blinded by the light. + +At last this unknown creature of the abyss blinked its eyes open, +and, shading them with its disengaged hand, opened its mouth and gave +vent to a shouting noise, articulate almost as speech might be, that +penetrated even the steel case and padded jacket of the sphere. How a +shouting may be accomplished without lungs Elstead does not profess to +explain. It then moved sideways out of the glare into the mystery of +shadow that bordered it on either side, and Elstead felt rather than +saw that it was coming towards him. Fancying the light had attracted +it, he turned the switch that cut off the current. In another moment +something soft dabbed upon the steel, and the globe swayed. + +Then the shouting was repeated, and it seemed to him that a distant +echo answered it. The dabbing recurred, and the globe swayed and ground +against the spindle over which the wire was rolled. He stood in the +blackness and peered out into the everlasting night of the abyss. +And presently he saw, very faint and remote, other phosphorescent +quasi-human forms hurrying towards him. + +Hardly knowing what he did, he felt about in his swaying prison for +the stud of the exterior electric light, and came by accident against +his own small glow-lamp in its padded recess. The sphere twisted, and +then threw him down; he heard shouts like shouts of surprise, and when +he rose to his feet, he saw two pairs of stalked eyes peering into the +lower window and reflecting his light. + +In another moment hands were dabbing vigorously at his steel casing, +and there was a sound, horrible enough in his position, of the metal +protection of the clockwork being vigorously hammered. That, indeed, +sent his heart into his mouth, for if these strange creatures succeeded +in stopping that, his release would never occur. Scarcely had he +thought as much when he felt the sphere sway violently, and the floor +of it press hard against his feet. He turned off the small glow-lamp +that lit the interior, and sent the ray of the large light in the +separate compartment out into the water. The sea-floor and the man-like +creatures had disappeared, and a couple of fish chasing each other +dropped suddenly by the window. + +He thought at once that these strange denizens of the deep sea had +broken the rope, and that he had escaped. He drove up faster and +faster, and then stopped with a jerk that sent him flying against the +padded roof of his prison. For half a minute, perhaps, he was too +astonished to think. + +Then he felt that the sphere was spinning slowly, and rocking, and +it seemed to him that it was also being drawn through the water. By +crouching close to the window, he managed to make his weight effective +and roll that part of the sphere downward, but he could see nothing +save the pale ray of his light striking down ineffectively into the +darkness. It occurred to him that he would see more if he turned the +lamp off, and allowed his eyes to grow accustomed to the profound +obscurity. + +In this he was wise. After some minutes the velvety blackness became a +translucent blackness, and then, far away, and as faint as the zodiacal +light of an English summer evening, he saw shapes moving below. He +judged these creatures had detached his cable, and were towing him +along the sea bottom. + +And then he saw something faint and remote across the undulations of +the submarine plain, a broad horizon of pale luminosity that extended +this way and that way as far as the range of his little window +permitted him to see. To this he was being towed, as a balloon might be +towed by men out of the open country into a town. He approached it very +slowly, and very slowly the dim irradiation was gathered together into +more definite shapes. + +It was nearly five o'clock before he came over this luminous area, and +by that time he could make out an arrangement suggestive of streets +and houses grouped about a vast roofless erection that was grotesquely +suggestive of a ruined abbey. It was spread out like a map below him. +The houses were all roofless enclosures of walls, and their substance +being, as he afterwards saw, of phosphorescent bones, gave the place an +appearance as if it were built of drowned moonshine. + +Among the inner caves of the place waving trees of crinoid stretched +their tentacles, and tall, slender, glassy sponges shot like shining +minarets and lilies of filmy light out of the general glow of the +city. In the open spaces of the place he could see a stirring movement +as of crowds of people, but he was too many fathoms above them to +distinguish the individuals in those crowds. + +Then slowly they pulled him down, and as they did so, the details of +the place crept slowly upon his apprehension. He saw that the courses +of the cloudy buildings were marked out with beaded lines of round +objects, and then he perceived that at several points below him, in +broad open spaces, were forms like the encrusted shapes of ships. + +Slowly and surely he was drawn down, and the forms below him became +brighter, clearer, more distinct. He was being pulled down, he +perceived, towards the large building in the centre of the town, and he +could catch a glimpse ever and again of the multitudinous forms that +were lugging at his cord. He was astonished to see that the rigging of +one of the ships, which formed such a prominent feature of the place, +was crowded with a host of gesticulating figures regarding him, and +then the walls of the great building rose about him silently, and hid +the city from his eyes. + +And such walls they were, of water-logged wood, and twisted wire-rope, +and iron spars, and copper, and the bones and skulls of dead men. The +skulls ran in zigzag lines and spirals and fantastic curves over the +building; and in and out of their eye-sockets, and over the whole +surface of the place, lurked and played a multitude of silvery little +fishes. + +Suddenly his ears were filled with a low shouting and a noise like the +violent blowing of horns, and this gave place to a fantastic chant. +Down the sphere sank, past the huge pointed windows, through which he +saw vaguely a great number of these strange, ghostlike people regarding +him, and at last he came to rest, as it seemed, on a kind of altar that +stood in the centre of the place. + +And now he was at such a level that he could see these strange people +of the abyss plainly once more. To his astonishment, he perceived that +they were prostrating themselves before him, all save one, dressed as +it seemed in a robe of placoid scales, and crowned with a luminous +diadem, who stood with his reptilian mouth opening and shutting, as +though he led the chanting of the worshippers. + +A curious impulse made Elstead turn on his small glow-lamp again, so +that he became visible to these creatures of the abyss, albeit the +glare made them disappear forthwith into night. At this sudden sight +of him, the chanting gave place to a tumult of exultant shouts; and +Elstead, being anxious to watch them, turned his light off again, and +vanished from before their eyes. But for a time he was too blind to +make out what they were doing, and when at last he could distinguish +them, they were kneeling again. And thus they continued worshipping +him, without rest or intermission, for the space of three hours. + +Most circumstantial was Elstead's account of this astounding city and +its people, these people of perpetual night, who have never seen sun +or moon or stars, green vegetation, nor any living, air-breathing +creatures, who know nothing of fire, nor any light but the +phosphorescent light of living things. + +Startling as is his story, it is yet more startling to find that +scientific men, of such eminence as Adams and Jenkins, find nothing +incredible in it. They tell me they see no reason why intelligent, +water-breathing, vertebrated creatures, inured to a low temperature and +enormous pressure, and of such a heavy structure, that neither alive +nor dead would they float, might not live upon the bottom of the deep +sea, and quite unsuspected by us, descendants like ourselves of the +great Theriomorpha of the New Red Sandstone age. + +We should be known to them, however, as strange, meteoric creatures, +wont to fall catastrophically dead out of the mysterious blackness of +their watery sky. And not only we ourselves, but our ships, our metals, +our appliances, would come raining down out of the night. Sometimes +sinking things would smite down and crush them, as if it were the +judgment of some unseen power above, and sometimes would come things of +the utmost rarity or utility, or shapes of inspiring suggestion. One +can understand, perhaps, something of their behaviour at the descent of +a living man, if one thinks what a barbaric people might do, to whom an +enhaloed, shining creature came suddenly out of the sky. + +At one time or another Elstead probably told the officers of the +_Ptarmigan_ every detail of his strange twelve hours in the abyss. That +he also intended to write them down is certain, but he never did, and +so unhappily we have to piece together the discrepant fragments of his +story from the reminiscences of Commander Simmons, Weybridge, Steevens, +Lindley, and the others. + +We see the thing darkly in fragmentary glimpses--the huge ghostly +building, the bowing, chanting people, with their dark chameleon-like +heads and faintly luminous clothing, and Elstead, with his light turned +on again, vainly trying to convey to their minds that the cord by which +the sphere was held was to be severed. Minute after minute slipped +away, and Elstead, looking at his watch, was horrified to find that he +had oxygen only for four hours more. But the chant in his honour kept +on as remorselessly as if it was the marching song of his approaching +death. + +The manner of his release he does not understand, but to judge by the +end of cord that hung from the sphere, it had been cut through by +rubbing against the edge of the altar. Abruptly the sphere rolled over, +and he swept up, out of their world, as an ethereal creature clothed +in a vacuum would sweep through our own atmosphere back to its native +ether again. He must have torn out of their sight as a hydrogen bubble +hastens upward from our air. A strange ascension it must have seemed to +them. + +The sphere rushed up with even greater velocity than, when weighted +with the lead sinkers, it had rushed down. It became exceedingly hot. +It drove up with the windows uppermost, and he remembers the torrent of +bubbles frothing against the glass. Every moment he expected this to +fly. Then suddenly something like a huge wheel seemed to be released +in his head, the padded compartment began spinning about him, and he +fainted. His next recollection was of his cabin, and of the doctor's +voice. + +But that is the substance of the extraordinary story that Elstead +related in fragments to the officers of the _Ptarmigan_. He promised to +write it all down at a later date. His mind was chiefly occupied with +the improvement of his apparatus, which was effected at Rio. + +It remains only to tell that on February 2, 1896, he made his second +descent into the ocean abyss, with the improvements his first +experience suggested. What happened we shall probably never know. +He never returned. The _Ptarmigan_ beat about over the point of his +submersion, seeking him in vain for thirteen days. Then she returned to +Rio, and the news was telegraphed to his friends. So the matter remains +for the present. But it is hardly probable that no further attempt +will be made to verify his strange story of these hitherto unsuspected +cities of the deep sea. + + + + +THE APPLE + + +"I must get rid of it," said the man in the corner of the carriage, +abruptly breaking the silence. + +Mr. Hinchcliff looked up, hearing imperfectly. He had been lost in +the rapt contemplation of the college cap tied by a string to his +portmanteau handles--the outward and visible sign of his newly-gained +pedagogic position--in the rapt appreciation of the college cap and +the pleasant anticipations it excited. For Mr. Hinchcliff had just +matriculated at London University, and was going to be junior assistant +at the Holmwood Grammar School--a very enviable position. He stared +across the carriage at his fellow-traveller. + +"Why not give it away?" said this person. "Give it away! Why not?" + +He was a tall, dark, sunburnt man with a pale face. His arms were +folded tightly, and his feet were on the seat in front of him. He was +pulling at a lank black moustache. He stared hard at his toes. + +"Why not?" he said. + +Mr. Hinchcliff coughed. + +The stranger lifted his eyes--they were curious, dark-grey eyes--and +stared blankly at Mr. Hinchcliff for the best part of a minute, +perhaps. His expression grew to interest. + +"Yes," he said slowly. "Why not? And end it." + +"I don't quite follow you, I'm afraid," said Mr. Hinchcliff, with +another cough. + +"You don't quite follow me?" said the stranger quite mechanically, +his singular eyes wandering from Mr. Hinchcliff to the bag with its +ostentatiously displayed cap, and back to Mr. Hinchcliff's downy face. + +"You're so abrupt, you know," apologised Mr Hinchcliff. + +"Why shouldn't I?" said the stranger, following his thoughts. "You are +a student?" he said, addressing Mr. Hinchcliff. + +"I am--by Correspondence--of the London University," said Mr. +Hinchcliff, with irrepressible pride, and feeling nervously at his tie. + +"In pursuit of knowledge," said the stranger, and suddenly took his +feet off the seat, put his fist on his knees, and stared at Mr. +Hinchcliff as though he had never seen a student before. "Yes," he +said, and flung out an index finger. Then he rose, took a bag from +the hat-rack, and unlocked it. Quite silently he drew out something +round and wrapped in a quantity of silver-paper, and unfolded this +carefully. He held it out towards Mr. Hinchcliff--a small, very smooth, +golden-yellow fruit. + +Mr. Hinchcliff's eyes and mouth were open. He did not offer to take +this object--if he was intended to take it. + +"That," said this fantastic stranger, speaking very slowly, "is the +Apple of the Tree of Knowledge. Look at it--small, and bright, and +wonderful--Knowledge--and I am going to give it to you." + +Mr. Hinchcliff's mind worked painfully for a minute, and then +the sufficient explanation, "Mad!" flashed across his brain, and +illuminated the whole situation. One humoured madmen. He put his head a +little on one side. + +"The Apple of the Tree of Knowledge, eigh!" said Mr. Hinchcliff, +regarding it with a finely assumed air of interest, and then looking +at the interlocutor. "But don't you want to eat it yourself? And +besides--how did you come by it?" + +"It never fades. I have had it now three months. And it is ever bright +and smooth and ripe and desirable, as you see it." He laid his hand +on his knee and regarded the fruit musingly. Then he began to wrap it +again in the papers, as though he had abandoned his intention of giving +it away. + +"But how did you come by it?" said Mr. Hinchcliff, who had his +argumentative side. "And how do you know that it _is_ the Fruit of the +Tree?" + +"I bought this fruit," said the stranger, "three months ago--for a +drink of water and a crust of bread. The man who gave it to me--because +I kept the life in him--was an Armenian. Armenia! that wonderful +country, the first of all countries, where the ark of the Flood +remains to this day, buried in the glaciers of Mount Ararat. This man, +I say, fleeing with others from the Kurds who had come upon them, +went up into desolate places among the mountains--places beyond the +common knowledge of men. And fleeing from imminent pursuit, they +came to a slope high among the mountain-peaks, green with a grass +like knife-blades, that cut and slashed most pitilessly at anyone +who went into it. The Kurds were close behind, and there was nothing +for it but to plunge in, and the worst of it was that the paths they +made through it at the price of their blood served for the Kurds to +follow. Every one of the fugitives was killed save this Armenian and +another. He heard the screams and cries of his friends, and the swish +of the grass about those who were pursuing them--it was tall grass +rising overhead. And then a shouting and answers, and when presently he +paused, everything was still. He pushed out again, not understanding, +cut and bleeding, until he came out on a steep slope of rocks below a +precipice, and then he saw the grass was all on fire, and the smoke of +it rose like a veil between him and his enemies." + +The stranger paused. "Yes?" said Mr. Hinchcliff. "Yes?" + +"There he was, all torn and bloody from the knife-blades of the grass, +the rocks blazing under the afternoon sun--the sky molten brass--and +the smoke of the fire driving towards him. He dared not stay there. +Death he did not mind, but torture! Far away beyond the smoke he heard +shouts and cries. Women screaming. So he went clambering up a gorge in +the rocks--everywhere were bushes with dry branches that stuck out like +thorns among the leaves--until he clambered over the brow of a ridge +that hid him. And then he met his companion, a shepherd, who had also +escaped. And, counting cold and famine and thirst as nothing against +the Kurds, they went on into the heights, and among the snow and ice. +They wandered three whole days. + +"The third day came the vision. I suppose hungry men often do see +visions, but then there is this fruit." He lifted the wrapped globe in +his hand. "And I have heard it, too, from other mountaineers who have +known something of the legend. It was in the evening time, when the +stars were increasing, that they came down a slope of polished rock +into a huge dark valley all set about with strange, contorted trees, +and in these trees hung little globes like glow-worm spheres, strange +round yellow lights. + +"Suddenly this valley was lit far away, many miles away, far down it, +with a golden flame marching slowly athwart it, that made the stunted +trees against it black as night, and turned the slopes all about them +and their figures to the likeness of fiery gold. And at the vision +they, knowing the legends of the mountains, instantly knew that it was +Eden they saw, or the sentinel of Eden, and they fell upon their faces +like men struck dead. + +"When they dared to look again the valley was dark for a space, and +then the light came again--returning, a burning amber. + +"At that the shepherd sprang to his feet, and with a shout began to run +down towards the light, but the other man was too fearful to follow +him. He stood stunned, amazed, and terrified, watching his companion +recede towards the marching glare. And hardly had the shepherd set out +when there came a noise like thunder, the beating of invisible wings +hurrying up the valley, and a great and terrible fear; and at that +the man who gave me the fruit turned--if he might still escape. And +hurrying headlong up the slope again, with that tumult sweeping after +him, he stumbled against one of these stunted bushes, and a ripe fruit +came off it into his hand. This fruit. Forthwith, the wings and the +thunder rolled all about him. He fell and fainted, and when he came to +his senses, he was back among the blackened ruins of his own village, +and I and the others were attending to the wounded. A vision? But the +golden fruit of the tree was still clutched in his hand. There were +others there who knew the legend, knew what that strange fruit might +be." He paused. "And this is it," he said. + +It was a most extraordinary story to be told in a third-class carriage +on a Sussex railway. It was as if the real was a mere veil to the +fantastic, and here was the fantastic poking through. "Is it?" was all +Mr. Hinchcliff could say. + +"The legend," said the stranger, "tells that those thickets of dwarfed +trees growing about the garden sprang from the apple that Adam carried +in his hand when he and Eve were driven forth. He felt something in +his hand, saw the half-eaten apple, and flung it petulantly aside. +And there they grow, in that desolate valley, girdled round with the +everlasting snows, and there the fiery swords keep ward against the +Judgment Day." + +"But I thought these things were"--Mr. Hinchcliff +paused--"fables--parables rather. Do you mean to tell me that there in +Armenia"-- + +The stranger answered the unfinished question with the fruit in his +open hand. + +"But you don't know," said Mr. Hinchcliff, "that that _is_ the fruit +of the Tree of Knowledge. The man may have had--a sort of mirage, say. +Suppose"-- + +"Look at it," said the stranger. + +It was certainly a strange-looking globe, not really an apple, Mr. +Hinchcliff saw, and a curious glowing golden colour, almost as though +light itself was wrought into its substance. As he looked at it, he +began to see more vividly the desolate valley among the mountains, the +guarding swords of fire, the strange antiquities of the story he had +just heard. He rubbed a knuckle into his eye. "But"--said he. + +"It has kept like that, smooth and full, three months. Longer than that +it is now by some days. No drying, no withering, no decay." + +"And you yourself," said Mr. Hinchcliff, "really believe that"-- + +"Is the Forbidden Fruit." + +There was no mistaking the earnestness of the man's manner and his +perfect sanity. "The Fruit of Knowledge," he said. + +"Suppose it was?" said Mr. Hinchcliff, after a pause, still staring +at it. "But after all," said Mr. Hinchcliff, "it's not my kind of +knowledge--not the sort of knowledge. I mean, Adam and Eve have eaten +it already." + +"We inherit their sins--not their knowledge," said the stranger. +"That would make it all clear and bright again. We should see +into everything, through everything, into the deepest meaning of +everything"-- + +"Why don't you eat it, then?" said Mr. Hinchcliff, with an inspiration. + +"I took it intending to eat it," said the stranger. "Man has fallen. +Merely to eat again could scarcely"-- + +"Knowledge is power," said Mr. Hinchcliff. + +"But is it happiness? I am older than you--more than twice as old. +Time after time I have held this in my hand, and my heart has +failed me at the thought of all that one might know, that terrible +lucidity-- Suppose suddenly all the world became pitilessly clear?" + +"That, I think, would be a great advantage," said Mr. Hinchcliff, "on +the whole." + +"Suppose you saw into the hearts and minds of everyone about you, into +their most secret recesses--people you loved, whose love you valued?" + +"You'd soon find out the humbugs," said Mr. Hinchcliff, greatly struck +by the idea. + +"And worse--to know yourself, bare of your most intimate illusions. +To see yourself in your place. All that your lusts and weaknesses +prevented your doing. No merciful perspective." + +"That might be an excellent thing too. 'Know thyself,' you know." + +"You are young," said the stranger. + +"If you don't care to eat it, and it bothers you, why don't you throw +it away?" + +"There again, perhaps, you will not understand me. To me, how could one +throw away a thing like that, glowing, wonderful? Once one has it, one +is bound. But, on the other hand, to _give_ it away! To give it away +to someone who thirsted after knowledge, who found no terror in the +thought of that clear perception"-- + +"Of course," said Mr. Hinchcliff thoughtfully, "it might be some sort +of poisonous fruit." + +And then his eye caught something motionless, the end of a white board +black-lettered outside the carriage window. "--MWOOD," he saw. He +started convulsively. "Gracious!" said Mr. Hinchcliff. "Holmwood!"--and +the practical present blotted out the mystic realisations that had been +stealing upon him. + +In another moment he was opening the carriage-door, portmanteau in +hand. The guard was already fluttering his green flag. Mr. Hinchcliff +jumped out. "Here!" said a voice behind him, and he saw the dark eyes +of the stranger shining and the golden fruit, bright and bare, held +out of the open carriage-door. He took it instinctively, the train was +already moving. + +"_No!_" shouted the stranger, and made a snatch at it as if to take it +back. + +"Stand away," cried a country porter, thrusting forward to close the +door. The stranger shouted something Mr. Hinchcliff did not catch, head +and arm thrust excitedly out of the window, and then the shadow of the +bridge fell on him, and in a trice he was hidden. Mr. Hinchcliff stood +astonished, staring at the end of the last waggon receding round the +bend, and with the wonderful fruit in his hand. For the fraction of +a minute his mind was confused, and then he became aware that two or +three people on the platform were regarding him with interest. Was he +not the new Grammar School master making his début? It occurred to him +that, so far as they could tell, the fruit might very well be the naïve +refreshment of an orange. He flushed at the thought, and thrust the +fruit into his side pocket, where it bulged undesirably. But there was +no help for it, so he went towards them, awkwardly concealing his sense +of awkwardness, to ask the way to the Grammar School, and the means of +getting his portmanteau and the two tin boxes which lay up the platform +thither. Of all the odd and fantastic yarns to tell a fellow! + +His luggage could be taken on a truck for sixpence, he found, and he +could precede it on foot. He fancied an ironical note in the voices. He +was painfully aware of his contour. + +The curious earnestness of the man in the train, and the glamour +of the story he told, had, for a time, diverted the current of Mr. +Hinchcliff's thoughts. It drove like a mist before his immediate +concerns. Fires that went to and fro! But the preoccupation of his +new position, and the impression he was to produce upon Holmwood +generally, and the school people in particular, returned upon him with +reinvigorating power before he left the station and cleared his mental +atmosphere. But it is extraordinary what an inconvenient thing the +addition of a soft and rather brightly-golden fruit, not three inches +in diameter, may prove to a sensitive youth on his best appearance. +In the pocket of his black jacket it bulged dreadfully, spoilt the +lines altogether. He passed a little old lady in black, and he felt +her eye drop upon the excrescence at once. He was wearing one glove +and carrying the other, together with his stick, so that to bear the +fruit openly was impossible. In one place, where the road into the +town seemed suitably secluded, he took his encumbrance out of his +pocket and tried it in his hat. It was just too large, the hat wobbled +ludicrously, and just as he was taking it out again, a butcher's boy +came driving round the corner. + +"Confound it!" said Mr. Hinchcliff. + +He would have eaten the thing, and attained omniscience there and +then, but it would seem so silly to go into the town sucking a juicy +fruit--and it certainly felt juicy. If one of the boys should come by, +it might do him a serious injury with his discipline so to be seen. +And the juice might make his face sticky and get upon his cuffs--or it +might be an acid juice as potent as lemon, and take all the colour out +of his clothes. + +Then round a bend in the lane came two pleasant sunlit girlish figures. +They were walking slowly towards the town and chattering--at any +moment they might look round and see a hot-faced young man behind them +carrying a kind of phosphorescent yellow tomato! They would be sure to +laugh. + +"_Hang!_" said Mr. Hinchcliff, and with a swift jerk sent the +encumbrance flying over the stone wall of an orchard that there abutted +on the road. As it vanished, he felt a faint twinge of loss that lasted +scarcely a moment. He adjusted the stick and glove in his hand, and +walked on, erect and self-conscious, to pass the girls. + + * * * * * + +But in the darkness of the night Mr. Hinchcliff had a dream, and saw +the valley, and the flaming swords, and the contorted trees, and knew +that it really was the Apple of the Tree of Knowledge that he had +thrown regardlessly away. And he awoke very unhappy. + +In the morning his regret had passed, but afterwards it returned and +troubled him; never, however, when he was happy or busily occupied. At +last, one moonlight night about eleven, when all Holmwood was quiet, +his regrets returned with redoubled force, and therewith an impulse to +adventure. He slipped out of the house and over the playground wall, +went through the silent town to Station Lane, and climbed into the +orchard where he had thrown the fruit. But nothing was to be found +of it there among the dewy grass and the faint intangible globes of +dandelion down. + + + + +UNDER THE KNIFE + + +"What if I die under it?" The thought recurred again and again, as I +walked home from Haddon's. It was a purely personal question. I was +spared the deep anxieties of a married man, and I knew there were few +of my intimate friends but would find my death troublesome chiefly on +account of their duty of regret. I was surprised indeed, and perhaps +a little humiliated, as I turned the matter over, to think how few +could possibly exceed the conventional requirement. Things came +before me stripped of glamour, in a clear dry light, during that walk +from Haddon's house over Primrose Hill. There were the friends of my +youth: I perceived now that our affection was a tradition, which we +foregathered rather laboriously to maintain. There were the rivals +and helpers of my later career: I suppose I had been cold-blooded or +undemonstrative--one perhaps implies the other. It may be that even the +capacity for friendship is a question of physique. There had been a +time in my own life when I had grieved bitterly enough at the loss of +a friend; but as I walked home that afternoon the emotional side of my +imagination was dormant. I could not pity myself, nor feel sorry for +my friends, nor conceive of them as grieving for me. + +I was interested in this deadness of my emotional nature--no doubt +a concomitant of my stagnating physiology; and my thoughts wandered +off along the line it suggested. Once before, in my hot youth, I +had suffered a sudden loss of blood, and had been within an ace of +death. I remembered now that my affections as well as my passions had +drained out of me, leaving scarce anything but a tranquil resignation, +a dreg of self-pity. It had been weeks before the old ambitions, +and tendernesses, and all the complex moral interplay of a man, had +reasserted themselves. It occurred to me that the real meaning of +this numbness might be a gradual slipping away from the pleasure-pain +guidance of the animal man. It has been proven, I take it, as +thoroughly as anything can be proven in this world, that the higher +emotions, the moral feelings, even the subtle tendernesses of love, are +evolved from the elemental desires and fears of the simple animal: they +are the harness in which man's mental freedom goes. And it may be that, +as death overshadows us, as our possibility of acting diminishes, this +complex growth of balanced impulse, propensity, and aversion, whose +interplay inspires our acts, goes with it. Leaving what? + +I was suddenly brought back to reality by an imminent collision with +a butcher-boy's tray. I found that I was crossing the bridge over the +Regent's Park Canal, which runs parallel with that in the Zoological +Gardens. The boy in blue had been looking over his shoulder at a black +barge advancing slowly, towed by a gaunt white horse. In the Gardens +a nurse was leading three happy little children over the bridge. The +trees were bright green; the spring hopefulness was still unstained by +the dusts of summer; the sky in the water was bright and clear, but +broken by long waves, by quivering bands of black, as the barge drove +through. The breeze was stirring; but it did not stir me as the spring +breeze used to do. + +Was this dulness of feeling in itself an anticipation? It was curious +that I could reason and follow out a network of suggestion as clearly +as ever: so, at least, it seemed to me. It was calmness rather than +dulness that was coming upon me. Was there any ground for the belief in +the presentiment of death? Did a man near to death begin instinctively +to withdraw himself from the meshes of matter and sense, even before +the cold hand was laid upon his? I felt strangely isolated--isolated +without regret--from the life and existence about me. The children +playing in the sun and gathering strength and experience for the +business of life, the park-keeper gossiping with a nursemaid, the +nursing mother, the young couple intent upon each other as they passed +me, the trees by the wayside spreading new pleading leaves to the +sunlight, the stir in their branches--I had been part of it all, but I +had nearly done with it now. + +Some way down the Broad Walk I perceived that I was tired, and that my +feet were heavy. It was hot that afternoon, and I turned aside and sat +down on one of the green chairs that line the way. In a minute I had +dozed into a dream, and the tide of my thoughts washed up a vision +of the resurrection. I was still sitting in the chair, but I thought +myself actually dead, withered, tattered, dried, one eye (I saw) pecked +out by birds. "Awake!" cried a voice; and incontinently the dust of the +path and the mould under the grass became insurgent. I had never before +thought of Regent's Park as a cemetery, but now, through the trees, +stretching as far as eye could see, I beheld a flat plain of writhing +graves and heeling tombstones. There seemed to be some trouble: the +rising dead appeared to stifle as they struggled upward, they bled in +their struggles, the red flesh was tattered away from the white bones. +"Awake!" cried a voice; but I determined I would not rise to such +horrors. "Awake!" They would not let me alone. "Wike up!" said an angry +voice. A cockney angel! The man who sells the tickets was shaking me, +demanding my penny. + +I paid my penny, pocketed my ticket, yawned, stretched my legs, and, +feeling now rather less torpid, got up and walked on towards Langham +Place. I speedily lost myself again in a shifting maze of thoughts +about death. Going across Marylebone Road into that crescent at the end +of Langham Place, I had the narrowest escape from the shaft of a cab, +and went on my way with a palpitating heart and a bruised shoulder. It +struck me that it would have been curious if my meditations on my death +on the morrow had led to my death that day. + +But I will not weary you with more of my experiences that day and +the next. I knew more and more certainly that I should die under the +operation; at times I think I was inclined to pose to myself. The +doctors were coming at eleven, and I did not get up. It seemed scarce +worth while to trouble about washing and dressing, and though I read +my newspapers and the letters that came by the first post, I did not +find them very interesting. There was a friendly note from Addison, +my old school friend, calling my attention to two discrepancies and +a printer's error in my new book, with one from Langridge venting +some vexation over Minton. The rest were business communications. I +breakfasted in bed. The glow of pain at my side seemed more massive. +I knew it was pain, and yet, if you can understand, I did not find it +very painful. I had been awake and hot and thirsty in the night, but in +the morning bed felt comfortable. In the night-time I had lain thinking +of things that were past; in the morning I dozed over the question of +immortality. Haddon came, punctual to the minute, with a neat black +bag; and Mowbray soon followed. Their arrival stirred me up a little. I +began to take a more personal interest in the proceedings. Haddon moved +the little octagonal table close to the bedside, and, with his broad +black back to me, began taking things out of his bag. I heard the light +click of steel upon steel. My imagination, I found, was not altogether +stagnant. "Will you hurt me much?" I said in an off-hand tone. + +"Not a bit," Haddon answered over his shoulder. "We shall chloroform +you. Your heart's as sound as a bell." And as he spoke, I had a whiff +of the pungent sweetness of the anæsthetic. + +They stretched me out, with a convenient exposure of my side, and, +almost before I realised what was happening, the chloroform was being +administered. It stings the nostrils, and there is a suffocating +sensation, at first. I knew I should die--that this was the end of +consciousness for me. And suddenly I felt that I was not prepared for +death: I had a vague sense of a duty overlooked--I knew not what. What +was it I had not done? I could think of nothing more to do, nothing +desirable left in life; and yet I had the strangest disinclination +to death. And the physical sensation was painfully oppressive. Of +course the doctors did not know they were going to kill me. Possibly +I struggled. Then I fell motionless, and a great silence, a monstrous +silence, and an impenetrable blackness came upon me. + +There must have been an interval of absolute unconsciousness, +seconds or minutes. Then, with a chilly, unemotional clearness, I +perceived that I was not yet dead. I was still in my body; but all the +multitudinous sensations that come sweeping from it to make up the +background of consciousness had gone, leaving me free of it all. No, +not free of it all; for as yet something still held me to the poor +stark flesh upon the bed--held me, yet not so closely that I did not +feel myself external to it, independent of it, straining away from it. +I do not think I saw, I do not think I heard; but I perceived all that +was going on, and it was as if I both heard and saw. Haddon was bending +over me, Mowbray behind me; the scalpel--it was a large scalpel--was +cutting my flesh at the side under the flying ribs. It was interesting +to see myself cut like cheese, without a pang, without even a qualm. +The interest was much of a quality with that one might feel in a game +of chess between strangers. Haddon's face was firm and his hand steady; +but I was surprised to perceive (_how_ I know not) that he was feeling +the gravest doubt as to his own wisdom in the conduct of the operation. + +Mowbray's thoughts, too, I could see. He was thinking that Haddon's +manner showed too much of the specialist. New suggestions came up like +bubbles through a stream of frothing meditation, and burst one after +another in the little bright spot of his consciousness. He could not +help noticing and admiring Haddon's swift dexterity, in spite of his +envious quality and his disposition to detract. I saw my liver exposed. +I was puzzled at my own condition. I did not feel that I was dead, but +I was different in some way from my living self. The grey depression, +that had weighed on me for a year or more and coloured all my thoughts, +was gone. I perceived and thought without any emotional tint at all. +I wondered if everyone perceived things in this way under chloroform, +and forgot it again when he came out of it. It would be inconvenient to +look into some heads, and not forget. + +Although I did not think that I was dead, I still perceived quite +clearly that I