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diff --git a/76603-0.txt b/76603-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ac64d86 --- /dev/null +++ b/76603-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7779 @@ + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76603 *** + + + + + +KARL GRIER + + + + + KARL GRIER + + The Strange Story of a + Man with a Sixth Sense + + BY + LOUIS TRACY + + AUTHOR OF “THE WINGS OF THE MORNING,” “THE PILLAR + OF LIGHT” AND “THE GREAT MOGUL.” + + [Illustration] + + New York + Edward J. Clode + 156 Fifth Avenue + 1906 + + + + + COPYRIGHT, 1905, BY + EDWARD J. CLODE + + _Entered at Stationers’ Hall_ + + _The Plimpton Press Norwood Mass. U.S.A._ + + + + +CONTENTS + + + CHAPTER I + PAGE + THE AFFAIR OF THE TEA-GARDEN 1 + + CHAPTER II + + THE SAVING OF CONSTANTINE 14 + + CHAPTER III + + THE FINDING OF MAGGIE HUTCHINSON 27 + + CHAPTER IV + + A CAT AND FRANK HOOPER 41 + + CHAPTER V + + KARL’S FIRST MEETING WITH STEINDAL 53 + + CHAPTER VI + + IN WHICH CONSTANTINE HAS A VISION 66 + + CHAPTER VII + + “BLOOD IS A VERY PECULIAR JUICE” 78 + + CHAPTER VIII + + MAGGIE HUTCHINSON INTERVENES 90 + + CHAPTER IX + + THE CONFOUNDED HOTEL CLERK 101 + + CHAPTER X + + MAGGIE TELLS WHAT BEFEL HER 115 + + CHAPTER XI + + THE KEY OF THE TREASURE-HOUSE 126 + + CHAPTER XII + + THE SCENE IN THE GARDEN COURT 138 + + CHAPTER XIII + + CONSTANTINE TAKES A JOURNEY 151 + + CHAPTER XIV + + CONSTANTINE ENCOUNTERS THE SHARK 165 + + CHAPTER XV + + THE OTHER WOMAN 177 + + CHAPTER XVI + + WOMEN CALLED HIM “THE MAGNET” 190 + + CHAPTER XVII + + I MEET NORA CAZENOVE 203 + + CHAPTER XVIII + + THE PROBLEM TAKES SHAPE 216 + + CHAPTER XIX + + THE UNBIDDEN GUEST 231 + + CHAPTER XX + + STEINDAL GIVES A PUBLIC PERFORMANCE 246 + + CHAPTER XXI + + HOOPER SUGGESTS A WAY OUT 260 + + CHAPTER XXII + + NORA FACES THE INEVITABLE 275 + + CHAPTER XXIII + + “A STRUGGLE ’TWIXT LOVE AND DEATH” 292 + + CHAPTER XXIV + + THE FALL OF THE CURTAIN 308 + + + + +KARL GRIER + + + + +CHAPTER I + +THE AFFAIR OF THE TEA-GARDEN + + +The chief actor in the singular, perhaps unprecedented, incidents +herein recorded now leads a sedate existence of British top-hatted +respectability. Many reputable citizens of London and Edinburgh, not +to mention cosmopolitan Paris and New York, to whom he is personally +known, would be exceedingly surprised were they to recognize, through +the thin disguise of places and people, the popular man of the world +whose extraordinary career is now set forth for the first time. + +Some few there are who dimly comprehend Karl Grier’s secret. They, for +reasons that shall be obvious, will keep their amazed imaginings locked +in their own hearts. Others, men of precise science for the most part, +who have been approached in order that certain remarkable phenomena +might be sanely investigated, refute with scorn the suggestion that +such a person ever lived. That is to say, they cannot deny Karl Grier, +with his giant frame and his hearty whole-souled laugh, but they do +deny most emphatically that he ever possessed the unknown power which +he exercised in a marvelous way during several eventful years. + +If aught could make Karl angry, it is the stupid agnosticism of these +learned critics, true children of the dull tribe which began, ages +ago, to create its own unbending gods of stone and wood, and has been +setting up barriers to knowledge ever since, building dogmatic walls +the crossing of which is forbidden by bell, book, and candle. + +Yet it is not within my province to rail against these infallibles, +who smile at the density which imprisoned Galileo in the sixteen +hundreds, but refuse to-day’s evidence of a new realm in man’s mental +activity. Sometimes Karl has been tempted, with me, his biographer, +as tempter, to place before an astounded world such an array of facts +as must convert these scoffers into perfervid disciples. He has +been deterred--and here I may claim some credit, too--by personal +considerations, by dread of the fierce light of publicity being shed on +those near and dear to him, and, in lesser degree, by the fact that a +settled, happy existence has stifled the weird and subtle sense which +was vouchsafed to him during the growth and plentitude of his bodily +and spiritual powers. So, peace be to the critics. “Eppur si muove!” +sighed the astronomer, recanting the truth to save his life. + +For, without further preamble be it said, my friend Grier was endowed +with, or permitted by Providence to use, a sixth sense, which he and +I, seeking its correct classification in after years, named telegnomy, +or far-knowing. That is the nearest the vocabulary of our times will +approach to the description of his mysterious faculty. Strictly +speaking, it was not a new sense, as one differentiates seeing from +hearing, or taste from touch. Purists in words may even quarrel with me +for using the term “sense” to denote a transcendental union of reason +with physical attributes. But, in writing a quaint, almost sensational, +narrative of actual occurrences, it is well to be content with the +simple phraseology of every-day life, and, in that well-defined vehicle +of plain thought, the faculty vouchsafed to Karl Grier was a sense. + +Its stupendous range, its curiously rational limitations, will be +grasped only by an intelligent reading of these memoirs. So a truce to +the “Yea” and “Nay” of theorists. Let the story, or group of queer +incidents, as it may be termed, speak for itself. + +“I have always thought,” said Karl, musing once in analytical mood, +“that my sixth sense owed its inception to the Babel-like jargon of +languages which surrounded my youthful years. I remember distinctly +being attired, on my fourth birthday, in a new sailor suit, which +showed to an admiring family circle that I was rated as a first-class +A.B. on His Majesty’s ship _Victorious_. We lived then in India, where +my father grew tea on a Darjeeling plantation. I had a half-caste +French nurse from Trichinopoly, a Mahomedan bearer, or male servant, +a Scottish father and a German mother, and each member of our little +republic spoke his or her own tongue when the heart was stirred. +In my jubilation I endeavored to climb a creeper, and fell off the +low veranda on to a path covered with sharp flints. Both I and the +suit were damaged at all points of contact with the globe. My mother +shrieked: ‘Ach, Himmel!’ but, being a woman of steady nerves, she soon +perceived that little real mischief had resulted, and she went on: ‘Er +ist zum seemann nicht geboren’ (He is not cut out for a sailor). My +father said, with a laugh: ‘We should hae kepit the bairn in a cutty +sark.’ The nurse flew to my assistance, crying: ‘Pauvre p’tit! Tu +n’es pas assez adroit!’ whilst Abdul Khan, my bearer, tried to console +my grief with his ‘Kuchparwani, batcha, mainne mitai lata!’ (Never +mind, little one, I have some sweets for you.) Now, these varied +exclamations, conveying many distinct ideas in four languages, of which +the Eastern differed in every respect from the European, were instantly +intelligible to me. Abdul Khan alone comforted me--the others hurt my +pride. But the real point is that I understood them all to the finest +shade of meaning. To put it plainly, sounds, and not words, conveyed +clear ideas. It was the first unknown step along an uncharted road; the +step a fox-terrier takes when he grasps the inflections of his master’s +voice.” + +“I suppose that is what people mean when they say that you can +never really speak a language well until you learn to think in that +language?” said I. + +Karl laughed gently, and a dreamy look came into his eyes. At one time +this would have been the certain prelude to a condition which, for +want of a more accurate term, we called a “trance,” though it was far +removed from the muscular or mental subjection induced by mesmerism or +clairvoyance. Now he simply dropped his eyelids, took a whiff or two +of his pipe, and, when he glanced at me again, there was quiet humor, +not fantasy, in his big blue orbs. + +“No,” he answered, “the states may be kin, but they differ, as the +visual powers of a daisy, which can see the sun, differ from those +of man. Education, by its necessary artificiality, tends to destroy +natural gifts. The daily growth of a living language supplies adequate +proof of this truism. The first sounds uttered by man, quite apart from +signs and symbols, implied a want or an emotion. Those primary words +run in unbroken gamut through all variations of speech or dialect. +Of course, they vary, but not greatly, no more than the bark of the +Indian dog, the grunt of the Indian pig, the caw of the Indian crow--I +could recite hundreds of examples--vary from the typical cries of +their European congeners. To my childish intelligence, sounds were all +sufficing. I knew the voices of nature. The whinney of a horse told +me whether he was hungry or thirsty, afraid or angered. I heard the +kites whistling their fellow-ghouls to the feast. I could actually +distinguish the answering bleat of a kid to the hoarse summons of its +dam amidst a flock of goats. Good heavens! if only my baby mind could +have uttered its knowledge, and found a scientific recorder, what +undeciphered mysteries of human development might I not have solved!” + +Although this train of reminiscence was somewhat removed from the +far more curious and complex sense he developed afterwards, it was +interesting as showing a tendency towards the abnormal. + +“Have you any reason to believe that animals ever knew you possessed +the key to their utterances?” I asked. + +“Not in a convincing degree. Oddly enough, my intelligence was more +receptive than creative. Certainly my dogs, ponies, birds, and other +so-called dumb creatures with which I was brought in contact were in +extraordinary sympathy with me. But such human and animal collusions +are far from rare. And I could not speak to them with effect. Our +physical appliances are fashioned by use, remember. If the nasal sounds +of French will change the shape of the roof of a Frenchman’s mouth, or +singing develop the singer’s throat in a single lifetime, how much more +profoundly must untold generations of ordered language have modified +the vocal organs. So my four-footed friends could not understand my +harsh imitations. They were too far down the scale. I could plumb +_their_ depths, but _they_ could only gaze at me wistfully, as men look +at the stars.” + +He went on to tell how he startled his father, one day, by the +information that a colony of minahs (the Indian starling) had found a +snake in a flower-bed, which was true, though none could guess how the +child knew it; and he made me shake with merriment as he described the +antics of a monkey, whose chattering rage he did succeed in burlesquing +with some degree of realism. But these are not serious contributions +to science, and I am truly endeavoring to help forward my fellow-men +along the path which Morse, Edison, Marconi, and many another earnest +worker, each in a separate sphere, yet each striving for the same goal, +have indicated to a world not yet ready to advance. I pass, therefore, +to the first recorded use of his sixth sense. In all probability there +were minor instances, which were unnoticed either by his parents or by +the child himself. This one could not be gainsaid. It verified itself +most dramatically. + +Karl’s peculiar gift of understanding the crude languages of nomads--he +lost the hidden key long before any one thought of testing him with +Homeric verse or the polished periods of Cicero--enabled him to +converse with the unkempt Nepalese and wilder Tibetans who occasionally +visited the station in the guise of petty traders. He was six years +old when the famous Hutchinson Raid took place. Already he had learnt +to read, but, luckily, his parents, being wise folk, determined that +such a precocious child must not be encouraged in his studies, else the +growth of method in that wondrous little brain must already have dimmed +his comprehension of primeval speech. + +The Griers’ tea-garden, with its fine bungalow and spacious coolie +quarters, was an old estate. It stood on the outskirts of the scattered +houses which comprised the station. In a neighboring valley, two miles +away, a London company had established a huge garden, employing nearly +three thousand coolies, and the manager was a Mr. Frank Hutchinson. One +day, at the beginning of the hot weather, Hutchinson drove to the local +bank, and obtained a very considerable sum of money, some twenty odd +thousand rupees, to pay the monthly wages. Being a “brither Scot,” he +called on the Griers, left his wife there for a gossip, and his little +daughter, Maggie, for a romp with Karl. The three set out towards home +in time for dinner, and Karl was, naturally, very reluctant to part +from his little playmate. + +She, too, nearly wept, so he consoled her by saying:-- + +“Don’t cwy, Maggie”--for he had a slight lisp--“Mamsie says we are +coming to see you soon, and _I’ll think of you until Nanna_ (the French +nurse) _puts me to bed_.” + +Maggie evidently found consolation in this limited promise of fidelity. +It can only be assumed that the boy kept his vow. In his mind he +followed the child and her parents down into the valley, across the +river, and up the hill-side to the spacious compound which held the +house and offices. Arrived there, in fancy, his active brain roamed +about the place, which he knew well. Then his wits wandered. His +father, quitting the monthly accounts in time for dinner, found the +nurse sitting in the veranda, sewing, in a dim light. Near her was +Karl, unusually quiet, curled up in a big peg-chair. Grier spoke, but +the boy did not answer. Stooping, he noticed a tiny stream of blood +issuing from a nostril. + +Though not a nervous man, he lifted Karl into his arms with quick +anxiety, and the youngster appeared to wake from a light sleep. + +“What is the matter, sonny?” he asked, somewhat puzzled. “Why is your +nose bleeding?” + +“I don’t know, Daddy, but I have been a long way, and maybe I hurted +myself.” + +“Been a long way! Has Master Karl been out, Mathilde?” he inquired. + +“Mais non, m’sieur. He play some time, then he sit himself in the +chair.” + +“But I have, Daddy,” persisted the child. “I went with Maggie. I heard +Mr. Hutchinson tell Mrs. Hutchinson that their tea crop was not a good +one, as the soil was too light, and he thought the Company had not +chosen a good pitch.” + +This was sufficiently bewildering from a boy of six, being an opinion +which Hutchinson would not utter even to Grier himself. But Karl, whose +lisp need not be reproduced, was brimful of news. + +“Oh, it is quite, quite true,” he cried in response to his father’s +laughing protest. “Maggie went in, and was a naughty girl because +she could not sit up for dinner. Then I went around the house, and I +saw some hill men in a wood. They said they were going to kill Mr. +Hutchinson to-night, and steal his money. One of them will give the +_chowkidars_ (watchmen) something to make them sleep. They will put the +bags of money on some ponies, and go by a hill path into Sikkim. There +are eight brown ponies and one white one. I counted them.” + +Some inkling of a tremendous fact stayed the remonstrance on Mr. +Grier’s lips. He was Scottish, you see, a Highlander bred and born, +and he _almost_ believed in second sight. So he encouraged Karl to +talk, obtained additional and more convincing details, for the child +gave him the exact phrases of the Shillong patois used by the bandits, +and finally handed over the youthful visionary to Mathilde, telling her +to ask Mrs. Grier to keep some dinner for him--he was called away on +urgent business. + +He rode to the house of the District Superintendent of Police. As a +favor, for Grier was a popular man, Captain Melville gathered a few +mounted constables, and they all cantered off to the Hutchinsons’ +garden. In the compound they found a stranger fraternizing with the +servants, and in his possession was a quantity of sweetmeats, which +subsequent examination proved to be rank with _dhatura_, an Indian drug +which can induce sleep or death. + +A raid on the wood secured a dozen rascals armed to the teeth, and the +nine ponies, exactly as Karl had described them. There was a small +fight, in which a sepoy’s head was cut open, but the surprise was +too effectual for any serious resistance to be offered. “Conspiracy” +was the root word of the legal indictment which sent the gang to the +Andamans convict settlement. + +The affair was known as the “Hutchinson Raid.” Such things happen +in India. But Karl’s share in the adventure was kept quiet by the +authorities. It would have discredited the otherwise conclusive +evidence, they thought. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +THE SAVING OF CONSTANTINE + + +Though others might calmly dismiss the child’s vision as an +extraordinarily accurate delusion--“an unusually elaborate series of +coincidences,” the policeman termed it--not so his parents. A man from +Inverness, a woman from the Schwartz Wald, may be dour and stolid to +outward seeming, but they are highly imaginative by nature. + +An ancestor of Grier’s, a warrior bard, took service with the +Elector-Palatine, and this remote link led to the Indian tea-planter +marrying a stout and pretty Gretchen from the borders of the Black +Forest. Karl, named after his German grandfather, not altogether +without an eye to the main chance, I regret to say, was their only +child, and were he the ugliest duckling ever hatched he would yet +have been their greatest treasure. But he was a very good-looking, +merry-eyed, manly little fellow, with a face like one of Murillo’s +angels, and eyes with the blue of the Red Sea in them. If you are in +doubt as to the true blend of sapphire and ultramarine meant by that +tint, ask any sailor-man of your acquaintance, and he will tell you +that the blue of the Red Sea is a deep, unvarying, steadfast color, +while the blue of the Mediterranean is, often as not, a steely mistral +gray. + +In a word, Mr. and Mrs. Grier secretly worshiped their bonny chick, and +it was a great shock to them to discover that his developing brains +held compartments not within common ken. Therefore, although Karl ate +his meals heartily, and throve apace, they kept a close eye on him, +and compared notes whenever any curious action or utterance caught +their attention. And what eagle-like intensity there is in that wistful +parental glance! How it detects and interprets signs and portents! What +degenerates must be the father and mother whose first warning of danger +to their young comes from a nurse! + +So it came to pass that once, aged seven, Karl had the earache. +“Goodness me!” cries the experienced matron, “that is nothing to +cause domestic flutterings. A pinch of bicarbonate of soda dissolved +in a teaspoonful of hot water, or, in severe attacks, a few drops of +laudanum on cotton-wool, will deaden the pain and induce sleep.” + +Yes, madam, but if your little Tom, Dick, or Harry remarked that “the +music was doing it,” and, when pressed for details, began to explain +that some one was playing a flute, thus--whereupon Karl softly hummed +part of the obligato to the nightingale song from the “Marriage of +Jeannette”--if, moreover, your budding genius went on: + +“There is a lady singing now. Listen: + + Au bord du chemin qui passe ma porte + Fleurit un bel aubépin, un bel aubépin....” + +and you knew quite well that the Commissioner’s niece, helped by a +love-sick subaltern who fluted, was probably singing that identical +song in a house over a mile distant, what would you do? + +Send for the doctor, of course. + +The doctor came, a hard-headed Scot--they thrive in India, those +Scotsmen--and heard the story. At first he was inclined to place +a mother’s vagaries firmly on one side, but, when a _chuprassi_ +(messenger) brought a reply to Mrs. Grier’s note, and he read what the +Commissioner’s niece had written, he stroked his long nose silently. +For this was the answer: + +“Yes, Mr. Browne was here for luncheon. About two o’clock he ran +through the ‘Rossignol’ song with me, first without the voice, +afterwards with all the frills. But what on earth made you guess it? +Mr. Browne is so amazed that he is staying to tea. _Do_ come and tell +us all about it.” + +“And ye say ye mentioned the chune yerself, Mrs. Grier?” said he +meditatively. + +“Yes, indeed. I heard Miss Nicholls sing it at the Gloucesters’ concert +and Karl was not there. What can it all mean, doctor?” + +“I wish I could read that riddle. Ye would see all the letters of the +alphabet afther me name. But trouble not yer head about Karl, Mrs. +Grier. A slight discharge is beginning, and that brings instant relief.” + +He sought Grier in the big drying-room of the tea factory. + +“That boy of yours is a pheenomenon,” he said. “The sensory zone of his +brain is, I should imagine, of remarkable size and unique capacity. +With care, and ordinary luck, he should grow into a marvelous man. But +yer wife must not fret if he puzzles her at times. He has the digestion +of an ostrich, and the stamina of a young bull.” + +“Is there any way of accounting for his queer faculties?” asked the +planter. + +“How can the normal account for the abnormal?” answered the doctor. +“Here we have a set of nerves the functions of which are ill +understood. We know that unilateral destruction of a center will +partially abolish sensation on the opposite side of the body. A +bilatereal lesion will destroy all sensation. In simple language, if +the hearing nerves are damaged on the right side, you are somewhat deaf +in the left ear; but general destruction means total deafness. That is +what happens when the ordinary appliances are deranged. It is beyond me +to explain the process whereby those same appliances obtain a tenfold, +perhaps a thousand-fold, activity.” + +“Is such a thing possible?” + +The Civil Surgeon selected a cigar from five exactly similar weeds in +his case with a care that betokened a nice discrimination. + +“One does not discuss these matters with womenfolk, Grier; they +think ye are flying in the face of Providence,” he said. “Therefore, +keep my opeenion for yer own lug, so to speak. I have a theory, a +pipe-and-tobacco bit of pheelosophy, mind you, that human inventiveness +is bounded only by the latent powers of the human brain. The limits are +absolute, but they are far beyond our dimmest comprehension, as yet. I +suppose you never saw an epileptic lunatic?” + +“No.” + +The tea-planter disliked the abrupt question. When you come to think of +it, it had a disagreeable sound in a discussion of a pretty child’s +simple ailment. Doctors are apt to forget their hearers’ unscientific +feelings. + +“It provides a most interesting study,” said Dr. Macpherson, with +a grim glee. “Such a case is frequently accompanied by sensory +hallucinations and certain subjective sensations, such as unseen +flashes of light and color, strange, and often offensive, tastes and +smells, the result of some morbid irritation of the cortical sensory +centers, which are the anatomical subtrata of ideation.” + +“What the--what has all this got to do with Karl?” demanded Grier, with +rising wrath. + +“Softly, noo, ma man. Before ye build ye mun have a foundation. I am +one of those who think that insanity is closely akin to genius. An +extra dense membrane may convert a potential Isaac Newton into an +actual eediot. The other day, a clever Frenchman--they are daring +deevils, the French--opened an imbecile’s skull, rearranged his brain +lobes, and provided space for expansion. The imbecile went through all +the processes of intellectual growth, and is now a sane man. Why should +not nature go one better than the surgeon, and suddenly irradiate her +wide realm by some lightning gleam? In other days her efforts in that +direction led her subjects to martyrdom or sanctity, by the sheer +chance of their being on the winning or losing side. Mostly, both then +and now, she sends her unfortunate failures to the mad-house.” + +“Look here, Macpherson,” interrupted Grier hotly, “you are talking +about my boy, remember.” + +“Deed, ay! He’s a credit to ye, but he wouldn’t have the earache if ye +hadn’t dowered him wi’a thick cranium.” + +And the doctor hurried away, sore because his grains of science had +fallen on such unreceptive soil. + +Karl, of course, recovered speedily, and the more he learnt to +appreciate a Manipur pony, a brace of sporting fox-terriers, and an +air-gun, the less prone was he to uncanny manifestations. As the sway +of Mathilde declined, the more did he unconsciously acquire the lore of +the jungle, until, at ten years of age, he had the wisdom and beauty of +a young god, though he could scarce write his name, and spelled as a +Scotchman jokes. + +So a family council sat many times, and there came a day when Mrs. +Grier and Karl leaned against the rail of the P. & O. steamer, +_Ganges_, and watched the form of the stalwart planter until he, and +the Calcutta Ghaut, and the busy banks of the Hughli River, dissolved +in a mist of tears. + +For India is an evil land in which to rear tender plants of European +stock, and Karl must go home, not to see the glowing east again until +he was a man. His mother went with him, and, if God favored the loving +family, they would all be reunited when Grier sold his tea-garden in +its highest state of efficiency some three years later. These partings +yield the sternest test of an imperial race. Hearts which do not break +suffer the fiercer strain. + +Karl, who had forgotten the sea, being scarce able to toddle when his +parents quitted Britain, quickly merged his sorrows in the marvels of +the Bay of Bengal. His mother, choking her grief each day until the +boy slept, watched him narrowly. She was a very intelligent woman, +and, although her formula was wordless, she had a definite belief that +the immensity of the ocean, its far-flung silence, might affect her +extraordinary son in some unexpected manner. + +Luckily, Dr. Macpherson, time-expired and pensioned, was on board, and +in him she had a sympathetic friend also who was a skilled observer. He +concurred with her that repression or secrecy was not to be thought of +in connection with Karl. The boy’s insatiable curiosity about ships +and their ways was not denied such information as was obtainable. The +captain, attracted one morning by his joyous laugh, took him up to +the chart-house, showed him how to take an observation, explained the +curvature of the earth, and, finally, made him pull the cord of the +siren, thereby summoning all hands to collision quarters for inspection. + +Now, the raucous blast of the fog-horn spoke to the youngster as the +voice of the ship. It probed boundless depths in Karl’s soul. He heard +the tremulous waves of sound speeding over the face of the waters long +after the steam breath was dry in the whistle. He heard, though he knew +it not, the solemn echoes as the rolling harmony was sent up from sea +to clouds and back to the sea again. + +And he began to “dream.” Mrs. Grier, fearful of the outcome, would have +distracted his attention, but Dr. Macpherson, who had never seen the +boy in the actual state of exaltation, besought her not to check him. + +The day passed without incident. After dinner they were on deck, +enjoying the glorious tropical moon, “that orbèd maiden, with white +fire laden,” which some globe-trotting impressionist has described as +yellow! Macpherson, thinking Karl’s visionary mood had passed without +result, pointed out such planets as were ascendant, and added the +information that several hundreds of smaller bodies were invisible, +save to astronomers. + +“I can see a good many,” said Karl, instantly. + +“Nonsense. Those are stars,” smiled the doctor. + +“No. I mean round black things, like balloons. Some of them are shiny +on one side.” + +“By gad!” muttered the man under his breath. He gazed up at the +glittering firmament. + +“That big fellow there is Jupiter,” he said. “Can you discover anything +peculiar about him?” + +“Yes,” said Karl, instantly. “There are three little dots quite near. +They look like pins stuck in a blue cloth.” + +“Karl, did anybody ever tell you that Jupiter had three moons?” + +“I never heard of Jupiter before, but I have often seen the three +moons,” was the amazing answer. + +“That is true,” interposed Mrs. Grier. “We kept such problems from his +ken.” + +What Dr. Macpherson might have said will never be known. They were +standing on the port side, well forward. On a clear space aft some +light-hearted people were waltzing. In utter disobedience of the +ship’s rules, a young Armenian, scion of a great commercial house in +London and Calcutta, was sitting on the rail. Some one cannoned against +him and he fell, yelling, into the sea. + +Instantly there was a hubbub of screams and rushing feet. A cool-headed +man threw a life-buoy after the unfortunate youth, and others shouted +to the officer of the watch. Very speedily the steamer’s way was +stopped and the engines reversed. + +The ship’s framework throbbed under the agony of the giant machines +thus rudely checked in their work. British quartermasters and lithe +Lascars worked like fiends to clear a boat’s hamper and swing out the +davits. But it was a hopeless task. Great steamers slip through a mile +of water with such rapidity, and the course was so interfered with by +reversing the propellers, that nothing short of a miracle would reveal +the whereabouts of the hapless Armenian, even if he still floated and +retained consciousness. + +“Mrs. Grier--” began Macpherson. + +“I know what you would say,” she cried bravely. “Yes, let Karl help, +and let me try to thank God he has the power.” + +Were it not for Macpherson’s great reputation and personal popularity +the captain would scarcely have listened to him in that confused +moment. Even as it was, he only understood the doctor to say that +Constantine, the Armenian, could be found, and he gave permission in a +dazed way for the man and the boy to be seated in the boat before it +was lowered. + +Then Macpherson had to convince a sceptical third officer, and, +greatest difficulty of all, he had to bend Karl’s excited wits to the +task in hand, for the child was delighted with the adventure. + +The plash of the oars, the stealing away of the huge black hull of the +_Ganges_, the earnest words of Macpherson, soon had their effect. Karl +commenced to know what was expected of him. + +“Yes,” he said, standing up on a seat in his eagerness, and pointing to +a different course, “he is there, crying out loud. He is calling for +his mother.” + +Not the best sailor of them all could see or hear aught. Yet, for want +of other guide, the third officer swung round the boat’s head. + +Ever and anon Karl told them where the Armenian was, and even shouted, +in his shrill treble, to encourage him. + +At last, after twenty minutes of strenuous tugging, a quartermaster in +the bows roared hoarsely, “By the Lord, I can see him!” + +“Of course,” chirrupped Karl. “He was there all the time!” + +So a half-drowned, wholly hysterical Constantine, clinging desperately +to a buoy which he refused to abandon, was dragged into the boat, and +Karl was restored to his weeping mother’s arms, while strange tales ran +through the ship when the screw jogged merrily onwards once more. + +That saving of Constantine meant a good deal to Karl, as shall be seen. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +THE FINDING OF MAGGIE HUTCHINSON + + +Sir William Macpherson earned his K.C.I.E. not so much by his thirty +years of Ind as by the comparative leisure which enabled him to write +that famous essay on “Brain Excitations.” He has told me since that the +genesis of the theory which likens man to an induction coil came to him +as the oars swung merrily back to the _Ganges_, he striving the while +to restore the Armenian’s vitality. + +“Karl,” he whispered, stirred by the impulse of the moment, “can you +see your father?” + +The boy looked unerringly towards the north, where Darjeeling lay, +eight hundred miles distant. + +“No,” he said after a slight pause, “it is dark.” + +“Dark?” repeated the scientist. + +“Yes, like a fog at night, you know.” + +“But there is no fog, and it was quite as dark a few minutes since, +when you saw Mr. Constantine in the sea.” + +Karl seemed to focus his thoughts once more. Then he nestled wearily +close to his friend. + +“Something seems to press me back, and I am tired,” he said. + +Every woman who reads this would, in all probability, like to box +Macpherson’s ears. And, indeed, he had the good grace to be ashamed +of himself, though, if doctors did not push individual experiments a +trifle too far occasionally, the mass of humanity would be the worse +for their caution. Nevertheless, though he contented himself with +asking the third officer to shield the boy from the keen surface air +of the sea, his mind was busy. Karl’s wonderful comprehension of root +words was known to him, and he felt that the expressions “dark,” “fog,” +“something seems to press me back,” even the unwonted excuse of being +“tired,” were not chosen at random. + +Then he remembered how a friend had taken him once, when home on +furlough, to witness certain telephonic tests conducted by the +Post-office engineers at St. Martin’s-le-Grand. An instrument was +affixed to an appliance which registered 10,000, 15,000, 20,000 +miles of resistance at will, for such high tensions are needed when +sea-cables are laid. It was instructive to hear the same human voice +dying away as the conductivity of the wire decreased. Again, he +happened to be present when the Indo-European Telegraph Company carried +out their famous experiment, and actually linked a transmitter in +Paris with a receiver in Calcutta. As far away as Teheran the action of +the electric indicator was sharp and distinct, but from Constantinople +westwards through Vienna the current became sluggish, until the supreme +effort of Paris required slow and careful manipulation ere the message +emerged from chaos. + +Here were unfailing indications of what Karl meant by “pressing back” +and “tired.” But what was the significance of the darkness, the fog? +Suddenly Macpherson asked himself: + +“What was the force which fought against the thousands of miles of +telegraph wire? Suppose there was no wire? Yet the force remained!” + +It came to him that the child cast his bright intelligence forth +in ever-spreading Hertzian waves, and that his perceptive powers +diminished with distance, on the well-established ratio of the decrease +of sound as the circle widens and air-waves lengthen with slower +movement. Moreover, the apparent difficulty of reconciling his instant +discovery of planets known only to astronomers with his inability to +penetrate deeply the gloom of earth vanished when the lateral density +of the air mantle was taken into account. To see the three moons of +Jupiter! That was a marvel in itself. Strangely enough, Du Maurier, an +artist dreamer, had attributed the power to one of the characters in +his novel _The Martian_. But that was a phase in a spirit romance; here +was a child with eyes like telescopes and ears like telephones. + +Greatly was the scientist tempted to try Karl again on the nearer, +and wholly unknown, physical features of Colombo. But he resisted and +vigorously chafed the Armenian’s chest and back, though, to be sure, +the tenacious clinging of the youth to the canvas buoy rendered such +massage difficult. + +Thenceforth, during the voyage home, Constantine pestered Karl with a +ludicrous, dog-like fidelity. The Armenian was lean, tall, and dark, +with the big, black eyes, large mouth, small ears, and prominent nose +of his race. Ordinarily, he was a bumptious and exceedingly “clever” +young man, the heir to crores of rupees, and a business of world-wide +renown; yet the mere sight of Karl skipping towards him along the deck +would stop his blatant chatter and convert him into a sort of human +grey-hound, a timid animal, which had just caught sight of its master. +This submissiveness amused the other passengers, annoyed Mrs. Grier, +and caused Macpherson certain ponderings. + +Constantine told the doctor that when he found himself in the water +grasping the life-buoy his first impression was that the ship could not +possibly find him. He began to cry in a frenzy, but suddenly he became +reassured. After that he had no fear of being drowned, but he had a +horrible premonition that a huge shark was rushing from the depths +with incredible speed to devour him. The memory of this shark always +returned whenever he saw Karl! The monster’s jaws opened! He could feel +it crush his bones! + +The boy throve splendidly aboard ship. Constantine went to England +overland from Marseilles, but he met the _Ganges_ at Tilbury, and Mrs. +Grier could hardly refuse the aldermanic gold watch and absurdly heavy +chain he presented to Karl. The watch had a fine inscription, too: +“From Paul Constantine to Karl Grier, in memory of the s.s. _Ganges_, +Bay of Bengal, Lat. 12.10 N.; Long. 84.40 E.” + +There was a date, but Karl was saved from mind-searchings by the fact +that his mother placed the gift in her bank, to await later years. + +And then Karl went to school. Just picture this sturdy little human +dynamo, with his superhuman eyes and ears, sitting down in class with +a number of youthful Edinburgh contemporaries! Yet it was impossible +for his parents to encourage the growth of his spiritual faculties (as +we may describe them) at the expense of the equipment needed to fit him +for the citizenship of the world. So he learnt the exact locality of +the North Cape in Lapland, the value of the common denominator, and the +great utility of the algebraic x. And, as he pored over books, so the +hidden spark dimmed. + +At first he was wont to startle his companions no less than his tutors. +When a master was explaining that the moon was a satellite of the +earth, and was popularly known as a destroyed world, owing to the arid +mountains and volcanic chasms with which her bright face is decorated, +it was slightly ridiculous to be told by a boy of eleven, all aglow +with interest--“Oh, yes, sir. I saw the lunar mountains quite plainly +last night. And there are several great pits as black as ink.” + +“Nonsense, Grier!” would the master say sharply, and Karl would be +stilled for the hour. Hence, he kept to himself the daily knowledge he +had of the hours of high water in the Forth, many miles away. + +Once, by chance, the same master had arranged to take his class on a +boating excursion up the Forth, and the question of tide arose. Karl +volunteered the information that the tide would be high about three +o’clock. Examined as to his accuracy (he was a careless young dog in +matters of spelling or arithmetic) he admitted that he had no actual +knowledge save the “feeling.” + +Fortunately, Mr. David Malcolm, the master, was a man prone to take +stock of the young idea, so he wrote to Mrs. Grier, and received a +positive shock when that sensible and level-headed woman gave him the +assurance of evidence that her son was not romancing. Indeed, it may +be assumed without fear of contradiction that to Mr. Malcolm’s growing +appreciation of the boy’s powers was due, in great measure, their +retention. Even under his kindly sway Karl was rapidly assimilating +to the mold of the school. Games, lessons, discipline, the smaller +issues of daily intercourse with other boys, were coating the inner +perceptiveness with a dense membrane. Again, at this period Karl almost +lost his universal language key. Declensions and conjugations choked +intuitive knowledge, and, to all seeming, when his father brought +him to Oxford at the age of eighteen, young Grier was only a lively, +intelligent, and muscular undergrad--exceptionally bright, perhaps, but +in no wise the “phee-nomenon” Sir William Macpherson had dubbed him. + +But Dame Nature, not to be balked in the development of her prodigy, +arranged matters with that happy knack of hers whereby she cloaks +design under the guise of accident. + +Grier had been at Oxford two years when a menagerie visited the +classical city on the Isis. Although wild beast shows are not regarded +by the authorities as essential aids to Oxonian success, Karl and +others visited the evil-smelling place. Now, a man will remember +through his nose and finger-tips when other more highly trained senses +fail. The first sniff of the closely packed laager of caravans brought +to Grier’s mind a series of vivid pictures of early days in the +Himalayan foot-hills. He lost himself a little, but his dreams were +interrupted by a scene which yielded an exciting paragraph for next +morning’s newspapers. + +A defective iron screen enabled a gorilla to get at a black panther. +The two beasts had a peculiar antipathy to each other, and the showman +placed them close together for effect. Like many another dramatist he +obtained a “curtain” he had not bargained for. Once the way was clear, +by reason of the giving way of the corroded lattice, the animals met in +Homeric combat. It was a fine fight, but it did not last long, for the +gorilla tore the panther’s head off. + +The other denizens of the menagerie, aroused from lethargy by the +mortal defiances hurled forth by cat and ape, scented the battle and +spoke in strange tongues. And behold! Karl knew what they were saying! +He heard the lion and tiger roaring “Kill!” the deer and buffaloes +shrieking “Run!” the monkey tribe chattering “Climb, brother, and +reach from above!” Above all resounded the raging challenge of the +elephant, who, when he is stirred, is the real master of the jungle. +Whips, hay-forks, and heavy bars of iron soon ended the disturbance. A +number of fainting women were carried out into the fresh air, and Karl, +to his intense chagrin, for he was a great dandy in those days, found +that his nose had bled freely during the hubbub. When Mr. Verdant Green +was “up” his friends would have asked who had tapped his claret, but +Karl’s companions were anxious to learn the identity of the gentleman +who had “punched him on the boko!” Youth is perennial though it may +change its idioms. It was disappointing to learn that the gore arose +from natural causes. The slaying of the panther had evoked the boys’ +fighting instincts! Pugilism--to use the naked hands on a foe--that was +the ideal! Had not the gorilla thought so? + +That night Karl found he could not sleep, so he rose and threw wide +a window. His chambers overlooked the College quadrangle with its +well-kept lawn, and, in this time of high summer, the exquisite +profiles of Oxford were blended with the soft luxuriance of the trees +guarding the peaceful precincts. + +Karl was now a tall and graceful young man. A devoted follower of the +favorite University sports, he was studious withal, and his natural +bent inclined him more to the uncompromising tenets of science than to +the literature and dogma of the classics. While following the routine +laid down by his father’s advisers, he read deeply in the less popular +branches of knowledge. Lectures on anthropology, comparative anatomy, +philology and physics--subjects which certainly provided a varied +intellectual pasturage--invariably counted him among note-takers. +Hence, it is not to be wondered at if, on this particular night, he +should give earnest thought to the half-forgotten and long-disused +powers of his childhood, powers called back into vivid existence by the +roaring of a few beasts! + +He recalled, quite clearly, the incident in which his friendship +with little Maggie Hutchinson figured so dramatically. Again, with +the photographic trick of memory, he conjured up the Darjeeling +valley. He saw the green slopes dotted here and there with planters’ +bungalows, the tea-gardens, resembling gooseberry bushes in the first +tender shoots, the winding roads, the tropical foliage. Yielding +to a whimsical surprise at the accuracy of his impressions, he +endeavored to reconstruct some of the incidents of the raid, but he +quickly discovered that beyond following events in ordered sequence +of recollection he could achieve nothing outside the range of what +appeared to be a very precise and realistic memory. + +“I wonder where Miss Margaret is now,” he murmured, with a smiling +glance skywards. “She must be a demure young lady of eighteen or +thereabouts. I think my mother said she was in Berlin, having developed +a great talent for playing the violin. Berlin! That is a long way from +Oxford, and Maggie is abed, sound asleep, little dreaming that a young +man in England is picturing her in a Kate Greenaway costume of fourteen +years ago.” + +So in this fanciful mood, the notion suddenly seized him that he would +like to see Maggie Hutchinson. What he really meant was that he would +be glad to meet her again, and exchange juvenile reminiscences of +early days in India. It is important to insist on this point, as his +undoubted intention, or desire, when contrasted with that which did +really happen, goes far to prove telegnomy a sense and not a mental +state. + +Remember, he fancied the girl was in Berlin and in bed, and, being an +extremely considerate person, Karl would certainly not have wished to +disturb her, even if such a thing were sanely possible. + +He thought the external light fled with exceeding rapidity. There was +an instant’s gloom, and then he was looking at a sunlit scene. The +surroundings were quite novel to his eyes. He seemed to be standing on +a spacious veranda of a very fine hotel. The flooring, the walls, the +pillars, were all of wood, and Karl had never seen a hotel built of +that material. Hundreds of well-dressed people were seated around small +tables, waiters were flitting to and fro; on an empty table near him he +noticed an “engaged” card, and even a _menu du diner_ of the previous +day. (It was nearly one o’clock when he went to the window.) Beyond +a crowded lawn were a theater, a band-stand, and a raised promenade +bordering the sea. + +He stared about him with the frank curiosity of the stranger. On the +right, the hotel buildings shut off the view, but, on the left, the +veranda ran a long way. It was bounded, apparently, by the turnstiles +of a railway station, and he read, quite distinctly, a prominent +notice: “Trains depart for New York every ten minutes between 6 p.m. +and midnight.” + +Away in the distance he saw a gigantic red brick building bearing the +gilded sign “Atlantic Hotel,” and he was about to stoop and pick up the +menu card--thinking to discover his whereabouts by that means--when +his attention was drawn to two persons who separated themselves from +a laughing party grouped near the band-stand. The couple, a tall, +slightly-built foreign-looking man, and a very pretty girl, whose +costume and figure alike bespoke her youth, slowly drew nearer to the +hotel veranda. + +Grier experienced no amazement when he recognized in the man, +Constantine, the Armenian. The young lady was unknown to him at first, +until some gesture, accompanied with a smile and a quick upward glance +of the eyes, recalled Mrs. Hutchinson, and he reflected that Maggie’s +mother must have looked like that when she was eighteen. + +So this was Maggie herself! How extraordinary! But what was Constantine +saying that her face should flame and her big brown eyes survey him so +scornfully. They were both talking vehemently. In his eagerness Karl +bent forward to listen. He was inclined to step from off the veranda +and join them. Perhaps Constantine, the Armenian, required to be kicked. + +At that instant he was conscious of a sharp pain in his left hand. +He was plunged into a dark void, and he came to his ordinary senses +to find that he had escaped from falling through the window into the +quadrangle only because he had pressed his left hand heavily on the top +of a pointed stick used to support some flowers in a window-box. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +A CAT AND FRANK HOOPER + + +In relation to the every-day affairs of life, Karl Grier had nerves of +iron, controlled by a well-ordered brain. + +“As soon as I recovered my wits,” he said, laughingly, afterwards, +“I closed the window, examined the injury to my hand, which was +painful but of little account, undressed, and went to bed, resolutely +determined to sleep. I knew I was overwrought, and that the worst +thing I could do was to strive uselessly to read the puzzle of the +trance, or vision, I had just experienced. I estimated that it had +lasted nearly a quarter of an hour. During those fifteen minutes I had +seemingly paid a visit to the United States. That would suffice for one +evening. I closed my eyes, endeavored to construct equipotential lines +on an imaginary surface containing two electrified spheres, and, as a +consequence, was soon sound asleep.” + +This time, be it noted, there was no sanguinary result of the spell +cast upon him. Sir William Macpherson, in the work already alluded to, +guardedly called attention to the symptoms of bleeding at the nose +and ears, and came to the conclusion that Karl presented a hitherto +unrecorded phase of hypertrophy of the brain. There were periodical +expansions of the encephalon, or, in simple language, the nerve-cells, +nerve-tubes, and the rest of the marvelous apparatus which constitute +the mental and govern the physical equipment of man, increased in +number and power, and, consequently, to a slight extent, in size. All +cases previously noted had revealed deficiency of intellect. Either the +skull could not accommodate its unwieldy tenant, or the heart could not +nourish it. Grier, exercising unknown faculties in childhood, received +the requisite nutriment without effort, and growth was permitted by the +occasional bursting of a distended membrane. + +Obviously, a full scientific explanation of the phenomenon is +impossible here. Not one scientist in ten thousand would even admit its +existence, and the few who do believe would demand a bulky tome to set +forth their reasons. + +Karl, untroubled by such considerations, overslept himself, was late +for chapel, and was reprimanded for his somnolence! He retained the +liveliest impression of all that had taken place, and, being convinced +that he had seen some well-known seaside resort in North America, +invited to his rooms a young New Yorker, who was taking a degree at +Oxford. He merely described the scene, without any explanation of its +significance, and his friend recognized it at once. + +“That is Manhattan Beach,” he cried, “one of the places where New York +dines when the weather is hot. Society goes to the Beach, the crowd +to Coney Island. They are not far apart, as the crow flies, but miles +asunder in every other respect. Say, I thought you had never been to +the States?” + +“Nor have I, to my present knowledge,” said Karl with a smile. “I have, +so to speak, constructed the picture, by force of imagination, let us +say.” + +“I congratulate you. Personally, I never fail to ‘construct’ places I +have not seen, but I find invariably that the reality differs from the +conception as greatly--well, as radically as my version of that cat’s +plaintive remarks might differ from their true inwardness.” + +It was night again, and the two were sitting near the open window. +Somewhere beneath in the quad a seemingly disconsolate feline was +mewing its aspirations. There was a moment’s silence while they +listened, the American blithely unconscious that he had done aught save +utter a harmless pleasantry. + +“Tell me what you think the cat is saying,” said Karl, quietly. + +“I am not strong on cat,” was the reply. “Like Lord Roberts, I detest +the whole tribe. Away back in the origin of species I must have an +affinity with either the cat’s mortal enemy, or its prey. But, as a +guess, I should credit puss with remarking that he, or she, is waiting +in the gy-arden ne-ow. ‘It’s a fine ne-ight; oh, won’t ye-ou come over +the we-all,’ is my version.” + +Your true American can do that sort of thing and preserve the face of a +sphinx. His natural drawl lent an adroit buffoonery to his joke. He had +not the least notion that his friend was speaking in earnest. But he +pricked his ears, metaphorically, when Grier said, beginning in a low +monotone, but ending excitedly: + +“You are mistaken. That cat is using a chant of defiance. It is old as +the hills, the product of the wind-mutterings of storm and the crash of +thunder. Listen: + + Who art thou who seest with fire, snake-creeping among the bushes? + Think not thou art hidden. + I also have eyes of flame. Beware! + I am young and strong; I can bite and tear. + I spring far to conquest. + My claws are sharp. + Fly, ere I rend thee! + Comest thou yet? Kill then, kill!” + +As the concluding words rang through the room there came from without +the spitting and snarling of a pair of frenzied cats. There was a rush +and a scurry, and all was still. + +The American leaped to his feet with a somewhat hysterical laugh. + +“Say, Grier,” he cried, “that’s one against me. But how, in the name +of the father of all cats, did you manage to wind up your epic of the +Tertiary Period at the exact moment the fur began to fly?” + +“Sit down, please. I am translating freely, but accurately enough. +Animals contrive to enfold many parts of speech in a single sound.” + +“Do you mean to tell me you _understood_ that cat’s mewing?” + +“I--I think so.” + +“Your thinking is uncommonly realistic.” + +“Try to credit me, Hooper. I am not romancing. Somewhere at the back +of my head I have a language code which explains these things. If Max +Müller can declare with conviction that every thought which ever passed +through a human brain may be expressed in one hundred and twenty-one +radical concepts, if the earth and the heavens can be composed of sixty +chemical substances, surely it is not outrageously impossible for a +lower animal organism to contrive a large vocabulary out of a few +elementary sounds?” + +Hooper produced a cigar. + +“This requires profound smoke,” he said. + +“I want help,” murmured Karl. “Criticize and question as much as you +like, but scoffing will serve no purpose.” + +“The deuce a scoff. I am far too interested. To begin at the +beginning: What is the cat, or cattish, for ‘seeing with fire,’ and +‘snake-creeping,’ both exceedingly apt phrases, by the way?” + +“I cannot tell you. I only know that these are handy symbols of +root-ideas. Musicians would comprehend a mental condition of definite +thought without syllabic form. Mendelssohn wrote: ‘It is exactly +at that moment when language is unable to voice the experiences of +the soul that the vocation of music opens to us; if all that passes +in us were capable of expression in words I should write no more +music.’ Wagner goes to the extreme of assigning a measured musical +phrase to a given idea. Were I not deficient in the parrot’s skill +of sound-reproduction, I could most certainly converse, in crude +suggestion, with many animals. What is speech? Merely the trick of +conveying ideas by articulate sounds. Can it be affirmed that man +alone is gifted with the power? I once heard a gamekeeper calling a +corn-crake by using a little mechanical instrument. The bird came, in +response to the fancied cry of its mate. It was shot for its credulity. +Were my vocal cords differently shaped I could have warned it against +danger. Is not that speech?” + +“Unless I am greatly mistaken, you are expounding a new thesis of life, +Grier,” said the American. “Is there any limit? Do you go down the +scale? How about insects, reptiles, fishes?” + +Karl paused a little while. “Would that I might answer!” he cried at +last. “Who am I that I should add unknown words to the sparse total +which serves human needs? Think what it means, that list of Müller’s! +Six score root-ideas, from which we have named 245,000 species of +living animals, classified nearly 100,000 fossils, produced the works +of Shakespeare and Milton! Yet I swear to you that many a time, in +India, lying awake and listening to the croaking of innumerable frogs, +I could distinguish the one final shriek of agony of a frog seized by a +snake from the million-voiced chorus of its fellows.” + +“Are these unknown languages always recognizable? If a dog yelps +because he has been booted, do you hear him say: ‘Stop that, you +two-legged ruffian! What have I done, I should like to know?’ If so, +you must have a lively time of it at a cattle-fair, for instance.” + +Karl laughed. He rose, pulled down the blind, and switched on the +electric light. + +“I am quite serious,” protested his friend. “For goodness’ sake don’t +be vexed if my questions seem idiotic. When I came here to-night I +did not expect you to play ‘Hail Columbia’ with all my preconceived +notions.” + +“Vexed! Why should I be vexed with so strenuous a listener? No, I do +not gather up all these animal utterances, else I should go mad. The +exercise of my peculiar faculties requires effort. I am like a loaded +camera. To take a picture I must raise the shutter.” + +“You speak in the plural. Was your description of Manhattan Beach based +on some other intuition?” + +“Yes. If you care to listen I will tell you some strange things. But +first I must have your pledge of inviolable secrecy.” + +Hooper gave ready assurance, and Karl acquainted him with a good many, +substantially all the main points, of the facts I have previously +recorded. + +The American was shrewd and precise. He was studying Roman Law and +Jurisprudence at the English University, his avowed object being +to devote his life to the codification of his own country’s laws. +Therefore, among the young men of his college, Karl could have found +none of quicker and clearer perceptiveness. + +When the recital reached the previous night’s inexplicable events he +checked each item as though it were a section of a statute. + +“There is one feature of your unparalleled experiences which stands out +in bold relief,” he commented, at the close of Grier’s story. “You can +see and hear only that which is taking place at the precise moment of +your trance, as we shall call it. You can look into neither the past +nor the future. Last night, allowing for a difference of five hours, +you actually saw people dining and listening to the band at Manhattan +Beach. It is noteworthy that you saw only, and did not hear. Yet you +heard the Armenian yelling for help when he was a mile from the ship. +The deduction is obvious. The electric waves, or whatever they are, +which convey impressions to your brain, follow the known laws of the +transmission of light and sound. If I were poetically inclined, I might +put it that you can see the spheres but you cannot hear their music. +Now, I am going to ask you, straight out, if you will oblige me by +ringing up that young lady again.” + +“Now?” + +“Right now. It is not far from the same hour.” + +“I will try,” said Karl, simply. + +In order to reproduce kindred conditions he extinguished the light, +raised the blind and the window, and looked out. + +“Last night,” he said, “I nearly fell into the quad in my excitement.” + +“No fear of that unless I fall too,” was the emphatic reply. + +Karl focused his thoughts on Maggie Hutchinson. He found it easy to +follow the trend of circumstances which led up to the vision of the +preceding day. Soon there came the now almost familiar darkening of +the air and the instantaneous disappearance of surrounding objects, to +be succeeded by a well-defined view of a somewhat dimly lighted but +spacious apartment. It was a very large room, with an unusually low +ceiling, but the decorations, carpets, panels, and queer little windows +were fashioned or conceived with much taste. At the farther end was a +grand piano. In the center of the floor was a sunken space, guarded by +rails. Seated on a sort of divan which ran round the walls were a great +many ladies and some half-dozen gentlemen. They were reading, talking, +or lying comfortably ensconced in cushions. But the odd thing was that +the room and its inhabitants absolutely defied the law of gravity. No +earthquake that ever shook the globe could make a house sway in such +fashion without causing irretrievable ruin. + +Yet the people in this uncanny apartment appeared to be in no wise +disturbed by its vagaries, and, most amazing thing of all, when any +individual crossed the room, or entered, or quitted it, he or she +walked with a ridiculous disregard for either the changing angles of +the room or Newton’s theory. So astonished was Karl by the spectacle +that it took him a long time to realize that he was looking at the +saloon drawing-room of a big Atlantic liner, which was evidently +ploughing through a stiff gale. He saw the ship’s name, the _Merlin_, +on a printed notice swinging on the wall, and he laughed so heartily at +the antics of a fat man who essayed to carry a shawl to a lady on the +opposite side of the vessel, that he regained his wits to find Hooper +holding his arm and eagerly demanding: + +“Well, what have you seen? Why are you laughing?” + +Grier, not bewildered in the slightest degree by the sudden transition +from the saloon of an ocean-going steamship to his chambers in an +Oxford College, told his attentive friend what had transpired. + +Like every up-to-date American, Hooper knew most of the great liners, +and kept track of their sailings. An Englishman drops a letter into the +pillar-box and trusts to Heaven and the Postmaster-General that it will +reach its destination, but the average New Yorker would wonder what was +wrong with him if he could not follow the missive by sea and rail, with +precise details of the journey from start to finish. + +So Hooper ejaculated: “The _Merlin_! Great Scott! She sailed from New +York to-day. Was the girl on board?” + +“I do not know,” admitted Karl. “I did not even look for her, so +greatly was I mystified by the wobbliness of everything.” + +“Well, I guess we’ve done enough for one _séance_,” said the other. +“I’ve read and heard of some top-notch clairvoyants, but I give you +best. To-morrow evening, after Hall, I shall have the tangle a bit +less knotted, if pen and paper will follow its twists. You were away +somewhere for nearly twenty minutes, your eyes were closed, and you +reeled so that I thought you would have fallen. Guess you felt the +deck heaving! But, say, old man, do you sleep well after this kind of +circus?” + +“Sleep! I sleep like a healthy navvy!” said Karl. + + + + +CHAPTER V + +KARL’S FIRST MEETING WITH STEINDAL + + +Hooper turned up next evening armed with a note-book. + +“I did not go to bed until long after sunrise,” he said. “When I began +to marshal my thoughts into some semblance of order, I was amazed to +find how far back into the twilight of human origins you carried me +with your cat language. Has it ever struck you how old this world is, +how long men have waited before they took their first sure step towards +knowledge?” + +“Are you speaking of the evolution of matter in general, or of mankind +in particular?” asked Grier. + +“Of our noble selves, to be sure. Geologically, there is practically no +limit backward, but we have been so fed up on individualism that we are +only now beginning to abandon useless speculations as to the eternity +of the future for a more definite study of the eternity of the past. +Now you, with your animal language and your genuine far-seeing, have +cleared the mist from a theory I have held nebulously for a year or +more. Let me state it in progressive theses: (_a_) Human inventiveness +is bounded only by the zone of human intelligence; (_b_) the capacity +of the brain extends far beyond our present scientific comprehension; +(_c_) every new discovery is, therefore, a mere quickening into +activity of some special attribute latent in all properly regulated +brains; (_d_) a time may come when man shall know all things, as +nothing can happen, nor can have happened, which the brain is not +capable of conceiving.” + +“An old Indian acquaintance, Sir William Macpherson, has told me that +he has reached a similar conclusion. Nevertheless, your theorizing +vaults a long way in advance of my experiences.” + +“Not a bit of it. You are merely a living testimony of faculties either +undeveloped or deemed dead owing to disuse. Oddly enough, you, my +friend, possess powers which we modern degenerates--beef-fed and stodgy +with misapplied civilization--coolly relegate to the lower animals or, +at the best, to savage tribes. Watch cattle in a field, birds in the +air--are they not skilled weather prophets, far more reliable than +any Meteorological Bureau? They don’t tap a glass cylinder of mercury +or write learnedly about cirrus clouds and convex cumuli. No, the +cows and horses just nibble the grass on the exposed hills, the birds +skate about unconcernedly, if the advancing gloom simply heralds a +passing shower; but see them all scoot for shelter before ever a leaf +is stirred if a real storm is about to break. That is pure, undiluted, +unquestioning knowledge. The power of transmitting news instantly +over long distances, possessed by certain human nomads, is of the +same type. Therefore, my dear Karl, you hark back in the centuries. +You are away down the social scale. I, an up-to-date demigod, to whom +the real meaning of nearly every word I use is unknown, tell you this +unblushingly.” + +“Is that a part of your theory that the world is still in its infancy +in its search after truth?” + +“Well hit, my prehistoric man, my vitalized fossil. You are old as many +of the hills. Oh, if only I could put a date on you! Say, have you ever +heard of Eridhu?” + +“Do you mean the Chaldean city?” + +“Yes. Well, six thousand