was soon to die. This brought me back to the +consideration of Haddon's proceedings. I looked into his mind, and +saw that he was afraid of cutting a branch of the portal vein. My +attention was distracted from details by the curious changes going on +in his mind. His consciousness was like the quivering little spot of +light which is thrown by the mirror of a galvanometer. His thoughts +ran under it like a stream, some through the focus bright and distinct, +some shadowy in the half-light of the edge. Just now the little glow +was steady; but the least movement on Mowbray's part, the slightest +sound from outside, even a faint difference in the slow movement of +the living flesh he was cutting, set the light-spot shivering and +spinning. A new sense-impression came rushing up through the flow of +thoughts; and lo! the light-spot jerked away towards it, swifter than +a frightened fish. It was wonderful to think that upon that unstable, +fitful thing depended all the complex motions of the man; that for +the next five minutes, therefore, my life hung upon its movements. +And he was growing more and more nervous in his work. It was as if a +little picture of a cut vein grew brighter, and struggled to oust from +his brain another picture of a cut falling short of the mark. He was +afraid: his dread of cutting too little was battling with his dread of +cutting too far. + +Then, suddenly, like an escape of water from under a lock-gate, a +great uprush of horrible realisation set all his thoughts swirling, +and simultaneously I perceived that the vein was cut. He started back +with a hoarse exclamation, and I saw the brown-purple blood gather +in a swift bead, and run trickling. He was horrified. He pitched the +red-stained scalpel on to the octagonal table; and instantly both +doctors flung themselves upon me, making hasty and ill-conceived +efforts to remedy the disaster. "Ice!" said Mowbray, gasping. But I +knew that I was killed, though my body still clung to me. + +I will not describe their belated endeavours to save me, though I +perceived every detail. My perceptions were sharper and swifter +than they had ever been in life; my thoughts rushed through my mind +with incredible swiftness, but with perfect definition. I can only +compare their crowded clarity to the effects of a reasonable dose +of opium. In a moment it would all be over, and I should be free. I +knew I was immortal, but what would happen I did not know. Should I +drift off presently, like a puff of smoke from a gun, in some kind of +half-material body, an attenuated version of my material self? Should +I find myself suddenly among the innumerable hosts of the dead, and +know the world about me for the phantasmagoria it had always seemed? +Should I drift to some spiritualistic _séance_, and there make foolish, +incomprehensible attempts to affect a purblind medium? It was a +state of unemotional curiosity, of colourless expectation. And then +I realised a growing stress upon me, a feeling as though some huge +human magnet was drawing me upward out of my body. The stress grew and +grew. I seemed an atom for which monstrous forces were fighting. For +one brief, terrible moment sensation came back to me. That feeling of +falling headlong which comes in nightmares, that feeling a thousand +times intensified, that and a black horror swept across my thoughts in +a torrent. Then the two doctors, the naked body with its cut side, the +little room, swept away from under me and vanished, as a speck of foam +vanishes down an eddy. + +I was in mid-air. Far below was the West End of London, receding +rapidly,--for I seemed to be flying swiftly upward,--and, as it +receded, passing westward, like a panorama. I could see, through the +faint haze of smoke, the innumerable roofs chimney-set, the narrow +roadways, stippled with people and conveyances, the little specks +of squares, and the church steeples like thorns sticking out of the +fabric. But it spun away as the earth rotated on its axis, and in a +few seconds (as it seemed) I was over the scattered clumps of town +about Ealing, the little Thames a thread of blue to the south, and the +Chiltern Hills and the North Downs coming up like the rim of a basin, +far away and faint with haze. Up I rushed. And at first I had not the +faintest conception what this headlong rush upward could mean. + +Every moment the circle of scenery beneath me grew wider and wider, +and the details of town and field, of hill and valley, got more and +more hazy and pale and indistinct, a luminous grey was mingled more +and more with the blue of the hills and the green of the open meadows; +and a little patch of cloud, low and far to the west, shone ever more +dazzlingly white. Above, as the veil of atmosphere between myself and +outer space grew thinner, the sky, which had been a fair springtime +blue at first, grew deeper and richer in colour, passing steadily +through the intervening shades, until presently it was as dark as +the blue sky of midnight, and presently as black as the blackness of +a frosty starlight, and at last as black as no blackness I had ever +beheld. And first one star, and then many, and at last an innumerable +host broke out upon the sky: more stars than anyone has ever seen from +the face of the earth. For the blueness of the sky is the light of the +sun and stars sifted and spread abroad blindingly: there is diffused +light even in the darkest skies of winter, and we do not see the stars +by day only because of the dazzling irradiation of the sun. But now I +saw things--I know not how; assuredly with no mortal eyes--and that +defect of bedazzlement blinded me no longer. The sun was incredibly +strange and wonderful. The body of it was a disc of blinding white +light: not yellowish, as it seems to those who live upon the earth, but +livid white, all streaked with scarlet streaks and rimmed about with a +fringe of writhing tongues of red fire. And, shooting half-way across +the heavens from either side of it, and brighter than the Milky Way, +were two pinions of silver-white, making it look more like those winged +globes I have seen in Egyptian sculpture, than anything else I can +remember upon earth. These I knew for the solar corona, though I had +never seen anything of it but a picture during the days of my earthly +life. + +When my attention came back to the earth again, I saw that it +had fallen very far away from me. Field and town were long since +indistinguishable, and all the varied hues of the country were merging +into a uniform bright grey, broken only by the brilliant white of the +clouds that lay scattered in flocculent masses over Ireland and the +west of England. For now I could see the outlines of the north of +France and Ireland, and all this island of Britain, save where Scotland +passed over the horizon to the north, or where the coast was blurred +or obliterated by cloud. The sea was a dull grey, and darker than the +land; and the whole panorama was rotating slowly towards the east. + +All this had happened so swiftly that, until I was some thousand miles +or so from the earth, I had no thought for myself. But now I perceived +I had neither hands nor feet, neither parts nor organs, and that I felt +neither alarm nor pain. All about me I perceived that the vacancy (for +I had already left the air behind) was cold beyond the imagination of +man; but it troubled me not. The sun's rays shot through the void, +powerless to light or heat until they should strike on matter in their +course. I saw things with a serene self-forgetfulness, even as if I +were God. And down below there, rushing away from me,--countless miles +in a second,--where a little dark spot on the grey marked the position +of London, two doctors were struggling to restore life to the poor +hacked and outworn shell I had abandoned. I felt then such release, +such serenity as I can compare to no mortal delight I have ever known. + +It was only after I had perceived all these things that the meaning of +that headlong rush of the earth grew into comprehension. Yet it was +so simple, so obvious, that I was amazed at my never anticipating the +thing that was happening to me. I had suddenly been cut adrift from +matter: all that was material of me was there upon earth, whirling +away through space, held to the earth by gravitation, partaking of the +earth-inertia, moving in its wreath of epicycles round the sun, and +with the sun and the planets on their vast march through space. But +the immaterial has no inertia, feels nothing of the pull of matter +for matter: where it parts from its garment of flesh, there it remains +(so far as space concerns it any longer) immovable in space. I was not +leaving the earth: the earth was leaving _me_, and not only the earth, +but the whole solar system was streaming past. And about me in space, +invisible to me, scattered in the wake of the earth upon its journey, +there must be an innumerable multitude of souls, stripped like myself +of the material, stripped like myself of the passions of the individual +and the generous emotions of the gregarious brute, naked intelligences, +things of newborn wonder and thought, marvelling at the strange release +that had suddenly come on them! + +As I receded faster and faster from the strange white sun in the black +heavens, and from the broad and shining earth upon which my being had +begun, I seemed to grow, in some incredible manner, vast: vast as +regards this world I had left, vast as regards the moments and periods +of a human life. Very soon I saw the full circle of the earth, slightly +gibbous, like the moon when she nears her full, but very large; and +the silvery shape of America was now in the noonday blaze wherein (as +it seemed) little England had been basking but a few minutes ago. At +first the earth was large, and shone in the heavens, filling a great +part of them; but every moment she grew smaller and more distant. As +she shrunk, the broad moon in its third quarter crept into view over +the rim of her disc. I looked for the constellations. Only that part of +Aries directly behind the sun and the Lion, which the earth covered, +were hidden. I recognised the tortuous, tattered band of the Milky +Way, with Vega very bright between sun and earth; and Sirius and Orion +shone splendid against the unfathomable blackness in the opposite +quarter of the heavens. The Pole Star was overhead, and the Great Bear +hung over the circle of the earth. And away beneath and beyond the +shining corona of the sun were strange groupings of stars I had never +seen in my life--notably, a dagger-shaped group that I knew for the +Southern Cross. All these were no larger than when they had shone on +earth; but the little stars that one scarce sees shone now against the +setting of black vacancy as brightly as the first-magnitudes had done, +while the larger worlds were points of indescribable glory and colour. +Aldebaran was a spot of blood-red fire, and Sirius condensed to one +point the light of a world of sapphires. And they shone steadily: they +did not scintillate, they were calmly glorious. My impressions had an +adamantine hardness and brightness: there was no blurring softness, +no atmosphere, nothing but infinite darkness set with the myriads of +these acute and brilliant points and specks of light. Presently, when +I looked again, the little earth seemed no bigger than the sun, and +it dwindled and turned as I looked, until, in a second's space (as it +seemed to me), it was halved; and so it went on swiftly dwindling. Far +away in the opposite direction, a little pinkish pin's head of light, +shining steadily, was the planet Mars. I swam motionless in vacancy, +and, without a trace of terror or astonishment, watched the speck of +cosmic dust we call the world fall away from me. + +Presently it dawned upon me that my sense of duration had changed: that +my mind was moving not faster but infinitely slower, that between each +separate impression there was a period of many days. The moon spun once +round the earth as I noted this; and I perceived clearly the motion of +Mars in his orbit. Moreover, it appeared as if the time between thought +and thought grew steadily greater, until at last a thousand years was +but a moment in my perception. + +At first the constellations had shone motionless against the black +background of infinite space; but presently it seemed as though the +group of stars about Hercules and the Scorpion was contracting, while +Orion and Aldebaran and their neighbours were scattering apart. +Flashing suddenly out of the darkness there came a flying multitude +of particles of rock, glittering like dust-specks in a sunbeam, and +encompassed in a faintly luminous haze. They swirled all about me, +and vanished again in a twinkling far behind. And then I saw that a +bright spot of light, that shone a little to one side of my path, was +growing very rapidly larger, and perceived that it was the planet +Saturn rushing towards me. Larger and larger it grew, swallowing up the +heavens behind it, and hiding every moment a fresh multitude of stars. +I perceived its flattened, whirling body, its disc-like belt, and seven +of its little satellites. It grew and grew, till it towered enormous; +and then I plunged amid a streaming multitude of clashing stones and +dancing dust-particles and gas-eddies, and saw for a moment the mighty +triple belt like three concentric arches of moonlight above me, its +shadow black on the boiling tumult below. These things happened in +one-tenth of the time it takes to tell of them. The planet went by like +a flash of lightning; for a few seconds it blotted out the sun, and +there and then became a mere black, dwindling, winged patch against the +light. The earth, the mother mote of my being, I could no longer see. + +So, with a stately swiftness, in the profoundest silence, the solar +system fell from me, as it had been a garment, until the sun was a mere +star amid the multitude of stars, with its eddy of planet-specks, lost +in the confused glittering of the remoter light. I was no longer a +denizen of the solar system: I had come to the Outer Universe, I seemed +to grasp and comprehend the whole world of matter. Ever more swiftly +the stars closed in about the spot where Antares and Vega had vanished +in a luminous haze, until that part of the sky had the semblance of +a whirling mass of nebulæ, and ever before me yawned vaster gaps of +vacant blackness, and the stars shone fewer and fewer. It seemed as if +I moved towards a point between Orion's belt and sword; and the void +about that region opened vaster and vaster every second, an incredible +gulf of nothingness, into which I was falling. Faster and ever faster +the universe rushed by, a hurry of whirling motes at last, speeding +silently into the void. Stars glowing brighter and brighter, with +their circling planets catching the light in a ghostly fashion as I +neared them, shone out and vanished again into inexistence; faint +comets, clusters of meteorites, winking specks of matter, eddying light +points, whizzed past, some perhaps a hundred millions of miles or so +from me at most, few nearer, travelling with unimaginable rapidity, +shooting constellations, momentary darts of fire, through that black, +enormous night. More than anything else it was like a dusty draught, +sunbeam-lit. Broader, and wider, and deeper grew the starless space, +the vacant Beyond, into which I was being drawn. At last a quarter of +the heavens was black and blank, and the whole headlong rush of stellar +universe closed in behind me like a veil of light that is gathered +together. It drove away from me like a monstrous jack-o'-lantern driven +by the wind. I had come out into the wilderness of space. Ever the +vacant blackness grew broader, until the hosts of the stars seemed +only like a swarm of fiery specks hurrying away from me, inconceivably +remote, and the darkness, the nothingness and emptiness, was about me +on every side. Soon the little universe of matter, the cage of points +in which I had begun to be, was dwindling, now to a whirling disc of +luminous glittering, and now to one minute disc of hazy light. In a +little while it would shrink to a point, and at last would vanish +altogether. + +Suddenly feeling came back to me--feeling in the shape of overwhelming +terror: such a dread of those dark vastitudes as no words can describe, +a passionate resurgence of sympathy and social desire. Were there +other souls, invisible to me as I to them, about me in the blackness? +or was I indeed, even as I felt, alone? Had I passed out of being +into something that was neither being nor not-being? The covering +of the body, the covering of matter, had been torn from me, and the +hallucinations of companionship and security. Everything was black and +silent. I had ceased to be. I was nothing. There was nothing, save only +that infinitesimal dot of light that dwindled in the gulf. I strained +myself to hear and see, and for a while there was naught but infinite +silence, intolerable darkness, horror, and despair. + +Then I saw that about the spot of light into which the whole world of +matter had shrunk there was a faint glow. And in a band on either side +of that the darkness was not absolute. I watched it for ages, as it +seemed to me, and through the long waiting the haze grew imperceptibly +more distinct. And then about the band appeared an irregular cloud +of the faintest, palest brown. I felt a passionate impatience; but +the things grew brighter so slowly that they scarce seemed to change. +What was unfolding itself? What was this strange reddish dawn in the +interminable night of space? + +The cloud's shape was grotesque. It seemed to be looped along its lower +side into four projecting masses, and, above, it ended in a straight +line. What phantom was it? I felt assured I had seen that figure +before; but I could not think what, nor where, nor when it was. Then +the realisation rushed upon me. _It was a clenched Hand._ I was alone +in space, alone with this huge, shadowy Hand, upon which the whole +Universe of Matter lay like an unconsidered speck of dust. It seemed +as though I watched it through vast periods of time. On the forefinger +glittered a ring; and the universe from which I had come was but a spot +of light upon the ring's curvature. And the thing that the hand gripped +had the likeness of a black rod. Through a long eternity I watched +this Hand, with the ring and the rod, marvelling and fearing and +waiting helplessly on what might follow. It seemed as though nothing +could follow: that I should watch for ever, seeing only the Hand and +the thing it held, and understanding nothing of its import. Was the +whole universe but a refracting speck upon some greater Being? Were our +worlds but the atoms of another universe, and those again of another, +and so on through an endless progression? And what was I? Was I indeed +immaterial? A vague persuasion of a body gathering about me came into +my suspense. The abysmal darkness about the Hand filled with impalpable +suggestions, with uncertain, fluctuating shapes. + +Then, suddenly, came a sound, like the sound of a tolling bell: faint, +as if infinitely far; muffled, as though heard through thick swathings +of darkness: a deep, vibrating resonance, with vast gulfs of silence +between each stroke. And the Hand appeared to tighten on the rod. And +I saw far above the Hand, towards the apex of the darkness, a circle +of dim phosphorescence, a ghostly sphere whence these sounds came +throbbing; and at the last stroke the Hand vanished, for the hour had +come, and I heard a noise of many waters. But the black rod remained +as a great band across the sky. And then a voice, which seemed to run +to the uttermost parts of space, spoke, saying, "There will be no more +pain." + +At that an almost intolerable gladness and radiance rushed in upon +me, and I saw the circle shining white and bright, and the rod black +and shining, and many things else distinct and clear. And the circle +was the face of the clock, and the rod the rail of my bed. Haddon was +standing at the foot, against the rail, with a small pair of scissors +on his fingers; and the hands of my clock on the mantel over his +shoulder were clasped together over the hour of twelve. Mowbray was +washing something in a basin at the octagonal table, and at my side I +felt a subdued feeling that could scarce be spoken of as pain. + +The operation had not killed me. And I perceived, suddenly, that the +dull melancholy of half a year was lifted from my mind. + + + + +THE SEA RAIDERS + +I + + +Until the extraordinary affair at Sidmouth, the peculiar species +_Haploteuthis ferox_ was known to science only generically, on the +strength of a half-digested tentacle obtained near the Azores, and a +decaying body pecked by birds and nibbled by fish, found early in 1896 +by Mr. Jennings, near Land's End. + +In no department of zoological science, indeed, are we quite so much in +the dark as with regard to the deep-sea cephalopods. A mere accident, +for instance, it was that led to the Prince of Monaco's discovery +of nearly a dozen new forms in the summer of 1895, a discovery in +which the before-mentioned tentacle was included. It chanced that +a cachalot was killed off Terceira by some sperm whalers, and in +its last struggles charged almost to the Prince's yacht, missed it, +rolled under, and died within twenty yards of his rudder. And in its +agony it threw up a number of large objects, which the Prince, dimly +perceiving they were strange and important, was, by a happy expedient, +able to secure before they sank. He set his screws in motion, and +kept them circling in the vortices thus created until a boat could +be lowered. And these specimens were whole cephalopods and fragments +of cephalopods, some of gigantic proportions, and almost all of them +unknown to science! + +It would seem, indeed, that these large and agile creatures, living +in the middle depths of the sea, must, to a large extent, for ever +remain unknown to us, since under water they are too nimble for nets, +and it is only by such rare unlooked-for accidents that specimens +can be obtained. In the case of _Haploteuthis ferox_, for instance, +we are still altogether ignorant of its habitat, as ignorant as we +are of the breeding-ground of the herring or the sea-ways of the +salmon. And zoologists are altogether at a loss to account for its +sudden appearance on our coast. Possibly it was the stress of a hunger +migration that drove it hither out of the deep. But it will be, +perhaps, better to avoid necessarily inconclusive discussion, and to +proceed at once with our narrative. + +The first human being to set eyes upon a living _Haploteuthis_--the +first human being to survive, that is, for there can be little doubt +now that the wave of bathing fatalities and boating accidents that +travelled along the coast of Cornwall and Devon in early May was due +to this cause--was a retired tea-dealer of the name of Fison, who was +stopping at a Sidmouth boarding-house. It was in the afternoon, and he +was walking along the cliff path between Sidmouth and Ladram Bay. The +cliffs in this direction are very high, but down the red face of them +in one place a kind of ladder staircase has been made. He was near +this when his attention was attracted by what at first he thought to +be a cluster of birds struggling over a fragment of food that caught +the sunlight, and glistened pinkish-white. The tide was right out, and +this object was not only far below him, but remote across a broad waste +of rock reefs covered with dark seaweed and interspersed with silvery +shining tidal pools. And he was, moreover, dazzled by the brightness of +the further water. + +In a minute, regarding this again, he perceived that his judgment was +in fault, for over this struggle circled a number of birds, jackdaws +and gulls for the most part, the latter gleaming blindingly when the +sunlight smote their wings, and they seemed minute in comparison with +it. And his curiosity was, perhaps, aroused all the more strongly +because of his first insufficient explanations. + +As he had nothing better to do than amuse himself, he decided to make +this object, whatever it was, the goal of his afternoon walk, instead +of Ladram Bay, conceiving it might perhaps be a great fish of some +sort, stranded by some chance, and flapping about in its distress. And +so he hurried down the long steep ladder, stopping at intervals of +thirty feet or so to take breath and scan the mysterious movement. + +At the foot of the cliff he was, of course, nearer his object than +he had been; but, on the other hand, it now came up against the +incandescent sky, beneath the sun, so as to seem dark and indistinct. +Whatever was pinkish of it was now hidden by a skerry of weedy +boulders. But he perceived that it was made up of seven rounded bodies, +distinct or connected, and that the birds kept up a constant croaking +and screaming, but seemed afraid to approach it too closely. + +Mr. Fison, torn by curiosity, began picking his way across the +wave-worn rocks, and, finding the wet seaweed that covered them thickly +rendered them extremely slippery, he stopped, removed his shoes and +socks, and coiled his trousers above his knees. His object was, of +course, merely to avoid stumbling into the rocky pools about him, and +perhaps he was rather glad, as all men are, of an excuse to resume, +even for a moment, the sensations of his boyhood. At anyrate, it is to +this, no doubt, that he owes his life. + +He approached his mark with all the assurance which the absolute +security of this country against all forms of animal life gives its +inhabitants. The round bodies moved to and fro, but it was only when he +surmounted the skerry of boulders I have mentioned that he realised the +horrible nature of the discovery. It came upon him with some suddenness. + +The rounded bodies fell apart as he came into sight over the ridge, +and displayed the pinkish object to be the partially devoured body of +a human being, but whether of a man or woman he was unable to say. +And the rounded bodies were new and ghastly-looking creatures, in +shape somewhat resembling an octopus, and with huge and very long and +flexible tentacles, coiled copiously on the ground. The skin had a +glistening texture, unpleasant to see, like shiny leather. The downward +bend of the tentacle-surrounded mouth, the curious excrescence at the +bend, the tentacles, and the large intelligent eyes, gave the creatures +a grotesque suggestion of a face. They were the size of a fair-sized +swine about the body, and the tentacles seemed to him to be many feet +in length. There were, he thinks, seven or eight at least of the +creatures. Twenty yards beyond them, amid the surf of the now returning +tide, two others were emerging from the sea. + +Their bodies lay flatly on the rocks, and their eyes regarded him with +evil interest; but it does not appear that Mr. Fison was afraid, or +that he realised that he was in any danger. Possibly his confidence +is to be ascribed to the limpness of their attitudes. But he was +horrified, of course, and intensely excited and indignant at such +revolting creatures preying upon human flesh. He thought they had +chanced upon a drowned body. He shouted to them, with the idea of +driving them off, and, finding they did not budge, cast about him, +picked up a big rounded lump of rock, and flung it at one. + +And then, slowly uncoiling their tentacles, they all began moving +towards him--creeping at first deliberately, and making a soft purring +sound to each other. + +In a moment Mr. Fison realised that he was in danger. He shouted again, +threw both his boots, and started off, with a leap, forthwith. Twenty +yards off he stopped and faced about, judging them slow, and behold! +the tentacles of their leader were already pouring over the rocky +ridge on which he had just been standing! + +At that he shouted again, but this time not threatening, but a cry +of dismay, and began jumping, striding, slipping, wading across the +uneven expanse between him and the beach. The tall red cliffs seemed +suddenly at a vast distance, and he saw, as though they were creatures +in another world, two minute workmen engaged in the repair of the +ladder-way, and little suspecting the race for life that was beginning +below them. At one time he could hear the creatures splashing in the +pools not a dozen feet behind him, and once he slipped and almost fell. + +They chased him to the very foot of the cliffs, and desisted only when +he had been joined by the workmen at the foot of the ladder-way up the +cliff. All three of the men pelted them with stones for a time, and +then hurried to the cliff top and along the path towards Sidmouth, to +secure assistance and a boat, and to rescue the desecrated body from +the clutches of these abominable creatures. + + +II + +And, as if he had not already been in sufficient peril that day, Mr. +Fison went with the boat to point out the exact spot of his adventure. + +As the tide was down, it required a considerable detour to reach the +spot, and when at last they came off the ladder-way, the mangled body +had disappeared. The water was now running in, submerging first one +slab of slimy rock and then another, and the four men in the boat--the +workmen, that is, the boatman, and Mr. Fison--now turned their +attention from the bearings off shore to the water beneath the keel. + +At first they could see little below them, save a dark jungle of +laminaria, with an occasional darting fish. Their minds were set +on adventure, and they expressed their disappointment freely. But +presently they saw one of the monsters swimming through the water +seaward, with a curious rolling motion that suggested to Mr. Fison +the spinning roll of a captive balloon. Almost immediately after, +the waving streamers of laminaria were extraordinarily perturbed, +parted for a moment, and three of these beasts became darkly visible, +struggling for what was probably some fragment of the drowned man. In +a moment the copious olive-green ribbons had poured again over this +writhing group. + +At that all four men, greatly excited, began beating the water with +oars and shouting, and immediately they saw a tumultuous movement among +the weeds. They desisted to see more clearly, and as soon as the water +was smooth, they saw, as it seemed to them, the whole sea bottom among +the weeds set with eyes. + +"Ugly swine!" cried one of the men. "Why, there's dozens!" + +And forthwith the things began to rise through the water about them. +Mr. Fison has since described to the writer this startling eruption +out of the waving laminaria meadows. To him it seemed to occupy a +considerable time, but it is probable that really it was an affair of +a few seconds only. For a time nothing but eyes, and then he speaks of +tentacles streaming out and parting the weed fronds this way and that. +Then these things, growing larger, until at last the bottom was hidden +by their intercoiling forms, and the tips of tentacles rose darkly here +and there into the air above the swell of the waters. + +One came up boldly to the side of the boat, and, clinging to this with +three of its sucker-set tentacles, threw four others over the gunwale, +as if with an intention either of oversetting the boat or of clambering +into it. Mr. Fison at once caught up the boathook, and, jabbing +furiously at the soft tentacles, forced it to desist. He was struck in +the back and almost pitched overboard by the boatman, who was using his +oar to resist a similar attack on the other side of the boat. But the +tentacles on either side at once relaxed their hold at this, slid out +of sight, and splashed into the water. + +"We'd better get out of this," said Mr. Fison, who was trembling +violently. He went to the tiller, while the boatman and one of the +workmen seated themselves and began rowing. The other workman stood +up in the fore part of the boat, with the boathook, ready to strike +any more tentacles that might appear. Nothing else seems to have been +said. Mr. Fison had expressed the common feeling beyond amendment. +In a hushed, scared mood, with faces white and drawn, they set about +escaping from the position into which they had so recklessly blundered. + +But the oars had scarcely dropped into the water before dark, tapering, +serpentine ropes had bound them, and were about the rudder; and +creeping up the sides of the boat with a looping motion came the +suckers again. The men gripped their oars and pulled, but it was like +trying to move a boat in a floating raft of weeds. "Help here!" cried +the boatman, and Mr. Fison and the second workman rushed to help lug at +the oar. + +Then the man with the boathook--his name was Ewan, or Ewen--sprang up +with a curse, and began striking downward over the side, as far as he +could reach, at the bank of tentacles that now clustered along the +boat's bottom. And, at the same time, the two rowers stood up to get +a better purchase for the recovery of their oars. The boatman handed +his to Mr. Fison, who lugged desperately, and, meanwhile, the boatman +opened a big clasp-knife, and, leaning over the side of the boat, began +hacking at the spiring arms upon the oar shaft. + +Mr. Fison, staggering with the quivering rocking of the boat, his teeth +set, his breath coming short, and the veins starting on his hands as +he pulled at his oar, suddenly cast his eyes seaward. And there, not +fifty yards off, across the long rollers of the incoming tide, was a +large boat standing in towards them, with three women and a little +child in it. A boatman was rowing, and a little man in a pink-ribboned +straw hat and whites stood in the stern, hailing them. For a moment, of +course, Mr. Fison thought of help, and then he thought of the child. +He abandoned his oar forthwith, threw up his arms in a frantic gesture, +and screamed to the party in the boat to keep away "for God's sake!" +It says much for the modesty and courage of Mr. Fison that he does not +seem to be aware that there was any quality of heroism in his action at +this juncture. The oar he had abandoned was at once drawn under, and +presently reappeared floating about twenty yards away. + +At the same moment Mr. Fison felt the boat under him lurch violently, +and a hoarse scream, a prolonged cry of terror from Hill, the boatman, +caused him to forget the party of excursionists altogether. He turned, +and saw Hill crouching by the forward rowlock, his face convulsed with +terror, and his right arm over the side and drawn tightly down. He gave +now a succession of short, sharp cries, "Oh! oh! oh!