years ago it was a seaport, and the sanctuary +of the Chaldean god, Eâ. Now, it is a dust-heap, miles inland. A +friend of mine, sorting among the rubbish last year, found a tomb. The +gentleman buried therein must have been an Akkadian antiquary, who +hated, even in death, to be parted from his treasures, because the +brick vault containing his remains also held a variety of objects +several thousand years older than himself.” + +“Are the facts quite clear?” + +“Clear. Just listen to the evidence. You, as a bloated Britisher, are +aware, no doubt, that the year when it first attained the dignity +of record began with the vernal equinox, and the opening month was +named after the ‘propitious Bull’? Thus, Bull headed the twelve +constellations of the zodiac, and was quite an important character. +Well, in the tomb aforesaid, the excavators found a small stone urn, +bearing, not Taurus, the Bull’s sign, but Aquarius, the water-carrier. +The sun, at the vernal equinox, has been in Aries since 2,500 B.C., and +it first entered Taurus somewhere about 4,700 B.C. Lots of centuries +must have been passed in observation before the astrologers formed the +calendar we use to-day, so the urn could claim, at the very least, a +venerable antiquity, unless it was a hoary Chaldean hoax. There is +a good reason to believe it was anything but a joke. It was brought +to Washington, eagerly examined by a gathering of archæologists, and +dropped by some trembling enthusiast on to a marble floor.” + +“Good gracious!” + +“Yes, the finder said something like that. Indeed, his language was +even more fluent. Yet the accident led to a discovery. The shattered +urn consisted of two vessels, one within the other. Between the two was +a thin slip of ivory, and on this was a cuneiform inscription, with +a lively drawing showing how one gentleman hammered a big nail into +another gentleman’s skull.” + +“Do you propose to treat me in that way?” + +“I have reached my point now. That record of a crime, probably a +murder of revenge, was kept secret for at least 7,000 years, and only +Schliemann or Haynes could tell us how much longer. So your peculiarly +constituted brain, my friend, has gone on repeating itself through many +a forgotten ancestor until the accident of environment enabled its +hidden recesses to burst their bonds. It took a great many clever men a +great many years to decipher the cuneiform characters of the Akkadians, +and you will probably be dead long before some genius yet unborn tells +an anxious world why you can see things that are taking place at a +distance of over three thousand miles. Meanwhile, behold in me your +patient observer and chronicler. To-night--” + +“To-night we shall talk and smoke, and pursue vain conceits,” said +Karl, determinedly. “I think I ought to forego these glimpses into the +void. They are unpleasing in many ways. Of what personal benefit is +this unusual gift? I wish to qualify myself for a commercial career, +and the only practical use of such escapades as those of the two +preceding nights is somewhat in the detective line. I mean to resist +the impulse for the future.” + +“Now you are indulging in banalities. You can no more resist the +occasional use of your splendid gifts than a duckling reared by a +hen could hold back from a pond. And do you really think that I have +written twenty pages of notes merely to fool away three hours? I guess +Maggie can’t be a nice girl, or it’s a sure thing you would want to see +her again.” + +Karl smiled, and a very charming way he had of revealing his white +teeth with the kindliest and most good-natured expression of genuine +fun. + +“Even if you are smugging at law, Frank,” he said, “you should spare +your friends the tricks of counsel. You fancy, and probably your belief +is justified, that if I allow my mind to dwell on Miss Hutchinson’s +appearance, such as I have recently discovered it to be, I shall wander +off hopelessly across the ocean to find her. I am sorry to disappoint +you, but I am firm in my resolution to discourage these influences as +much as possible.” + +Hooper sighed. He put away his note-book and viciously bit the end off +a green cigar, a feat by no means so easy as the smokers of British dry +weeds may imagine. + +“Then let us talk of ships and kings and sealing-wax,” he growled. “I +am rather strong on ancient Egypt. Would you like to hear my views on +Ka?” + +Hooper was speaking with careless sarcasm. He was grievously annoyed +that Grier should cut off a highly interesting experiment in such a +summary fashion. Yet there is an unconscious art which is superior to +all intent, and Hooper had blundered on to a question which set his +hearer’s mind in a whirl. + +“Ka!” he said softly. “Surely that is what we call the soul? It is +animism, the shadowy second self evoked from dreams. Yes, that is a +root word, direct from the earliest mint. Man, in his first speech, +described Ka.” + +The American veiled the joy in his eyes by a cloud of smoke. + +“If I can only plunk him near the window now, he will switch on to +Maggie with a jerk,” was the ready reflection. But the “plunking,” +whatever it may mean--for your good American, when not undergoing the +embalming process which finally fits him for Paris, can coin words +at will--was not necessary. Karl, without effort or volition, passed +through the umbra which separated his known senses from the sway of +their unknown congener. He leaned back in his chair, closed his eyes, +and was forthwith, to all appearance, sleeping lightly. + +Hooper, whose nostrils quivered with repressed excitement, flung +away his cigar and applied himself to the task of recording all +external physical indications of the emotions his companion might be +experiencing. It will be remembered that this trance-like condition +was usually preceded by some slight disturbance of the blood-vessels +infringing on or adjacent to the brain. There was no such sign of +cerebral disorder on this occasion. Karl seemed to have yielded to a +desire for a pleasant and refreshing doze. + +Again, when he saw Maggie Hutchinson and the Armenian at Manhattan +Beach, he had endeavored to approach nearer to them, and was only +prevented by the fortunate interposition of a window-ledge and a stick +stuck in a flower-pot, while his temporary flight to the storm-tossed +saloon of the _Merlin_ had caused him to sway in Hooper’s arms. +To-night he sat immovable, though he witnessed a series of really +remarkable events, the sight or hearing of which would assuredly +have evoked some reflex action or cry during any of his earlier +manifestations. + +Luckily, there was present, in the young American, a sympathetic +watcher, who, notwithstanding his comparative youth, had all the +coolness and critical acumen of a hardened investigator. Hooper, +true to his own theory, was convinced that he was assisting in the +development of a hitherto unsuspected function in man’s brain. He +knew that the obscure sum of influences we call heredity affects the +adult man in a surprisingly small traceable degree as compared with +education. If it were possible to leave an infant, born of civilized +parents, wholly to its own devices, what direct characteristics of +human ancestry would it exhibit? It would possess no articulate +language, its knowledge would not extend beyond the limited recognition +of a few articles of food, its reasoning faculties would be a blank, +its highly convoluted brain a storehouse of potentialities as hidden +as the wonder of its nervous system or the chemical building of its +tissue. In a word, a child which, under tuition, might become the +discoverer of a new province in human thought, would sink instantly +to the condition of palæolithic man. Let the key be lost which should +unlock the treasury, and untold ages of horror and suffering, of +seemingly endless and unavailing effort, must be endured ere it could +be found again. Yet the treasure was there intact, as surely pent +within the protoplasmic ovum as displayed in all its splendor on the +printed page of the world-convincing treatise. That was the great +miracle of nature, and Hooper asked himself what phase of her manifold +powers was now unfolding itself before his intent yet uncomprehending +eyes. + +He knew that mankind to-day can produce, in facsimile, types of +ancestors found in pliocene strata at least 500,000 years old. Stone +knives alone could make the intentional cuts found on the ribs of a +cetacean stranded on the shore of the pliocene sea, and what that meant +to a prehistoric tribe is clearly shown by Lord Avebury’s (Sir John +Lubbock’s) summary of a description by Captain Grey of a recent whale +feast in Australia: + +“When a whale is washed ashore it is a real godsend to them (the +aborigines). Fires are lit to give notice of the joyful event. They +rub themselves all over with blubber and anoint their favorite wives +in the same way. Then they cut down through the blubber to the beef, +which they eat raw or broil on pointed sticks. As other natives arrive +they ‘fairly eat their way into the whale, and you see them climbing in +and about the stinking carcase, choosing tit-bits.... There is no sight +in the world more revolting than to see a young and gracefully formed +girl stepping out of the interior of a putrid whale.’” + +Hooper had plenty of time to let his imagination run riot in this +wise. The light fell on Grier’s face, but the watcher looked in vain +for any indication of the sights or sounds in which the sleeper +was participating. Karl, to outward semblance, might be either +really asleep or brought to muscular rigidity by the influence of +an anæsthetic. He was calm, unmoved, the lips slightly parted, with +healthy color, and an easy rise and fall of the chest. + +This late sitting broke the stringent college rules, but Hooper cared +little for penal ordinances. Yet even he grew anxious when Karl +failed to arouse himself after an hour had passed in utter silence. +He was very reluctant to disturb his comrade. This present flight +through space promised to transcend its predecessors in the prolonged +sequence of its events. Nevertheless, there was a limit to his friend’s +endurance if not to his own. + +When the expiration of another fifteen minutes revealed no sign of +Grier’s return to consciousness, Hooper did not think he was justified +in permitting the trance to continue indefinitely without assuring +himself, at any rate, that Grier’s pulse was normal and his heart +beating regularly. + +He stooped and caught Karl’s wrist gently. He noticed that the +breathing was slow and measured, and he had just succeeded in detecting +the pulse when Karl opened his eyes. + +He gave one surprised, almost bewildered glance at Hooper, laughed +cheerfully when he looked at the clock on the mantelpiece, and said, in +the most matter-of-fact way: + +“Have you ever heard of a man named Steindal in New York?” + +“Y--yes.” Hooper nearly stammered, he was so taken aback by the +curiously commonplace question. + +“Is he connected with the stage?” went on Karl, eagerly. + +“Yes, in a sense. He is a dramatic agent, I think.” + +“He is unquestionably a dramatic scoundrel. Why did you interfere? At +the very moment I quitted him he was giving his own precious character +to Constantine. Never mind! I will find the rascal and beat him to a +jelly.” + +“Bully for you! Things have happened, then?” + +“My dear Frank, I have not only seen but _heard_. Think what it means! +Three thousand miles of wireless telephony! And what a first-rate brute +that fellow Steindal is!” + +“A regular son of a gun, I have no doubt. But say. I thought you had +rung up Maggie Hutchinson?” + +“I did not see her, thank Heaven, but I heard so much concerning her +that I shall make it my business to meet the _Merlin_ at Liverpool and +warn her against that pair of beauties in New York.” + +Hooper selected a fresh and extra green cigar. + +“Now, indeed, I can smoke the calumet of peace while you talk,” he +said, curling up in an easy chair with the comfortable _abandon_ of one +who has faithfully kept a long vigil. + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +IN WHICH CONSTANTINE HAS A VISION + + +Although he had not the slightest difficulty in recounting the precise +phrases of conversations and the exact details of actions which had +their habitat in New York during the previous hour and a quarter, +Karl did unquestionably feel the need of choosing his words when he +began to tell Hooper how a new and wholly entrancing phase of his +extraordinary powers was opened up by the discovery that mere distance +no longer diminished his sense of hearing. It was so vitally important +to be accurate. First impressions are of prime value in describing a +sensation. If a man only retained his first impression of the taste of +alcohol what a sober world it would be! + +When his conscious intelligence quitted the room in which he and +Hooper were sitting, he had no fixed objective in his mind. This fresh +departure was noteworthy, and, indeed, absolutely essential to the +theory propounded by Sir William Macpherson, namely, that Karl was a +living installation of wireless telegraphy. If this rough-and-ready +definition of the phenomenon were reasonably correct, it was essential +that the human “station” should have the power of receiving as well as +transmitting the electrical influences which called into activity its +sixth sense. Hitherto Grier had, so to speak, swept the mental horizon +with a searchlight, hoping or expecting to find the object he sought. +Now, in a state of quiescence, yet tuned to the proper pitch by the +sound of one of those strong, deep words which vibrate back to the +twilight of human origins, he was encountered by another radio-active +force, and became, for a time, a machine-like recorder of impressions. + +After the familiar passing through darkness into light--this momentary +eclipse being apparently a mechanical readjustment of the normal +functions of the brain to their novel requirements--he found himself a +spectator of a meeting between two men, a meeting which was seemingly +taking place in a second-floor office overlooking the junction of two +busy thoroughfares. + +He could hear nothing. He was in the position of an audience watching +the cinematographic representation of an express train thundering +through a station--there was all the realism of life and motion, but no +sound. In his case, of course, there were the added illusions of color +and sunlight, nor was the vision distracted by perplexing flutterings +of a winding film. + +One of the men was Constantine, tall, sallow-faced, dark-eyed, habited +in evening dress, but showing an Oriental love of display by the pair +of diamond studs blazing in his shirt-front, the thrilling design of +his brocade waistcoat, and the braid, two inches wide, which seamed his +trousers. His companion, also attired in the garb abhorred by George +Bernard Shaw, was, in all save his un-American aspect (both men being +unmistakably “aliens”) the exact antithesis of Constantine. A short, +tubby man, the product, it appeared, of a Polish-Jew father and a +Mexican half-caste mother, he might be likened to a human olive. He was +so round, so greeny-bronze in complexion, that Karl, summing him up +afterwards, said: + +“When I meet him, I shall half expect to see him preserved in vinegar +inside a bottle with a flamboyant label.” + +The two were discussing a matter of grave interest, judging by their +faces. Karl made a sub-conscious effort to listen to what they were +saying, but it failed, though he subsequently recalled a faint +knowledge of vague sounds, as though he were endeavoring to hear +through thick glass. + +The room was sumptuously furnished. The walls were decorated with +photographs, large and small, of gentlemen with wide and expressive +mouths and abundant hair, and of ladies with goo-goo eyes and even more +abundant hair, wearing picture hats for the most part. Several framed +letters, either typewritten or hugely scrawled, were crowded together +over the fireplace, and they set forth in unguarded terms the varied +excellences of “Dear Steindal,” or “Mr. Wilhelm Steindal,” or “Wilhelm +Steindal, Esq.” Through the open windows Karl saw electric cars +hurrying to and fro beneath, the bright steel rails commanding a clear +center of the street, while the general traffic was made up of light +trolleys, delivery vans and bicycles, with hardly ever