--oh!" Mr. Fison +believes that he must have been hacking at the tentacles below the +water-line, and have been grasped by them, but, of course, it is quite +impossible to say now certainly what had happened. The boat was heeling +over, so that the gunwale was within ten inches of the water, and both +Ewan and the other labourer were striking down into the water, with oar +and boathook, on either side of Hill's arm. Mr. Fison instinctively +placed himself to counterpoise them. + +Then Hill, who was a burly, powerful man, made a strenuous effort, and +rose almost to a standing position. He lifted his arm, indeed, clean +out of the water. Hanging to it was a complicated tangle of brown +ropes; and the eyes of one of the brutes that had hold of him, glaring +straight and resolute, showed momentarily above the surface. The boat +heeled more and more, and the green-brown water came pouring in a +cascade over the side. Then Hill slipped and fell with his ribs across +the side, and his arm and the mass of tentacles about it splashed back +into the water. He rolled over; his boot kicked Mr. Fison's knee as +that gentleman rushed forward to seize him, and in another moment fresh +tentacles had whipped about his waist and neck, and after a brief, +convulsive struggle, in which the boat was nearly capsized, Hill was +lugged overboard. The boat righted with a violent jerk that all but +sent Mr. Fison over the other side, and hid the struggle in the water +from his eyes. + +He stood staggering to recover his balance for a moment, and as he +did so, he became aware that the struggle and the inflowing tide had +carried them close upon the weedy rocks again. Not four yards off a +table of rock still rose in rhythmic movements above the in-wash of the +tide. In a moment Mr. Fison seized the oar from Ewan, gave one vigorous +stroke, then, dropping it, ran to the bows and leapt. He felt his feet +slide over the rock, and, by a frantic effort, leapt again towards a +further mass. He stumbled over this, came to his knees, and rose again. + +"Look out!" cried someone, and a large drab body struck him. He was +knocked flat into a tidal pool by one of the workmen, and as he went +down he heard smothered, choking cries, that he believed at the time +came from Hill. Then he found himself marvelling at the shrillness and +variety of Hill's voice. Someone jumped over him, and a curving rush +of foamy water poured over him, and passed. He scrambled to his feet +dripping, and, without looking seaward, ran as fast as his terror would +let him shoreward. Before him, over the flat space of scattered rocks, +stumbled the two workmen--one a dozen yards in front of the other. + +He looked over his shoulder at last, and, seeing that he was not +pursued, faced about. He was astonished. From the moment of the rising +of the cephalopods out of the water, he had been acting too swiftly +to fully comprehend his actions. Now it seemed to him as if he had +suddenly jumped out of an evil dream. + +For there were the sky, cloudless and blazing with the afternoon sun, +the sea weltering under its pitiless brightness, the soft creamy foam +of the breaking water, and the low, long, dark ridges of rock. The +righted boat floated, rising and falling gently on the swell about +a dozen yards from shore. Hill and the monsters, all the stress and +tumult of that fierce fight for life, had vanished as though they had +never been. + +Mr. Fison's heart was beating violently; he was throbbing to the +finger-tips, and his breath came deep. + +There was something missing. For some seconds he could not think +clearly enough what this might be. Sun, sky, sea, rocks--what was it? +Then he remembered the boatload of excursionists. It had vanished. +He wondered whether he had imagined it. He turned, and saw the two +workmen standing side by side under the projecting masses of the tall +pink cliffs. He hesitated whether he should make one last attempt +to save the man Hill. His physical excitement seemed to desert him +suddenly, and leave him aimless and helpless. He turned shoreward, +stumbling and wading towards his two companions. + +He looked back again, and there were now two boats floating, and the +one farthest out at sea pitched clumsily, bottom upward. + + +III + +So it was _Haploteuthis ferox_ made its appearance upon the Devonshire +coast. So far, this has been its most serious aggression. Mr. Fison's +account, taken together with the wave of boating and bathing casualties +to which I have already alluded, and the absence of fish from the +Cornish coasts that year, points clearly to a shoal of these voracious +deep-sea monsters prowling slowly along the sub-tidal coastline. +Hunger migration has, I know, been suggested as the force that drove +them hither; but, for my own part, I prefer to believe the alternative +theory of Hemsley. Hemsley holds that a pack or shoal of these +creatures may have become enamoured of human flesh by the accident of +a foundered ship sinking among them, and have wandered in search of it +out of their accustomed zone; first waylaying and following ships, and +so coming to our shores in the wake of the Atlantic traffic. But to +discuss Hemsley's cogent and admirably-stated arguments would be out +of place here. + +It would seem that the appetites of the shoal were satisfied by the +catch of eleven people--for so far as can be ascertained, there were +ten people in the second boat, and certainly these creatures gave +no further signs of their presence off Sidmouth that day. The coast +between Seaton and Budleigh Salterton was patrolled all that evening +and night by four Preventive Service boats, the men in which were armed +with harpoons and cutlasses, and as the evening advanced, a number +of more or less similarly equipped expeditions, organised by private +individuals, joined them. Mr. Fison took no part in any of these +expeditions. + +About midnight excited hails were heard from a boat about a couple of +miles out at sea to the south-east of Sidmouth, and a lantern was seen +waving in a strange manner to and fro and up and down. The nearer boats +at once hurried towards the alarm. The venturesome occupants of the +boat, a seaman, a curate, and two schoolboys, had actually seen the +monsters passing under their boat. The creatures, it seems, like most +deep-sea organisms, were phosphorescent, and they had been floating, +five fathoms deep or so, like creatures of moonshine through the +blackness of the water, their tentacles retracted and as if asleep, +rolling over and over, and moving slowly in a wedge-like formation +towards the south-east. + +These people told their story in gesticulated fragments, as first one +boat drew alongside and then another. At last there was a little fleet +of eight or nine boats collected together, and from them a tumult, +like the chatter of a marketplace, rose into the stillness of the +night. There was little or no disposition to pursue the shoal, the +people had neither weapons nor experience for such a dubious chase, +and presently--even with a certain relief, it may be--the boats turned +shoreward. + +And now to tell what is perhaps the most astonishing fact in this whole +astonishing raid. We have not the slightest knowledge of the subsequent +movements of the shoal, although the whole south-west coast was now +alert for it. But it may, perhaps, be significant that a cachalot +was stranded off Sark on June 3. Two weeks and three days after this +Sidmouth affair, a living _Haploteuthis_ came ashore on Calais sands. +It was alive, because several witnesses saw its tentacles moving in a +convulsive way. But it is probable that it was dying. A gentleman named +Pouchet obtained a rifle and shot it. + +That was the last appearance of a living _Haploteuthis_. No others +were seen on the French coast. On the 15th of June a dead body, almost +complete, was washed ashore near Torquay, and a few days later a boat +from the Marine Biological station, engaged in dredging off Plymouth, +picked up a rotting specimen, slashed deeply with a cutlass wound. How +the former specimen had come by its death it is impossible to say. And +on the last day of June, Mr. Egbert Caine, an artist, bathing near +Newlyn, threw up his arms, shrieked, and was drawn under. A friend +bathing with him made no attempt to save him, but swam at once for +the shore. This is the last fact to tell of this extraordinary raid +from the deeper sea. Whether it is really the last of these horrible +creatures it is, as yet, premature to say. But it is believed, and +certainly it is to be hoped, that they have returned now, and returned +for good, to the sunless depths of the middle seas, out of which they +have so strangely and so mysteriously arisen. + + + + +POLLOCK AND THE PORROH MAN + + +It was in a swampy village on the lagoon river behind the Turner +Peninsula that Pollock's first encounter with the Porroh man occurred. +The women of that country are famous for their good looks--they are +Gallinas with a dash of European blood that dates from the days of +Vasco de Gama and the English slave-traders, and the Porroh man, too, +was possibly inspired by a faint Caucasian taint in his composition. +(It's a curious thing to think that some of us may have distant cousins +eating men on Sherboro Island or raiding with the Sofas.) At anyrate, +the Porroh man stabbed the woman to the heart as though he had been a +mere low-class Italian, and very narrowly missed Pollock. But Pollock, +using his revolver to parry the lightning stab which was aimed at his +deltoid muscle, sent the iron dagger flying, and, firing, hit the man +in the hand. + +He fired again and missed, knocking a sudden window out of the wall +of the hut. The Porroh man stooped in the doorway, glancing under his +arm at Pollock. Pollock caught a glimpse of his inverted face in the +sunlight, and then the Englishman was alone, sick and trembling with +the excitement of the affair, in the twilight of the place. It had all +happened in less time than it takes to read about it. + +The woman was quite dead, and having ascertained this, Pollock went to +the entrance of the hut and looked out. Things outside were dazzling +bright. Half a dozen of the porters of the expedition were standing up +in a group near the green huts they occupied, and staring towards him, +wondering what the shots might signify. Behind the little group of men +was the broad stretch of black fetid mud by the river, a green carpet +of rafts of papyrus and water-grass, and then the leaden water. The +mangroves beyond the stream loomed indistinctly through the blue haze. +There were no signs of excitement in the squat village, whose fence was +just visible above the cane-grass. + +Pollock came out of the hut cautiously and walked towards the river, +looking over his shoulder at intervals. But the Porroh man had +vanished. Pollock clutched his revolver nervously in his hand. + +One of his men came to meet him, and as he came, pointed to the bushes +behind the hut in which the Porroh man had disappeared. Pollock had +an irritating persuasion of having made an absolute fool of himself; +he felt bitter, savage, at the turn things had taken. At the same +time, he would have to tell Waterhouse--the moral, exemplary, cautious +Waterhouse--who would inevitably take the matter seriously. Pollock +cursed bitterly at his luck, at Waterhouse, and especially at the West +Coast of Africa. He felt consummately sick of the expedition. And +in the back of his mind all the time was a speculative doubt where +precisely within the visible horizon the Porroh man might be. + +It is perhaps rather shocking, but he was not at all upset by the +murder that had just happened. He had seen so much brutality during the +last three months, so many dead women, burnt huts, drying skeletons, up +the Kittam River in the wake of the Sofa cavalry, that his senses were +blunted. What disturbed him was the persuasion that this business was +only beginning. + +He swore savagely at the black, who ventured to ask a question, and +went on into the tent under the orange-trees where Waterhouse was +lying, feeling exasperatingly like a boy going into the headmaster's +study. + +Waterhouse was still sleeping off the effects of his last dose of +chlorodyne, and Pollock sat down on a packing-case beside him, and, +lighting his pipe, waited for him to awake. About him were scattered +the pots and weapons Waterhouse had collected from the Mendi people, +and which he had been repacking for the canoe voyage to Sulyma. + +Presently Waterhouse woke up, and after judicial stretching, decided +he was all right again. Pollock got him some tea. Over the tea the +incidents of the afternoon were described by Pollock, after some +preliminary beating about the bush. Waterhouse took the matter even +more seriously than Pollock had anticipated. He did not simply +disapprove, he scolded, he insulted. + +"You're one of those infernal fools who think a black man isn't a human +being," he said. "I can't be ill a day without you must get into some +dirty scrape or other. This is the third time in a month that you have +come crossways-on with a native, and this time you're in for it with a +vengeance. Porroh, too! They're down upon you enough as it is, about +that idol you wrote your silly name on. And they're the most vindictive +devils on earth! You make a man ashamed of civilisation. To think you +come of a decent family! If ever I cumber myself up with a vicious, +stupid young lout like you again"-- + +"Steady on, now," snarled Pollock, in the tone that always exasperated +Waterhouse; "steady on." + +At that Waterhouse became speechless. He jumped to his feet. + +"Look here, Pollock," he said, after a struggle to control his breath. +"You must go home. I won't have you any longer. I'm ill enough as it is +through you"-- + +"Keep your hair on," said Pollock, staring in front of him. "I'm ready +enough to go." + +Waterhouse became calmer again. He sat down on the camp-stool. "Very +well," he said. "I don't want a row, Pollock, you know, but it's +confoundedly annoying to have one's plans put out by this kind of +thing. I'll come to Sulyma with you, and see you safe aboard"-- + +"You needn't," said Pollock. "I can go alone. From here." + +"Not far," said Waterhouse. "You don't understand this Porroh +business." + +"How should _I_ know she belonged to a Porroh man?" said Pollock +bitterly. + +"Well, she did," said Waterhouse; "and you can't undo the thing. Go +alone, indeed! I wonder what they'd do to you. You don't seem to +understand that this Porroh hokey-pokey rules this country, is its law, +religion, constitution, medicine, magic.... They appoint the chiefs. +The Inquisition, at its best, couldn't hold a candle to these chaps. +He will probably set Awajale, the chief here, on to us. It's lucky our +porters are Mendis. We shall have to shift this little settlement of +ours.... Confound you, Pollock! And, of course, you must go and miss +him." + +He thought, and his thoughts seemed disagreeable. Presently he stood up +and took his rifle. "I'd keep close for a bit, if I were you," he said, +over his shoulder, as he went out. "I'm going out to see what I can +find out about it." + +Pollock remained sitting in the tent, meditating. "I was meant for a +civilised life," he said to himself, regretfully, as he filled his +pipe. "The sooner I get back to London or Paris the better for me." + +His eye fell on the sealed case in which Waterhouse had put the +featherless poisoned arrows they had bought in the Mendi country. "I +wish I had hit the beggar somewhere vital," said Pollock viciously. + +Waterhouse came back after a long interval. He was not communicative, +though Pollock asked him questions enough. The Porroh man, it seems, +was a prominent member of that mystical society. The village was +interested, but not threatening. No doubt the witch-doctor had gone +into the bush. He was a great witch-doctor. "Of course, he's up to +something," said Waterhouse, and became silent. + +"But what can he do?" asked Pollock, unheeded. + +"I must get you out of this. There's something brewing, or things would +not be so quiet," said Waterhouse, after a gap of silence. Pollock +wanted to know what the brew might be. "Dancing in a circle of skulls," +said Waterhouse; "brewing a stink in a copper pot." Pollock wanted +particulars. Waterhouse was vague, Pollock pressing. At last Waterhouse +lost his temper. "How the devil should _I_ know?" he said to Pollock's +twentieth inquiry what the Porroh man would do. "He tried to kill +you off-hand in the hut. _Now_, I fancy he will try something more +elaborate. But you'll see fast enough. I don't want to help unnerve +you. It's probably all nonsense." + +That night, as they were sitting at their fire, Pollock again tried to +draw Waterhouse out on the subject of Porroh methods. "Better get to +sleep," said Waterhouse, when Pollock's bent became apparent; "we start +early to-morrow. You may want all your nerve about you." + +"But what line will he take?" + +"Can't say. They're versatile people. They know a lot of rum dodges. +You'd better get that copper-devil, Shakespear, to talk." + +There was a flash and a heavy bang out of the darkness behind the +huts, and a clay bullet came whistling close to Pollock's head. This, +at least, was crude enough. The blacks and half-breeds sitting and +yarning round their own fire jumped up, and someone fired into the dark. + +"Better go into one of the huts," said Waterhouse quietly, still +sitting unmoved. + +Pollock stood up by the fire and drew his revolver. Fighting, at least, +he was not afraid of. But a man in the dark is in the best of armour. +Realising the wisdom of Waterhouse's advice, Pollock went into the tent +and lay down there. + +What little sleep he had was disturbed by dreams, variegated dreams, +but chiefly of the Porroh man's face, upside down, as he went out of +the hut, and looked up under his arm. It was odd that this transitory +impression should have stuck so firmly in Pollock's memory. Moreover, +he was troubled by queer pains in his limbs. + +In the white haze of the early morning, as they were loading the +canoes, a barbed arrow suddenly appeared quivering in the ground close +to Pollock's foot. The boys made a perfunctory effort to clear out the +thicket, but it led to no capture. + +After these two occurrences, there was a disposition on the part of +the expedition to leave Pollock to himself, and Pollock became, for +the first time in his life, anxious to mingle with blacks. Waterhouse +took one canoe, and Pollock, in spite of a friendly desire to chat +with Waterhouse, had to take the other. He was left all alone in the +front part of the canoe, and he had the greatest trouble to make the +men--who did not love him--keep to the middle of the river, a clear +hundred yards or more from either shore. However, he made Shakespear, +the Freetown half-breed, come up to his own end of the canoe and tell +him about Porroh, which Shakespear, failing in his attempts to leave +Pollock alone, presently did with considerable freedom and gusto. + +The day passed. The canoe glided swiftly along the ribbon of lagoon +water, between the drift of water-figs, fallen trees, papyrus, and +palm-wine palms, and with the dark mangrove swamp to the left, through +which one could hear now and then the roar of the Atlantic surf. +Shakespear told in his soft, blurred English of how the Porroh could +cast spells; how men withered up under their malice; how they could +send dreams and devils; how they tormented and killed the sons of +Ijibu; how they kidnapped a white trader from Sulyma who had maltreated +one of the sect, and how his body looked when it was found. And Pollock +after each narrative cursed under his breath at the want of missionary +enterprise that allowed such things to be, and at the inert British +Government that ruled over this dark heathendom of Sierra Leone. In +the evening they came to the Kasi Lake, and sent a score of crocodiles +lumbering off the island on which the expedition camped for the night. + +The next day they reached Sulyma, and smelt the sea breeze, but Pollock +had to put up there for five days before he could get on to Freetown. +Waterhouse, considering him to be comparatively safe here, and within +the pale of Freetown influence, left him and went back with the +expedition to Gbemma, and Pollock became very friendly with Perera, +the only resident white trader at Sulyma--so friendly, indeed, that he +went about with him everywhere. Perera was a little Portuguese Jew, who +had lived in England, and he appreciated the Englishman's friendliness +as a great compliment. + +For two days nothing happened out of the ordinary; for the most part +Pollock and Perera played Nap--the only game they had in common--and +Pollock got into debt. Then, on the second evening, Pollock had a +disagreeable intimation of the arrival of the Porroh man in Sulyma by +getting a flesh-wound in the shoulder from a lump of filed iron. It +was a long shot, and the missile had nearly spent its force when it +hit him. Still it conveyed its message plainly enough. Pollock sat up +in his hammock, revolver in hand, all that night, and next morning +confided, to some extent, in the Anglo-Portuguese. + +Perera took the matter seriously. He knew the local customs pretty +thoroughly. "It is a personal question, you must know. It is revenge. +And of course he is hurried by your leaving de country. None of de +natives or half-breeds will interfere wid him very much--unless you +make it wort deir while. If you come upon him suddenly, you might shoot +him. But den he might shoot you. + +"Den dere's dis--infernal magic," said Perera. "Of course, I don't +believe in it--superstition--but still it's not nice to tink dat +wherever you are, dere is a black man, who spends a moonlight night now +and den a-dancing about a fire to send you bad dreams.... Had any bad +dreams?" + +"Rather," said Pollock. "I keep on seeing the beggar's head upside down +grinning at me and showing all his teeth as he did in the hut, and +coming close up to me, and then going ever so far off, and coming back. +It's nothing to be afraid of, but somehow it simply paralyses me with +terror in my sleep. Queer things--dreams. I know it's a dream all the +time, and I can't wake up from it." + +"It's probably only fancy," said Perera. "Den my niggers say Porroh men +can send snakes. Seen any snakes lately?" + +"Only one. I killed him this morning, on the floor near my hammock. +Almost trod on him as I got up." + +"_Ah!_" said Perera, and then, reassuringly, "Of course it is +a--coincidence. Still I would keep my eyes open. Den dere's pains in de +bones." + +"I thought they were due to miasma," said Pollock. + +"Probably dey are. When did dey begin?" + +Then Pollock remembered that he first noticed them the night after the +fight in the hut. "It's my opinion he don't want to kill you," said +Perera--"at least not yet. I've heard deir idea is to scare and worry +a man wid deir spells, and narrow misses, and rheumatic pains, and bad +dreams, and all dat, until he's sick of life. Of course, it's all talk, +you know. You mustn't worry about it.... But I wonder what he'll be up +to next." + +"_I_ shall have to be up to something first," said Pollock, staring +gloomily at the greasy cards that Perera was putting on the table. "It +don't suit my dignity to be followed about, and shot at, and blighted +in this way. I wonder if Porroh hokey-pokey upsets your luck at cards." + +He looked at Perera suspiciously. + +"Very likely it does," said Perera warmly, shuffling. "Dey are +wonderful people." + +That afternoon Pollock killed two snakes in his hammock, and there +was also an extraordinary increase in the number of red ants that +swarmed over the place; and these annoyances put him in a fit temper +to talk over business with a certain Mendi rough he had interviewed +before. The Mendi rough showed Pollock a little iron dagger, and +demonstrated where one struck in the neck, in a way that made Pollock +shiver, and in return for certain considerations Pollock promised him a +double-barrelled gun with an ornamental lock. + +In the evening, as Pollock and Perera were playing cards, the Mendi +rough came in through the doorway, carrying something in a blood-soaked +piece of native cloth. + +"Not here!" said Pollock very hurriedly. "Not here!" + +But he was not quick enough to prevent the man, who was anxious to get +to Pollock's side of the bargain, from opening the cloth and throwing +the head of the Porroh man upon the table. It bounded from there on to +the floor, leaving a red trail on the cards, and rolled into a corner, +where it came to rest upside down, but glaring hard at Pollock. + +Perera jumped up as the thing fell among the cards, and began in his +excitement to gabble in Portuguese. The Mendi was bowing, with the red +cloth in his hand. "De gun!" he said. Pollock stared back at the head +in the corner. It bore exactly the expression it had in his dreams. +Something seemed to snap in his own brain as he looked at it. + +Then Perera found his English again. + +"You got him killed?" he said. "You did not kill him yourself?" + +"Why should I?" said Pollock. + +"But he will not be able to take it off now!" + +"Take _what_ off?" said Pollock. + +"And all dese cards are spoiled!" + +"_What_ do you mean by taking off?" said Pollock. + +"You must send me a new pack from Freetown. You can buy dem dere." + +"But--'take it off'?" + +"It is only superstition. I forgot. De niggers say dat if de +witches--he was a witch-- But it is rubbish.... You must make de Porroh +man take it off, or kill him yourself.... It is very silly." + +Pollock swore under his breath, still staring hard at the head in the +corner. + +"I can't stand that glare," he said. Then suddenly he rushed at the +thing and kicked it. It rolled some yards or so, and came to rest in +the same position as before, upside down, and looking at him. + +"He is ugly," said the Anglo-Portuguese. "Very ugly. Dey do it on deir +faces with little knives." + +Pollock would have kicked the head again, but the Mendi man touched +him on the arm. "De gun?" he said, looking nervously at the head. + +"Two--if you will take that beastly thing away," said Pollock. + +The Mendi shook his head, and intimated that he only wanted one gun now +due to him, and for which he would be obliged. Pollock found neither +cajolery nor bullying any good with him. Perera had a gun to sell (at +a profit of three hundred per cent.), and with that the man presently +departed. Then Pollock's eyes, against his will, were recalled to the +thing on the floor. + +"It is funny dat his head keeps upside down," said Perera, with an +uneasy laugh. "His brains must be heavy, like de weight in de little +images one sees dat keep always upright wid lead in dem. You will take +him wiv you when you go presently. You might take him now. De cards are +all spoilt. Dere is a man sell dem in Freetown. De room is in a filty +mess as it is. You should have killed him yourself." + +Pollock pulled himself together, and went and picked up the head. He +would hang it up by the lamp-hook in the middle of the ceiling of his +room, and dig a grave for it at once. He was under the impression that +he hung it up by the hair, but that must have been wrong, for when he +returned for it, it was hanging by the neck upside down. + +He buried it before sunset on the north side of the shed he occupied, +so that he should not have to pass the grave after dark when he was +returning from Perera's. He killed two snakes before he went to +sleep. In the darkest part of the night he awoke with a start, and +heard a pattering sound and something scraping on the floor. He sat up +noiselessly, and felt under his pillow for his revolver. A mumbling +growl followed, and Pollock fired at the sound. There was a yelp, and +something dark passed for a moment across the hazy blue of the doorway. +"A dog!" said Pollock, lying down again. + +In the early dawn he awoke again with a peculiar sense of unrest. The +vague pain in his bones had returned. For some time he lay watching the +red ants that were swarming over the ceiling, and then, as the light +grew brighter, he looked over the edge of his hammock and saw something +dark on the floor. He gave such a violent start that the hammock +overset and flung him out. + +He found himself lying, perhaps, a yard away from the head of the +Porroh man. It had been disinterred by the dog, and the nose was +grievously battered. Ants and flies swarmed over it. By an odd +coincidence, it was still upside down, and with the same diabolical +expression in the inverted eyes. + +Pollock sat paralysed, and stared at the horror for some time. Then +he got up and walked round it--giving it a wide berth--and out of the +shed. The clear light of the sunrise, the living stir of vegetation +before the breath of the dying land-breeze, and the empty grave with +the marks of the dog's paws, lightened the weight upon his mind a +little. + +He told Perera of the business as though it was a jest--a jest to be +told with white lips. "You should not have frighten de dog," said +Perera, with poorly simulated hilarity. + +The next two days, until the steamer came, were spent by Pollock in +making a more effectual disposition of his possession. Overcoming +his aversion to handling the thing, he went down to the river mouth +and threw it into the sea-water, but by some miracle it escaped the +crocodiles, and was cast up by the tide on the mud a little way up +the river, to be found by an intelligent Arab half-breed, and offered +for sale to Pollock and Perera as a curiosity, just on the edge of +night. The native hung about in the brief twilight, making lower and +lower offers, and at last, getting scared in some way by the evident +dread these wise white men had for the thing, went off, and, passing +Pollock's shed, threw his burden in there for Pollock to discover in +the morning. + +At this Pollock got into a kind of frenzy. He would burn the thing. He +went out straightway into the dawn, and had constructed a big pyre of +brushwood before the heat of the day. He was interrupted by the hooter +of the little paddle steamer from Monrovia to Bathurst, which was +coming through the gap in the bar. "Thank Heaven!" said Pollock, with +infinite piety, when the meaning of the sound dawned upon him. With +trembling hands he lit his pile of wood hastily, threw the head upon +it, and went away to pack his portmanteau and make his adieux to Perera. + +That afternoon, with a sense of infinite relief, Pollock watched the +flat swampy foreshore of Sulyma grow small in the distance. The gap in +the long line of white surge became narrower and narrower. It seemed +to be closing in and cutting him off from his trouble. The feeling of +dread and worry began to slip from him bit by bit. At Sulyma belief in +Porroh malignity and Porroh magic had been in the air, his sense of +Porroh had been vast, pervading, threatening, dreadful. Now manifestly +the domain of Porroh was only a little place, a little black band +between the sea and the blue cloudy Mendi uplands. + +"Good-bye, Porroh!" said Pollock. "Good-bye--certainly not _au revoir_." + +The captain of the steamer came and leant over the rail beside him, and +wished him good-evening, and spat at the froth of the wake in token of +friendly ease. + +"I picked up a rummy curio on the beach this go," said the captain. +"It's a thing I never saw done this side of Indy before." + +"What might that be?" said Pollock. + +"Pickled 'ed," said the captain. + +"_What?_" said Pollock. + +"'Ed--smoked. 'Ed of one of these Porroh chaps, all ornamented with +knife-cuts. Why! What's up? Nothing? I shouldn't have took you for a +nervous chap. Green in the face. By gosh! you're a bad sailor. All +right, eh? Lord, how funny you went!... Well, this 'ed I was telling +you of is a bit rum in a way. I've got it, along with some snakes, in a +jar of spirit in my cabin what I keeps for such curios, and I'm hanged +if it don't float upsy down. Hullo!" + +Pollock had given an incoherent cry, and had his hands in his hair. He +ran towards the paddle-boxes with a half-formed idea of jumping into +the sea, and then he realised his position and turned back towards the +captain. + +"Here!" said the captain. "Jack Philips, just keep him off me! Stand +off! No nearer, mister! What's the matter with you? Are you mad?" + +Pollock put his hand to his head. It was no good explaining. "I believe +I am pretty nearly mad at times," he said. "It's a pain I have here. +Comes suddenly. You'll excuse me, I hope." + +He was white and in a perspiration. He saw suddenly very clearly all +the danger he ran of having his sanity doubted. He forced himself +to restore the captain's confidence, by answering his sympathetic +inquiries, noting his suggestions, even trying a spoonful of neat +brandy in his cheek, and, that matter settled, asking a number of +questions about the captain's private trade in curiosities. The captain +described the head in detail. All the while Pollock was struggling to +keep under a preposterous persuasion that the ship was as transparent +as glass, and that he could distinctly see the inverted face looking at +him from the cabin beneath his feet. + +Pollock had a worse time almost on the steamer than he had at Sulyma. +All day he had to control himself in spite of his intense perception +of the imminent presence of that horrible head that was overshadowing +his mind. At night his old nightmare returned, until, with a violent +effort, he would force himself awake, rigid with the horror of it, and +with the ghost of a hoarse scream in his throat. + +He left the actual head behind at Bathurst, where he changed ship +for Teneriffe, but not his dreams nor the dull ache in his bones. +At Teneriffe Pollock transferred to a Cape liner, but the head +followed him. He gambled, he tried chess, he even read books, but +he knew the danger of drink. Yet whenever a round black shadow, a +round black object came into his range, there he looked for the head, +and--saw it. He knew clearly enough that his imagination was growing +traitor to him, and yet at times it seemed the ship he sailed in, +his fellow-passengers, the sailors, the wide sea, was all part of a +filmy phantasmagoria that hung, scarcely veiling it, between him and a +horrible real world. Then the Porroh man, thrusting his diabolical face +through that curtain, was the one real and undeniable thing. At that he +would get up and touch things, taste something, gnaw something, burn +his hand with a match, or run a needle into himself. + +So, struggling grimly and silently with his excited imagination, +Pollock reached England. He landed at Southampton, and went on straight +from Waterloo to his banker's in Cornhill in a cab. There he transacted +some business with the manager in a private room, and all the while the +head hung like an ornament under the black marble mantel and dripped +upon the fender. He could hear the drops fall, and see the red on the +fender. + +"A pretty fern," said the manager, following his eyes. "But it makes +the fender rusty." + +"Very," said Pollock; "a _very_ pretty fern. And that reminds me. +Can you recommend me a physician for mind troubles? I've got a +little--what is it?--hallucination." + +The head laughed savagely, wildly. Pollock was surprised the manager +did not notice it. But the manager only stared at his face. + +With the address of a doctor, Pollock presently emerged in Cornhill. +There was no cab in sight, and so he went on down to the western end +of the street, and essayed the crossing opposite the Mansion House. +The crossing is hardly easy even for the expert Londoner; cabs, vans, +carriages, mail-carts, omnibuses go by in one incessant stream; to +anyone fresh from the malarious solitudes of Sierra Leone it is a +boiling, maddening confusion. But when an inverted head suddenly comes +bouncing, like an indiarubber ball, between your legs, leaving distinct +smears of blood every time it touches the ground, you can scarcely hope +to avoid an accident. Pollock lifted his feet convulsively to avoid +it, and then kicked at the thing furiously. Then something hit him +violently in the back, and a hot pain ran up his arm. + +He had been hit by the pole of an omnibus, and three of the fingers +of his left hand smashed by the hoof of one of the horses--the very +fingers, as it happened, that he shot from the Porroh man. They pulled +him out from between the horses' legs, and found the address of the +physician in his crushed hand. + +For a couple of days Pollock's sensations were full of the sweet, +pungent smell of chloroform, of painful operations that caused him no +pain, of lying still and being given food and drink. Then he had a +slight fever, and was very thirsty, and his old nightmare came back. It +was only when it returned that he noticed it had left him for a day. + +"If my skull had been smashed instead of my fingers, it might have gone +altogether," said Pollock, staring thoughtfully at the dark cushion +that had taken on for the time the shape of the head. + +Pollock at the first opportunity told the physician of his mind +trouble. He knew clearly that he must go mad unless something +should intervene to save him. He explained that he had witnessed +a decapitation in Dahomey, and was haunted by one of the heads. +Naturally, he did not care to state the actual facts. The physician +looked grave. + +Presently he spoke hesitatingly. "As a child, did you get very much +religious training?" + +"Very little," said Pollock. + +A shade passed over the physician's face. "I don't know if you have +heard of the miraculous cures--it may be, of course, they are not +miraculous--at Lourdes." + +"Faith-healing will hardly suit me, I am afraid," said Pollock, with +his eye on the dark cushion. + +The head distorted its scarred features in an abominable grimace. The +physician went upon a new track. "It's all imagination," he said, +speaking with sudden briskness. "A fair case for faith-healing, anyhow. +Your nervous system has run down, you're in that twilight state of +health when the bogles come easiest. The strong impression was too +much for you. I must make you up a little mixture that will strengthen +your nervous system--especially your brain. And you must take exercise." + +"I'm no good for faith-healing," said Pollock. + +"And therefore we must restore tone. Go in search of stimulating +air--Scotland, Norway, the Alps"-- + +"Jericho, if you like," said Pollock--"where Naaman went." + +However, so soon as his fingers would let him, Pollock made a gallant +attempt to follow out the doctor's suggestion. It was now November. +He tried football, but to Pollock the game consisted in kicking a +furious inverted head about a field. He was no good at the game. He +kicked blindly, with a kind of horror, and when they put him back into +goal, and the ball came swooping down upon him, he suddenly yelled +and got out of its way. The discreditable stories that had driven him +from England to wander in the tropics shut him off from any but men's +society, and now his increasingly strange behaviour made even his man +friends avoid him. The thing was no longer a thing of the eye merely; +it gibbered at him, spoke to him. A horrible fear came upon him that +presently, when he took hold of the apparition, it would no longer +become some mere article of furniture, but would _feel_ like a real +dissevered head. Alone, he would curse at the thing, defy it, entreat +it; once or twice, in spite of his grim self-control, he addressed it +in the presence of others. He felt the growing suspicion in the eyes of +the people that watched him--his landlady, the servant, his man. + +One day early in December his cousin Arnold--his next of kin--came to +see him and draw him out, and watch his sunken yellow face with narrow +eager eyes. And it seemed to Pollock that the hat his cousin carried +in his hand was no hat at all, but a Gorgon head that glared at him +upside down, and fought with its eyes against his reason. However, +he was still resolute to see the matter out. He got a bicycle, and, +riding over the frosty road from Wandsworth to Kingston, found the +thing rolling along at his side, and leaving a dark trail behind it. He +set his teeth and rode faster. Then suddenly, as he came down the hill +towards Richmond Park, the apparition rolled in front of him and under +his wheel, so quickly that he had no time for thought, and, turning +quickly to avoid it, was flung violently against a heap of stones and +broke his left wrist. + +The end came on Christmas morning. All night he had been in a fever, +the bandages encircling his wrist like a band of fire, his dreams more +vivid and terrible than ever. In the cold, colourless, uncertain light +that came before the sunrise, he sat up in his bed, and saw the head +upon the bracket in the place of the bronze jar that had stood there +overnight. + +"I know that is a bronze jar," he said, with a chill doubt at his +heart. Presently the doubt was irresistible. He got out of bed slowly, +shivering, and advanced to the jar with his hand raised. Surely +he would see now his imagination had deceived him, recognise the +distinctive sheen of bronze. At last, after an age of hesitation, +his fingers came down on the patterned cheek of the head. He withdrew +them spasmodically. The last stage was reached. His sense of touch had +betrayed him. + +Trembling, stumbling against the bed, kicking against his shoes with +his bare feet, a dark confusion eddying round him, he groped his way to +the dressing-table, took his razor from the drawer, and sat down on the +bed with this in his hand. In the looking-glass he saw his own face, +colourless, haggard, full of the ultimate bitterness of despair. + +He beheld in swift succession the incidents in the brief tale of his +experience. His wretched home, his still more wretched schooldays, +the years of vicious life he had led since then, one act of selfish +dishonour leading to another; it was all clear and pitiless now, all +its squalid folly, in the cold light of the dawn. He came to the +hut, to the fight with the Porroh man, to the retreat down the river +to Sulyma, to the Mendi assassin and his red parcel, to his frantic +endeavours to destroy the head, to the growth of his hallucination. It +was a hallucination! He _knew_ it was. A hallucination merely. For a +moment he snatched at hope. He looked away from the glass, and on the +bracket, the inverted head grinned and grimaced at him.... With the +stiff fingers of his bandaged hand he felt at his neck for the throb of +his arteries. The morning was very cold, the steel blade felt like ice. + + + + +THE RED ROOM + + +"I can assure you," said I, "that it will take a very tangible ghost to +frighten me." And I stood up before the fire with my glass in my hand. + +"It is your own choosing," said the man with the withered arm, and +glanced at me askance. + +"Eight-and-twenty years," said I, "I have lived, and never a ghost have +I seen as yet." + +The old woman sat staring hard into the fire, her pale eyes wide open. +"Ay," she broke in; "and eight-and-twenty years you have lived and +never seen the likes of this house, I reckon. There's a many things to +see, when one's still but eight-and-twenty." She swayed her head slowly +from side to side. "A many things to see and sorrow for." + +I half suspected the old people were trying to enhance the spiritual +terrors of their house by their droning insistence. I put down my empty +glass on the table and looked about the room, and caught a glimpse of +myself, abbreviated and broadened to an impossible sturdiness, in the +queer old mirror at the end of the room. "Well," I said, "if I see +anything to-night, I shall be so much the wiser. For I come to the +business with an open mind." + +"It's your own choosing," said