a cab or private +carriage. On two sides of a diminutive street lamp he read “Broadway” +and “W. 22d St.,” so he assumed that he had, for some occult reason, +found his way to New York. + +His attention was caught by the flush of anger on Constantine’s face. +The Armenian emphasized his comment with a passionate thump of his +clenched fist on the table. Steindal, if the fat man were the recipient +of those flattering letters, seemed to be expostulating. After some +argument, in which Constantine was apparently brought round to the +other’s view, the olive-skinned person stretched out a pulpy hand for +a code book, which he consulted, and framed a message. + +And now, for the first time to his adult knowledge, Karl _purposely +changed his position_ without interrupting his sight of events in the +least degree. That is to say, his experiments of the two previous +nights had the aspect of a very vivid dream, but, on this occasion, he +acted as if he had the power of physical movement. When he saw Maggie +Hutchinson at Manhattan Beach he endeavored to “stoop” over the hotel +table, and also to “step off” the veranda on to the grass lawn beyond, +but he succeeded in neither instance. + +To-day, except that his body was in Oxford, he fancied he had complete +liberty of movement in New York. + +So he passed behind Constantine’s companion, looked over his shoulder, +and read what he had written. The words “Margaret Hutchinson” stood +out clearly from a jumble of nonsense. Karl had never used a code, and +the meaningless nature of the script puzzled him until he saw that the +writer had jotted down sentences opposite each word on a separate sheet +of paper. Perusal of this key soon made the message coherent. It read: + +“Meet the _Merlin_ on arrival at Liverpool on the 10th inst. Offer +Miss Margaret Hutchinson star concert at St. James’s Hall in my name, +and promise her prolonged engagement on good terms for exclusive +contract, Steindal.” + +There was an evil leer on Steindal’s face when he read the draft to +Constantine, and the unpleasant smile with which the latter showed +his curt approval warned Grier that an ulterior purpose lay behind an +offer which, under ordinary circumstances, should prove very acceptable +to any girl at the outset of a professional career. Karl was eager to +learn more of the compact into which these two had entered, but, strive +as he might, he could only distinguish certain faint, quick, vibrating +noises which had a vague resemblance to taps on a cymbal. He did not +realize, until later, that he was, even then, extending his range +of hearing, and the sounds he caught were the clanging bells of the +street-cars! + +Steindal summoned an assistant, gave him the cablegram, with +instructions, and Constantine and he, donning dust-coats, descended +to the street. It was a perfect joy to Karl to discover that he could +accompany them. They were taken down by an elevator--which smacks of +Cork though it is pure American--and passed out into the street. + +And then Karl Grier’s sixth sense took its first ride on a Broadway +car! Being on the up-town track it was crowded with the latest flight +of business people. + +“Did the conductor take your fare and ring you up on the indicator? +Anyhow, he would say things if you tried to work in a sixpence for a +dime,” cried Hooper, when Karl reached this part of his story; and the +spirit passenger confessed to a singular dread of being in the way of +the men and women who were standing between the seats and clinging on +to the straps. + +This was a somewhat remarkable instance of a mental record of a purely +physical sensation. Once he began to roam about during his trances +he had to learn that matter and space did not exist for him in their +every-day acceptance. + +The car swung round a curve into Madison Square, crossed 23d Street, +swept past a number of fine hotels, shops, newspaper offices, and +theaters, passed under a section of the elevated railway, and clanged +its rapid way towards newer New York. + +At last Constantine and Steindal alighted opposite a spacious +restaurant, and Grier, being a ghost of quick perception, saw that even +a rich man like the Armenian would use the street-car in preference to +a brougham, because it was much safer and twice as speedy. + +He went with the pair up the steps of the restaurant and noted the +deferential smirk of the head waiter. Nothing would have pleased him +more than to play some prank on this flunky, but the means did not +exist, so he perforce rested content with a careful scrutiny of his +surroundings. In another week or two the patrons of this fashionable +eating-house would be scattered over the cooler parts of the earth. +Already the attendance was thin, but there were sufficient diners to +warrant the cosmopolitan claims of America’s chief city. + +All speculation on this and kindred matters was, however, suddenly +extinguished by a subtle, immensely remote, yet quite distinct sound +of harmonious music. And then, with an exquisite delight that was +almost painful in its intensity, he became aware that he was listening +to the strains of a band playing one of Strauss’s waltzes. With each +few bars the lilt of the composition became clearer, the orchestration +more defined, until he could distinguish the violins, the piano, the +piccolo, and, finally, the clarionets. + +His brain reeled under the intensity of this new emotion, and there was +some danger that he might react into physical consciousness, had not a +voice whispered, at exceedingly close quarters: + +“Dot _schwein-hund_ Steindal says we cahnd gook a _poulet en casserole_ +worth a cent.” + +It was the deferential head waiter murmuring confidences to the manager! + +So the music had bridged the void! He could hear as well as see across +the Atlantic! Again had that strange gift of language prepared the +way for the exercise of an unknown faculty. Rhythm, singing, those +inarticulate sounds which Noiré calls _clamor concomitans_, were the +first utterances of primitive man when working in concert. Every savage +race sings and dances, whether in peace or war. Uncivilized men work +best when they can sing. In olden days soldiers sang as they marched +against the enemy, and civilization has only substituted the bugles and +drums for the songs. + +Beyond all question the unfettered exercise of Karl’s additional +sense, that marvelous adjunct whereby his visual and auricular nerves +annihilated distance, arose from the chance that an orchestra, mainly +consisting of stringed instruments, struck up a measured cadence at a +moment when Karl was actually straining his faculties to obtain some +more precise notion of all that was taking place. + +And now Grier, who was somewhat in the position of an operator +controlling some rarely sensitive electrical apparatus, learnt that he +must focus the instrument with delicate precision if he were to avoid +confusion. So he bent his attention on the pair at the table, seated +himself metaphorically astride the iced cantaloup which decorated the +center of their board, and gathered in each word they uttered, with +the added zest of seeing the wary glances, the twitching nostrils, the +drawn lips. + +Steindal had ordered a meal with the air of a connoisseur. That he had +not exercised much tact in conveying his wants to the head waiter has +been proved by the latter’s private opinion whispered in New York and +overheard in Oxford. + +But Constantine merely toyed with the banquet, and his nervous state of +preoccupation only increased as the champagne rose to his head. + +“I believe that girl will bring me bad luck,” was the first connected +phrase he uttered which Karl could associate with Maggie Hutchinson’s +personality, granted that she was the unseen attraction drawing him +across the Atlantic. How well he remembered the Armenian’s voice, +though a decade had passed since the last time he had heard it on board +the P. & O. steamship _Ganges_, in Tilbury Dock, when Constantine gave +him a gold watch and chain. The watch was ticking in his waistcoat +pocket at that very moment, but the chain, being of a size that +provoked caustic undergraduate humor, lay in a drawer. + +“Bad luck! There’s no such thing, _amigo mio_! Bad management? Yes, it +abounds, but, where women are concerned, I flatter myself that I know +the sex. Fair, frail, and fickle, dark, deep, and _da capo_--that’s how +I classify ’em.” + +This new voice was that of an unctuous devil. Grier, with his finely +tuned ear for vocal effects, fancied that a boa-constrictor might speak +with such a voice. It was the oil in the man-olive which gave his +speech its smoothness. + +Steindal laughed softly at his own cheap wit, but Constantine was not +amused. + +“I tell you, Steindal,” he said, “that you do not understand the nature +of a girl brought up in the home atmosphere which surrounded Maggie +Hutchinson. Damn it, man, it is that sanctity of hers which renders her +attractive to me. What is a pretty face or a fairy-like figure? A mere +commodity, a ‘cheap lot, slightly soiled’ in the catalogue of life. +_That’s_ the sort of woman _you_ have in your mind, and I don’t want +her.” + +“Sanctity, at Maggie’s age, consists of soap and water and a soft +skin. We have a Spanish proverb: ‘_el corazón manda las carnes_’--the +heart controls the body, and I know that when a woman’s desires outrun +her means she begins to weigh her scruples to see if they are really +as heavy as she fancies. Just let Maggie Hutchinson taste success, +popularity, the delights of money-spending, and then withdraw the +pleasant cup before she has drunk too deeply! Bah! Don’t talk to me of +sanctity! To the man of the world, _es de vidrio la mujer_--woman is +made of glass!” + +Steindal, scoffing in the complacency of his knowledge, tilted some +champagne down his wide throat. Karl, feverishly anxious to discover +what plot these twentieth century ghouls were hatching against a young +and innocent girl, concentrated his thoughts on Constantine with some +reminiscence of that masterfulness he exhibited as a boy on board the +_Ganges_. + +He carried his intent too far. Constantine suddenly grew livid with +fear. He turned in his chair, gazed at the floor, and sprawled over the +table, sweeping glass and plates away with a crash. + +“Look!” he shrieked in an eerie falsetto. “Can’t you see that shark +deep down there in the black water? It will devour me! Oh, help, help!” + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +“BLOOD IS A VERY PECULIAR JUICE” + + +You know what people think when a man screams out that a shark is +threatening him from the black depths of the parquet flooring of a +fashionable dining-room. And a shark is a most uncommon feature of such +manifestations. Usually the disturbing vision is a rat, or a green imp +with red eyes, or even a squirming snake. Indeed, reptiles figure so +often in alcoholic apparitions that I have often wondered why there are +not more frequent “scenes” in the London Strand, owing to the presence +on the kerb of a number of street vendors who cause make-believe +serpents to wriggle all day long on a small board. + +Several ladies rose with startled cries. A passing waiter was so +unnerved that he dropped a laden tray, and the crash added to the alarm +of those seated at a distance, to whom the hubbub, but not its cause, +was audible. The band stopped playing, a clarionet breaking off with a +funny squeak in the middle of a cadenza, and, adding fuel each instant +to the wild-fire commotion, Constantine sprawled over the table and +yelled for succor. + +Wilhelm Steindal, convinced that his companion had suddenly gone +mad, showed that he was endowed with some of the grit essential to a +scoundrel of any real importance. He picked up a carafe of iced water, +and dashed the contents into the Armenian’s gray-green face, being +prepared to follow up the attack with the bottle itself, if needful. He +acted better than he knew. The physical shock of the liquid dissipated +the magnetic influence which Karl had unwittingly exercised on the man +he had rescued from the Bay of Bengal. Forthwith, Constantine recovered +his self-possession. He mopped his dripping face with a serviette, +apologized to the astounded manager and those diners seated near, and +went out, followed by Steindal. + +The latter was too flustered to garnish his speech with Spanish +phrases, a habit he affected in order to disguise the Polish-Jew +element in his composition. Indeed, his language now savored more of +the Bowery than of Spanish America. + +“Wot’n hell did you go’n kick up that sort of circus for?” he growled, +his shining face exuding oil in his excitement. + +“I couldn’t help it. I was overpowered by a--by a memory.” + +“It was a tomfool performance, anyhow. Seems to me it’ll be all round +N’York that Steindal was out at a skate wid some flea-sucked blighter +who had brought into the country a new variety of jim-jams!” + +“Look here, Steindal, I may be afraid of some things, but I have no +fear of you. If you talk to me in that fashion, I’ll smash your face.” + +Constantine looked so murderous that the stout man retreated a pace, +and a stalwart hall-porter moved ponderously forward. The Jew felt he +had gone too far. The Armenian was too rich a prize to be flung aside +because he had created a scene in a restaurant and spoiled a good +dinner. + +So he cried, with ready complacency: + +“Don’t get mad with me, dere’s a good fella. I only wanted to shake up +your wits a bit. Come on! Here’s your hat. Let’s walk round to your +hotel. You’ll soon be all right. _Carramba!_ You scared me worse’n you +scared yourself.” + +Up-town in New York you can turn out of a brilliantly lighted and +crowded avenue into a side-street of utmost quietude. The two passed +into one of these convenient thoroughfares, and were instantly removed +from the glare of the restaurant. + +Steindal halted to light a cigarette. He eyed the Armenian covertly. + +“Tell you what,” he chuckled, “thinkin’ of that girl has put you off +your base.” + +“No, you are mistaken. Something altogether different upset me. I can’t +explain matters to you here. Wait till I’ve had a highball in my room. +Then I’ll give you the lines of it. You need have no fear of a further +outbreak. I’m all right now. And you’ve got strong nerves, eh?” + +“I need ’em my boy, in my business. I’m a peach on nerves. In the +profession they call me ‘The electrocutioner,’ because I can stiffen a +contract in five seconds. _Por Dios!