the man with the withered arm once more. + +I heard the sound of a stick and a shambling step on the flags in the +passage outside, and the door creaked on its hinges as a second old man +entered, more bent, more wrinkled, more aged even than the first. He +supported himself by a single crutch, his eyes were covered by a shade, +and his lower lip, half-averted, hung pale and pink from his decaying +yellow teeth. He made straight for an arm-chair on the opposite side +of the table, sat down clumsily, and began to cough. The man with the +withered arm gave this new-comer a short glance of positive dislike; +the old woman took no notice of his arrival, but remained with her eyes +fixed steadily on the fire. + +"I said--it's your own choosing," said the man with the withered arm, +when the coughing had ceased for a while. + +"It's my own choosing," I answered. + +The man with the shade became aware of my presence for the first time, +and threw his head back for a moment and sideways, to see me. I caught +a momentary glimpse of his eyes, small and bright and inflamed. Then he +began to cough and splutter again. + +"Why don't you drink?" said the man with the withered arm, pushing +the beer towards him. The man with the shade poured out a glassful +with a shaky arm that splashed half as much again on the deal table. +A monstrous shadow of him crouched upon the wall and mocked his +action as he poured and drank. I must confess I had scarce expected +these grotesque custodians. There is to my mind something inhuman in +senility, something crouching and atavistic; the human qualities seem +to drop from old people insensibly day by day. The three of them made +me feel uncomfortable, with their gaunt silences, their bent carriage, +their evident unfriendliness to me and to one another. + +"If," said I, "you will show me to this haunted room of yours, I will +make myself comfortable there." + +The old man with the cough jerked his head back so suddenly that it +startled me, and shot another glance of his red eyes at me from under +the shade; but no one answered me. I waited a minute, glancing from one +to the other. + +"If," I said a little louder, "if you will show me to this haunted room +of yours, I will relieve you from the task of entertaining me." + +"There's a candle on the slab outside the door," said the man with the +withered arm, looking at my feet as he addressed me. "But if you go to +the red room to-night"-- + +("This night of all nights!" said the old woman.) + +"You go alone." + +"Very well," I answered. "And which way do I go?" + +"You go along the passage for a bit," said he, "until you come to a +door, and through that is a spiral staircase, and half-way up that is a +landing and another door covered with baize. Go through that and down +the long corridor to the end, and the red room is on your left up the +steps." + +"Have I got that right?" I said, and repeated his directions. He +corrected me in one particular. + +"And are you really going?" said the man with the shade, looking at me +again for the third time, with that queer, unnatural tilting of the +face. + +("This night of all nights!" said the old woman.) + +"It is what I came for," I said, and moved towards the door. As I did +so, the old man with the shade rose and staggered round the table, so +as to be closer to the others and to the fire. At the door I turned +and looked at them, and saw they were all close together, dark against +the firelight, staring at me over their shoulders, with an intent +expression on their ancient faces. + +"Good-night," I said, setting the door open. + +"It's your own choosing," said the man with the withered arm. + +I left the door wide open until the candle was well alight, and then I +shut them in and walked down the chilly, echoing passage. + +I must confess that the oddness of these three old pensioners in +whose charge her ladyship had left the castle, and the deep-toned, +old-fashioned furniture of the housekeeper's room in which they +foregathered, affected me in spite of my efforts to keep myself at a +matter-of-fact phase. They seemed to belong to another age, an older +age, an age when things spiritual were different from this of ours, +less certain; an age when omens and witches were credible, and ghosts +beyond denying. Their very existence was spectral; the cut of their +clothing, fashions born in dead brains. The ornaments and conveniences +of the room about them were ghostly--the thoughts of vanished men, +which still haunted rather than participated in the world of to-day. +But with an effort I sent such thoughts to the right-about. The long, +draughty subterranean passage was chilly and dusty, and my candle +flared and made the shadows cower and quiver. The echoes rang up and +down the spiral staircase, and a shadow came sweeping up after me, and +one fled before me into the darkness overhead. I came to the landing +and stopped there for a moment, listening to a rustling that I fancied +I heard; then, satisfied of the absolute silence, I pushed open the +baize-covered door and stood in the corridor. + +The effect was scarcely what I expected, for the moonlight, coming +in by the great window on the grand staircase, picked out everything +in vivid black shadow or silvery illumination. Everything was in its +place: the house might have been deserted on the yesterday instead of +eighteen months ago. There were candles in the sockets of the sconces, +and whatever dust had gathered on the carpets or upon the polished +flooring was distributed so evenly as to be invisible in the moonlight. +I was about to advance, and stopped abruptly. A bronze group stood upon +the landing, hidden from me by the corner of the wall, but its shadow +fell with marvellous distinctness upon the white panelling, and gave +me the impression of someone crouching to waylay me. I stood rigid for +half a minute perhaps. Then, with my hand in the pocket that held my +revolver, I advanced, only to discover a Ganymede and Eagle glistening +in the moonlight. That incident for a time restored my nerve, and a +porcelain Chinaman on a buhl table, whose head rocked silently as I +passed him, scarcely startled me. + +The door to the red room and the steps up to it were in a shadowy +corner. I moved my candle from side to side, in order to see clearly +the nature of the recess in which I stood before opening the door. Here +it was, thought I, that my predecessor was found, and the memory of +that story gave me a sudden twinge of apprehension. I glanced over my +shoulder at the Ganymede in the moonlight, and opened the door of the +red room rather hastily, with my face half turned to the pallid silence +of the landing. + +I entered, closed the door behind me at once, turned the key I found in +the lock within, and stood with the candle held aloft, surveying the +scene of my vigil, the great red room of Lorraine Castle, in which the +young duke had died. Or, rather, in which he had begun his dying, for +he had opened the door and fallen headlong down the steps I had just +ascended. That had been the end of his vigil, of his gallant attempt to +conquer the ghostly tradition of the place, and never, I thought, had +apoplexy better served the ends of superstition. And there were other +and older stories that clung to the room, back to the half-credible +beginning of it all, the tale of a timid wife and the tragic end that +came to her husband's jest of frightening her. And looking around that +large shadowy room, with its shadowy window bays, its recesses and +alcoves, one could well understand the legends that had sprouted in its +black corners, its germinating darkness. My candle was a little tongue +of light in its vastness, that failed to pierce the opposite end of the +room, and left an ocean of mystery and suggestion beyond its island of +light. + +I resolved to make a systematic examination of the place at once, and +dispel the fanciful suggestions of its obscurity before they obtained a +hold upon me. After satisfying myself of the fastening of the door, I +began to walk about the room, peering round each article of furniture, +tucking up the valances of the bed, and opening its curtains wide. I +pulled up the blinds and examined the fastenings of the several windows +before closing the shutters, leant forward and looked up the blackness +of the wide chimney, and tapped the dark oak panelling for any secret +opening. There were two big mirrors in the room, each with a pair of +sconces bearing candles, and on the mantelshelf, too, were more candles +in china candlesticks. All these I lit one after the other. The fire +was laid,--an unexpected consideration from the old housekeeper,--and I +lit it, to keep down any disposition to shiver, and when it was burning +well, I stood round with my back to it and regarded the room again. I +had pulled up a chintz-covered arm-chair and a table, to form a kind +of barricade before me, and on this lay my revolver ready to hand. My +precise examination had done me good, but I still found the remoter +darkness of the place, and its perfect stillness, too stimulating for +the imagination. The echoing of the stir and crackling of the fire +was no sort of comfort to me. The shadow in the alcove, at the end +in particular, had that undefinable quality of a presence, that odd +suggestion of a lurking living thing, that comes so easily in silence +and solitude. At last, to reassure myself, I walked with a candle into +it, and satisfied myself that there was nothing tangible there. I stood +that candle upon the floor of the alcove, and left it in that position. + +By this time I was in a state of considerable nervous tension, although +to my reason there was no adequate cause for the condition. My mind, +however, was perfectly clear. I postulated quite unreservedly that +nothing supernatural could happen, and to pass the time I began to +string some rhymes together, Ingoldsby fashion, of the original legend +of the place. A few I spoke aloud, but the echoes were not pleasant. +For the same reason I also abandoned, after a time, a conversation with +myself upon the impossibility of ghosts and haunting. My mind reverted +to the three old and distorted people downstairs, and I tried to keep +it upon that topic. The sombre reds and blacks of the room troubled me; +even with seven candles the place was merely dim. The one in the alcove +flared in a draught, and the fire-flickering kept the shadows and +penumbra perpetually shifting and stirring. Casting about for a remedy, +I recalled the candles I had seen in the passage, and, with a slight +effort, walked out into the moonlight, carrying a candle and leaving +the door open, and presently returned with as many as ten. These I put +in various knick-knacks of china with which the room was sparsely +adorned, lit and placed where the shadows had lain deepest, some on the +floor, some in the window recesses, until at last my seventeen candles +were so arranged that not an inch of the room but had the direct light +of at least one of them. It occurred to me that when the ghost came, I +could warn him not to trip over them. The room was now quite brightly +illuminated. There was something very cheery and reassuring in these +little streaming flames, and snuffing them gave me an occupation, and +afforded a reassuring sense of the passage of time. + +Even with that, however, the brooding expectation of the vigil weighed +heavily upon me. It was after midnight that the candle in the alcove +suddenly went out, and the black shadow sprang back to its place there. +I did not see the candle go out; I simply turned and saw that the +darkness was there, as one might start and see the unexpected presence +of a stranger. "By Jove!" said I aloud; "that draught's a strong one!" +and, taking the matches from the table, I walked across the room in a +leisurely manner to relight the corner again. My first match would not +strike, and as I succeeded with the second, something seemed to blink +on the wall before me. I turned my head involuntarily, and saw that the +two candles on the little table by the fireplace were extinguished. I +rose at once to my feet. + +"Odd!" I said. "Did I do that myself in a flash of absent-mindedness?" + +I walked back, relit one, and as I did so, I saw the candle in the +right sconce of one of the mirrors wink and go right out, and almost +immediately its companion followed it. There was no mistake about it. +The flame vanished, as if the wicks had been suddenly nipped between a +finger and a thumb, leaving the wick neither glowing nor smoking, but +black. While I stood gaping, the candle at the foot of the bed went +out, and the shadows seemed to take another step towards me. + +"This won't do!" said I, and first one and then another candle on the +mantelshelf followed. + +"What's up?" I cried, with a queer high note getting into my voice +somehow. At that the candle on the wardrobe went out, and the one I had +relit in the alcove followed. + +"Steady on!" I said. "These candles are wanted," speaking with a +half-hysterical facetiousness, and scratching away at a match the +while for the mantel candlesticks. My hands trembled so much that +twice I missed the rough paper of the matchbox. As the mantel emerged +from darkness again, two candles in the remoter end of the window +were eclipsed. But with the same match I also relit the larger mirror +candles, and those on the floor near the doorway, so that for the +moment I seemed to gain on the extinctions. But then in a volley there +vanished four lights at once in different corners of the room, and I +struck another match in quivering haste, and stood hesitating whither +to take it. + +As I stood undecided, an invisible hand seemed to sweep out the two +candles on the table. With a cry of terror, I dashed at the alcove, +then into the corner, and then into the window, relighting three, as +two more vanished by the fireplace; then, perceiving a better way, +I dropped the matches on the iron-bound deed-box in the corner, and +caught up the bedroom candlestick. With this I avoided the delay of +striking matches; but for all that the steady process of extinction +went on, and the shadows I feared and fought against returned, and +crept in upon me, first a step gained on this side of me and then on +that. It was like a ragged storm-cloud sweeping out the stars. Now and +then one returned for a minute, and was lost again. I was now almost +frantic with the horror of the coming darkness, and my self-possession +deserted me. I leaped panting and dishevelled from candle to candle, in +a vain struggle against that remorseless advance. + +I bruised myself on the thigh against the table, I sent a chair +headlong, I stumbled and fell and whisked the cloth from the table in +my fall. My candle rolled away from me, and I snatched another as I +rose. Abruptly this was blown out, as I swung it off the table, by the +wind of my sudden movement, and immediately the two remaining candles +followed. But there was light still in the room, a red light that +staved off the shadows from me. The fire! Of course, I could still +thrust my candle between the bars and relight it! + +I turned to where the flames were still dancing between the glowing +coals, and splashing red reflections upon the furniture, made two steps +towards the grate, and incontinently the flames dwindled and vanished, +the glow vanished, the reflections rushed together and vanished, and +as I thrust the candle between the bars, darkness closed upon me like +the shutting of an eye, wrapped about me in a stifling embrace, sealed +my vision, and crushed the last vestiges of reason from my brain. The +candle fell from my hand. I flung out my arms in a vain effort to +thrust that ponderous blackness away from me, and, lifting up my voice, +screamed with all my might--once, twice, thrice. Then I think I must +have staggered to my feet. I know I thought suddenly of the moonlit +corridor, and, with my head bowed and my arms over my face, made a run +for the door. + +But I had forgotten the exact position of the door, and struck myself +heavily against the corner of the bed. I staggered back, turned, and +was either struck or struck myself against some other bulky furniture. +I have a vague memory of battering myself thus, to and fro in the +darkness, of a cramped struggle, and of my own wild crying as I darted +to and fro, of a heavy blow at last upon my forehead, a horrible +sensation of falling that lasted an age, of my last frantic effort to +keep my footing, and then I remember no more. + + * * * * * + +I opened my eyes in daylight. My head was roughly bandaged, and the man +with the withered arm was watching my face. I looked about me, trying +to remember what had happened, and for a space I could not recollect. +I rolled my eyes into the corner, and saw the old woman, no longer +abstracted, pouring out some drops of medicine from a little blue +phial into a glass. "Where am I?" I asked. "I seem to remember you, and +yet I cannot remember who you are." + +They told me then, and I heard of the haunted Red Room as one who hears +a tale. "We found you at dawn," said he, "and there was blood on your +forehead and lips." + +It was very slowly I recovered my memory of my experience. "You believe +now," said the old man, "that the room is haunted?" He spoke no longer +as one who greets an intruder, but as one who grieves for a broken +friend. + +"Yes," said I; "the room is haunted." + +"And you have seen it. And we, who have lived here all our lives, have +never set eyes upon it. Because we have never dared.... Tell us, is it +truly the old earl who"-- + +"No," said I; "it is not." + +"I told you so," said the old lady, with the glass in her hand. "It is +his poor young countess who was frightened"-- + +"It is not," I said. "There is neither ghost of earl nor ghost of +countess in that room, there is no ghost there at all; but worse, far +worse"-- + +"Well?" they said. + +"The worst of all the things that haunt poor mortal man," said I; "and +that is, in all its nakedness--_Fear!_ Fear that will not have light +nor sound, that will not bear with reason, that deafens and darkens and +overwhelms. It followed me through the corridor, it fought against me +in the room"-- + +I stopped abruptly. There was an interval of silence. My hand went up +to my bandages. + +Then the man with the shade sighed and spoke. "That is it," said he. +"I knew that was it. A Power of Darkness. To put such a curse upon a +woman! It lurks there always. You can feel it even in the daytime, even +of a bright summer's day, in the hangings, in the curtains, keeping +behind you however you face about. In the dusk it creeps along the +corridor and follows you, so that you dare not turn. There is Fear in +that room of hers--black Fear, and there will be--so long as this house +of sin endures." + + + + +THE CONE + + +The night was hot and overcast, the sky red-rimmed with the lingering +sunset of midsummer. They sat at the open window, trying to fancy the +air was fresher there. The trees and shrubs of the garden stood stiff +and dark; beyond in the roadway a gas-lamp burnt, bright orange against +the hazy blue of the evening. Farther were the three lights of the +railway signal against the lowering sky. The man and woman spoke to one +another in low tones. + +"He does not suspect?" said the man, a little nervously. + +"Not he," she said peevishly, as though that too irritated her. "He +thinks of nothing but the works and the prices of fuel. He has no +imagination, no poetry." + +"None of these men of iron have," he said sententiously. "They have no +hearts." + +"_He_ has not," she said. She turned her discontented face towards the +window. The distant sound of a roaring and rushing drew nearer and +grew in volume; the house quivered; one heard the metallic rattle of +the tender. As the train passed, there was a glare of light above the +cutting and a driving tumult of smoke; one, two, three, four, five, +six, seven, eight black oblongs--eight trucks--passed across the dim +grey of the embankment, and were suddenly extinguished one by one in +the throat of the tunnel, which, with the last, seemed to swallow down +train, smoke, and sound in one abrupt gulp. + +"This country was all fresh and beautiful once," he said; "and now--it +is Gehenna. Down that way--nothing but pot-banks and chimneys belching +fire and dust into the face of heaven.... But what does it matter? An +end comes, an end to all this cruelty.... _To-morrow._" He spoke the +last word in a whisper. + +"_To-morrow_," she said, speaking in a whisper too, and still staring +out of the window. + +"Dear!" he said, putting his hand on hers. + +She turned with a start, and their eyes searched one another's. Hers +softened to his gaze. "My dear one!" she said, and then: "It seems +so strange--that you should have come into my life like this--to +open"-- She paused. + +"To open?" he said. + +"All this wonderful world"--she hesitated, and spoke still more +softly--"this world of _love_ to me." + +Then suddenly the door clicked and closed. They turned their heads, +and he started violently back. In the shadow of the room stood a great +shadowy figure--silent. They saw the face dimly in the half-light, with +unexpressive dark patches under the penthouse brows. Every muscle in +Raut's body suddenly became tense. When could the door have opened? +What had he heard? Had he heard all? What had he seen? A tumult of +questions. + +The new-comer's voice came at last, after a pause that seemed +interminable. "Well?" he said. + +"I was afraid I had missed you, Horrocks," said the man at the window, +gripping the window-ledge with his hand. His voice was unsteady. + +The clumsy figure of Horrocks came forward out of the shadow. He made +no answer to Raut's remark. For a moment he stood above them. + +The woman's heart was cold within her. "I told Mr. Raut it was just +possible you might come back," she said, in a voice that never quivered. + +Horrocks, still silent, sat down abruptly in the chair by her little +work-table. His big hands were clenched; one saw now the fire of his +eyes under the shadow of his brows. He was trying to get his breath. +His eyes went from the woman he had trusted to the friend he had +trusted, and then back to the woman. + +By this time and for the moment all three half understood one another. +Yet none dared say a word to ease the pent-up things that choked them. + +It was the husband's voice that broke the silence at last. + +"You wanted to see me?" he said to Raut. + +Raut started as he spoke. "I came to see you," he said, resolved to lie +to the last. + +"Yes," said Horrocks. + +"You promised," said Raut, "to show me some fine effects of moonlight +and smoke." + +"I promised to show you some fine effects of moonlight and smoke," +repeated Horrocks in a colourless voice. + +"And I thought I might catch you to-night before you went down to the +works," proceeded Raut, "and come with you." + +There was another pause. Did the man mean to take the thing coolly? Did +he after all know? How long had he been in the room? Yet even at the +moment when they heard the door, their attitudes.... Horrocks glanced +at the profile of the woman, shadowy pallid in the half-light. Then he +glanced at Raut, and seemed to recover himself suddenly. "Of course," +he said, "I promised to show you the works under their proper dramatic +conditions. It's odd how I could have forgotten." + +"If I am troubling you"--began Raut. + +Horrocks started again. A new light had suddenly come into the sultry +gloom of his eyes. "Not in the least," he said. + +"Have you been telling Mr. Raut of all these contrasts of flame and +shadow you think so splendid?" said the woman, turning now to her +husband for the first time, her confidence creeping back again, her +voice just one half-note too high. "That dreadful theory of yours +that machinery is beautiful, and everything else in the world ugly. I +thought he would not spare you, Mr. Raut. It's his great theory, his +one discovery in art." + +"I am slow to make discoveries," said Horrocks grimly, damping her +suddenly. "But what I discover...." He stopped. + +"Well?" she said. + +"Nothing;" and suddenly he rose to his feet. + +"I promised to show you the works," he said to Raut, and put his big, +clumsy hand on his friend's shoulder. "And you are ready to go?" + +"Quite," said Raut, and stood up also. + +There was another pause. Each of them peered through the indistinctness +of the dusk at the other two. Horrock's hand still rested on Raut's +shoulder. Raut half fancied still that the incident was trivial after +all. But Mrs. Horrocks knew her husband better, knew that grim quiet in +his voice, and the confusion in her mind took a vague shape of physical +evil. "Very well," said Horrocks, and, dropping his hand, turned +towards the door. + +"My hat?" Raut looked round in the half-light. + +"That's my work-basket," said Mrs. Horrocks, with a gust of hysterical +laughter. Their hands came together on the back of the chair. "Here it +is!" he said. She had an impulse to warn him in an undertone, but she +could not frame a word. "Don't go!" and "Beware of him!" struggled in +her mind, and the swift moment passed. + +"Got it?" said Horrocks, standing with the door half open. + +Raut stepped towards him. "Better say good-bye to Mrs. Horrocks," said +the ironmaster, even more grimly quiet in his tone than before. + +Raut started and turned. "Good-evening, Mrs. Horrocks," he said, and +their hands touched. + +Horrocks held the door open with a ceremonial politeness unusual in +him towards men. Raut went out, and then, after a wordless look at +her, her husband followed. She stood motionless while Raut's light +footfall and her husband's heavy tread, like bass and treble, passed +down the passage together. The front door slammed heavily. She went to +the window, moving slowly, and stood watching--leaning forward. The two +men appeared for a moment at the gateway in the road, passed under the +street lamp, and were hidden by the black masses of the shrubbery. The +lamplight fell for a moment on their faces, showing only unmeaning pale +patches, telling nothing of what she still feared, and doubted, and +craved vainly to know. Then she sank down into a crouching attitude in +the big arm-chair, her eyes wide open and staring out at the red lights +from the furnaces that flickered in the sky. An hour after she was +still there, her attitude scarcely changed. + +The oppressive stillness of the evening weighed heavily upon Raut. They +went side by side down the road in silence, and in silence turned into +the cinder-made by-way that presently opened out the prospect of the +valley. + +A blue haze, half dust, half mist, touched the long valley with +mystery. Beyond were Hanley and Etruria, grey and dark masses, +outlined thinly by the rare golden dots of the street lamps, and here +and there a gaslit window, or the yellow glare of some late-working +factory or crowded public-house. Out of the masses, clear and slender +against the evening sky, rose a multitude of tall chimneys, many of +them reeking, a few smokeless during a season of "play." Here and +there a pallid patch and ghostly stunted beehive shapes showed the +position of a pot-bank, or a wheel, black and sharp against the hot +lower sky, marked some colliery where they raise the iridescent coal +of the place. Nearer at hand was the broad stretch of railway, and +half invisible trains shunted--a steady puffing and rumbling, with +every run a ringing concussion and a rhythmic series of impacts, and a +passage of intermittent puffs of white steam across the further view. +And to the left, between the railway and the dark mass of the low hill +beyond, dominating the whole view, colossal, inky-black, and crowned +with smoke and fitful flames, stood the great cylinders of the Jeddah +Company Blast Furnaces, the central edifices of the big ironworks of +which Horrocks was the manager. They stood heavy and threatening, full +of an incessant turmoil of flames and seething molten iron, and about +the feet of them rattled the rolling-mills, and the steam-hammer beat +heavily and splashed the white iron sparks hither and thither. Even as +they looked, a truckful of fuel was shot into one of the giants, and +the red flames gleamed out, and a confusion of smoke and black dust +came boiling upwards towards the sky. + +"Certainly you get some fine effects of colour with your furnaces," +said Raut, breaking a silence that had become apprehensive. + +Horrocks grunted. He stood with his hands in his pockets, frowning down +at the dim steaming railway and the busy ironworks beyond, frowning as +if he were thinking out some knotty problem. + +Raut glanced at him and away again. "At present your moonlight effect +is hardly ripe," he continued, looking upward; "the moon is still +smothered by the vestiges of daylight." + +Horrocks stared at him with the expression of a man who has suddenly +awakened. "Vestiges of daylight?... Of course, of course." He too +looked up at the moon, pale still in the midsummer sky. "Come along," +he said suddenly, and, gripping Raut's arm in his hand, made a move +towards the path that dropped from them to the railway. + +Raut hung back. Their eyes met and saw a thousand things in a moment +that their lips came near to say. Horrocks's hand tightened and then +relaxed. He let go, and before Raut was aware of it, they were arm in +arm, and walking, one unwillingly enough, down the path. + +"You see the fine effect of the railway signals towards Burslem," +said Horrocks, suddenly breaking into loquacity, striding fast and +tightening the grip of his elbow the while. "Little green lights +and red and white lights, all against the haze. You have an eye for +effect, Raut. It's a fine effect. And look at those furnaces of mine, +how they rise upon us as we come down the hill. That to the right is +my pet--seventy feet of him. I packed him myself, and he's boiled +away cheerfully with iron in his guts for five long years. I've a +particular fancy for _him_. That line of red there--a lovely bit of +warm orange you'd call it, Raut--that's the puddlers' furnaces, and +there, in the hot light, three black figures--did you see the white +splash of the steam-hammer then?--that's the rolling-mills. Come along! +Clang, clatter, how it goes rattling across the floor! Sheet tin, +Raut,--amazing stuff. Glass mirrors are not in it when that stuff comes +from the mill. And, squelch!--there goes the hammer again. Come along!" + +He had to stop talking to catch at his breath. His arm twisted into +Raut's with benumbing tightness. He had come striding down the black +path towards the railway as though he was possessed. Raut had not +spoken a word, had simply hung back against Horrocks's pull with all +his strength. + +"I say," he said now, laughing nervously, but with an undernote of +snarl in his voice, "why on earth are you nipping my arm off, Horrocks, +and dragging me along like this?" + +At length Horrocks released him. His manner changed again. "Nipping +your arm off?" he said. "Sorry. But it's you taught me the trick of +walking in that friendly way." + +"You haven't learnt the refinements of it yet then," said Raut, +laughing artificially again. "By Jove! I'm black and blue." Horrocks +offered no apology. They stood now near the bottom of the hill, close +to the fence that bordered the railway. The ironworks had grown larger +and spread out with their approach. They looked up to the blast +furnaces now instead of down; the further view of Etruria and Hanley +had dropped out of sight with their descent. Before them, by the stile, +rose a notice-board, bearing, still dimly visible, the words, "BEWARE +OF THE TRAINS," half hidden by splashes of coaly mud. + +"Fine effects," said Horrocks, waving his arm. "Here comes a train. The +puffs of smoke, the orange glare, the round eye of light in front of +it, the melodious rattle. Fine effects! But these furnaces of mine used +to be finer, before we shoved cones in their throats, and saved the +gas." + +"How?" said Raut. "Cones?" + +"Cones, my man, cones. I'll show you one nearer. The flames used to +flare out of the open throats, great--what is it?--pillars of cloud by +day, red and black smoke, and pillars of fire by night. Now we run it +off in pipes, and burn it to heat the blast, and the top is shut by a +cone. You'll be interested in that cone." + +"But every now and then," said Raut, "you get a burst of fire and smoke +up there." + +"The cone's not fixed, it's hung by a chain from a lever, and balanced +by an equipoise. You shall see it nearer. Else, of course, there'd be +no way of getting fuel into the thing. Every now and then the cone +dips, and out comes the flare." + +"I see," said Raut. He looked over his shoulder. "The moon gets +brighter," he said. + +"Come along," said Horrocks abruptly, gripping his shoulder again, and +moving him suddenly towards the railway crossing. And then came one of +those swift incidents, vivid, but so rapid that they leave one doubtful +and reeling. Halfway across, Horrocks's hand suddenly clenched upon him +like a vice and swung him backward and through a half-turn, so that +he looked up the line. And there a chain of lamp-lit carriage-windows +telescoped swiftly as it came towards them, and the red and yellow +lights of an engine grew larger and larger, rushing down upon them. +As he grasped what this meant, he turned his face to Horrocks, and +pushed with all his strength against the arm that held him back between +the rails. The struggle did not last a moment. Just as certain as it +was that Horrocks held him there, so certain was it that he had been +violently lugged out of danger. + +"Out of the way," said Horrocks, with a gasp, as the train came +rattling by, and they stood panting by the gate into the ironworks. + +"I did not see it coming," said Raut, still, even in spite of his own +apprehensions, trying to keep up an appearance of ordinary intercourse. + +Horrocks answered with a grunt. "The cone," he said, and then, as one +who recovers himself, "I thought you did not hear." + +"I didn't," said Raut. + +"I wouldn't have had you run over then for the world," said Horrocks. + +"For a moment I lost my nerve," said Raut. + +Horrocks stood for half a minute, then turned abruptly towards the +ironworks again. "See how fine these great mounds of mine, these +clinker-heaps, look in the night! That truck yonder, up above there! +Up it goes, and out-tilts the slag. See the palpitating red stuff go +sliding down the slope. As we get nearer, the heap rises up and cuts +the blast furnaces. See the quiver up above the big one. Not that +way! This way, between the heaps. That goes to the puddling furnaces, +but I want to show you the canal first." He came and took Raut by the +elbow, and so they went along side by side. Raut answered Horrocks +vaguely. What, he asked himself, had really happened on the line? Was +he deluding himself with his own fancies, or had Horrocks actually held +him back in the way of the train? Had he just been within an ace of +being murdered? + +Suppose this slouching, scowling monster _did_ know anything? For a +minute or two then Raut was really afraid for his life, but the mood +passed as he reasoned with himself. After all, Horrocks might have +heard nothing. At anyrate, he had pulled him out of the way in time. +His odd manner might be due to the mere vague jealousy he had shown +once before. He was talking now of the ash-heaps and the canal. "Eigh?" +said Horrocks. + +"What?" said Raut. "Rather! The haze in the moonlight. Fine!" + +"Our canal," said Horrocks, stopping suddenly. "Our canal by moonlight +and firelight is an immense effect. You've never seen it? Fancy that! +You've spent too many of your evenings philandering up in Newcastle +there. I tell you, for real florid effects-- But you shall see. Boiling +water...." + +As they came out of the labyrinth of clinker-heaps and mounds of coal +and ore, the noises of the rolling-mill sprang upon them suddenly, +loud, near, and distinct. Three shadowy workmen went by and touched +their caps to Horrocks. Their faces were vague in the darkness. Raut +felt a futile impulse to address them, and before he could frame +his words, they passed into the shadows. Horrocks pointed to the +canal close before them now: a weird-looking place it seemed, in the +blood-red reflections of the furnaces. The hot water that cooled the +tuyères came into it, some fifty yards up--a tumultuous, almost boiling +affluent, and the steam rose up from the water in silent white wisps +and streaks, wrapping damply about them, an incessant succession of +ghosts coming up from the black and red eddies, a white uprising that +made the head swim. The shining black tower of the larger blast-furnace +rose overhead out of the mist, and its tumultuous riot filled their +ears. Raut kept away from the edge of the water, and watched Horrocks. + +"Here it is red," said Horrocks, "blood-red vapour as red and hot as +sin; but yonder there, where the moonlight falls on it, and it drives +across the clinker-heaps, it is as white as death." + +Raut turned his head for a moment, and then came back hastily to his +watch on Horrocks. "Come along to the rolling-mills," said Horrocks. +The threatening hold was not so evident that time, and Raut felt a +little reassured. But all the same, what on earth did Horrocks mean +about "white as death" and "red as sin"? Coincidence, perhaps? + +They went and stood behind the puddlers for a little while, and then +through the rolling-mills, where amidst an incessant din the deliberate +steam-hammer beat the juice out of the succulent iron, and black, +half-naked Titans rushed the plastic bars, like hot sealing-wax, +between the wheels. "Come on," said Horrocks in Raut's ear, and they +went and peeped through the little glass hole behind the tuyères, and +saw the tumbled fire writhing in the pit of the blast-furnace. It left +one eye blinded for a while. Then, with green and blue patches dancing +across the dark, they went to the lift by which the trucks of ore and +fuel and lime were raised to the top of the big cylinder. + +And out upon the narrow rail that overhung the furnace, Raut's +doubts came upon him again. Was it wise to be here? If Horrocks did +know--everything! Do what he would, he could not resist a violent +trembling. Right under foot was a sheer depth of seventy feet. It was a +dangerous place. They pushed by a truck of fuel to get to the railing +that crowned the place. The reek of the furnace, a sulphurous vapour +streaked with pungent bitterness, seemed to make the distant hillside +of Hanley quiver. The moon was riding out now from among a drift of +clouds, half-way up the sky above the undulating wooded outlines +of Newcastle. The steaming canal ran away from below them under an +indistinct bridge, and vanished into the dim haze of the flat fields +towards Burslem. + +"That's the cone I've been telling you of," shouted Horrocks; "and, +below that, sixty feet of fire and molten metal, with the air of the +blast frothing through it like gas in soda-water." + +Raut gripped the hand-rail tightly, and stared down at the cone. The +heat was intense. The boiling of the iron and the tumult of the blast +made a thunderous accompaniment to Horrocks's voice. But the thing had +to be gone through now. Perhaps, after all.... + +"In the middle," bawled Horrocks, "temperature near a thousand degrees. +If _you_ were dropped into it ... flash into flame like a pinch of +gunpowder in a candle. Put your hand out and feel the heat of his +breath. Why, even up here I've seen the rain-water boiling off the +trucks. And that cone there. It's a damned sight too hot for roasting +cakes. The top side of it's three hundred degrees." + +"Three hundred degrees!" said Raut. + +"Three hundred centigrade, mind!" said Horrocks. "It will boil the +blood out of you in no time." + +"Eigh?" said Raut, and turned. + +"Boil the blood out of you in.... No, you don't!" + +"Let me go!" screamed Raut. "Let go my arm!" + +With one hand he clutched at the hand-rail, then with both. For a +moment the two men stood swaying. Then suddenly, with a violent jerk, +Horrocks had twisted him from his hold. He clutched at Horrocks and +missed, his foot went back into empty air; in mid-air he twisted +himself, and then cheek and shoulder and knee struck the hot cone +together. + +He clutched the chain by which the cone hung, and the thing sank an +infinitesimal amount as he struck it. A circle of glowing red appeared +about him, and a tongue of flame, released from the chaos within, +flickered up towards him. An intense pain assailed him at the knees, +and he could smell the singeing of his hands. He raised himself to his +feet, and tried to climb up the chain, and then something struck his +head. Black and shining with the moonlight, the throat of the furnace +rose about him. + +Horrocks, he saw, stood above him by one of the trucks of fuel on the +rail. The gesticulating figure was bright and white in the moonlight, +and shouting, "Fizzle, you fool! Fizzle, you hunter of women! You +hot-blooded hound! Boil! boil! boil!" + +Suddenly he caught up a handful of coal out of the truck, and flung it +deliberately, lump after lump, at Raut. + +"Horrocks!" cried Raut. "Horrocks!" + +He clung crying to the chain, pulling himself up from the burning of +the cone. Each missile Horrocks flung hit him. His clothes charred +and glowed, and as he struggled the cone dropped, and a rush of hot +suffocating gas whooped out and burned round him in a swift breath of +flame. + +His human likeness departed from him. When the momentary red had +passed, Horrocks saw a charred, blackened figure, its head streaked +with blood, still clutching and fumbling with the chain, and writhing +in agony--a cindery animal, an inhuman, monstrous creature that began a +sobbing intermittent shriek. + +Abruptly, at the sight, the ironmaster's anger passed. A deadly +sickness came upon him. The heavy odour of burning flesh came drifting +up to his nostrils. His sanity returned to him. + +"God have mercy upon me!" he cried. "O God! what have I done?" + +He knew the thing below him, save that it still moved and felt, was +already a dead man--that the blood of the poor wretch must be boiling +in his veins. An intense realisation of that agony came to his mind, +and overcame every other feeling. For a moment he stood irresolute, and +then, turning to the truck, he hastily tilted its contents upon the +struggling thing that had once been a man. The mass fell with a thud, +and went radiating over the cone. With the thud the shriek ended, and +a boiling confusion of smoke, dust, and flame came rushing up towards +him. As it passed, he saw the cone clear again. + +Then he staggered back, and stood trembling, clinging to the rail with +both hands. His lips moved, but no words came to them. + +Down below was the sound of voices and running steps. The clangour of +rolling in the shed ceased abruptly. + + + + +THE PURPLE PILEUS + + +Mr. Coombes was sick of life. He walked away from his unhappy home, +and, sick not only of his own existence, but of everybody else's, +turned aside down Gaswork Lane to avoid the town, and, crossing the +wooden bridge that goes over the canal to Starling's Cottages, was +presently alone in the damp pinewoods and out of sight and sound of +human habitation. He would stand it no longer. He repeated aloud with +blasphemies unusual to him that he would stand it no longer. + +He was a pale-faced little man, with dark eyes and a fine and very +black moustache. He had a very stiff, upright collar slightly frayed, +that gave him an illusory double chin, and his overcoat (albeit +shabby) was trimmed with astrachan. His gloves were a bright brown +with black stripes over the knuckles, and split at the finger ends. +His appearance, his wife had said once in the dear, dead days beyond +recall,--before he married her, that is,--was military. But now she +called him-- It seems a dreadful thing to tell of between husband and +wife, but she called him "a little grub." It wasn't the only thing she +had called him, either. + +The row had arisen about that beastly Jennie again. Jennie was his +wife's friend, and, by no invitation of Mr. Coombes, she came in every +blessed Sunday to dinner, and made a shindy all the afternoon. She was +a big, noisy girl, with a taste for loud colours and a strident laugh; +and this Sunday she had outdone all her previous intrusions by bringing +in a fellow with her, a chap as showy as herself. And Mr. Coombes, +in a starchy, clean collar and his Sunday frock-coat, had sat dumb +and wrathful at his own table, while his wife and her guests talked +foolishly and undesirably, and laughed aloud. Well, he stood that, and +after dinner (which, "as usual," was late), what must Miss Jennie do +but go to the piano and play banjo tunes, for all the world as if it +were a week-day! Flesh and blood could not endure such goings on. They +would hear next door, they would hear in the road, it was a public +announcement of their disrepute. He had to speak. + +He had felt himself go pale, and a kind of rigour had affected his +respiration as he delivered himself. He had been sitting on one of +the chairs by the window--the new guest had taken possession of the +arm-chair. He turned his head. "Sun Day!" he said over the collar, in +the voice of one who warns. "Sun Day!" What people call a "nasty" tone +it was. + +Jennie had kept on playing, but his wife, who was looking through +some music that was piled on the top of the piano, had stared at him. +"What's wrong now?" she said; "can't people enjoy themselves?" + +"I don't mind rational 'njoyment, at all," said little Coombes, "but I +ain't a-going to have week-day tunes playing on a Sunday in this house." + +"What's wrong with my playing now?" said Jennie, stopping and twirling +round on the music-stool with a monstrous rustle of flounces. + +Coombes saw it was going to be a row, and opened too vigorously, as is +common with your timid, nervous men all the world over. "Steady on with +that music-stool!" said he; "it ain't made for 'eavy weights." + +"Never you mind about weights," said Jennie, incensed. "What was you +saying behind my back about my playing?" + +"Surely you don't 'old with not having a bit of music on a Sunday, Mr. +Coombes?" said the new guest, leaning back in the arm-chair, blowing +a cloud of cigarette smoke and smiling in a kind of pitying way. And +simultaneously his wife said something to Jennie about "Never mind 'im. +You go on, Jinny." + +"I do," said Mr. Coombes, addressing the new guest. + +"May I arst why?" said the new guest, evidently enjoying both his +cigarette and the prospect of an argument. He was, by the bye, a lank +young man, very stylishly dressed in bright drab, with a white cravat +and a pearl and silver pin. It had been better taste to come in a black +coat, Mr. Coombes thought. + +"Because," began Mr. Coombes, "it don't suit me. I'm a business man. I +'ave to study my connection. Rational 'njoyment"-- + +"His connection!" said Mrs. Coombes scornfully. "That's what he's +always a-saying. We got to do this, and we got to do that"-- + +"If you don't mean to study my connection," said Mr. Coombes, "what did +you marry me for?" + +"I wonder," said Jennie, and turned back to the piano. + +"I never saw such a man as you," said Mrs. Coombes. "You've altered all +round since we were married. Before"-- + +Then Jennie began at the tum, tum, tum again. + +"Look here!" said Mr. Coombes, driven at last to revolt, standing up +and raising his voice. "I tell you I won't have that." The frock-coat +heaved with his indignation. + +"No vi'lence, now," said the long young man in drab, sitting up. + +"Who the juice are you?" said Mr. Coombes fiercely. + +Whereupon they all began talking at once. The new guest said he was +Jennie's "intended," and meant to protect her, and Mr. Coombes said he +was welcome to do so anywhere but in his (Mr. Coombes') house; and Mrs. +Coombes said he ought to be ashamed of insulting his guests, and (as I +have already mentioned) that he was getting a regular little grub; and +the end was, that Mr. Coombes ordered his visitors out of the house, +and they wouldn't go, and so he said he would go himself. With his face +burning and tears of excitement in his eyes, he went into the passage, +and as he struggled with his overcoat--his frock-coat sleeves got +concertinaed up his arm--and gave a brush at his silk hat, Jennie began +again at the piano, and strummed him insultingly out of the house. +Tum, tum, tum. He slammed the shop door so that the house quivered. +That, briefly, was the immediate making of his mood. You will perhaps +begin to understand his disgust with existence. + +As he walked along the muddy path under the firs,--it was late October, +and the ditches and heaps of fir needles were gorgeous with clumps of +fungi,--he recapitulated the melancholy history of his marriage. It +was brief and commonplace enough. He now perceived with sufficient +clearness that his wife had married him out of a natural curiosity +and in order to escape from her worrying, laborious, and uncertain +life in the workroom; and, like the majority of her class, she was +far too stupid to realise that it was her duty to co-operate with +him in his business. She was greedy of enjoyment, loquacious, and +socially-minded, and evidently disappointed to find the restraints of +poverty still hanging about her. His worries exasperated her, and the +slightest attempt to control her proceedings resulted in a charge of +"grumbling." Why couldn't he be nice--as he used to be? And Coombes was +such a harmless little man, too, nourished mentally on _Self-Help_, and +with a meagre ambition of self-denial and competition, that was to end +in a "sufficiency." Then Jennie came in as a female Mephistopheles, +a gabbling chronicle of "fellers," and was always wanting his wife +to go to theatres, and "all that." And in addition were aunts of his +wife, and cousins (male and female), to eat up capital, insult him +personally, upset business arrangements, annoy good customers, and +generally blight his life. It was not the first occasion by many +that Mr. Coombes had fled his home in wrath and indignation, and +something like fear, vowing furiously and even aloud that he wouldn't +stand it, and so frothing away his energy along the line of least +resistance. But never before had he been quite so sick of life as on +this particular Sunday afternoon. The Sunday dinner may have had its +share in his despair--and the greyness of the sky. Perhaps, too, he +was beginning to realise his unendurable frustration as a business man +as the consequence of his marriage. Presently bankruptcy, and after +that-- Perhaps she might have reason to repent when it was too late. +And destiny, as I have already intimated, had planted the path through +the wood with evil-smelling fungi, thickly and variously planted it, +not only on the right side, but on the left. + +A small shopman is in such a melancholy position, if his wife turns out +a disloyal partner. His capital is all tied up in his business, and to +leave her, means to join the unemployed in some strange part of the +earth. The luxuries of divorce are beyond him altogether. So that the +good old tradition of marriage for better or worse holds inexorably for +him, and things work up to tragic culminations. Bricklayers kick their +wives to death, and dukes betray theirs; but it is among the small +clerks and shopkeepers nowadays that it comes most often to a cutting +of throats. Under the circumstances it is not so very remarkable--and +you must take it as charitably as you can--that the mind of Mr. Coombes +ran for a while on some such glorious close to his disappointed hopes, +and that he thought of razors, pistols, bread-knives, and touching +letters to the coroner denouncing his enemies by name, and praying +piously for forgiveness. After a time his fierceness gave way to +melancholia. He had been married in this very overcoat, in his first +and only frock-coat that was buttoned up beneath it. He began to recall +their courting along this very walk, his years of penurious saving to +get capital, and the bright hopefulness of his marrying days. For it +all to work out like this! Was there no sympathetic ruler anywhere in +the world? He reverted to death as a topic. + +He thought of the canal he had just crossed, and doubted whether he +shouldn't stand with his head out, even in the middle, and it was +while drowning was in his mind that the purple pileus caught his eye. +He looked at it mechanically for a moment, and stopped and stooped +towards it to pick it up, under the impression that it was some such +small leather object as a purse. Then he saw that it was the purple top +of a fungus, a peculiarly poisonous-looking purple: slimy, shiny, and +emitting a sour odour. He hesitated with his hand an inch or so from +it, and the thought of poison crossed his mind. With that he picked the +thing, and stood up again with it in his hand. + +The odour was certainly strong--acrid, but by no means disgusting. +He broke off a piece, and the fresh surface was a creamy white, that +changed like magic in the space of ten seconds to a yellowish-green +colour. It was even an inviting-looking change. He broke off two other +pieces to see it repeated. They were wonderful things these fungi, +thought Mr. Coombes, and all of them the deadliest poisons, as his +father had often told him. Deadly poisons! + +There is no time like the present for a rash resolve. Why not here +and now? thought Mr. Coombes. He tasted a little piece, a very little +piece indeed--a mere crumb. It was so pungent that he almost spat +it out again, then merely hot and full-flavoured. A kind of German +mustard with a touch of horse-radish and--well, mushroom. He swallowed +it in the excitement of the moment. Did he like it or did he not? +His mind was curiously careless. He would try another bit. It really +wasn't bad--it was good. He forgot his troubles in the interest of +the immediate moment. Playing with death it was. He took another +bite, and then deliberately finished a mouthful. A curious tingling +sensation began in his finger-tips and toes. His pulse began to move +faster. The blood in his ears sounded like a mill-race. "Try bi' more," +said Mr. Coombes. He turned and looked about him, and found his feet +unsteady. He saw and struggled towards a little patch of purple a dozen +yards away. "Jol' goo' stuff," said Mr. Coombes. "E--lomore ye'." He +pitched forward and fell on his face, his hands outstretched towards +the cluster of pilei. But he did not eat any more of them. He forgot +forthwith. + +He rolled over and sat up with a look of astonishment on his face. +His carefully brushed silk hat had rolled away towards the ditch. He +pressed his hand to his brow. Something had happened, but he could +not rightly determine what it was. Anyhow, he was no longer dull--he +felt bright, cheerful. And his throat was afire. He laughed in the +sudden gaiety of his heart. Had he been dull? He did not know; but at +anyrate he would be dull no longer. He got up and stood unsteadily, +regarding the universe with an agreeable smile. He began to remember. +He could not remember very well, because of a steam roundabout that +was beginning in his head. And he knew he had been disagreeable at +home, just because they wanted to be happy. They were quite right; life +should be as gay as possible. He would go home and make it up, and +reassure them. And why not take some of this delightful toadstool with +him, for them to eat? A hatful, no less. Some of those red ones with +white spots as well, and a few yellow. He had been a dull dog, an enemy +to merriment; he would make up for it. It would be gay to turn his +coat-sleeves inside out, and stick some yellow gorse into his waistcoat +pockets. Then home--singing--for a jolly evening. + + * * * * * + +After the departure of Mr. Coombes, Jennie discontinued playing, and +turned round on the music-stool again. "What a fuss about nothing," +said Jennie. + +"You see, Mr. Clarence, what I've got to put up with," said Mrs. +Coombes. + +"He is a bit hasty," said Mr. Clarence judicially. + +"He ain't got the slightest sense of our position," said Mrs. Coombes; +"that's what I complain of. He cares for nothing but his old shop; and +if I have a bit of company, or buy anything to keep myself decent, +or get any little thing I want out of the housekeeping money, there's +disagreeables. 'Economy,' he says; 'struggle for life,' and all that. +He lies awake of nights about it, worrying how he can screw me out of a +shilling. He wanted us to eat Dorset butter once. If once I was to give +in to him--there!" + +"Of course," said Jennie. + +"If a man values a woman," said Mr. Clarence lounging back in the +arm-chair, "he must be prepared to make sacrifices for her. For my own +part," said Mr. Clarence, with his eye on Jennie, "I shouldn't think +of marrying till I was in a position to do the thing in style. It's +downright selfishness. A man ought to go through the rough-and-tumble +by himself, and not drag her"-- + +"I don't agree altogether with that," said Jennie. "I don't see why +a man shouldn't have a woman's help, provided he doesn't treat her +meanly, you know. It's meanness"-- + +"You wouldn't believe," said Mrs. Coombes. "But I was a fool to 'ave +'im. I might 'ave known. If it 'adn't been for my father, we shouldn't +have had not a carriage to our wedding." + +"Lord! he didn't stick out at that?" said Mr. Clarence, quite shocked. + +"Said he wanted the money for his stock, or some such rubbish. Why, he +wouldn't have a woman in to help me once a week if it wasn't for my +standing out plucky. And the fusses he makes about money--comes to me, +well, pretty near crying, with sheets of paper and figgers. 'If only we +can tide over this year,' he says, 'the business is bound to go.' 'If +only we can tide over this year,' I says; 'then it'll be, if only we +can tide over next year. I know you,' I says. 'And you don't catch me +screwing myself lean and ugly. Why didn't you marry a slavey?' I says, +'if you wanted one--instead of a respectable girl,' I says." + +So Mrs. Coombes. But we will not follow this unedifying conversation +further. Suffice it that Mr. Coombes was very satisfactorily disposed +of, and they had a snug little time round the fire. Then Mrs. Coombes +went to get the tea, and Jennie sat coquettishly on the arm of Mr. +Clarence's chair until the tea-things clattered outside. "What was +that I heard?" asked Mrs. Coombes playfully, as she entered, and there +was badinage about kissing. They were just sitting down to the little +circular table when the first intimation of Mr. Coombes' return was +heard. + +This was a fumbling at the latch of the front door. + +"'Ere's my lord," said Mrs. Coombes. "Went out like a lion and comes +back like a lamb, I'll lay." + +Something fell over in the shop: a chair, it sounded like. Then there +was a sound as of some complicated step exercise in the passage. Then +the door opened and Coombes appeared. But it was Coombes transfigured. +The immaculate collar had been torn carelessly from his throat. His +carefully-brushed silk hat, half-full of a crush of fungi, was under +one arm; his coat was inside out, and his waistcoat adorned with +bunches of yellow-blossomed furze. These little eccentricities of +Sunday costume, however, were quite overshadowed by the change in his +face; it was livid white, his eyes were unnaturally large and bright, +and his pale blue lips were drawn back in a cheerless grin. "Merry!" +he said. He had stopped dancing to open the door. "Rational 'njoyment. +Dance." He made three fantastic steps into the room, and stood bowing. + +"Jim!" shrieked Mrs. Coombes, and Mr. Clarence sat petrified, with a +dropping lower jaw. + +"Tea," said Mr. Coombes. "Jol' thing, tea. Tose-stools, too. Brosher." + +"He's drunk," said Jennie in a weak voice. Never before had she seen +this intense pallor in a drunken man, or such shining, dilated eyes. + +Mr. Coombes held out a handful of scarlet agaric to Mr. Clarence. "Jo' +stuff," said he; "ta' some." + +At that moment he was genial. Then at the sight of their startled faces +he changed, with the swift transition of insanity, into overbearing +fury. And it seemed as if he had suddenly recalled the quarrel of his +departure. In such a huge voice as Mrs. Coombes had never heard before, +he shouted, "My house. I'm master 'ere. Eat what I give yer!" He bawled +this, as it seemed, without an effort, without a violent gesture, +standing there as motionless as one who whispers, holding out a handful +of fungus. + +Clarence approved himself a coward. He could not meet the mad fury in +Coombes' eyes; he rose to his feet, pushing back his chair, and turned, +stooping. At that Coombes rushed at him. Jennie saw her opportunity, +and, with the ghost of a shriek, made for the door. Mrs. Coombes +followed her. Clarence tried to dodge. Over went the tea-table with a +smash as Coombes clutched him by the collar and tried to thrust the +fungus into his mouth. Clarence was content to leave his collar behind +him, and shot out into the passage with red patches of fly agaric still +adherent to his face. "Shut 'im in!" cried Mrs. Coombes, and would have +closed the door, but her supports deserted her; Jennie saw the shop +door open, and vanished thereby, locking it behind her, while Clarence +went on hastily into the kitchen. Mr. Coombes came heavily against the +door, and Mrs. Coombes, finding the key was inside, fled upstairs and +locked herself in the spare bedroom. + +So the new convert to _joie de vivre_ emerged upon the passage, his +decorations a little scattered, but that respectable hatful of fungi +still under his arm. He hesitated at the three ways, and decided on the +kitchen. Whereupon Clarence, who was fumbling with the key, gave up +the attempt to imprison his host, and fled into the scullery, only to +be captured before he could open the door into the yard. Mr. Clarence +is singularly reticent of the details of what occurred. It seems that +Mr. Coombes' transitory irritation had vanished again, and he was once +more a genial playfellow. And as there were knives and meat choppers +about, Clarence very generously resolved to humour him and so avoid +anything tragic. It is beyond dispute that Mr. Coombes played with Mr. +Clarence to his heart's content; they could not have been more playful +and familiar if they had known each other for years. He insisted gaily +on Clarence trying the fungi, and after a friendly tussle, was smitten +with remorse at the mess he was making of his guest's face. It also +appears that Clarence was dragged under the sink and his face scrubbed +with the blacking brush,--he being still resolved to humour the lunatic +at any cost,--and that finally, in a somewhat dishevelled, chipped, and +discoloured condition, he was assisted to his coat and shown out by the +back door, the shopway being barred by Jennie. Mr. Coombes' wandering +thoughts then turned to Jennie. Jennie had been unable to unfasten the +shop door, but she shot the bolts against Mr. Coombes' latch-key, and +remained in possession of the shop for the rest of the evening. + +It would appear that Mr. Coombes then returned to the kitchen, still +in pursuit of gaiety, and, albeit a strict Good Templar, drank (or +spilt down the front of the first and only frock-coat) no less than +five bottles of the stout Mrs. Coombes insisted upon having for her +health's sake. He made cheerful noises by breaking off the necks of +the bottles with several of his wife's wedding-present dinner-plates, +and during the earlier part of this great drunk he sang divers merry +ballads. He cut his finger rather badly with one of the bottles,--the +only bloodshed in this story,--and what with that, and the systematic +convulsion of his inexperienced physiology by the liquorish brand +of Mrs. Coombes' stout, it may be the evil of the fungus poison was +somehow allayed. But we prefer to draw a veil over the concluding +incidents of this Sunday afternoon. They ended in the coal cellar, in a +deep and healing sleep. + + * * * * * + +An interval of five years elapsed. Again it was a Sunday afternoon +in October, and again Mr. Coombes walked through the pinewood beyond +the canal. He was still the same dark-eyed, black-moustached little +man that he was at the outset of the story, but his double chin was +now scarcely so illusory as it had been. His overcoat was new, with a +velvet lapel, and a stylish collar with turn-down corners, free of any +coarse starchiness, had replaced the original all-round article. His +hat was glossy, his gloves newish--though one finger had split and been +carefully mended. And a casual observer would have noticed about him a +certain rectitude of bearing, a certain erectness of head that marks +the man who thinks well of himself. He was a master now, with three +assistants. Beside him walked a larger sunburnt parody of himself, his +brother Tom, just back from Australia. They were recapitulating their +early struggles, and Mr. Coombes had just been making a financial +statement. + +"It's a very nice little business, Jim," said brother Tom. "In these +days of competition you're jolly lucky to have worked it up so. And +you're jolly lucky, too, to have a wife who's willing to help like +yours does." + +"Between ourselves," said Mr. Coombes, "it wasn't always so. It wasn't +always like this. To begin with, the missus was a bit giddy. Girls are +funny creatures." + +"Dear me!" + +"Yes. You'd hardly think it, but she was downright extravagant, and +always having slaps at me. I was a bit too easy and loving, and all +that, and she thought the whole blessed show was run for her. Turned +the 'ouse into a regular caravansery, always having her relations and +girls from business in, and their chaps. Comic songs a' Sunday, it was +getting to, and driving trade away. And she was making eyes at the +chaps, too! I tell you, Tom, the place wasn't my own." + +"Shouldn't 'a' thought it." + +"It was so. Well--I reasoned with her. I said, 'I ain't a duke, to keep +a wife like a pet animal. I married you for 'elp and company.' I said, +'You got to 'elp and pull the business through.' She wouldn't 'ear of +it. 'Very well,' I says; 'I'm a mild man till I'm roused,' I says, 'and +it's getting to that.' But she wouldn't 'ear of no warnings." + +"Well?" + +"It's the way with women. She didn't think I 'ad it in me to be roused. +Women of her sort (between ourselves, Tom) don't respect a man until +they're a bit afraid of him. So I just broke out to show her. In comes +a girl named Jennie, that used to work with her, and her chap. We 'ad +a bit of a row, and I came out 'ere--it was just such another day as +this--and I thought it all out. Then I went back and pitched into them." + +"You did?" + +"I did. I was mad, I can tell you. I wasn't going to 'it 'er, if I +could 'elp it, so I went back and licked into this chap, just to show +'er what I could do. 'E was a big chap, too. Well, I chucked him, and +smashed things about, and gave 'er a scaring, and she ran up and locked +'erself into the spare room." + +"Well?" + +"That's all. I says to 'er the next morning, 'Now you know,' I says, +'what I'm like when I'm roused.' And I didn't 'ave to say anything +more." + +"And you've been happy ever after, eh?" + +"So to speak. There's nothing like putting your foot down with them. If +it 'adn't been for that afternoon I should 'a' been tramping the roads +now, and she'd 'a' been grumbling at me, and all her family grumbling +for bringing her to poverty--I know their little ways. But we're all +right now. And it's a very decent little business, as you say." + +They proceed on their way meditatively. "Women are funny creatures," +said brother Tom. + +"They want a firm hand," says Coombes. + +"What a lot of these funguses there are about here!" remarked brother +Tom presently. "I can't see what use they are in the world." + +Mr. Coombes looked. "I dessay they're sent for some wise purpose," said +Mr. Coombes. + +And that was as much thanks as the purple pileus ever got for maddening +this absurd little man to the pitch of decisive action, and so altering +the whole course of his life. + + + + +THE JILTING OF JANE + + +As I sit writing in my study, I can hear our Jane bumping her way +downstairs with a brush and dustpan. She used in the old days to sing +hymn tunes, or the British national song for the time being, to these +instruments, but latterly she has been silent and even careful over +her work. Time was when I prayed with fervour for such silence, and +my wife with sighs for such care, but now they have come we are not +so glad as we might have anticipated we should be. Indeed, I would +rejoice secretly, though it may be unmanly weakness to admit it, even +to hear Jane sing "Daisy," or by the fracture of any plate but one of +Euphemia's best green ones, to learn that the period of brooding has +come to an end. + +Yet how we longed to hear the last of Jane's young man before we heard +the last of him! Jane was always very free with her conversation to +my wife, and discoursed admirably in the kitchen on a variety of +topics--so well, indeed, that I sometimes left my study door open--our +house is a small one--to partake of it. But after William came, it was +always William, nothing but William; William this and William that; +and when we thought William was worked out and exhausted altogether, +then William all over again. The engagement lasted altogether three +years; yet how she got introduced to William, and so became thus +saturated with him, was always a secret. For my part, I believe it +was at the street corner where the Rev. Barnabas Baux used to hold an +open-air service after evensong on Sundays. Young Cupids were wont to +flit like moths round the paraffin flare of that centre of High Church +hymn-singing. I fancy she stood singing hymns there, out of memory and +her imagination, instead of coming home to get supper, and William +came up beside her and said, "Hello!" "Hello yourself!" she said; and, +etiquette being satisfied, they proceeded to talk together. + +As Euphemia has a reprehensible way of letting her servants talk to +her, she soon heard of him. "He is _such_ a respectable young man, +ma'am," said Jane, "you don't know." Ignoring the slur cast on her +acquaintance, my wife inquired further about this William. + +"He is second porter at Maynard's, the draper's," said Jane, "and +gets eighteen shillings--nearly a pound--a week, m'm; and when the +head porter leaves he will be head porter. His relatives are quite +superior people, m'm. Not labouring people at all. His father was a +greengrosher, m'm, and had a chumor, and he was bankrup' twice. And one +of his sisters is in a Home for the Dying. It will be a very good match +for me, m'm," said Jane, "me being an orphan girl." + +"Then you are engaged to him?" asked my wife. + +"Not engaged, ma'am; but he is saving money to buy a ring--hammyfist." + +"Well, Jane, when you are properly engaged to him you may ask him round +here on Sunday afternoons, and have tea with him in the kitchen." +For my Euphemia has a motherly conception of her duty towards her +maid-servants. And presently the amethystine ring was being worn about +the house, even with ostentation, and Jane developed a new way of +bringing in the joint, so that this gage was evident. The elder Miss +Maitland was aggrieved by it, and told my wife that servants ought not +to wear rings. But my wife looked it up in _Enquire Within_ and _Mrs. +Motherly's Book of Household Management_, and found no prohibition. So +Jane remained with this happiness added to her love. + +The treasure of Jane's heart appeared to me to be what respectable +people call a very deserving young man. "William, ma'am," said Jane one +day suddenly, with ill-concealed complacency, as she counted out the +beer bottles, "William, ma'am, is a teetotaller. Yes, m'm; and he don't +smoke. Smoking, ma'am," said Jane, as one who reads the heart, "_do_ +make such a dust about. Beside the waste of money. _And_ the smell. +However, I suppose it's necessary to some." + +Possibly it dawned on Jane that she was reflecting a little severely +upon Euphemia's comparative ill-fortune, and she added kindly, "I'm +sure the master is a hangel when his pipe's alight. Compared to other +times." + +William was at first a rather shabby young man of the ready-made black +coat school of costume. He had watery grey eyes, and a complexion +appropriate to the brother of one in a Home for the Dying. Euphemia +did not fancy him very much, even at the beginning. His eminent +respectability was vouched for by an alpaca umbrella, from which he +never allowed himself to be parted. + +"He goes to chapel," said Jane. "His papa, ma'am"-- + +"His _what_, Jane?" + +"His papa, ma'am, was Church; but Mr. Maynard is a Plymouth Brother, +and William thinks it Policy, ma'am, to go there too. Mr. Maynard comes +and talks to him quite friendly, when they ain't busy, about using up +all the ends of string, and about his soul. He takes a lot of notice, +do Mr. Maynard, of William, and the way he saves string and his soul, +ma'am." + +Presently we heard that the head porter at Maynard's had left, and that +William was head porter at twenty-three shillings a week. "He is really +kind of over the man who drives the van," said Jane, "and him married +with three children." And she promised in the pride of her heart to +make interest for us with William to favour us so that we might get our +parcels of drapery from Maynard's with exceptional promptitude. + +After this promotion a rapidly increasing prosperity came upon Jane's +young man. One day, we learned that Mr. Maynard had given William a +book. "Smiles' Elp Yourself, it's called," said Jane; "but it ain't +comic. It tells you how to get on in the world, and some what William +read to me was _lovely_, ma'am." + +Euphemia told me of this laughing, and then she became suddenly grave. +"Do you know, dear," she said, "Jane said one thing I did not like. She +had been quiet for a minute, and then she suddenly remarked, 'William +is a lot above me, ma'am, ain't he?'" + +"I don't see anything in that," I said, though later my eyes were to be +opened. + +One Sunday afternoon about that time I was sitting at my +writing-desk--possibly I was reading a good book--when a something +went by the window. I heard a startled exclamation behind me, and +saw Euphemia with her hands clasped together and her eyes dilated. +"George," she said in an awestricken whisper, "did you see?" + +Then we both spoke to one another at the same moment, slowly and +solemnly: "_A silk hat! Yellow gloves! A new umbrella!_" + +"It may be my fancy, dear," said Euphemia; "but his tie was very like +yours. I believe Jane keeps him in ties. She told me a little while +ago in a way that implied volumes about the rest of your costume, 'The +master _do_ wear pretty ties, ma'am.' And he echoes all your novelties." + +The young couple passed our window again on their way to their +customary walk. They were arm in arm. Jane looked exquisitely proud, +happy, and uncomfortable, with new white cotton gloves, and William, in +the silk hat, singularly genteel! + +That was the culmination of Jane's happiness. When she returned, "Mr. +Maynard has been talking to William, ma'am," she said, "and he is to +serve customers, just like the young shop gentlemen, during the next +sale. And if he gets on, he is to be made an assistant, ma'am, at the +first opportunity. He has got to be as gentlemanly as he can, ma'am; +and if he ain't, ma'am, he says it won't be for want of trying. Mr. +Maynard has took a great fancy to him." + +"He _is_ getting on, Jane," said my wife. + +"Yes, ma'am," said Jane thoughtfully, "he _is_ getting on." + +And she sighed. + +That next Sunday, as I drank my tea, I interrogated my wife. "How is +this Sunday different from all other Sundays, little woman? What has +happened? Have you altered the curtains, or rearranged the furniture, +or where is the indefinable difference of it? Are you wearing your hair +in a new way without warning me? I clearly perceive a change in my +environment, and I cannot for the life of me say what it is." + +Then my wife answered in her most tragic voice: "George," she said, +"that--that William has not come near the place to-day! And Jane is +crying her heart out upstairs." + +There followed a period of silence. Jane, as I have said, stopped +singing about the house, and began to care for our brittle possessions, +which struck my wife as being a very sad sign indeed. The next Sunday, +and the next, Jane asked to go out, "to walk with William," and my +wife, who never attempts to extort confidences, gave her permission, +and asked no questions. On each occasion Jane came back looking +flushed and very determined. At last one day she became communicative. + +"William is being led away," she remarked abruptly, with a catching of +the breath, apropos of tablecloths. "Yes, m'm. She is a milliner, and +she can play on the piano." + +"I thought," said my wife, "that you went out with him on Sunday." + +"Not out with him, m'm--after him. I walked along by the side of them, +and told her he was engaged to me." + +"Dear me, Jane, did you? What did they do?" + +"Took no more notice of me than if I was dirt. So I told her she should +suffer for it." + +"It could not have been a very agreeable walk, Jane." + +"Not for no parties, ma'am. + +"I wish," said Jane, "I could play the piano, ma'am. But anyhow, I +don't mean to let _her_ get him away from me. She's older than him, and +her hair ain't gold to the roots, ma'am." + +It was on the August Bank Holiday that the crisis came. We do not +clearly know the details of the fray, but only such fragments as poor +Jane let fall. She came home dusty, excited, and with her heart hot +within her. + +The milliner's mother, the milliner, and William had made a party to +the Art Museum at South Kensington, I think. Anyhow, Jane had calmly +but firmly accosted them somewhere in the streets, and asserted her +right to what, in spite of the consensus of literature, she held to +be her inalienable property. She did, I think, go so far as to lay +hands on him. They dealt with her in a crushingly superior way. They +"called a cab." There was a "scene," William being pulled away into the +four-wheeler by his future wife and mother-in-law from the reluctant +hands of our discarded Jane. There were threats of giving her "in +charge." + +"My poor Jane!" said my wife, mincing veal as though she was mincing +William. "It's a shame of them. I would think no more of him. He is not +worthy of you." + +"No, m'm," said Jane. "He _is_ weak." + +"But it's that woman has done it," said Jane. She was never known +to bring herself to pronounce "that woman's" name or to admit her +girlishness. "I can't think what minds some women must have--to try and +get a girl's young man away from her. But there, it only hurts to talk +about it," said Jane. + +Thereafter our house rested from William. But there was something in +the manner of Jane's scrubbing the front doorstep or sweeping out the +rooms, a certain viciousness, that persuaded me that the story had not +yet ended. + +"Please, m'm, may I go and see a wedding to-morrow?" said Jane one day. + +My wife knew by instinct whose wedding. "Do you think it is wise, +Jane?" she said. + +"I would like to see the last of him," said Jane. + +"My dear," said my wife, fluttering into my room about twenty minutes +after Jane had started, "Jane has been to the boot-hole and taken all +the left-off boots and shoes, and gone off to the wedding with them in +a bag. Surely she cannot mean"-- + +"Jane," I said, "is developing character. Let us hope for the best." + +Jane came back with a pale, hard face. All the boots seemed to be still +in her bag, at which my wife heaved a premature sigh of relief. We +heard her go upstairs and replace the boots with considerable emphasis. + +"Quite a crowd at the wedding, ma'am," she said presently, in a purely +conversational style, sitting in our little kitchen, and scrubbing the +potatoes; "and such a lovely day for them." She proceeded to numerous +other details, clearly avoiding some cardinal incident. + +"It was all extremely respectable and nice, ma'am; but _her_ father +didn't wear a black coat, and looked quite out of place, ma'am. Mr. +Piddingquirk"-- + +"_Who?