_ Nerves!” + +His gurgling laugh surged in Karl’s ears as Hooper awakened him. +Steindal and Constantine had not yet reached Sixth Avenue from Broadway +ere the two young men in far-away Oxford were eagerly discussing the +incidents of the preceding hour and a quarter in New York. + +For once, the scientific necromancy of Karl’s flights through space +failed to enlist all their attention. Hooper, no less than Grier, was +thrilled by the thought that his friend had been drawn by some subtle +magnetic influence to participate, in many ways save actual presence, +in a conclave of such grave significance to a girl whose fortunes +already interested them. + +And it is, perhaps requisite, here and now, to protest against the +smile of supercilious incredulity with which some may read of the +earnestness betrayed by these youthful collegians. + +It is a fact of common knowledge that a telephone company, sufficiently +enlightened to endeavor to please its customers, has arranged for +a board of directors, consisting of three men in New York, two in +Baltimore, and one in Philadelphia, to sit in their respective offices, +holding the combined receiver and transmitter to ear and mouth, and +conduct a board meeting, to all intents and purposes as efficiently +as if they were gathered in the same room. Company directors, or +others resident in London, Birmingham, and Liverpool, could do exactly +the same thing if the British telephone officials did not require +an earthquake followed by a month’s deliberation before they would +undertake to provide the necessary facilities. + +It is exceedingly probable that, in a few years, the same instrument +which permits speech and hearing over practically unlimited distance +will carry a “seeing” apparatus as well. Will the scientific miracle be +any the more explicable because a certain quantity of insulated copper +wire intervenes between the persons seeing, hearing, and speaking +to each other? I am tempted into this disquisition because, as it +happens, the direct outcome of the conversations between the two sets +of men (than whom the English-speaking world could scarce produce four +persons more opposed in personal characteristics) was the introduction +of myself, the writer of this memoir, into the affair. Early in life, +journalism had taken me to India, where I met Karl’s father. He was a +man after my own heart. Many times, when the business of his tea estate +brought him to Calcutta, I had dined with him in the “Wilson-’otel,” +the strange name by which alone the _gharri-wala_ knows the Great +Eastern Hotel, or he had been carried off from the Red Road by me to +my own sanctum overlooking Chowringhee and the smooth, tree-dotted +_maidàn_ that stretches towards Fort William and the river. + +And you will guess readily what we poor exiles talked of while the +ice clinked in the long glasses and the blue smoke-rings of Bangalore +cheroots rose to the ceiling. He of his wife and child, I of a deluded +girl waiting in England until the rupee recovered from the heat-wave +which melted silver--Heavens! How we flung those topics back and forth, +like two tennis-players battering a ball. And we never bored each +other. Each man was far too thankful to have a sympathetic listener to +be weary of the other’s stories. + +So, in that way, I knew a great deal of Karl, and when, years having +passed, and the aforesaid girl (the rupee having long since steadied +itself at 1_s._ 4_d._) being gone to visit her mother in Devonshire +with our young hopeful, I decided to indulge in a long deferred trip to +Oxford, it was only natural that I should seek out the son of my old +Indian crony, and ask him to guide my steps along the ancient paths of +“the home of lost causes and impossible beliefs.” + +The odd thing was that no man in Britain was more prepared to give +credence to Karl’s “visions” than myself. I had long since read Sir +William Macpherson’s book, and constructed Frank Hooper’s theory of the +definite bounds of human inventiveness out of my own thought-producing +laboratory. “Blut ist ein ganz besondrer saft!” said old Mephisto, when +he wheedled Faust into signing his soul away with his own blood, and +the same “peculiar juice” of the Celtic stream ran in Grier’s veins +and in my own. Moreover, Grier _père_ had told me of the adventures +of Grier _fils_ in the matter of the Hutchinson Raid and the saving +of Constantine, so it was another of the strange coincidences of life +that brought a note from me, ensconced in the Mitre Inn, to Karl at his +college on the morning after his excursion to Steindal’s office and the +Broadway restaurant. + +Grier and Hooper come to me during the afternoon. Instead of admiring +the glories of Oxford, I had the recital of recent events poured into +my willing ears as we sat together in my private sitting-room on the +first floor. Dear me! how the years slipped back as I listened. The +rounded tree-tops and gracious spires of the English University town +did not differ so greatly from the dim outlines of the palatial city +on the left bank of the Hughli. What a mere hand-span is a vanished +decade! The magic carpet of Tangu, which instantaneously transported +its possessor whither he wished to go, was not a more wonderful vehicle +than a man’s memory. And Karl, even thus early in life, had a way of +talking that compelled attention. He spoke to the point, in simple +words. Evidently he had a horror of exaggeration. His explanations were +clear, logical, as a proposition of Euclid, and he was hardly ever at a +loss for a simile when illustrating one of the less easily understood +features of his new and extraordinary force. + +Being his senior by a good many years, I thought it my duty to point +out the hazardous nature of these excursions into the unknown. I was +fascinated by his story, of course, together with Hooper’s singularly +definite corroboration of its chief features, yet I feared lest such +playing with nervous excitability might result in paralysis or mental +trouble. + +But Karl’s cheery laugh reassured me. + +“I have taken a very precise set of notes of a lecture on Seismic Waves +this morning,” he said, “and at this very moment I could break that +poker across my knee. There’s little wrong with my brains, and still +less with my muscles, I can assure you.” + +He leaned forward, picked up the poker, and examined it critically. +It was an old-fashioned, heavy implement, with its point sharpened by +years of forgetfulness, which, in pokerdom, takes the form of slow +consumption in sulky fires. + +“Now that I come to examine it, I don’t think I can break it. Being +honest wrought iron, it will bend into a hoop. But I’ll polarize it, by +way of a change.” + +He pulled up his coat sleeves, and turned back the cuffs of his shirt +so as to bare his wrists. Then holding the poker point downwards on the +hearthrug, he began to stroke it softly with the tips of his fingers +and thumbs. His hands were white, long-fingered, and finely molded, +his wrists square and hard. Looking at him, watching the smile playing +on his eager face, and the athletic poise of his body as he kept the +poker from falling, I was struck by his physical resemblance to the +Vatican Discobolus, with its wonderful combination of repose at the +completion of the backward movement of the thrower, and of action at +the commencement of the powerful forward cast. + +But such thoughts were dispelled by the uncanny antics of the poker. It +was broad daylight, and any sleight-of-hand performance was out of the +question in every sense. Yet both Hooper and I myself saw Karl withdraw +his support from the poker, continuing the stroking movement in the +air, and gradually widening the distance between his hands. + +And the poker did not fall! It stood there immovable, as though its +point were stuck in the floor through the rug. At first I candidly +admit that I was certain Grier had found a hole in the carpet which +coincided with a crack in the flooring. But when he inclined the +imaginary axis of his hands, thus changing the direction of the +magnetic current that flowed between them, the poker adjusted its +poise to the new line of force. It described circles, leaned over at +impossible angles, lifted itself fully a foot in the air, and twice +traced in space the figure of a Maltese cross. I lay stress on this +simple yet peculiar manifestation of Karl’s powers, because it was the +first instance of them which had actually come under my personal notice. + +Certainly I was amazed, and even Hooper, notwithstanding the marvels +he had witnessed, expressed his surprise at the new feature of his +friend’s astounding qualities. + +“I can’t explain why I should have the gift of magnetic induction,” +laughed Karl. “I discovered it accidentally one day when I was making +an experiment with a freely suspended needle to determine a magnetic +meridian. I became very interested, the adjustment required delicate +manipulation, and suddenly my hands went cold, while the needle +followed their movements. Feel my hands now!” + +I caught his right hand. It was so icy to the touch that I believe I +started. + +“I really think I could magnetize your hands,” he went on. “Shall I +try?” + +Naturally, I agreed. Without permitting the poker to fall, he commenced +to stroke my hands from the finger-tips to the wrists. Soon I felt a +sensation akin to plunging them into snow. And behold, when he quitted +me, that most eccentric of pokers yielded to _my_ blandishments! + +But in my case a more orthodox circulation quickly shattered the +magnetic axis. In a few seconds the poker tottered, and would have +fallen had I not caught it. The marked diminution of temperature +experienced while I was under the influence of Karl’s electric energy +was not the least interesting feature of a curious incident, seeing +that it is an axiom of the classroom that all magnetic phenomena vanish +completely if a magnet be made red-hot! + +All this has astonishingly little to do with the more exciting personal +affairs of a charming young lady like Maggie Hutchinson. But it is +reasonable to suppose that Karl, anxious to secure the counsel of an +older man, thought fit to show this imaginary Solomon how necessary +faith was to the performance of good works, and it is in this same +spirit of convincing the incredulous that I have related the trivial +yet quite extraordinary poker-balancing of that summer’s afternoon in +the Mitre Hotel, Oxford. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +MAGGIE HUTCHINSON INTERVENES + + +“When you two have finished your parlor-tricks,” said Hooper, +endeavoring to copy a judicial eye-glare he had seen used by the Lord +Chief Justice, “this committee will proceed to the business of the +sitting.” + +It was, indeed, necessary for our budding lawyer to recall our +wandering thoughts to the affairs of the girl whom we believed to be +then half-way across the Atlantic on a journey to the British Isles. We +might accept Karl’s mediumistic statements to the fullest extent, not +only reading into them the literal significance of the conversations +and scenes he reported, but also paying heed to the logical outcome +of these episodes; yet there were serious difficulties in the way of +applying the information thus acquired. + +Put baldly, what would Karl say to Miss Margaret Hutchinson, who was +presumably accompanied by her mother, if he went to meet the _Merlin_ +at Liverpool? + +Let us, in imagination, reconstruct the incident, after the manner +beloved of the French _juge d’instruction_. The great liner draws up +to her berth at the landing-stage. Gangways are lowered, and there is a +frantic rush of passengers to enter the Customs shed, though the last +philosopher who walks placidly ashore knows that his luggage will be +decorated with little printed crowns in ample time to permit him to +travel to London by the same train that conveys the first triumphant +struggler. + +Hovering between a portion of a wall marked “H” and the ticket barrier +of the railway station will be found Maggie and her mama, both looking +exceedingly well after the voyage, and in a state of repressed +excitement arising from the conviction innate in every woman’s soul +that she will never see her boxes again, once they have been so +carelessly mixed up with other people’s belongings. + +Karl, exercising a degree of tact blended with silver, obtains +admission to the enclosure, and recognizes Maggie at once, having seen +her ten days ago at Manhattan Beach. + +But it is fully ten years since Maggie last saw him, so there occurs a +social embarrassment in the nature of what our sporting friends call +a “bull finch.” Nevertheless, Karl, having ingratiating manners, and +being really an old friend and the son of Mrs. Hutchinson’s special +crony, surmounts the obstacle, and is received with enthusiasm +tempered by a certain shyness on Maggie’s part (her memory of youthful +caresses becoming clearer each instant) and by speculation on the part +of mama as to the reason which induced this very good-looking and +well-dressed young man to come all the way to Liverpool to meet them. + +Clearly, Karl must talk platitudes about the weather, the fine +sea-going qualities of the _Merlin_, the ridiculousness of all Customs +examinations, or any other inane topic at the outset; it would never +do to plunge straight off into the occult cause of his presence. +Moreover, the train leaves for London in five minutes, and hosts of +acquaintances, some of long standing, others of the ship-board or moth +variety, exchange cheery greetings as they pass. + +“I suppose you are staying in Liverpool, Mr. Grier?” says Mrs. +Hutchinson at last, and Karl is impelled to say that he intends to +accompany them to London, when, at this critical state of affairs, +there enters the villain of the play in the shape of Steindal’s agent +with a contract in his hand and a stylographic pen in his waistcoat +pocket. + +After all is said and done, pretty Miss Margaret is making music +her profession, the Darjeeling tea-garden not having proved a great +success; and what chance does Karl, with his visions, stand against +Steindal, the concert director of international fame? For the great +“Wilhelm” has risen from the dramatic agency in which Hooper had +heard of him to the higher level of controlling the _maestri_, _prime +donne_, and other prodigies of that strange world which finds all its +inspiration in the first seven letters of the alphabet. His influence +is so far-reaching, his verdict accepted so unhesitatingly by managers +and publishers, that not many stars in the musical firmament can move +in orbits apart from Steindal. For a novice to attain notoriety without +his assistance would be almost impossible. Both mother and daughter +have already been taught by bitter experience that one must move +circumspectly where such a man is concerned, and, above all things, not +dare to interfere with plans he has made for professional advancement. +So, when Karl would urge Maggie to refuse the highly advantageous offer +made by Steindal’s London agent--who had actually come from London to +press it on his client’s acceptance--both the girl and her mother must +regard him as somewhat akin to a lunatic. + +The more mysteriously accurate the statements he made concerning +recent events on the other side of the Atlantic, the less the ladies +would regard their value from the common-sense point of view. Mrs. +Hutchinson, of course, remembered the escape from death she and her +husband, and probably her child, owed to Karl’s intervention years ago +in India. But that was a “strange dream,” a “queer coincidence,” and +any one who permitted her life to be governed by such supernatural +revelations must either be distinguished by Providence outside the +plane of ordinary mortals or be qualifying speedily for the “dangerous” +ward in an asylum. + +All this, and more, did I set forth temperately before my young +friends. They agreed with me, Hooper completely, and Grier with +reservations. + +“My advice is that you ask your mother to communicate with Mrs. +Hutchinson and her daughter,” I said. “It will surely follow that you +all meet in London or elsewhere, and you will have no difficulty in +leading up to a disclosure of your knowledge in what may be described +as a reasonable and convincing manner. They will be surprised, of +course, but they will be forewarned if evil is contemplated. It is +not that Steindal’s help will be injurious to Miss Hutchinson. He has +brought out a great many eminent artistes, and the public regard his +introduction of a newcomer as a sort of hallmark on precious metal. +Moreover, long before any nefarious plot can mature, you may have +information of a far more convincing sort.” + +“Exactly,” broke in Hooper. “I told Karl last night that he was in for +a series of first-rate biograph adventures now. He can’t avoid ’em. +It is perfectly evident that Constantine will ring him up at any hour +of the day or night. Great Scott! What a world it will be when we all +possess a telelog number!” + +We ignored the new word, and neither Karl nor I had as yet hit on +“telegnomy.” + +“I suppose you are right,” said Karl, submissively. “When a journalist +and a lawyer come to dissect a modern miracle they leave precious +little of its mysticism. But there is one thing you ought to do. You, +Frank, as an eye-witness, to a certain extent, should set down in +writing all that has taken place and all that I have told you, while +our friend here can affix his signature as further testimony of its +truth.” + +“Holy gee! Do you think I have missed a word of it?” cried Hooper, +triumphantly producing his note-book. + +“This is only the first chapter of a romance,” I said. + +“It may be the end as well as the beginning,” was Grier’s quiet +comment. “Do not forget that many years have elapsed between these +different excitations of a faculty I cannot control. Last night I +advanced a long stage in my attainments, and it is possible my extra +sense may disappear as rapidly as it has developed.” + +“I cannot agree with you,” said I. “The history of your gradual +extension of power seems rather to prove the opposite contention. +By a slow and well-marked process, nature has perfected in you an +amazing apparatus which probably heralds the advent of some mechanical +contrivance far beyond the range of our present knowledge. Why