_" + +"Mr. Piddingquirk--William that _was_, ma'am--had white gloves, and +a coat like a clergyman, and a lovely chrysanthemum. He looked so +nice, ma'am. And there was red carpet down, just like for gentlefolks. +And they say he gave the clerk four shillings, ma'am. It was a real +kerridge they had--not a fly. When they came out of church there was +rice-throwing, and her two little sisters dropping dead flowers. And +someone threw a slipper, and then I threw a boot"-- + +"Threw a _boot_, Jane!" + +"Yes, ma'am. Aimed at _her_. But it hit _him_. Yes, ma'am, hard. Gev +him a black eye, I should think. I only threw that one. I hadn't the +heart to try again. All the little boys cheered when it hit him." + +After an interval--"I am sorry the boot hit _him_." + +Another pause. The potatoes were being scrubbed violently. "He always +_was_ a bit above me, you know, ma'am. And he was led away." + +The potatoes were more than finished. Jane rose sharply, with a sigh, +and rapped the basin down on the table. + +"I don't care," she said. "I don't care a rap. He will find out his +mistake yet. It serves me right. I was stuck up about him. I ought not +to have looked so high. And I am glad things are as things are." + +My wife was in the kitchen, seeing to the higher cookery. After the +confession of the boot-throwing, she must have watched poor Jane fuming +with a certain dismay in those brown eyes of hers. But I imagine they +softened again very quickly, and then Jane's must have met them. + +"Oh, ma'am," said Jane, with an astonishing change of note, "think +of all that _might_ have been! Oh, ma'am, I _could_ have been so +happy! I ought to have known, but I didn't know.... You're very kind +to let me talk to you, ma'am ... for it's hard on me, ma'am ... it's +har-r-r-r-d"-- + +And I gather that Euphemia so far forgot herself as to let Jane sob +out some of the fulness of her heart on a sympathetic shoulder. My +Euphemia, thank Heaven, has never properly grasped the importance of +"keeping up her position." And since that fit of weeping, much of the +accent of bitterness has gone out of Jane's scrubbing and brush work. + +Indeed, something passed the other day with the butcher-boy--but that +scarcely belongs to this story. However, Jane is young still, and time +and change are at work with her. We all have our sorrows, but I do not +believe very much in the existence of sorrows that never heal. + + + + +IN THE MODERN VEIN + +AN UNSYMPATHETIC LOVE STORY + + +Of course the cultivated reader has heard of Aubrey Vair. He has +published on three several occasions volumes of delicate verses,--some, +indeed, border on indelicacy,--and his column "Of Things Literary" in +the _Climax_ is well known. His Byronic visage and an interview have +appeared in the _Perfect Lady_. It was Aubrey Vair, I believe, who +demonstrated that the humour of Dickens was worse than his sentiment, +and who detected "a subtle bourgeois flavour" in Shakespeare. However, +it is not generally known that Aubrey Vair has had erotic experiences +as well as erotic inspirations. He adopted Goethe some little time +since as his literary prototype, and that may have had something to do +with his temporary lapse from sexual integrity. + +For it is one of the commonest things that undermine literary men, +giving us landslips and picturesque effects along the otherwise even +cliff of their respectable life, ranking next to avarice, and certainly +above drink, this instability called genius, or, more fully, the +consciousness of genius, such as Aubrey Vair possessed. Since Shelley +set the fashion, your man of gifts has been assured that his duty to +himself and his duty to his wife are incompatible, and his renunciation +of the Philistine has been marked by such infidelity as his means and +courage warranted. Most virtue is lack of imagination. At anyrate, +a minor genius without his affections twisted into an inextricable +muddle, and who did not occasionally shed sonnets over his troubles, I +have never met. + +Even Aubrey Vair did this, weeping the sonnets overnight into his +blotting-book, and pretending to write literary _causerie_ when his +wife came down in her bath slippers to see what kept him up. She did +not understand him, of course. He did this even before the other woman +appeared, so ingrained is conjugal treachery in the talented mind. +Indeed, he wrote more sonnets before the other woman came than after +that event, because thereafter he spent much of his leisure in cutting +down the old productions, retrimming them, and generally altering this +readymade clothing of his passion to suit her particular height and +complexion. + +Aubrey Vair lived in a little red villa with a lawn at the back and a +view of the Downs behind Reigate. He lived upon discreet investment +eked out by literary work. His wife was handsome, sweet, and gentle, +and--such is the tender humility of good married women--she found her +life's happiness in seeing that little Aubrey Vair had well-cooked +variety for dinner, and that their house was the neatest and brightest +of all the houses they entered. Aubrey Vair enjoyed the dinners, and +was proud of the house, yet nevertheless he mourned because his genius +dwindled. Moreover, he grew plump, and corpulence threatened him. + +We learn in suffering what we teach in song, and Aubrey Vair knew +certainly that his soul could give no creditable crops unless his +affections were harrowed. And how to harrow them was the trouble, for +Reigate is a moral neighbourhood. + +So Aubrey Vair's romantic longings blew loose for a time, much as a +seedling creeper might, planted in the midst of a flower-bed. But at +last, in the fulness of time, the other woman came to the embrace +of Aubrey Vair's yearning heart-tendrils, and his romantic episode +proceeded as is here faithfully written down. + +The other woman was really a girl, and Aubrey Vair met her first at +a tennis party at Redhill. Aubrey Vair did not play tennis after the +accident to Miss Morton's eye, and because latterly it made him pant +and get warmer and moister than even a poet should be; and this young +lady had only recently arrived in England, and could not play. So they +gravitated into the two vacant basket chairs beside Mrs. Bayne's deaf +aunt, in front of the hollyhocks, and were presently talking at their +ease together. + +The other woman's name was unpropitious,--Miss Smith,--but you would +never have suspected it from her face and costume. Her parentage +was promising, she was an orphan, her mother was a Hindoo, and her +father an Indian civil servant; and Aubrey Vair--himself a happy +mixture of Kelt and Teuton, as, indeed, all literary men have to be +nowadays--naturally believed in the literary consequences of a mixture +of races. She was dressed in white. She had finely moulded pale +features, great depth of expression, and a cloud of delicately _frisé_ +black hair over her dark eyes, and she looked at Aubrey Vair with a +look half curious and half shy, that contrasted admirably with the +stereotyped frankness of your common Reigate girl. + +"This is a splendid lawn--the best in Redhill," said Aubrey Vair in the +course of the conversation; "and I like it all the better because the +daisies are spared." He indicated the daisies with a graceful sweep of +his rather elegant hand. + +"They are sweet little flowers," said the lady in white, "and I have +always associated them with England, chiefly, perhaps, through a +picture I saw 'over there' when I was very little, of children making +daisy chains. I promised myself that pleasure when I came home. But, +alas! I feel now rather too large for such delights." + +"I do not see why we should not be able to enjoy these simple pleasures +as we grow older--why our growth should have in it so much forgetting. +For my own part"-- + +"Has your wife got Jane's recipe for stuffing trout?" asked Mrs. +Bayne's deaf aunt abruptly. + +"I really don't know," said Aubrey Vair. + +"That's all right," said Mrs. Bayne's deaf aunt. "It ought to please +even you." + +"Anything will please me," said Aubrey Vair; "I care very little"-- + +"Oh, it's a lovely dish," said Mrs. Bayne's deaf aunt, and relapsed +into contemplation. + +"I was saying," said Aubrey Vair, "that I think I still find my keenest +pleasures in childish pastimes. I have a little nephew that I see a +great deal of, and when we fly kites together, I am sure it would be +hard to tell which of us is the happier. By the bye, you should get at +your daisy chains in that way. Beguile some little girl." + +"But I did. I took that Morton mite for a walk in the meadows, and +timidly broached the subject. And she reproached me for suggesting +'frivolous pursuits.' It was a horrible disappointment." + +"The governess here," said Aubrey Vair, "is robbing that child of its +youth in a terrible way. What will a life be that has no childhood at +the beginning?" + +"Some human beings are never young," he continued, "and they never +grow up. They lead absolutely colourless lives. They are--they are +etiolated. They never love, and never feel the loss of it. They +are--for the moment I can think of no better image--they are human +flower-pots, in which no soul has been planted. But a human soul +properly growing must begin in a fresh childishness." + +"Yes," said the dark lady thoughtfully, "a careless childhood, running +wild almost. That should be the beginning." + +"Then we pass through the wonder and diffidence of youth." + +"To strength and action," said the dark lady. Her dreamy eyes were +fixed on the Downs, and her fingers tightened on her knees as she +spoke. "Ah, it is a grand thing to live--as a man does--self-reliant +and free." + +"And so at last," said Aubrey Vair, "come to the culmination and crown +of life." He paused and glanced hastily at her. Then he dropped his +voice almost to a whisper--"And the culmination of life is love." + +Their eyes met for a moment, but she looked away at once. Aubrey Vair +felt a peculiar thrill and a catching in his breath, but his emotions +were too complex for analysis. He had a certain sense of surprise, +also, at the way his conversation had developed. + +Mrs. Bayne's deaf aunt suddenly dug him in the chest with her +ear-trumpet, and someone at tennis bawled, "Love all!" + +"Did I tell you Jane's girls have had scarlet fever?" asked Mrs. +Bayne's deaf aunt. + +"No," said Aubrey Vair. + +"Yes; and they are peeling now," said Mrs. Bayne's deaf aunt, shutting +her lips tightly, and nodding in a slow, significant manner at both of +them. + +There was a pause. All three seemed lost in thought, too deep for words. + +"Love," began Aubrey Vair presently, in a severely philosophical tone, +leaning back in his chair, holding his hands like a praying saint's +in front of him, and staring at the toe of his shoe,--"love is, I +believe, the one true and real thing in life. It rises above reason, +interest, or explanation. Yet I never read of an age when it was so +much forgotten as it is now. Never was love expected to run so much in +appointed channels, never was it so despised, checked, ordered, and +obstructed. Policemen say, 'This way, Eros!' As a result, we relieve +our emotional possibilities in the hunt for gold and notoriety. And +after all, with the best fortune in these, we only hold up the gilded +images of our success, and are weary slaves, with unsatisfied hearts, +in the pageant of life." + +Aubrey Vair sighed, and there was a pause. The girl looked at him out +of the mysterious darkness of her eyes. She had read many books, but +Aubrey Vair was her first literary man, and she took this kind of thing +for genius--as girls have done before. + +"We are," continued Aubrey Vair, conscious of a favourable +impression,--"we are like fireworks, mere dead, inert things until the +appointed spark comes; and then--if it is not damp--the dormant soul +blazes forth in all its warmth and beauty. That is living. I sometimes +think, do you know, that we should be happier if we could die soon +after that golden time, like the Ephemerides. There is a decay sets in." + +"Eigh?" said Mrs. Bayne's deaf aunt startlingly. "I didn't hear you." + +"I was on the point of remarking," shouted Aubrey Vair, wheeling the +array of his thoughts,--"I was on the point of remarking that few +people in Redhill could match Mrs. Morton's fine broad green." + +"Others have noticed it," Mrs. Bayne's deaf aunt shouted back. "It is +since she has had in her new false teeth." + +This interruption dislocated the conversation a little. However-- + +"I must thank you, Mr. Vair," said the dark girl, when they parted that +afternoon, "for having given me very much to think about." + +And from her manner, Aubrey Vair perceived clearly he had not wasted +his time. + + * * * * * + +It would require a subtler pen than mine to tell how from that day a +passion for Miss Smith grew like Jonah's gourd in the heart of Aubrey +Vair. He became pensive, and in the prolonged absence of Miss Smith, +irritable. Mrs. Aubrey Vair felt the change in him, and put it down +to a vitriolic Saturday Reviewer. Indisputably the _Saturday_ does at +times go a little far. He re-read _Elective Affinities_; and lent it +to Miss Smith. Incredible as it may appear to members of the Areopagus +Club, where we know Aubrey Vair, he did also beyond all question +inspire a sort of passion in that sombre-eyed, rather clever, and +really very beautiful girl. + +He talked to her a lot about love and destiny, and all that bric-à-brac +of the minor poet. And they talked together about his genius. He +elaborately, though discreetly, sought her society, and presented +and read to her the milder of his unpublished sonnets. We consider +his Byronic features pasty, but the feminine mind has its own laws. +I suppose, also, where a girl is not a fool, a literary man has an +enormous advantage over anyone but a preacher, in the show he can make +of his heart's wares. + +At last a day in that summer came when he met her alone, possibly by +chance, in a quiet lane towards Horley. There were ample hedges on +either side, rich with honeysuckle, vetch, and mullein. + +They conversed intimately of his poetic ambitions, and then he read +her those verses of his subsequently published in _Hobson's Magazine_: +"Tenderly ever, since I have met thee." He had written these the day +before; and though I think the sentiment is uncommonly trite, there is +a redeeming note of sincerity about the lines not conspicuous in all +Aubrey Vair's poetry. + +He read rather well, and a swell of genuine emotion crept into his +voice as he read, with one white hand thrown out to point the rhythm of +the lines. "Ever, my sweet, for thee," he concluded, looking up into +her face. + +Before he looked up, he had been thinking chiefly of his poem and its +effect. Straightway he forgot it. Her arms hung limply before her, and +her hands were clasped together. Her eyes were very tender. + +"Your verses go to the heart," she said softly. + +Her mobile features were capable of wonderful shades of expression. He +suddenly forgot his wife and his position as a minor poet as he looked +at her. It is possible that his classical features may themselves have +undergone a certain transfiguration. For one brief moment--and it was +always to linger in his memory--destiny lifted him out of his vain +little self to a nobler level of simplicity. The copy of "Tenderly +ever" fluttered from his hand. Considerations vanished. Only one thing +seemed of importance. + +"I love you," he said abruptly. + +An expression of fear came into her eyes. The grip of her hands upon +one another tightened convulsively. She became very pale. + +Then she moved her lips as if to speak, bringing her face slightly +nearer to his. There was nothing in the world at that moment for either +of them but one another. They were both trembling exceedingly. In a +whisper she said, "You love me?" + +Aubrey Vair stood quivering and speechless, looking into her eyes. He +had never seen such a light as he saw there before. He was in a wild +tumult of emotion. He was dreadfully scared at what he had done. He +could not say another word. He nodded. + +"And this has come to me?" she said presently, in the same awe-stricken +whisper, and then, "Oh, my love, my love!" + +And thereupon Aubrey Vair had her clasped to himself, her cheek upon +his shoulder and his lips to hers. + +Thus it was that Aubrey Vair came by the cardinal memory of his life. +To this day it recurs in his works. + +A little boy clambering in the hedge some way down the lane saw this +group with surprise, and then with scorn and contempt. Recking nothing +of his destiny, he turned away, feeling that he at least could never +come to the unspeakable unmanliness of hugging girls. Unhappily for +Reigate scandal, his shame for his sex was altogether too deep for +words. + + * * * * * + +An hour after, Aubrey Vair returned home in a hushed mood. There were +muffins after his own heart for his tea--Mrs. Aubrey Vair had had +hers. And there were chrysanthemums, chiefly white ones,--flowers he +loved,--set out in the china bowl he was wont to praise. And his wife +came behind him to kiss him as he sat eating. + +"De lill Jummuns," she remarked, kissing him under the ear. + +Then it came into the mind of Aubrey Vair with startling clearness, +while his ear was being kissed, and with his mouth full of muffin, that +life is a singularly complex thing. + + * * * * * + +The summer passed at last into the harvest-time, and the leaves began +falling. It was evening, the warm sunset light still touched the Downs, +but up the valley a blue haze was creeping. One or two lamps in Reigate +were already alight. + +About half-way up the slanting road that scales the Downs, there is +a wooden seat where one may obtain a fine view of the red villas +scattered below, and of the succession of blue hills beyond. Here the +girl with the shadowy face was sitting. + +She had a book on her knees, but it lay neglected. She was leaning +forward, her chin resting upon her hand. She was looking across the +valley into the darkening sky, with troubled eyes. + +Aubrey Vair appeared through the hazel-bushes, and sat down beside her. +He held half a dozen dead leaves in his hand. + +She did not alter her attitude. "Well?" she said. + +"Is it to be flight?" he asked. + +Aubrey Vair was rather pale. He had been having bad nights latterly, +with dreams of the Continental Express, Mrs. Aubrey Vair possibly even +in pursuit,--he always fancied her making the tragedy ridiculous by +tearfully bringing additional pairs of socks, and any such trifles he +had forgotten, with her,--all Reigate and Redhill in commotion. He had +never eloped before, and he had visions of difficulties with hotel +proprietors. Mrs. Aubrey Vair might telegraph ahead. Even he had had a +prophetic vision of a headline in a halfpenny evening newspaper: "Young +Lady abducts a Minor Poet." So there was a quaver in his voice as he +asked, "Is it to be flight?" + +"As you will," she answered, still not looking at him. + +"I want you to consider particularly how this will affect you. A man," +said Aubrey Vair, slowly, and staring hard at the leaves in his hand, +"even gains a certain éclat in these affairs. But to a woman it is +ruin--social, moral." + +"This is not love," said the girl in white. + +"Ah, my dearest! Think of yourself." + +"Stupid!" she said, under her breath. + +"You spoke?" + +"Nothing." + +"But cannot we go on, meeting one another, loving one another, without +any great scandal or misery? Could we not"-- + +"That," interrupted Miss Smith, "would be unspeakably horrible." + +"This is a dreadful conversation to me. Life is so intricate, such a +web of subtle strands binds us this way and that. I cannot tell what is +right. You must consider"-- + +"A man would break such strands." + +"There is no manliness," said Aubrey Vair, with a sudden glow of moral +exaltation, "in doing wrong. My love"-- + +"We could at least die together, dearest," she said. + +"Good Lord!" said Aubrey Vair. "I mean--consider my wife." + +"You have not considered her hitherto." + +"There is a flavour--of cowardice, of desertion, about suicide," said +Aubrey Vair. "Frankly, I have the English prejudice, and do not like +any kind of running away." + +Miss Smith smiled very faintly. "I see clearly now what I did not see. +My love and yours are very different things." + +"Possibly it is a sexual difference," said Aubrey Vair; and then, +feeling the remark inadequate, he relapsed into silence. + +They sat for some time without a word. The two lights in Reigate below +multiplied to a score of bright points, and, above, one star had become +visible. She began laughing, an almost noiseless, hysterical laugh that +jarred unaccountably upon Aubrey Vair. + +Presently she stood up. "They will wonder where I am," she said. "I +think I must be going." + +He followed her to the road. "Then this is the end?" he said, with a +curious mixture of relief and poignant regret. + +"Yes, this is the end," she answered, and turned away. + +There straightway dropped into the soul of Aubrey Vair a sense of +infinite loss. It was an altogether new sensation. She was perhaps +twenty yards away, when he groaned aloud with the weight of it, and +suddenly began running after her with his arms extended. + +"Annie," he cried,--"Annie! I have been talking _rot_. Annie, now +I know I love you! I cannot spare you. This must not be. I did not +understand." + +The weight was horrible. + +"Oh, stop, Annie!" he cried, with a breaking voice, and there were +tears on his face. + +She turned upon him suddenly, and his arms fell by his side. His +expression changed at the sight of her pale face. + +"You do not understand," she said. "I have said good-bye." + +She looked at him; he was evidently greatly distressed, a little out of +breath, and he had just stopped blubbering. His contemptible quality +reached the pathetic. She came up close to him, and, taking his damp +Byronic visage between her hands, she kissed him again and again. +"Good-bye, little man that I loved," she said; "and good-bye to this +folly of love." + +Then, with something that may have been a laugh or a sob,--she herself, +when she came to write it all in her novel, did not know which,--she +turned and hurried away again, and went out of the path that Aubrey +Vair must pursue, at the cross-roads. + +Aubrey Vair stood, where she had kissed him, with a mind as inactive +as his body, until her white dress had disappeared. Then he gave an +involuntary sigh, a large exhaustive expiration, and so awoke himself, +and began walking, pensively dragging his feet through the dead leaves, +home. Emotions are terrible things. + + * * * * * + +"Do you like the potatoes, dear?" asked Mrs. Aubrey Vair at dinner. "I +cooked them myself." + +Aubrey Vair descended slowly from cloudy, impalpable meditations to the +level of fried potatoes. "These potatoes"--he remarked, after a pause +during which he was struggling with recollection. "Yes. These potatoes +have exactly the tints of the dead leaves of the hazel." + +"What a fanciful poet it is!" said Mrs. Aubrey Vair. "Taste them. They +are very nice potatoes indeed." + + + + +A CATASTROPHE + + +The little shop was not paying. The realisation came insensibly. +Winslow was not the man for definite addition and subtraction +and sudden discovery. He became aware of the truth in his mind +gradually, as though it had always been there. A lot of facts had +converged and led him there. There was that line of cretonnes--four +half-pieces--untouched, save for half a yard sold to cover a stool. +There were those shirtings at 4¾d.--Bandersnatch, in the Broadway, +was selling them at 2¾d.--under cost, in fact. (Surely Bandersnatch +might let a man live!) Those servants' caps, a selling line, needed +replenishing, and that brought back the memory of Winslow's sole +wholesale dealers, Helter, Skelter, & Grab. Why! how about their +account? + +Winslow stood with a big green box open on the counter before him +when he thought of it. His pale grey eyes grew a little rounder; his +pale, straggling moustache twitched. He had been drifting along, day +after day. He went round to the ramshackle cash-desk in the corner--it +was Winslow's weakness to sell his goods over the counter, give his +customers a duplicate bill, and then dodge into the desk to receive +the money, as though he doubted his own honesty. His lank forefinger, +with the prominent joints, ran down the bright little calendar +("Clack's Cottons last for All Time"). "One--two--three; three weeks +an' a day!" said Winslow, staring. "March! Only three weeks and a day. +It _can't_ be." + +"Tea, dear," said Mrs. Winslow, opening the door with the glass window +and the white blind that communicated with the parlour. + +"One minute," said Winslow, and began unlocking the desk. + +An irritable old gentleman, very hot and red about the face, and in a +heavy fur-lined cloak, came in noisily. Mrs. Winslow vanished. + +"Ugh!" said the old gentleman. "Pocket-handkerchief." + +"Yes, sir," said Winslow. "About what price"-- + +"Ugh!" said the old gentleman. "Poggit-handkerchief, quig!" + +Winslow began to feel flustered. He produced two boxes. + +"These, sir"--began Winslow. + +"Sheed tin!" said the old gentleman, clutching the stiffness of the +linen. "Wad to blow my nose--not haggit about." + +"A cotton one, p'raps, sir?" said Winslow. + +"How much?" said the old gentleman over the handkerchief. + +"Sevenpence, sir. There's nothing more I can show you? No ties, +braces--?" + +"Damn!" said the old gentleman, fumbling in his ticket-pocket, and +finally producing half a crown. Winslow looked round for his little +metallic duplicate-book which he kept in various fixtures, according +to circumstances, and then he caught the old gentleman's eye. He +went straight to the desk at once and got the change, with an entire +disregard of the routine of the shop. + +Winslow was always more or less excited by a customer. But the open +desk reminded him of his trouble. It did not come back to him all at +once. He heard a finger-nail softly tapping on the glass, and, looking +up, saw Minnie's eyes over the blind. It seemed like retreat opening. +He shut and locked the desk, and went into the little room to tea. + +But he was preoccupied. Three weeks and a day! He took unusually large +bites of his bread and butter, and stared hard at the little pot of +jam. He answered Minnie's conversational advances distractedly. The +shadow of Helter, Skelter, & Grab lay upon the tea-table. He was +struggling with this new idea of failure, the tangible realisation, +that was taking shape and substance, condensing, as it were, out +of the misty uneasiness of many days. At present it was simply one +concrete fact; there were thirty-nine pounds left in the bank, and that +day three weeks Messrs. Helter, Skelter, & Grab, those enterprising +outfitters of young men, would demand their eighty pounds. + +After tea there was a customer or so--little purchases: some muslin +and buckram, dress-protectors, tape, and a pair of Lisle hose. Then, +knowing that Black Care was lurking in the dusky corners of the shop, +he lit the three lamps early and set to, refolding his cotton prints, +the most vigorous and least meditative proceeding of which he could +think. He could see Minnie's shadow in the other room as she moved +about the table. She was busy turning an old dress. He had a walk after +supper, looked in at the Y.M.C.A., but found no one to talk to, and +finally went to bed. Minnie was already there. And there, too, waiting +for him, nudging him gently, until about midnight he was hopelessly +awake, sat Black Care. + +He had had one or two nights lately in that company, but this was +much worse. First came Messrs. Helter, Skelter, & Grab, and their +demand for eighty pounds--an enormous sum when your original capital +was only a hundred and seventy. They camped, as it were, before him, +sat down and beleaguered him. He clutched feebly at the circumambient +darkness for expedients. Suppose he had a sale, sold things for almost +anything? He tried to imagine a sale miraculously successful in some +unexpected manner, and mildly profitable, in spite of reductions below +cost. Then Bandersnatch Limited, 101, 102, 103, 105, 106, 107 Broadway, +joined the siege, a long caterpillar of frontage, a battery of shop +fronts, wherein things were sold at a farthing above cost. How could +he fight such an establishment? Besides, what had he to sell? He began +to review his resources. What taking line was there to bait the sale? +Then straightway came those pieces of cretonne, yellow and black, with +a bluish-green flower; those discredited skirtings, prints without +buoyancy, skirmishing haberdashery, some despairful four-button gloves +by an inferior maker--a hopeless crew. And that was his force against +Bandersnatch, Helter, Skelter, & Grab, and the pitiless world behind +them. Whatever had made him think a mortal would buy such things? +Why had he bought this and neglected that? He suddenly realised the +intensity of his hatred for Helter, Skelter, & Grab's salesman. Then +he drove towards an agony of self-reproach. He had spent too much +on that cash-desk. What real need was there of a desk? He saw his +vanity of that desk in a lurid glow of self-discovery. And the lamps? +Five pounds! Then suddenly, with what was almost physical pain, he +remembered the rent. + +He groaned and turned over. And there, dim in the darkness, was the +hummock of Mrs. Winslow's shoulders. That set him off in another +direction. He became acutely sensible of Minnie's want of feeling. Here +he was, worried to death about business, and she sleeping like a little +child. He regretted having married, with that infinite bitterness that +only comes to the human heart in the small hours of the morning. That +hummock of white seemed absolutely without helpfulness, a burden, a +responsibility. What fools men were to marry! Minnie's inert repose +irritated him so much that he was almost provoked to wake her up and +tell her that they were "Ruined." She would have to go back to her +uncle; her uncle had always been against him: and as for his own +future, Winslow was exceedingly uncertain. A shop assistant who has +once set up for himself finds the utmost difficulty in getting into a +situation again. He began to figure himself "crib-hunting" again, going +from this wholesale house to that, writing innumerable letters. How +he hated writing letters! "Sir,--Referring to your advertisement in +the _Christian World_." He beheld an infinite vista of discomfort and +disappointment, ending--in a gulf. + +He dressed, yawning, and went down to open the shop. He felt tired +before the day began. As he carried the shutters in, he kept asking +himself what good he was doing. The end was inevitable, whether he +bothered or not. The clear daylight smote into the place, and showed +how old and rough and splintered was the floor, how shabby the +second-hand counter, how hopeless the whole enterprise. He had been +dreaming these past six months of a bright little shop, of a happy +couple, of a modest but comely profit flowing in. He had suddenly +awakened from his dream. The braid that bound his decent black coat--it +was a little loose--caught against the catch of the shop door, and was +torn loose. This suddenly turned his wretchedness to wrath. He stood +quivering for a moment, then, with a spiteful clutch, tore the braid +looser, and went in to Minnie. + +"Here," he said, with infinite reproach; "look here! You might look +after a chap a bit." + +"I didn't see it was torn," said Minnie. + +"You never do," said Winslow, with gross injustice, "until things are +too late." + +Minnie looked suddenly at his face. "I'll sew it now, Sid, if you like." + +"Let's have breakfast first," said Winslow, "and do things at their +proper time." + +He was preoccupied at breakfast, and Minnie watched him anxiously. +His only remark was to declare his egg a bad one. It wasn't; it was a +little flavoury,--being one of those at fifteen a shilling,--but quite +nice. He pushed it away from him, and then, having eaten a slice of +bread and butter, admitted himself in the wrong by resuming the egg. + +"Sid," said Minnie, as he stood up to go into the shop again, "you're +not well." + +"I'm _well_ enough." He looked at her as though he hated her. + +"Then there's something else the matter. You aren't angry with me, Sid, +are you, about that braid? _Do_ tell me what's the matter. You were +just like this at tea yesterday, and at supper-time. It wasn't the +braid then." + +"And I'm likely to be." + +She looked interrogation. "Oh, what _is_ the matter?" she said. + +It was too good a chance to miss, and he brought the evil news out with +dramatic force. "Matter?" he said. "I done my best, and here we are. +That's the matter! If I can't pay Helter, Skelter & Grab eighty pounds, +this day three week"--Pause. "We shall be sold up! Sold up! That's the +matter, Min! SOLD UP!" + +"Oh, Sid!" began Minnie. + +He slammed the door. For the moment he felt relieved of at least half +his misery. He began dusting boxes that did not require dusting, +and then reblocked a cretonne already faultlessly blocked. He was +in a state of grim wretchedness; a martyr under the harrow of fate. +At anyrate, it should not be said he failed for want of industry. +And how he had planned and contrived and worked! All to this end! +He felt horrible doubts. Providence and Bandersnatch--surely they +were incompatible! Perhaps he was being "tried"? That sent him +off upon a new tack, a very comforting one. That martyr pose, the +gold-in-the-furnace attitude, lasted all the morning. + +At dinner--"potato pie"--he looked up suddenly, and saw Minnie's face +regarding him. Pale she looked, and a little red about the eyes. +Something caught him suddenly with a queer effect upon his throat. All +his thoughts seemed to wheel round into quite a new direction. + +He pushed back his plate and stared at her blankly. Then he got up, +went round the table to her--she staring at him. He dropped on his +knees beside her without a word. "Oh, Minnie!" he said, and suddenly +she knew it was peace, and put her arms about him, as he began to sob +and weep. + +He cried like a little boy, slobbering on her shoulder that he was a +knave to have married her and brought her to this, that he hadn't the +wits to be trusted with a penny, that it was all his fault, that he +"_had_ hoped _so_"--ending in a howl. And she, crying gently herself, +patting his shoulders, said "_Ssh!_" softly to his noisy weeping, and +so soothed the outbreak. Then suddenly the crazy little bell upon the +shop door began, and Winslow had to jump to his feet, and be a man +again. + +After that scene they "talked it over" at tea, at supper, in +bed, at every possible interval in between, solemnly--quite +inconclusively--with set faces and eyes for the most part staring in +front of them--and yet with a certain mutual comfort. "What to do I +don't know," was Winslow's main proposition. Minnie tried to take a +cheerful view of service--with a probable baby. But she found she +needed all her courage. And her uncle would help her again, perhaps, +just at the critical time. It didn't do for folks to be too proud. +Besides, "something might happen," a favourite formula with her. + +One hopeful line was to anticipate a sudden afflux of customers. +"Perhaps," said Minnie, "you might get together fifty. They know you +well enough to trust you a bit." They debated that point. Once the +possibility of Helter, Skelter and Grab giving credit was admitted, +it was pleasant to begin sweating the acceptable minimum. For some +half-hour over tea the second day after Winslow's discoveries they +were quite cheerful again, laughing even at their terrific fears. Even +twenty pounds to go on with might be considered enough. Then in some +mysterious way the pleasant prospect of Messrs. Helter, Skelter, & Grab +tempering the wind to the shorn retailer vanished--vanished absolutely, +and Winslow found himself again in the pit of despair. + +He began looking about at the furniture, and wondering idly what +it would fetch. The chiffonier was good, anyhow, and there were +Minnie's old plates that her mother used to have. Then he began to +think of desperate expedients for putting off the evil day. He had +heard somewhere of Bills of Sale--there was to his ears something +comfortingly substantial in the phrase. Then, why not "Go to the +Money-Lenders"? + +One cheering thing happened on Thursday afternoon; a little girl came +in with a pattern of "print," and he was able to match it. He had not +been able to match anything out of his meagre stock before. He went +in and told Minnie. The incident is mentioned lest the reader should +imagine it was uniform despair with him. + +The next morning, and the next, after the discovery, Winslow opened +shop late. When one has been awake most of the night, and has no hope, +what _is_ the good of getting up punctually? But as he went into the +dark shop on Friday he saw something lying on the floor, something +lit by the bright light that came under the ill-fitting door--a black +oblong. He stooped and picked up an envelope with a deep mourning edge. +It was addressed to his wife. Clearly a death in her family--perhaps +her uncle. He knew the man too well to have expectations. And they +would have to get mourning and go to the funeral. The brutal cruelty +of people dying! He saw it all in a flash--he always visualised his +thoughts. Black trousers to get, black crape, black gloves--none in +stock--the railway fares, the shop closed for the day. + +"I'm afraid there's bad news, Minnie," he said. + +She was kneeling before the fireplace, blowing the fire. She had her +housemaid's gloves on and the old country sun-bonnet she wore of +a morning, to keep the dust out of her hair. She turned, saw the +envelope, gave a gasp, and pressed two bloodless lips together. + +"I'm afraid it's uncle," she said, holding the letter and staring with +eyes wide open into Winslow's face. "_It's a strange hand!_" + +"The postmark's Hull," said Winslow. + +"The postmark's Hull." + +Minnie opened the letter slowly, drew it out, hesitated, turned it +over, saw the signature. "It's Mr. Speight!" + +"What does he say?" said Winslow. + +Minnie began to read. "_Oh!_" she screamed. She dropped the letter, +collapsed into a crouching heap, her hands covering her eyes. Winslow +snatched at it. "A most terrible accident has occurred," he read; +"Melchior's chimney fell down yesterday evening right on the top of +your uncle's house, and every living soul was killed--your uncle, +your cousin Mary, Will and Ned, and the girl--every one of them, and +smashed--you would hardly know them. I'm writing to you to break the +news before you see it in the papers"--The letter fluttered from +Winslow's fingers. He put out his hand against the mantel to steady +himself. + +All of them dead! Then he saw, as in a vision, a row of seven cottages, +each let at seven shillings a week, a timber yard, two villas, and the +ruins--still marketable--of the avuncular residence. He tried to feel +a sense of loss and could not. They were sure to have been left to +Minnie's aunt. All dead! 7×7×52÷20 began insensibly to work itself out +in his mind, but discipline was ever weak in his mental arithmetic; +figures kept moving from one line to another, like children playing +at Widdy, Widdy Way. Was it two hundred pounds about--or one hundred +pounds? Presently he picked up the letter again, and finishing reading +it. "You being the next of kin," said Mr. Speight. + +"How _awful_!" said Minnie in a horror-struck whisper, and looking up +at last. Winslow stared back at her, shaking his head solemnly. There +were a thousand things running through his mind, but none that, even +to his dull sense, seemed appropriate as a remark. "It was the Lord's +will," he said at last. + +"It seems so very, very terrible," said Minnie; "auntie, dear +auntie--Ted--poor, dear uncle"-- + +"It was the Lord's will, Minnie," said Winslow, with infinite feeling. +A long silence. + +"Yes," said Minnie, very slowly, staring thoughtfully at the crackling +black paper in the grate. The fire had gone out. "Yes, perhaps it was +the Lord's will." + +They looked gravely at one another. Each would have been terribly +shocked at any mention of the property by the other. She turned to the +dark fireplace and began tearing up an old newspaper slowly. Whatever +our losses may be, the world's work still waits for us. Winslow gave a +deep sigh and walked in a hushed manner towards the front door. As he +opened it, a flood of sunlight came streaming into the dark shadows of +the closed shop. Bandersnatch, Helter, Skelter, & Grab, had vanished +out of his mind like the mists before the rising sun. + +Presently he was carrying in the shutters, and in the briskest way, +the fire in the kitchen was crackling exhilaratingly, with a little +saucepan walloping above it, for Minnie was boiling two eggs,--one for +herself this morning, as well as one for him,--and Minnie herself was +audible, laying breakfast with the greatest _éclat_. The blow was a +sudden and terrible one--but it behoves us to face such things bravely +in this sad, unaccountable world. It was quite midday before either of +them mentioned the cottages. + + + + +THE LOST INHERITANCE + + +"My uncle," said the man with the glass eye, "was what you might call +a hemi-semi-demi millionaire. He was worth about a hundred and twenty +thousand. Quite. And he left me all his money." + +I glanced at the shiny sleeve of his coat, and my eye travelled up to +the frayed collar. + +"Every penny," said the man with the glass eye, and I caught the active +pupil looking at me with a touch of offence. + +"I've never had any windfalls like that," I said, trying to speak +enviously and propitiate him. + +"Even a legacy isn't always a blessing," he remarked with a sigh, and +with an air of philosophical resignation he put the red nose and the +wiry moustache into his tankard for a space. + +"Perhaps not," I said. + +"He was an author, you see, and he wrote a lot of books." + +"Indeed!" + +"That was the trouble of it all." He stared at me with the available +eye to see if I grasped his statement, then averted his face a little +and produced a toothpick. + +"You see," he said, smacking his lips after a pause, "it was like this. +He was my uncle--my maternal uncle. And he had--what shall I call +it?--a weakness for writing edifying literature. Weakness is hardly +the word--downright mania is nearer the mark. He'd been librarian in a +Polytechnic, and as soon as the money came to him he began to indulge +his ambition. It's a simply extraordinary and incomprehensible thing +to me. Here was a man of thirty-seven suddenly dropped into a perfect +pile of gold, and he didn't go--not a day's bust on it. One would think +a chap would go and get himself dressed a bit decent--say a couple of +dozen pairs of trousers at a West End tailor's; but he never did. You'd +hardly believe it, but when he died he hadn't even a gold watch. It +seems wrong for people like that to have money. All he did was just to +take a house, and order in pretty nearly five tons of books and ink and +paper, and set to writing edifying literature as hard as ever he could +write. I _can't_ understand it! But he did. The money came to him, +curiously enough, through a maternal uncle of _his_, unexpected like, +when he was seven-and-thirty. My mother, it happened, was his only +relation in the wide, wide world, except some second cousins of his. +And I was her only son. You follow all that? The second cousins had one +only son, too, but they brought him to see the old man too soon. He was +rather a spoilt youngster, was this son of theirs, and directly he set +eyes on my uncle, he began bawling out as hard as he could. 'Take 'im +away--er,' he says, 'take 'im away,' and so did for himself entirely. +It was pretty straight sailing, you'd think, for me, eh? And my mother, +being a sensible, careful woman, settled the business in her own mind +long before he did. + +"He was a curious little chap, was my uncle, as I remember him. I +don't wonder at the kid being scared. Hair, just like these Japanese +dolls they sell, black and straight and stiff all round the brim and +none in the middle, and below, a whitish kind of face and rather +large dark grey eyes moving about behind his spectacles. He used to +attach a great deal of importance to dress, and always wore a flapping +overcoat and a big-brimmed felt hat of a most extraordinary size. He +looked a rummy little beggar, I can tell you. Indoors it was, as a +rule, a dirty red flannel dressing-gown and a black skull-cap he had. +That black skull-cap made him look like the portraits of all kinds of +celebrated people. He was always moving about from house to house, +was my uncle, with his chair which had belonged to Savage Landor, and +his two writing-tables, one of Carlyle's and the other of Shelley's, +so the dealer told him, and the completest portable reference library +in England, he said he had--and he lugged the whole caravan, now to a +house at Down, near Darwin's old place, then to Reigate, near Meredith, +then off to Haslemere, then back to Chelsea for a bit, and then up to +Hampstead. He knew there was something wrong with his stuff, but he +never knew there was anything wrong with his brains. It was always the +air, or the water, or the altitude, or some tommy-rot like that. 'So +much depends on environment,' he used to say, and stare at you hard, as +if he half suspected you were hiding a grin at him somewhere under your +face. 'So much depends on environment to a sensitive mind like mine.' + +"What was his name? You wouldn't know it if I told you. He wrote +nothing that anyone has ever read--nothing. No one _could_ read it. +He wanted to be a great teacher, he said, and he didn't know what he +wanted to teach any more than a child. So he just blethered at large +about Truth and Righteousness, and the Spirit of History, and all +that. Book after book he wrote and published at his own expense. He +wasn't quite right in his head, you know, really; and to hear him go +on at the critics--not because they slated him, mind you--he liked +that--but because they didn't take any notice of him at all. 'What +do the nations want?' he would ask, holding out his brown old claw. +'Why, teaching--guidance! They are scattered upon the hills like sheep +without a shepherd. There is War and Rumours of War, the unlaid Spirit +of Discord abroad in the land, Nihilism, Vivisection, Vaccination, +Drunkenness, Penury, Want, Socialistic Error, Selfish Capital! Do +you see the clouds, Ted?'--My name, you know--'Do you see the clouds +lowering over the land? and behind it all--the Mongol waits!' He +was always very great on Mongols and the Spectre of Socialism, and +such-like things. + +"Then out would come his finger at me, and with his eyes all afire and +his skull-cap askew, he would whisper: 'And here am I. What do I want? +Nations to teach. Nations! I say it with all modesty, Ted, I _could_. I +would guide them; nay! but I _will_ guide them to a safe haven, to the +land of Righteousness, flowing with milk and honey.' + +"That's how he used to go on. Ramble, rave about the nations, and +righteousness, and that kind of thing. Kind of mincemeat of Bible and +blethers. From fourteen up to three-and-twenty, when I might have +been improving my mind, my mother used to wash me and brush my hair +(at least in the earlier years of it), with a nice parting down the +middle, and take me, once or twice a week, to hear this old lunatic +jabber about things he had read of in the morning papers, trying to do +it as much like Carlyle as he could, and I used to sit according to +instructions, and look intelligent and nice, and pretend to be taking +it all in. Afterwards I used to go of my own free will, out of a regard +for the legacy. I was the only person that used to go and see him. +He wrote, I believe, to every man who made the slightest stir in the +world, sending him a copy or so of his books, and inviting him to come +and talk about the nations to him; but half of them didn't answer, +and none ever came. And when the girl let you in--she was an artful +bit of goods, that girl--there were heaps of letters on the hall-seat +waiting to go off, addressed to Prince Bismark, the President of the +United States, and such-like people. And one went up the staircase +and along the cobwebby passage,--the housekeeper drank like fury, and +his passages were always cobwebby,--and found him at last, with books +turned down all over the room, and heaps of torn paper on the floor, +and telegrams and newspapers littered about, and empty coffee-cups and +half-eaten bits of toast on the desk and the mantel. You'd see his back +humped up, and his hair would be sticking out quite straight between +the collar of that dressing-gown thing and the edge of the skull-cap. + +"'A moment!' he would say. 'A moment!' over his shoulder. 'The _mot +juste_, you know, Ted, _le mot juste_. Righteous thought righteously +expressed--Aah!--concatenation. And now, Ted,' he'd say, spinning round +in his study chair, 'how's Young England?' That was his silly name for +me. + +"Well, that was my uncle, and that was how he talked--to me, at +anyrate. With others about he seemed a bit shy. And he not only talked +to me, but he gave me his books, books of six hundred pages or so, +with cock-eyed headings, 'The Shrieking Sisterhood,' 'The Behemoth of +Bigotry,' 'Crucibles and Cullenders,' and so on. All very strong, and +none of them original. The very last time but one that I saw him he +gave me a book. He was feeling ill even then, and his hand shook and he +was despondent. I noticed it because I was naturally on the look-out +for those little symptoms. 'My last book, Ted,' he said. 'My last book, +my boy; my last word to the deaf and hardened nations;' and I'm hanged +if a tear didn't go rolling down his yellow old cheek. He was regular +crying because it was so nearly over, and he hadn't only written about +fifty-three books of rubbish. 'I've sometimes thought, Ted'--he said, +and stopped. + +"'Perhaps I've been a bit hasty and angry with this stiff-necked +generation. A little more sweetness, perhaps, and a little less +blinding light. I've sometimes thought--I might have swayed them. But +I've done my best, Ted.' + +"And then, with a burst, for the first and last time in his life +he owned himself a failure. It showed he was really ill. He seemed +to think for a minute, and then he spoke quietly and low, as sane +and sober as I am now. 'I've been a fool, Ted,' he said. 'I've been +flapping nonsense all my life. Only He who readeth the heart knows +whether this is anything more than vanity. Ted, I don't. But He knows, +He knows, and if I have done foolishly and vainly, in my heart--in my +heart'-- + +"Just like that he spoke, repeating himself, and he stopped quite short +and handed the book to me, trembling. Then the old shine came back into +his eye. I remember it all fairly well, because I repeated it and acted +it to my old mother when I got home, to cheer her up a bit. 'Take this +book and read it,' he said. 'It's my last word, my very last word. I've +left all my property to you, Ted, and may you use it better than I have +done.' And then he fell a-coughing. + +"I remember that quite well even now, and how I went home cock-a-hoop, +and how he was in bed the next time I called. The housekeeper was +downstairs drunk, and I fooled about--as a young man will--with the +girl in the passage before I went to him. He was sinking fast. But even +then his vanity clung to him. + +"'Have you read it?' he whispered. + +"'Sat up all night reading it,' I said in his ear to cheer him. 'It's +the last,' said I, and then, with a memory of some poetry or other in +my head, 'but it's the bravest and best.' + +"He smiled a little and tried to squeeze my hand as a woman might do, +and left off squeezing in the middle, and lay still. 'The bravest and +the best,' said I again, seeing it pleased him. But he didn't answer. +I heard the girl giggle outside the door, for occasionally we'd had +just a bit of innocent laughter, you know, at his ways. I looked at +his face, and his eyes were closed, and it was just as if somebody had +punched in his nose on either side. But he was still smiling. It's +queer to think of--he lay dead, lay dead there, an utter failure, with +the smile of success on his face. + +"That was the end of my uncle. You can imagine me and my mother saw +that he had a decent funeral. Then, of course, came the hunt for the +will. We began decent and respectful at first, and before the day was +out we were ripping chairs, and smashing bureau panels, and sounding +walls. Every hour we expected those others to come in. We asked the +housekeeper, and found she'd actually witnessed a will--on an ordinary +half-sheet of notepaper it was written, and very short, she said--not +a month ago. The other witness was the gardener, and he bore her out +word for word. But I'm hanged if there was that or any other will to +be found. The way my mother talked must have made him turn in his +grave. At last a lawyer at Reigate sprang one on us that had been made +years ago during some temporary quarrel with my mother. I'm blest if +that wasn't the only will to be discovered anywhere, and it left every +penny he possessed to that 'Take 'im away' youngster of his second +cousin's--a chap who'd never had to stand his talking not for one +afternoon of his life." + +The man with the glass eye stopped. + +"I thought you said"--I began. + +"Half a minute," said the man with the glass eye. "_I_ had to wait +for the end of the story till this very morning, and I was a blessed +sight more interested than you are. You just wait a bit too. They +executed the will, and the other chap inherited, and directly he was +one-and-twenty he began to blew it. How he did blew it, to be sure! He +bet, he drank, he got in the papers for this and that. I tell you, it +makes me wriggle to think of the times he had. He blewed every ha'penny +of it before he was thirty, and the last I heard of him was--Holloway! +Three years ago. + +"Well, I naturally fell on hard times, because, as you see, the only +trade I knew was legacy-cadging. All my plans were waiting over to +begin, so to speak, when the old chap died. I've had my ups and downs +since then. Just now it's a period of depression. I tell you frankly, +I'm on the look-out for help. I was hunting round my room to find +something to raise a bit on for immediate necessities, and the sight +of all those presentation volumes--no one will buy them, not to wrap +butter in, even--well, they annoyed me. I'd promised him not to part +with them, and I never kept a promise easier. I let out at them with my +boot, and sent them shooting across the room. One lifted at the kick, +and spun through the air. And out of it flapped--You guess? + +"It was the will. He'd given it me himself in that very last volume of +all." + +He folded his arms on the table, and looked sadly with the active eye +at his empty tankard. He shook his head slowly, and said softly, "I'd +never _opened_ the book, much more cut a page!" Then he looked up, with +a bitter laugh, for my sympathy. "Fancy hiding it there! Eigh? Of all +places." + +He began to fish absently for a dead fly with his finger. "It just +shows you the vanity of authors," he said, looking up at me. "It wasn't +no trick of his. He'd meant perfectly fair. He'd really thought I was +really going home to read that blessed book of his through. But it +shows you, don't it?"--his eye went down to the tankard again,--"It +shows you, too, how we poor human beings fail to understand one +another." + +But there was no misunderstanding the eloquent thirst of his eye. +He accepted with ill-feigned surprise. He said, in the usual subtle +formula, that he didn't mind if he did. + + + + +THE SAD STORY OF A DRAMATIC CRITIC + + +I was--you shall hear immediately why I am not now--Egbert Craddock +Cummins. The name remains. I am still (Heaven help me!) Dramatic Critic +to the _Fiery Cross_. What I shall be in a little while I do not know. +I write in great trouble and confusion of mind. I will do what I can +to make myself clear in the face of terrible difficulties. You must +bear with me a little. When a man is rapidly losing his own identity, +he naturally finds a difficulty in expressing himself. I will make it +perfectly plain in a minute, when once I get my grip upon the story. +Let me see--where _am_ I? I wish I knew. Ah, I have it! Dead self! +Egbert Craddock Cummins! + +In the past I should have disliked writing anything quite so full of +"I" as this story must be. It is full of "I's" before and behind, like +the beast in Revelation--the one with a head like a calf, I am afraid. +But my tastes have changed since I became a Dramatic Critic and studied +the masters--G.R.S., G.B.S., G.A.S., and the others. Everything has +changed since then. At least the story is about myself--so that there +is some excuse for me. And it is really not egotism, because, as I +say, since those days my identity has undergone an entire alteration. + +That past!... I was--in those days--rather a nice fellow, rather +shy--taste for grey in my clothes, weedy little moustache, face +"interesting," slight stutter which I had caught in early life from +a schoolfellow. Engaged to a very nice girl, named Delia. Fairly +new, she was--cigarettes--liked me because I was human and original. +Considered I was like Lamb--on the strength of the stutter, I believe. +Father, an eminent authority on postage stamps. She read a great +deal in the British Museum. (A perfect pairing ground for literary +people, that British Museum--you should read George Egerton and Justin +Huntly M'Carthy and Gissing and the rest of them.) We loved in our +intellectual way, and shared the brightest hopes. (All gone now.) And +her father liked me because I seemed honestly eager to hear about +stamps. She had no mother. Indeed, I had the happiest prospects a +young man could have. I never went to theatres in those days. My Aunt +Charlotte before she died had told me not to. + +Then Barnaby, the editor of the _Fiery Cross_, made me--in spite +of my spasmodic efforts to escape--Dramatic Critic. He is a fine, +healthy man, Barnaby, with an enormous head of frizzy black hair and +a convincing manner, and he caught me on the staircase going to see +Wembly. He had been dining, and was more than usually buoyant. "Hullo, +Cummins!" he said. "The very man I want!" He caught me by the shoulder +or the collar or something, ran me up the little passage, and flung me +over the waste-paper basket into the arm-chair in his office. "Pray be +seated," he said, as he did so. Then he ran across the room and came +back with some pink and yellow tickets and pushed them into my hand. +"Opera Comique," he said, "Thursday; Friday, the Surrey; Saturday, the +Frivolity. That's all, I think." + +"But"--I began. + +"Glad you're free," he said, snatching some proofs off the desk and +beginning to read. + +"I don't quite understand," I said. + +"_Eigh?_" he said, at the top of his voice, as though he thought I had +gone, and was startled at my remark. + +"Do you want me to criticise these plays?" + +"Do something with 'em.... Did you think it was a treat?" + +"But I can't." + +"Did you call me a fool?" + +"Well, I've never been to a theatre in my life." + +"Virgin soil." + +"But I don't know anything about it, you know." + +"That's just it. New view. No habits. No _clichés_ in stock. Ours is a +live paper, not a bag of tricks. None of your clockwork professional +journalism in this office. And I can rely on your integrity"-- + +"But I've conscientious scruples"-- + +He caught me up suddenly and put me outside his door. "Go and talk to +Wembly about that," he said. "He'll explain." + +As I stood perplexed, he opened the door again, said, "I forgot this," +thrust a fourth ticket into my hand (it was for that night--in twenty +minutes' time), and slammed the door upon me. His expression was quite +calm, but I caught his eye. + +I hate arguments. I decided that I would take his hint and become (to +my own destruction) a Dramatic Critic. I walked slowly down the passage +to Wembly. That Barnaby has a remarkably persuasive way. He has made +few suggestions during our very pleasant intercourse of four years +that he has not ultimately won me round to adopting. It may be, of +course, that I am of a yielding disposition; certainly I am too apt to +take my colour from my circumstances. It is, indeed, to my unfortunate +susceptibility to vivid impressions that all my misfortunes are due. +I have already alluded to the slight stammer I had acquired from a +schoolfellow in my youth. However, this is a digression.... I went home +in a cab to dress. + +I will not trouble the reader with my thoughts about the first-night +audience, strange assembly as it is,--those I reserve for my +Memoirs,--nor the humiliating story of how I got lost during the +_entr'acte_ in a lot of red plush passages, and saw the third act from +the gallery. The only point upon which I wish to lay stress was the +remarkable effect of the acting upon me. You must remember I had lived +a quiet and retired life, and had never been to the theatre before, +and that I am extremely sensitive to vivid impressions. At the risk of +repetition I must insist upon these points. + +The first effect was a profound amazement, not untinctured by alarm. +The phenomenal unnaturalness of acting is a thing discounted in the +minds of most people by early visits to the theatre. They get used to +the fantastic gestures, the flamboyant emotions, the weird mouthings, +melodious snortings, agonising yelps, lip-gnawings, glaring horrors, +and other emotional symbolism of the stage. It becomes at last a mere +deaf-and-dumb language to them, which they read intelligently _pari +passu_ with the hearing of the dialogue. But all this was new to me. +The thing was called a modern comedy, the people were supposed to be +English and were dressed like fashionable Americans of the current +epoch, and I fell into the natural error of supposing that the actors +were trying to represent human beings. I looked round on my first-night +audience with a kind of wonder, discovered--as all new Dramatic Critics +do--that it rested with me to reform the Drama, and, after a supper +choked with emotion, went off to the office to write a column, piebald +with "new paragraphs" (as all my stuff is--it fills out so) and purple +with indignation. Barnaby was delighted. + +But I could not sleep that night. I dreamt of actors--actors glaring, +actors smiting their chests, actors flinging out a handful of extended +fingers, actors smiling bitterly, laughing despairingly, falling +hopelessly, dying idiotically. I got up at eleven with a slight +headache, read my notice in the _Fiery Cross_, breakfasted, and went +back to my room to shave. (It's my habit to do so.) Then an odd thing +happened. I could not find my razor. Suddenly it occurred to me that I +had not unpacked it the day before. + +"Ah!" said I, in front of the looking-glass. Then "Hullo!" + +Quite involuntarily, when I had thought of my portmanteau, I had flung +up the left arm (fingers fully extended) and clutched at my diaphragm +with my right hand. I am an acutely self-conscious man at all times. +The gesture struck me as absolutely novel for me. I repeated it, for +my own satisfaction. "Odd!" Then (rather puzzled) I turned to my +portmanteau. + +After shaving, my mind reverted to the acting I had seen, and I +entertained myself before the cheval glass with some imitations of +Jafferay's more exaggerated gestures. "Really, one might think it a +disease," I said--"Stage-Walkitis!" (There's many a truth spoken in +jest.) Then, if I remember rightly, I went off to see Wembly, and +afterwards lunched at the British Museum with Delia. We actually spoke +about our prospects, in the light of my new appointment. + +But that appointment was the beginning of my downfall. From that day +I necessarily became a persistent theatre-goer, and almost insensibly +I began to change. The next thing I noticed after the gesture about +the razor, was to catch myself bowing ineffably when I met Delia, and +stooping in an old-fashioned, courtly way over her hand. Directly I +caught myself, I straightened myself up and became very uncomfortable. +I remember she looked at me curiously. Then, in the office, I found +myself doing "nervous business," fingers on teeth, when Barnaby asked +me a question I could not very well answer. Then, in some trifling +difference with Delia, I clasped my hand to my brow. And I pranced +through my social transactions at times singularly like an actor! I +tried not to--no one could be more keenly alive to the arrant absurdity +of the histrionic bearing. And I did! + +It began to dawn on me what it all meant. The acting, I saw, was too +much for my delicately-strung nervous system. I have always, I know, +been too amenable to the suggestions of my circumstances. Night after +night of concentrated attention to the conventional attitudes and +intonation of the English stage was gradually affecting my speech and +carriage. I was giving way to the infection of sympathetic imitation. +Night after night my plastic nervous system took the print of some new +amazing gesture, some new emotional exaggeration--and retained it. A +kind of theatrical veneer threatened to plate over and obliterate my +private individuality altogether. I saw myself in a kind of vision. +Sitting by myself one night, my new self seemed to me to glide, +posing and gesticulating, across the room. He clutched his throat, he +opened his fingers, he opened his legs in walking like a high-class +marionette. He went from attitude to attitude. He might have been +clockwork. Directly after this I made an ineffectual attempt to +resign my theatrical work. But Barnaby persisted in talking about the +Polywhiddle Divorce all the time I was with him, and I could get no +opportunity of saying what I wished. + +And then Delia's manner began to change towards me. The ease of our +intercourse vanished. I felt she was learning to dislike me. I +grinned, and capered, and scowled, and posed at her in a thousand ways, +and knew--with what a voiceless agony!--that I did it all the time. I +tried to resign again, and Barnaby talked about "X" and "Z" and "Y" in +the _New Review_, and gave me a strong cigar to smoke, and so routed +me. And then I walked up the Assyrian Gallery in the manner of Irving +to meet Delia, and so precipitated the crisis. + +"Ah!--_Dear!_" I said, with more sprightliness and emotion in my voice +than had ever been in all my life before I became (to my own undoing) a +Dramatic Critic. + +She held out her hand rather coldly, scrutinising my face as she did +so. I prepared, with a new-won grace, to walk by her side. + +"Egbert," she said, standing still, and thought. Then she looked at me. + +I said nothing. I felt what was coming. I tried to be the old Egbert +Craddock Cummins of shambling gait and stammering sincerity, whom she +loved, but I felt even as I did so that I was a new thing, a thing +of surging emotions and mysterious fixity--like no human being that +ever lived, except upon the stage. "Egbert," she said, "you are not +yourself." + +"Ah!" Involuntarily I clutched my diaphragm and averted my head (as is +the way with them). + +"There!" she said. + +"_What do you mean?_" I said, whispering in vocal italics--you know +how they do it--turning on her, perplexity on face, right hand down, +left on brow. I knew quite well what she meant. I knew quite well the +dramatic unreality of my behaviour. But I struggled against it in vain. +"What do you mean?" I said, and, in a kind of hoarse whisper, "I don't +understand!" + +She really looked as though she disliked me. "What do you keep on +posing for?" she said. "I don't like it. You didn't use to." + +"Didn't use to!" I said slowly, repeating this twice. I glared up and +down the gallery, with short, sharp glances. "We are alone," I said +swiftly. "_Listen!_" I poked my forefinger towards her, and glared at +her. "I am under a curse." + +I saw her hand tighten upon her sunshade. "You are under some bad +influence or other," said Delia. "You should give it up. I never knew +anyone change as you have done." + +"Delia!" I said, lapsing into the pathetic. "Pity me. Augh! Delia! +_Pit_--y me!" + +She eyed me critically. "_Why_ you keep playing the fool like this I +don't know," she said. "Anyhow, I really cannot go about with a man who +behaves as you do. You made us both ridiculous on Wednesday. Frankly, +I dislike you, as you are now. I met you here to tell you so--as it's +about the only place where we can be sure of being alone together"-- + +"Delia!" said I, with intensity, knuckles of clenched hands white. "You +don't mean"-- + +"I do," said Delia. "A woman's lot is sad enough at the best of times. +But with you"-- + +I clapped my hand on my brow. + +"So, good-bye," said Delia, without emotion. + +"Oh, Delia!" I said. "Not _this_?" + +"Good-bye, Mr. Cummins," she said. + +By a violent effort I controlled myself and touched her hand. I tried +to say some word of explanation to her. She looked into my working face +and winced. "I _must_ do it," she said hopelessly. Then she turned from +me and began walking rapidly down the gallery. + +Heavens! How the human agony cried within me! I loved Delia. But +nothing found expression--I was already too deeply crusted with my +acquired self. + +"Good-baye!" I said at last, watching her retreating figure. How I +hated myself for doing it! After she had vanished, I repeated in a +dreamy way, "Good-baye!" looking hopelessly round me. Then, with a kind +of heart-broken cry, I shook my clenched fists in the air, staggered to +the pedestal of a winged figure, buried my face in my arms, and made my +shoulders heave. Something within me said "Ass!" as I did so. (I had +the greatest difficulty in persuading the Museum policeman, who was +attracted by my cry of agony, that I was not intoxicated, but merely +suffering from a transient indisposition.) + +But even this great sorrow has not availed to save me from my fate. +I see it, everyone sees it; I grow more "theatrical" every day. +And no one could be more painfully aware of the pungent silliness +of theatrical ways. The quiet, nervous, but pleasing E. C. Cummins +vanishes. I cannot save him. I am driven like a dead leaf before the +winds of March. My tailor even enters into the spirit of my disorder. +He has a peculiar sense of what is fitting. I tried to get a dull grey +suit from him this spring, and he foisted a brilliant blue upon me, +and I see he has put braid down the sides of my new dress trousers. My +hairdresser insists upon giving me a "wave." + +I am beginning to associate with actors. I detest them, but it is only +in their company that I can feel I am not glaringly conspicuous. Their +talk infects me. I notice a growing tendency to dramatic brevity, to +dashes and pauses in my style, to a punctuation of bows and attitudes. +Barnaby has remarked it too. I offended Wembly by calling him "Dear +Boy" yesterday. I dread the end, but I cannot escape from it. + +The fact is, I am being obliterated. Living a grey, retired life all +my youth, I came to the theatre a delicate sketch of a man, a thing +of tints and faint lines. Their gorgeous colouring has effaced me +altogether. People forget how much mode of expression, method of +movement, are a matter of contagion. I have heard of stage-struck +people before, and thought it a figure of speech. I spoke of it +jestingly, as a disease. It is no jest. It _is_ a disease. And I have +got it bad! Deep down within me I protest against the wrong done to my +personality--unavailingly. For three hours or more a week I have to go +and concentrate my attention on some fresh play, and the suggestions +of the drama strengthen their awful hold upon me. My manners grow so +flamboyant, my passions so professional, that I doubt, as I said at the +outset, whether it is really myself that behaves in such a manner. I +feel merely the core to this dramatic casing, that grows thicker and +presses upon me--me and mine. I feel like King John's abbot in his cope +of lead. + +I doubt, indeed, whether I should not abandon the struggle +altogether--leave this sad world of ordinary life for which I am +so ill-fitted, abandon the name of Cummins for some professional +pseudonym, complete my self-effacement, and--a thing of tricks and +tatters, of posing and pretence--go upon the stage. It seems my only +resort--"to hold the mirror up to Nature." For in the ordinary life, +I will confess, no one now seems to regard me as both sane and sober. +Only upon the stage, I feel convinced, will people take me seriously. +That will be the end of it. I _know_ that will be the end of it. And +yet ... I will frankly confess ... all that marks off your actor +from your common man ... I _detest_. I am still largely of my Aunt +Charlotte's opinion, that playacting is unworthy of a pure-minded man's +attention, much more participation. Even now I would resign my dramatic +criticism and try a rest. Only I can't get hold of Barnaby. Letters +of resignation he never notices. He says it is against the etiquette +of journalism to write to your Editor. And when I go to see him, he +gives me another big cigar and some strong whisky and soda, and then +something always turns up to prevent my explanation. + + + + +A SLIP UNDER THE MICROSCOPE + + +Outside the laboratory windows was a watery-grey fog, and within +a close warmth and the yellow light of the green-shaded gas lamps +that stood two to each table down its narrow length. On each table +stood a couple of glass jars containing the mangled vestiges of the +crayfish, mussels, frogs, and guineapigs, upon which the students had +been working, and down the side of the room, facing the windows, were +shelves bearing bleached dissections in spirits, surmounted by a row +of beautifully executed anatomical drawings in whitewood frames and +overhanging a row of cubical lockers. All the doors of the laboratory +were panelled with blackboard, and on these were the half-erased +diagrams of the previous day's work. The laboratory was empty, save for +the demonstrator, who sat near the preparation-room door, and silent, +save for a low, continuous murmur, and the clicking of the rocker +microtome at which he was working. But scattered about the room were +traces of numerous students: hand-bags, polished boxes of instruments, +in one place a large drawing covered by newspaper, and in another a +prettily bound copy of _News from Nowhere_, a book oddly at variance +with its surroundings. These things had been put down hastily as the +students had arrived and hurried at once to secure their seats in the +adjacent lecture theatre. Deadened by the closed door, the measured +accents of the professor sounded as a featureless muttering. + +Presently, faint through the closed windows came the sound of the +Oratory clock striking the hour of eleven. The clicking of the +microtome ceased, and the demonstrator looked at his watch, rose, +thrust his hands into his pockets, and walked slowly down the +laboratory towards the lecture theatre door. He stood listening for a +moment, and then his eye fell on the little volume by William Morris. +He picked it up, glanced at the title, smiled, opened it, looked at the +name on the fly-leaf, ran the leaves through with his hand, and put +it down. Almost immediately the even murmur of the lecturer ceased, +there was a sudden burst of pencils rattling on the desks in the +lecture theatre, a stirring, a scraping of feet, and a number of voices +speaking together. Then a firm footfall approached the door, which +began to open, and stood ajar, as some indistinctly heard question +arrested the new-comer. + +The demonstrator turned, walked slowly back past the microtome, and +left the laboratory by the preparation-room door. As he did so, +first one, and then several students carrying notebooks entered the +laboratory from the lecture theatre, and distributed themselves among +the little tables, or stood in a group about the doorway. They were an +exceptionally heterogeneous assembly, for while Oxford and Cambridge +still recoil from the blushing prospect of mixed classes, the College +of Science anticipated America in the matter years ago--mixed socially, +too, for the prestige of the College is high, and its scholarships, +free of any age limit, dredge deeper even than do those of the Scotch +universities. The class numbered one-and-twenty, but some remained in +the theatre questioning the professor, copying the blackboard diagrams +before they were washed off, or examining the special specimens he had +produced to illustrate the day's teaching. Of the nine who had come +into the laboratory three were girls, one of whom, a little fair woman, +wearing spectacles and dressed in greyish-green, was peering out of +the window at the fog, while the other two, both wholesome-looking, +plain-faced schoolgirls, unrolled and put on the brown holland aprons +they wore while dissecting. Of the men, two went down the laboratory +to their places, one a pallid, dark-bearded man, who had once been +a tailor; the other a pleasant-featured, ruddy young man of twenty, +dressed in a well-fitting brown suit; young Wedderburn, the son of +Wedderburn the eye specialist. The others formed a little knot near +the theatre door. One of these, a dwarfed, spectacled figure, with +a hunch back, sat on a bent wood stool; two others, one a short, +dark youngster, and the other a flaxen-haired, reddish-complexioned +young man, stood leaning side by side against the slate sink, while +the fourth stood facing them, and maintained the larger share of the +conversation. + +This last person was named Hill. He was a sturdily built young fellow, +of the same age as Wedderburn; he had a white face, dark grey eyes, +hair of an indeterminate colour, and prominent, irregular features. +He talked rather louder than was needful, and thrust his hands deeply +into his pockets. His collar was frayed and blue with the starch of a +careless laundress, his clothes were evidently readymade, and there +was a patch on the side of his boot near the toe. And as he talked +or listened to the others, he glanced now and again towards the +lecture theatre door. They were discussing the depressing peroration +of the lecture they had just heard, the last lecture it was in the +introductory course in zoology. "From ovum to ovum is the goal of the +higher vertebrata," the lecturer had said in his melancholy tones, +and so had neatly rounded off the sketch of comparative anatomy he +had been developing. The spectacled hunchback had repeated it, with +noisy appreciation, had tossed it towards the fair-haired student with +an evident provocation, and had started one of those vague, rambling +discussions on generalities, so unaccountably dear to the student mind +all the world over. + +"That is our goal, perhaps--I admit it--as far as science goes," said +the fair-haired student, rising to the challenge. "But there are things +above science." + +"Science," said Hill confidently, "is systematic knowledge. Ideas that +don't come into the system--must anyhow--be loose ideas." He was not +quite sure whether that was a clever saying or a fatuity until his +hearers took it seriously. + +"The thing I cannot understand," said the hunchback, at large, "is +whether Hill is a materialist or not." + +"There is one thing above matter," said Hill promptly, feeling he had +a better thing this time, aware, too, of someone in the doorway behind +him, and raising his voice a trifle for her benefit, "and that is, the +delusion that there is something above matter." + +"So we have your gospel at last," said the fair student. "It's all +a delusion, is it? All our aspirations to lead something more than +dogs' lives, all our work for anything beyond ourselves. But see how +inconsistent you are. Your socialism, for instance. Why do you trouble +about the interests of the race? Why do you concern yourself about +the beggar in the gutter? Why are you bothering yourself to lend that +book"--he indicated William Morris by a movement of the head--"to +everyone in the lab.?" + +"Girl," said the hunchback indistinctly, and glanced guiltily over his +shoulder. + +The girl in brown, with the brown eyes, had come into the laboratory, +and stood on the other side of the table behind him, with her rolled-up +apron in one hand, looking over her shoulder, listening to the +discussion. She did not notice the hunchback, because she was glancing +from Hill to his interlocutor. Hill's consciousness of her presence +betrayed itself to her only in his studious ignorance of the fact; but +she understood that, and it pleased her. "I see no reason," said he, +"why a man should live like a brute because he knows of nothing beyond +matter, and does not expect to exist a hundred years hence." + +"Why shouldn't he?" said the fair-haired student. + +"Why _should_ he?" said Hill. + +"What inducement has he?" + +"That's the way with all you religious people. It's all a business of +inducements. Cannot a man seek after righteousness for righteousness' +sake?" + +There was a pause. The fair man answered, with a kind of vocal padding, +"But--you see--inducement--when I said inducement," to gain time. And +then the hunchback came to his rescue and inserted a question. He was +a terrible person in the debating society with his questions, and they +invariably took one form--a demand for a definition. "What's your +definition of righteousness?" said the hunchback at this stage. + +Hill experienced a sudden loss of complacency at this question, +but even as it was asked, relief came in the person of Brooks, the +laboratory attendant, who entered by the preparation-room door, +carrying a number of freshly killed guineapigs by their hind legs. +"This is the last batch of material this session," said the youngster, +who had not previously spoken. Brooks advanced up the laboratory, +smacking down a couple of guineapigs at each table. The rest of the +class, scenting the prey from afar, came crowding in by the lecture +theatre door, and the discussion perished abruptly as the students who +were not already in their places hurried to them to secure the choice +of a specimen. There was a noise of keys rattling on split rings as +lockers were opened and dissecting instruments taken out. Hill was +already standing by his table, and his box of scalpels was sticking out +of his pocket. The girl in brown came a step towards him, and, leaning +over his table, said softly, "Did you see that I returned your book, +Mr. Hill?" + +During the whole scene she and the book had been vividly present in his +consciousness; but he made a clumsy pretence of looking at the book and +seeing it for the first time. "Oh yes," he said, taking it up. "I see. +Did you like it?" + +"I want to ask you some questions about it--some time." + +"Certainly," said Hill. "I shall be glad." He stopped awkwardly. "You +liked it?" he said. + +"It's a wonderful book. Only some things I don't understand." + +Then suddenly the laboratory was hushed by a curious braying noise. It +was the demonstrator. He was at the blackboard ready to begin the day's +instruction, and it was his custom to demand silence by a sound midway +between the "Er" of common intercourse and the blast of a trumpet. The +girl in brown slipped back to her place: it was immediately in front +of Hill's, and Hill, forgetting her forthwith, took a notebook out of +the drawer of his table, turned over its leaves hastily, drew a stumpy +pencil from his pocket, and prepared to make a copious note of the +coming demonstration. For demonstrations and lectures are the sacred +text of the College students. Books, saving only the Professor's own, +you may--it is even expedient to--ignore. + + * * * * * + +Hill was the son of a Landport cobbler, and had been hooked by a chance +blue paper the authorities had thrown out to the Landport Technical +College. He kept himself in London on his allowance of a guinea a +week, and found that, with proper care, this also covered his clothing +allowance, an occasional waterproof collar, that is; and ink and +needles and cotton, and such-like necessaries for a man about town. +This was his first year and his first session, but the brown old man +in Landport had already got himself detested in many public-houses by +boasting of his son, "the Professor." Hill was a vigorous youngster, +with a serene contempt for the clergy of all denominations, and a +fine ambition to reconstruct the world. He regarded his scholarship +as a brilliant opportunity. He had begun to read at seven, and had +read steadily whatever came in his way, good or bad, since then. His +worldly experience had been limited to the island of Portsea, and +acquired chiefly in the wholesale boot factory in which he had worked +by day, after passing the seventh standard of the Board school. He had +a considerable gift of speech, as the College Debating Society, which +met amidst the crushing machines and mine models in the metallurgical +theatre downstairs, already recognised--recognised by a violent +battering of desks whenever he rose. And he was just at that fine +emotional age when life opens at the end of a narrow pass like a broad +valley at one's feet, full of the promise of wonderful discoveries and +tremendous achievements. And his own limitations, save that he knew +that he knew neither Latin nor French, were all unknown to him. + +At first his interest had been divided pretty equally between his +biological work at the College and social and theological theorising, +an employment which he took in deadly earnest. Of a night, when the +big museum library was not open, he would sit on the bed of his room +in Chelsea with his coat and a muffler on, and write out the lecture +notes and revise his dissection memoranda, until Thorpe called him +out by a whistle,--the landlady objected to open the door to attic +visitors,--and then the two would go prowling about the shadowy, shiny, +gas-lit streets, talking, very much in the fashion of the sample +just given, of the God Idea, and Righteousness, and Carlyle, and the +Reorganisation of Society. And, in the midst of it all, Hill, arguing +not only for Thorpe, but for the casual passer-by, would lose the +thread of his argument glancing at some pretty painted face that looked +meaningly at him as he passed. Science and Righteousness! But once or +twice lately there had been signs that a third interest was creeping +into his life, and he had found his attention wandering from the fate +of the mesoblastic somites or the probable meaning of the blastopore, +to the thought of the girl with the brown eyes who sat at the table +before him. + +She was a paying student; she descended inconceivable social altitudes +to speak to him. At the thought of the education she must have had, +and the accomplishments she must possess, the soul of Hill became +abject within him. She had spoken to him first over a difficulty about +the alisphenoid of a rabbit's skull, and he had found that, in biology +at least, he had no reason for self-abasement. And from that, after +the manner of young people starting from any starting-point, they got +to generalities, and while Hill attacked her upon the question of +socialism,--some instinct told him to spare her a direct assault upon +her religion,--she was gathering resolution to undertake what she told +herself was his æsthetic education. She was a year or two older than +he, though the thought never occurred to him. The loan of _News from +Nowhere_ was the beginning of a series of cross loans. Upon some absurd +first principle of his, Hill had never "wasted time" upon poetry, +and it seemed an appalling deficiency to her. One day in the lunch +hour, when she chanced upon him alone in the little museum where the +skeletons were arranged, shamefully eating the bun that constituted +his midday meal, she retreated, and returned to lend him, with a +slightly furtive air, a volume of Browning. He stood sideways towards +her and took the book rather clumsily, because he was holding the bun +in the other hand. And in the retrospect his voice lacked the cheerful +clearness he could have wished. + +That occurred after the examination in comparative anatomy, on the +day before the College turned out its students, and was carefully +locked up by the officials, for the Christmas holidays. The excitement +of cramming for the first trial of strength had for a little while +dominated Hill, to the exclusion of his other interests. In the +forecasts of the result in which everyone indulged, he was surprised +to find that no one regarded him as a possible competitor for the +Harvey Commemoration Medal, of which this and the two subsequent +examinations disposed. It was about this time that Wedderburn, who +so far had lived inconspicuously on the uttermost margin of Hill's +perceptions, began to take on the appearance of an obstacle. By a +mutual agreement, the nocturnal prowlings with Thorpe ceased for the +three weeks before the examination, and his landlady pointed out that +she really could not supply so much lamp oil at the price. He walked to +and fro from the College with little slips of mnemonics in his hand, +lists of crayfish appendages, rabbits' skull-bones, and vertebrate +nerves, for example, and became a positive nuisance to foot passengers +in the opposite direction. + +But, by a natural reaction, Poetry and the girl with the brown eyes +ruled the Christmas holiday. The pending results of the examination +became such a secondary consideration that Hill marvelled at his +father's excitement. Even had he wished it, there was no comparative +anatomy to read in Landport, and he was too poor to buy books, but the +stock of poets in the library was extensive, and Hill's attack was +magnificently sustained. He saturated himself with the fluent numbers +of Longfellow and Tennyson, and fortified himself with Shakespeare; +found a kindred soul in Pope, and a master in Shelley, and heard and +fled the siren voices of Eliza Cook and Mrs. Hemans. But he read no +more Browning, because he hoped for the loan of other volumes from Miss +Haysman when he returned to London. + +He walked from his lodgings to the College with that volume of Browning +in his shiny black bag, and his mind teeming with the finest general +propositions about poetry. Indeed, he framed first this little speech +and then that with which to grace the return. The morning was an +exceptionally pleasant one for London; there was a clear, hard frost +and undeniable blue in the sky, a thin haze softened every outline, and +warm shafts of sunlight struck between the house blocks and turned the +sunny side of the street to amber and gold. In the hall of the College +he pulled off his glove and signed his name with fingers so stiff with +cold that the characteristic dash under the signature he cultivated +became a quivering line. He imagined Miss Haysman about him everywhere. +He turned at the staircase, and there, below, he saw a crowd struggling +at the foot of the notice-board. This, possibly, was the biology list. +He forgot Browning and Miss Haysman for the moment, and joined the +scrimmage. And at last, with his cheek flattened against the sleeve of +the man on the step above him, he read the list-- + + CLASS I + + H. J. Somers Wedderburn + William Hill + +and thereafter followed a second class that is outside our present +sympathies. It was characteristic that he did not trouble to look for +Thorpe on the physics list, but backed out of the struggle at once, and +in a curious emotional state between pride over common second-class +humanity and acute disappointment at Wedderburn's success, went on his +way upstairs. At the top, as he was hanging up his coat in the passage, +the zoological demonstrator, a young man from Oxford, who secretly +regarded him as a blatant "mugger" of the very worst type, offered his +heartiest congratulations. + +At the laboratory door Hill stopped for a second to get his breath, +and then entered. He looked straight up the laboratory and saw all +five girl students grouped in their places, and Wedderburn, the once +retiring Wedderburn, leaning rather gracefully against the window, +playing with the blind tassel and talking, apparently, to the five +of them. Now, Hill could talk bravely enough and even overbearingly +to one girl, and he could have made a speech to a roomful of girls, +but this business of standing at ease and appreciating, fencing, and +returning quick remarks round a group was, he knew, altogether beyond +him. Coming up the staircase his feelings for Wedderburn had been +generous, a certain admiration perhaps, a willingness to shake his hand +conspicuously and heartily as one who had fought but the first round. +But before Christmas Wedderburn had never gone up to that end of the +room to talk. In a flash Hill's mist of vague excitement condensed +abruptly to a vivid dislike of Wedderburn. Possibly his expression +changed. As he came up to his place, Wedderburn nodded carelessly to +him, and the others glanced round. Miss Haysman looked at him and away +again, the faintest touch of her eyes. "I can't agree with you, Mr. +Wedderburn," she said. + +"I must congratulate you on your first class, Mr. Hill," said the +spectacled girl in green, turning round and beaming at him. + +"It's nothing," said Hill, staring at Wedderburn and Miss Haysman +talking together, and eager to hear what they talked about. + +"We poor folks in the second class don't think so," said the girl in +spectacles. + +What was it Wedderburn was saying? Something about William Morris! +Hill did not answer the girl in spectacles, and the smile died out of +his face. He could not hear, and failed to see how he could "cut in." +Confound Wedderburn! He sat down, opened his bag, hesitated whether +to return the volume of Browning forthwith, in the sight of all, and +instead drew out his new notebooks for the short course in elementary +botany that was now beginning, and which would terminate in February. +As he did so, a fat, heavy man, with a white face and pale grey eyes, +Bindon, the professor of botany, who came up from Kew for January and +February, came in by the lecture theatre door, and passed, rubbing his +hands together and smiling, in silent affability down the laboratory. + + * * * * * + +In the subsequent six weeks Hill experienced some very rapid and +curiously complex emotional developments. For the most part he had +Wedderburn in focus--a fact that Miss Haysman never suspected. She told +Hill (for in the comparative privacy of the museum she talked a good +deal to him of socialism and Browning and general propositions) that +she had met Wedderburn at the house of some people she knew, and "he's +inherited his cleverness; for his father, you know, is the great eye +specialist." + +"_My_ father is a cobbler," said Hill, quite irrelevantly, and +perceived the want of dignity even as he said it. But the gleam of +jealousy did not offend her. She conceived herself the fundamental +source of it. He suffered bitterly from a sense of Wedderburn's +unfairness, and a realisation of his own handicap. Here was this +Wedderburn had picked up a prominent man for a father, and instead +of his losing so many marks on the score of that advantage, it was +counted to him for righteousness! And while Hill had to introduce +himself and talk to Miss Haysman clumsily over mangled guineapigs in +the laboratory, this Wedderburn, in some backstairs way, had access to +her social altitudes, and could converse in a polished argot that Hill +understood perhaps, but felt incapable of speaking. Not, of course, +that he wanted to. Then it seemed to Hill that for Wedderburn to come +there day after day with cuffs unfrayed, neatly tailored, precisely +barbered, quietly perfect, was in itself an ill-bred, sneering sort +of proceeding. Moreover, it was a stealthy thing for Wedderburn to +behave insignificantly for a space, to mock modesty, to lead Hill to +fancy that he himself was beyond dispute the man of the year, and +then suddenly to dart in front of him, and incontinently to swell up +in this fashion. In addition to these things, Wedderburn displayed an +increasing disposition to join in any conversational grouping that +included Miss Haysman, and would venture, and indeed seek occasion, to +pass opinions derogatory to socialism and atheism. He goaded Hill to +incivilities by neat, shallow, and exceedingly effective personalities +about the socialist leaders, until Hill hated Bernard Shaw's graceful +egotisms, William Morris's limited editions and luxurious wall-papers, +and Walter Crane's charmingly absurd ideal working men, about as much +as he hated Wedderburn. The dissertations in the laboratory, that had +been his glory in the previous term, became a danger, degenerated into +inglorious tussles with Wedderburn, and Hill kept to them only out of +an obscure perception that his honour was involved. In the debating +society Hill knew quite clearly that, to a thunderous accompaniment +of banged desks, he could have pulverised Wedderburn. Only Wedderburn +never attended the debating society to be pulverised, because--nauseous +affectation!--he "dined late." + +You must not imagine that these things presented themselves in quite +such a crude form to Hill's perception. Hill was a born generaliser. +Wedderburn to him was not so much an individual obstacle as a type, +the salient angle of a class. The economic theories that, after +infinite ferment, had shaped themselves in Hill's mind, became abruptly +concrete at the contact. The world became full of easy-mannered, +graceful, gracefully-dressed, conversationally dexterous, finally +shallow Wedderburns, Bishops Wedderburn, Wedderburn M.P.'s, Professors +Wedderburn, Wedderburn landlords, all with finger-bowl shibboleths and +epigrammatic cities of refuge from a sturdy debater. And everyone +ill-clothed or ill-dressed, from the cobbler to the cab-runner, was a +man and a brother, a fellow-sufferer, to Hill's imagination. So that +he became, as it were, a champion of the fallen and oppressed, albeit +to outward seeming only a self-assertive, ill-mannered young man, and +an unsuccessful champion at that. Again and again a skirmish over the +afternoon tea that the girl students had inaugurated, left Hill with +flushed cheeks and a tattered temper, and the debating society noticed +a new quality of sarcastic bitterness in his speeches. + +You will understand now how it was necessary, if only in the interests +of humanity, that Hill should demolish Wedderburn in the forthcoming +examination and outshine him in the eyes of Miss Haysman; and you +will perceive, too, how Miss Haysman fell into some common feminine +misconceptions. The Hill-Wedderburn quarrel, for in his unostentatious +way Wedderburn reciprocated Hill's ill-veiled rivalry, became a tribute +to her indefinable charm; she was the Queen of Beauty in a tournament +of scalpels and stumpy pencils. To her confidential friend's secret +annoyance, it even troubled her conscience, for she was a good girl, +and painfully aware, from Ruskin and contemporary fiction, how entirely +men's activities are determined by women's attitudes. And if Hill never +by any chance mentioned the topic of love to her, she only credited him +with the finer modesty for that omission. + +So the time came on for the second examination, and Hill's increasing +pallor confirmed the general rumour that he was working hard. In the +aërated bread shop near South Kensington Station you would see him, +breaking his bun and sipping his milk, with his eyes intent upon a +paper of closely written notes. In his bedroom there were propositions +about buds and stems round his looking-glass, a diagram to catch his +eye, if soap should chance to spare it, above his washing basin. +He missed several meetings of the debating society, but he found +the chance encounters with Miss Haysman in the spacious ways of the +adjacent art museum, or in the little museum at the top of the College, +or in the College corridors, more frequent and very restful. In +particular, they used to meet in a little gallery full of wrought-iron +chests and gates, near the art library, and there Hill used to talk, +under the gentle stimulus of her flattering attention, of Browning and +his personal ambitions. A characteristic she found remarkable in him +was his freedom from avarice. He contemplated quite calmly the prospect +of living all his life on an income below a hundred pounds a year. But +he was determined to be famous, to make, recognisably in his own proper +person, the world a better place to live in. He took Bradlaugh and John +Burns for his leaders and models, poor, even impecunious, great men. +But Miss Haysman thought that such lives were deficient on the æsthetic +side, by which, though she did not know it, she meant good wall-paper +and upholstery, pretty books, tasteful clothes, concerts, and meals +nicely cooked and respectfully served. + +At last came the day of the second examination, and the professor of +botany, a fussy, conscientious man, rearranged all the tables in a long +narrow laboratory to prevent copying, and put his demonstrator on a +chair on a table (where he felt, he said, like a Hindoo god), to see +all the cheating, and stuck a notice outside the door, "Door closed," +for no earthly reason that any human being could discover. And all the +morning from ten till one the quill of Wedderburn shrieked defiance +at Hill's, and the quills of the others chased their leaders in a +tireless pack, and so also it was in the afternoon. Wedderburn was a +little quieter than usual, and Hill's face was hot all day, and his +overcoat bulged with textbooks and notebooks against the last moment's +revision. And the next day, in the morning and in the afternoon, was +the practical examination, when sections had to be cut and slides +identified. In the morning Hill was depressed because he knew he had +cut a thick section, and in the afternoon came the mysterious slip. + +It was just the kind of thing that the botanical professor was always +doing. Like the income tax, it offered a premium to the cheat. It was +a preparation under the microscope, a little glass slip, held in its +place on the stage of the instrument by light steel clips, and the +inscription set forth that the slip was not to be moved. Each student +was to go in turn to it, sketch it, write in his book of answers what +he considered it to be, and return to his place. Now, to move such a +slip is a thing one can do by a chance movement of the finger, and in +a fraction of a second. The professor's reason for decreeing that the +slip should not be moved depended on the fact that the object he wanted +identified was characteristic of a certain tree stem. In the position +in which it was placed it was a difficult thing to recognise, but once +the slip was moved so as to bring other parts of the preparation into +view, its nature was obvious enough. + +Hill came to this, flushed from a contest with staining re-agents, sat +down on the little stool before the microscope, turned the mirror to +get the best light, and then, out of sheer habit, shifted the slip. +At once he remembered the prohibition, and, with an almost continuous +motion of his hands, moved it back, and sat paralysed with astonishment +at his action. + +Then, slowly, he turned his head. The professor was out of the room; +the demonstrator sat aloft on his impromptu rostrum, reading the +_Q. Jour. Mi. Sci._; the rest of the examinees were busy, and with +their backs to him. Should he own up to the accident now? He knew +quite clearly what the thing was. It was a lenticel, a characteristic +preparation from the elder-tree. His eyes roved over his intent +fellow-students, and Wedderburn suddenly glanced over his shoulder at +him with a queer expression in his eyes. The mental excitement that had +kept Hill at an abnormal pitch of vigour these two days gave way to a +curious nervous tension. His book of answers was beside him. He did not +write down what the thing was, but with one eye at the microscope he +began making a hasty sketch of it. His mind was full of this grotesque +puzzle in ethics that had suddenly been sprung upon him. Should he +identify it? or should he leave this question unanswered? In that +case Wedderburn would probably come out first in the second result. +How could he tell now whether he might not have identified the thing +without shifting it? It was possible that Wedderburn had failed to +recognise it, of course. Suppose Wedderburn too had shifted the slide? +He looked up at the clock. There were fifteen minutes in which to +make up his mind. He gathered up his book of answers and the coloured +pencils he used in illustrating his replies, and walked back to his +seat. + +He read through his manuscript, and then sat thinking and gnawing +his knuckle. It would look queer now if he owned up. He _must_ beat +Wedderburn. He forgot the examples of those starry gentlemen, John +Burns and Bradlaugh. Besides, he reflected, the glimpse of the rest +of the slip he had had was, after all, quite accidental, forced upon +him by chance, a kind of providential revelation rather than an unfair +advantage. It was not nearly so dishonest to avail himself of that as +it was of Broome, who believed in the efficacy of prayer, to pray daily +for a first-class. "Five minutes more," said the demonstrator, folding +up his paper and becoming observant. Hill watched the clock hands until +two minutes remained; then he opened the book of answers, and, with hot +ears and an affectation of ease, gave his drawing of the lenticel its +name. + +When the second pass list appeared, the previous positions of +Wedderburn and Hill were reversed, and the spectacled girl in green, +who knew the demonstrator in private life (where he was practically +human), said that in the result of the two examinations taken together +Hill had the advantage of a mark--167 to 166 out of a possible 200. +Everyone admired Hill in a way, though the suspicion of "mugging" +clung to him. But Hill was to find congratulations and Miss Haysman's +enhanced opinion of him, and even the decided decline in the crest +of Wedderburn, tainted by an unhappy memory. He felt a remarkable +access of energy at first, and the note of a democracy marching to +triumph returned to his debating society speeches; he worked at his +comparative anatomy with tremendous zeal and effect, and he went on +with his æsthetic education. But through it all, a vivid little picture +was continually coming before his mind's eye--of a sneakish person +manipulating a slide. + +No human being had witnessed the act, and he was cocksure that no +higher power existed to see it; but for all that it worried him. +Memories are not dead things, but alive; they dwindle in disuse, +but they harden and develop in all sorts of queer ways if they are +being continually fretted. Curiously enough, though at the time he +perceived clearly that the shifting was accidental, as the days wore +on, his memory became confused about it, until at last he was not +sure--although he assured himself that he _was_ sure--whether the +movement had been absolutely involuntary. Then it is possible that +Hill's dietary was conducive to morbid conscientiousness; a breakfast +frequently eaten in a hurry, a midday bun, and, at such hours after +five as chanced to be convenient, such meat as his means determined, +usually in a chophouse in a back street off the Brompton Road. +Occasionally he treated himself to threepenny or ninepenny classics, +and they usually represented a suppression of potatoes or chops. It is +indisputable that outbreaks of self-abasement and emotional revival +have a distinct relation to periods of scarcity. But apart from this +influence on the feelings, there was in Hill a distinct aversion +to falsity that the blasphemous Landport cobbler had inculcated by +strap and tongue from his earliest years. Of one fact about professed +atheists I am convinced; they may be--they usually are--fools, void +of subtlety, revilers of holy institutions, brutal speakers, and +mischievous knaves, but they lie with difficulty. If it were not so, +if they had the faintest grasp of the idea of compromise, they would +simply be liberal churchmen. And, moreover, this memory poisoned his +regard for Miss Haysman. For she now so evidently preferred him to +Wedderburn that he felt sure he cared for her, and began reciprocating +her attentions by timid marks of personal regard; at one time he even +bought a bunch of violets, carried it about in his pocket, and produced +it, with a stumbling explanation, withered and dead, in the gallery of +old iron. It poisoned, too, the denunciation of capitalist dishonesty +that had been one of his life's pleasures. And, lastly, it poisoned his +triumph in Wedderburn. Previously he had been Wedderburn's superior +in his own eyes, and had raged simply at a want of recognition. Now +he began to fret at the darker suspicion of positive inferiority. He +fancied he found justifications for his position in Browning, but they +vanished on analysis. At last--moved, curiously enough, by exactly the +same motive forces that had resulted in his dishonesty--he went to +Professor Bindon, and made a clean breast of the whole affair. As Hill +was a paid student, Professor Bindon did not ask him to sit down, and +he stood before the professor's desk as he made his confession. + +"It's a curious story," said Professor Bindon, slowly realising how +the thing reflected on himself, and then letting his anger rise,--"A +most remarkable story. I can't understand your doing it, and I can't +understand this avowal. You're a type of student--Cambridge men would +never dream--I suppose I ought to have thought--Why _did_ you cheat?" + +"I didn't--cheat," said Hill. + +"But you have just been telling me you did." + +"I thought I explained"-- + +"Either you cheated or you did not cheat." + +"I said my motion was involuntary." + +"I am not a metaphysician, I am a servant of science--of fact. You +were told not to move the slip. You did move the slip. If that is not +cheating"-- + +"If I was a cheat," said Hill, with the note of hysterics in his voice, +"should I come here and tell you?" + +"Your repentance, of course, does you credit," said Professor Bindon, +"but it does not alter the original facts." + +"No, sir," said Hill, giving in in utter self-abasement. + +"Even now you cause an enormous amount of trouble. The examination list +will have to be revised." + +"I suppose so, sir." + +"Suppose so? Of course it must be revised. And I don't see how I can +conscientiously pass you." + +"Not pass me?" said Hill. "Fail me?" + +"It's the rule in all examinations. Or where should we be? What else +did you expect? You don't want to shirk the consequences of your own +acts?" + +"I thought, perhaps"--said Hill. And then, "Fail me? I thought, as I +told you, you would simply deduct the marks given for that slip." + +"Impossible!" said Bindon. "Besides, it would still leave you above +Wedderburn. Deduct only the marks--Preposterous! The Departmental +Regulations distinctly say"-- + +"But it's my own admission, sir." + +"The Regulations say nothing whatever of the manner in which the matter +comes to light. They simply provide"-- + +"It will ruin me. If I fail this examination, they won't renew my +scholarship." + +"You should have thought of that before." + +"But, sir, consider all my circumstances"-- + +"I cannot consider anything. Professors in this College are machines. +The Regulations will not even let us recommend our students for +appointments. I am a machine, and you have worked me. I have to do"-- + +"It's very hard, sir." + +"Possibly it is." + +"If I am to be failed this examination, I might as well go home at +once." + +"That is as you think proper." Bindon's voice softened a little; he +perceived he had been unjust, and, provided he did not contradict +himself, he was disposed to amelioration, "As a private person," he +said, "I think this confession of yours goes far to mitigate your +offence. But you have set the machinery in motion, and now it must take +its course. I--I am really sorry you gave way." + +A wave of emotion prevented Hill from answering. Suddenly, very +vividly, he saw the heavily-lined face of the old Landport cobbler, his +father. "Good God! What a fool I have been!" he said hotly and abruptly. + +"I hope," said Bindon, "that it will be a lesson to you." + +But, curiously enough, they were not thinking of quite the same +indiscretion. + +There was a pause. + +"I would like a day to think, sir, and then I will let you know--about +going home, I mean," said Hill, moving towards the door. + + * * * * * + +The next day Hill's place was vacant. The spectacled girl in green was, +as usual, first with the news. Wedderburn and Miss Haysman were talking +of a performance of _The Meistersingers_ when she came up to them. + +"Have you heard?" she said. + +"Heard what?" + +"There was cheating in the examination." + +"Cheating!" said Wedderburn, with his face suddenly hot. "How?" + +"That slide"-- + +"Moved? Never!" + +"It was. That slide that we weren't to move"-- + +"Nonsense!" said Wedderburn. "Why! How could they find out? Who do they +say--?" + +"It was Mr. Hill." + +"_Hill!_" + +"Mr. Hill!" + +"Not--surely not the immaculate Hill?" said Wedderburn, recovering. + +"I don't believe it," said Miss Haysman. "How do you know?" + +"I _didn't_," said the girl in spectacles. "But I know it now for a +fact. Mr. Hill went and confessed to Professor Bindon himself." + +"By Jove!" said Wedderburn. "Hill of all people. But I am always +inclined to distrust these philanthropists-on-principle"-- + +"Are you quite sure?" said Miss Haysman, with a catch in her breath. + +"Quite. It's dreadful, isn't it? But, you know, what can you expect? +His father is a cobbler." + +Then Miss Haysman astonished the girl in spectacles. + +"I don't care. I will not believe it," she said, flushing darkly under +her warm-tinted skin. "I will not believe it until he has told me so +himself--face to face. I would scarcely believe it then," and abruptly +she turned her back on the girl in spectacles, and walked to her own +place. + +"It's true, all the same," said the girl in spectacles, peering and +smiling at Wedderburn. + +But Wedderburn did not answer her. She was indeed one of those people +who seem destined to make unanswered remarks. + + +THE END + + + + + PRINTED BY + MORRISON AND GIBB LIMITED, EDINBURGH + + + + +Transcriber's note + + +Words in italics were surrounded with _underscores_ and small capitals +changed to all capitals. + +The original has been preserved, except for the following corrections, +on page + + 11 "contion" changed to "condition" (in an extremely dishevelled + condition.) + 99 , changed to . (parables rather. Do you mean) + 221 . added (but it hit _him_. Yes, ma'am) + 257 " removed (was his silly name for me.) + 259 beginning double quotes added and nested double quotes changed to + single quotes ("'Have you read it?' ... 'The bravest and the best,' + said I again). + +Additional: the book mentioned on page 216 "Smiles' Elp Yourself" +is an existing book "Self help; with illustrations of conduct and +perseverance" by Samuel Smiles, to be found on Project Gutenberg as +Ebook number 935. + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Plattner Story and Others, by H. G. Wells + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 42989 *** |