should +she suddenly destroy that which she has taken so long to fashion? It +is unquestionable that birthmarks on human beings are produced by a +curiously simple variant of the photographic lens. I have seen the dial +of a clock reproduced in a girl’s eyes, the clear drawing of a rose +on a child’s shoulder. Such pre-natal photographs are not common, but +they have always been and will continue to be, while the human race +possesses its present characteristics.” + +“I would be better content if some other subject were chosen for this +new demonstration,” said he. + +“Oh, cheer up, Grier!” cried Hooper. “For all you know, you may be the +last of the Mohicans. I was reading Pliny’s description of the ‘Agate +of Pyrrhus’ the other day. Ever hear of it? No! Well, you have seen +polished agates, and any one can find amusement in discovering heads, +figures, animals, even landscapes in them. A good specimen is called a +‘gamaheu,’ and Pliny’s agate was a rip-snorter. It contained the Nine +Muses with Apollo in the midst of them. Having attained the dignity +of classic art, poor old nature grew tired, and now we have nary a +gamaheu.” + +“You are scoffing,” I said indignantly. “Let us adjourn the session. I +came here to see Oxford, not to indulge in physiolatry.” + +“The fact is that you are surfeited with wonders,” retorted Hooper. “It +is a common failing of the species. Think what a supreme genius was the +first pithecoid man who invented a wheel, who used fire, who fashioned +a bow! How we ought to grovel at the mere mention of the great unknown +who perceived that the other beasts were created to serve mankind!” + +I rang for a waiter. Lager beer alone could quench this young sage’s +enthusiasm. + +Perhaps Grier had exhausted some accumulation of nervous force, +perhaps the supply cells of the electric waves which carried sight and +sound across the Atlantic were unequal just then to sustained calls +on their resources, but, whatever the reason, it is certain that he +was untroubled by visions, waking or asleep, during several days. I +prolonged my visit to Oxford, passing all the available time in Karl’s +company, and, more often than not, Hooper was with us. + +The latter tried every artifice, especially during the undisturbed +eventide, to induce in his companion that which he considered the +fitting conditions for a telegnomic trance. + +“Guess Maggie’s feelin’ fine an’ dandy by this time,” he would say, +after alluding to the “sickening monotony” of the first days at sea. + +Or again: + +“Wonder if Steindal is going to Delmonico’s to-night? It’s a sure thing +he’ll give the other place a distant nod of recognition for some time +to come.” + +But it was of no avail. + +Once there was a chance of success. We were talking of the uselessness +of certain lines of thought, and I instanced as an example of +fallacious reasoning the famous problem of John of Salisbury: + +“When a hog is driven to market with a rope round his neck does the man +or the rope take him?” + +“I read Plato a good deal,” said Hooper, “and there are times when I +more than half suspect him of asking a question akin to that with his +tongue in his check.” + +“That is because you have a small head, Frank,” said Karl. “Plato was +a broad man. Indeed, his proper name was Aristocles, and he was called +Platon, the broad-shouldered one, as a nickname. Hence, I should +credit him with a big head, and big-headed men lead in intellect. +Observe, _I_ have a big head. My size in hats is seven and a quarter. +My natural modesty prevents me from drawing further conclusions.” + +“That fellow Constantine has a small head, I fancy?” murmured Hooper, +with a quick sidelong glance at me. + +“Yes, I think so. Oh, yes, I am sure. It is hatchet-shaped, with the +animal propensities dominant and yet a certain intellectuality of +forehead, aided, perhaps, by the large, dark eyes.... But Steindal! +He has a head modelled like an egg, a type curiously capable of the +highest and most debased attributes.” + +He was silent after that. Hooper signalled to me to remain stolid as a +Red Indian. But Karl soon moved restlessly. + +“You fellows imagine I am on the verge of a new display,” he cried +with a certain impatience. “I don’t say it is impossible, but there +is something holding me back. I don’t deny that I tried just then to +send forth an investigating ray. But nothing happened, not even the +preliminary umbra.” + +He was fretful this evening, annoyed that the power should apparently +have escaped him. He dreaded, I believe, lest the tremendous strain +of the incidents in the Broadway restaurant should have permanently +impaired the hyper-sensitive membranes and nerve-cells which were +called into play. + +None of us had the slightest suspicion of what had really happened, +namely, that Karl himself, by perplexing his ordinary faculties with +doubts anent pretty Maggie Hutchinson, had set up a hostile influence +(using the phrase solely in its magnetic meaning) which temporarily +benumbed the delicate organism of his sixth sense. + +It took him some time to acquire the exact poise of mental placidity +most favorable to the exercise of his unique faculties. Meanwhile, a +startling confirmation of his “visions” came in a very unexpected and +prosaic manner. + +Hooper and I were awaiting him at the door of the _Mitre_, a drive +to Woodstock being the order of the afternoon, when Karl came to us +in a great hurry, his lips apart, and his big blue eyes shining with +excitement. + +“Say,” whispered Hooper, “the _Merlin_ has arrived and things have +happened.” + +And Karl had actually received this most surprising telegram from his +mother in Scotland: + +“Mrs. Hutchinson and daughter Maggie arrive in England to-day from +States. They proceed direct to Pall Mall Hotel, London, and are most +anxious to see you at once. Wire them and me. With love, Mother.” + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +THE CONFOUNDED HOTEL CLERK + + +“Whoop!” shouted the American, joyously. “Didn’t I tell you things were +going to hum? You stand on me! Steindal, Constantine and Co. haven’t a +dog’s chance!” + +I pointed out that such unseemly behavior at the door of a busy hotel +in the High was likely to cause unpleasant comment, if, indeed, it did +not excite proctorial wrath, and he retorted that a freeborn Yankee +was entitled to unfurl the Stars and Stripes on all such occasions as +seemed personally fitting. In fact, we both were very elated by the +really remarkable confirmation of Karl’s story given by Mrs. Grier’s +telegram, and we exhibited our emotions after the manner of our +respective kith. + +Though we Anglo-Saxons, the Siamese twins of the Atlantic, are so +closely bound together by the ties of speech and history, though the +best blood of Britain has been generously given to the building up of +the great nation of the west, there are differences of temperament, +probably induced by climate, which divide us into well-marked +varieties of the human family. Thus, while Hooper did not hesitate to +express his wordy delight, and with animated face and lively movement +exhibit the dynamic energy called into play by Karl’s announcement, I +strove to stiffen myself into a passable representation of a wooden +image. I suppose we Britons do that sort of thing because we think that +sort of thing is the correct thing, don’chyno. + +You have but to cross the Atlantic a few times to obtain clear +mind-pictures of the expansive Jonathan and the bovine Bull. An +American liner puts off from Pier 14 in the Hudson River and swings +slowly in the stream until her nose points towards the Statue of +Liberty. Look back at the wharf banked high with people, and see the +innumerable little flags, the countless handkerchiefs, signalling +frantic farewells! That is enthusiasm! If Brown and his wife set +forth for Europe, Smith, Jones, and Robinson and their respective +wives gather on the steamer to see the Browns off. There is a lot of +excitement, flowers, and flag-wagging--perhaps some furtive tears--but, +anyhow, an honest display of unbridled human nature. Then see that +same vessel edging away from Southampton quay, and note the guarded +leave-taking of those rare individuals who depart so greatly from +British traditions as to speed their voyaging friends as far as the +ship’s gangway. The last time I was there, a dozen of us, cowering +behind rain-swept railway trucks, had journeyed from London to see +off a whole ship’s company. Do you fancy we flagged anybody, or +waved handkerchiefs, or yelled cheery messages? Not we! We watched +the steamer disappearing into a squall and then eyed each other +suspiciously, if not with active hostility; while some of us negotiated +for the only available cab. + +Yet it is all gammon, this seeming stoicism, a smug respectability +which “goes well,” as the milliners say, with a silk hat and an +umbrella. Indeed, if for “climate” you read “umbrella,” you have +what Max Müller would call the “root concept” of my philosophy. John +adapts his garments to suit his uncertain weather, and he carries this +covering-up method into all the affairs of life. + +Certain explanations to the authorities procured permission for Karl +to go to London. I accompanied him in the time-honored rôle of _amicus +curiæ_, but Hooper, of his own accord, said it would be more seemly if +he were held in reserve as one who could offer confirmatory evidence if +it were required. + +Three hours after the receipt of Mrs. Grier’s telegram we were at the +inquiry office of the Pall Mall Hotel. It was then 6 P.M. + +“The _Merlin_ is not in yet,” said the hotel clerk, in the curt, +off-hand manner which the Londoner is beginning to learn from his +American fellow-official. + +“Not in yet!” I gasped. “Why, man, we received a message hours ago at +Oxford concerning people on board.” + +“That is more than we have done.” + +He made pretence to be exceedingly busy with a ledger; but prolonged +ill-usage by ticket examiners, platform inspectors, and the rest of the +Jacks in office who seldom know much about their duties, has hardened +me. + +“Are you so overworked that you cannot attend to me, or shall I ask Mr. +Schmidt’s assistance?” I demanded. + +Now here I have given you a most useful tip. Always ascertain the name +of the manager of the hotel. The prompt, familiar reference to the +august “Schmidt”--whom I did not know--warned the clerk that here might +be some person of importance, worthy to be on terms of intimacy with +the great gun of the Pall Mall Hotel. He groveled, closing the ledger +carefully lest the bang should annoy me further. + +“I beg your pardon, sir. I hope you did not misunderstand me,” he +said, smiling--oh, how I hate that false smirk--“the _Merlin_ was +signaled from Queenstown yesterday, but she has not reached Liverpool. +We place a notice in the vestibule the moment we have any news, and the +telegram itself states--what time--the special--Excuse me, sir, but +your friend--” + +Karl was standing by my side during the brief colloquy with the clerk. +I saw the pert Londoner’s eyes droop. His lips parted and whitened, his +voice faltered, his demeanor was that of Richard III on the eve of the +battle of Bosworth Field. I half expected to hear him yelp: + + My conscience hath a thousand several tongues, + And every tongue brings in a several tale, + And every tale condemns me for a villain. + +I gazed anxiously at my companion, and became partly aware of what +had happened. Karl had magnetized the clerk! In another instant the +dapper little man would be crawling over the counter, looking up with +uncomprehending terror at the Jove-like being who bent those lightning +shafts on him. + +I caught Karl by the arm. Instantly the concentrated energy which had +shrunk the pupils of his eyes to pin-points relaxed, the relieved +motor and sensory nerves returned to their ordinary functions, and he +looked benignantly at the quivering clerk, whom he had not seen at all +during the transient oblivion of his surroundings. + +“It is all right,” he said, turning towards me. “A railway porter has +just told Maggie that the train will leave the landing-stage station in +twenty minutes. In fact, at this moment she is talking to Steindal’s +representative, a man named Bocci. And, do you know, from what she said +I imagine--” + +I caught the clerk listening now with a rabbit-eared amazement that +nearly equaled his previous alarm. I was sorry for him. He must be in +a state of agitation somewhat akin to the flutterings of a sparrow +rescued from the deadly fascination of a snake. + +So I laughed, with the best assumption of the actor’s art of which I +was capable. + +“Let him off, Karl!” I cried. “The next time we seek information I am +sure he will give it to us readily.” + +Karl took my cue and grinned in concert. I led him away to a lounge, +but, ever and anon, the clerk watched us from the corner of his eye, +and I chortled to see him comparing the clock with the time stated on a +telegram which reached him a few minutes later, wherein the departure +of the _Merlin_ special was announced in exact concord with Karl’s +statement. + +Meanwhile I learnt what had taken place. No sooner had Grier heard +the unexpected fact of the steamer’s non-arrival than he, quite +carelessly, “sent out,” as he phrased it, to find Maggie and the ship. +He experienced no difficulty this time. He saw the girl and her mother +standing in a huge shed and conversing with a foreign-looking person. +Through several doors he distinguished the brass-rimmed port-holes +and white rails of a large vessel, and he heard a hum of voices, the +clanking of cranes, and the tramping of many feet. + +“From what I gathered,” he said, “Signor Bocci was surprised, even +annoyed, to learn that Miss Hutchinson was not prepared to accept at +once the contract which Steindal offered. ‘No artiste has ever obtained +more favorable terms from my principal,’ he told her. ‘Is it that +you demand more money, or more frequent appearances?’ ‘Oh, no,’ said +Maggie, and she has such a nice, sweet voice; ‘I am, indeed, greatly +obliged to Mr. Steindal, and to you, signor, for having troubled to +come to Liverpool. But I really must ask you to let arrangements stand +in abeyance until my mother and I meet you in London.’ ‘But what am +I to cable to Steindal?’ he asked. ‘Why cable this evening?’ she +persisted. ‘Am I such an important little person that the world is +waiting breathlessly for my decision?’ That is all I heard while I was +paralyzing the clerk.” + +“How was Miss Hutchinson dressed?” + +“In a navy blue costume trimmed with black braid. She wore a white +yachting cap and white gloves. Mrs. Hutchinson was dressed in black, +with a sort of black lace mantle and a black bonnet of lace and +feathers.” + +“And Bocci--what is _he_ like?” + +“An ordinary, under-sized, pasty-faced Italian, fiercely outlined with +black hair, eyebrows, and moustache.” + +I went to the bureau again. The inquiry clerk was apprehensive, but I +only wanted the London Directory. And therein I hunted up the entry: +“Bocci, Giovanni, concert agent,” with a number in a Strand side-street. + +“How did you know that Steindal’s London representative was named +Bocci?” I asked Karl. + +“Oh, I forgot to tell you that Miss Hutchinson held his card in her +hand.” + +He rattled off “Signor Giovanni Bocci,” and the rest of the copperplate +legend! I wonder what the inquiry clerk would have thought had he +overheard the whole of Karl’s story. Afterwards, when steeled to the +marvel of it all, I did not hesitate to prod the dull wits of the heavy +tribe which Emerson describes as “only understanding pitch-forks and +the cry of ‘Fire!’” But that evening I forebore, lest we should be +turned out of the hotel. + +Indeed, that monstrous British dread of a “scene” induced me to beseech +Karl not to go wandering off through space until the conditions were +more private. We had four hours to spare, so we dined, strolled to +Hyde Park and back, and finally awaited in the hotel vestibule the +advent of the two ladies. It was the height of the London season. One +of the many fine days which the world’s capital manages to smuggle in +between layers of fog and sheeted storm was drawing to a close. And how +majestic, how radiantly calm, is London at such an hour! The purple +haze of evening glorifies the harsh lines of myriad roofs; the long +rows of twinkling lights might have been designed by Whistler; beneath +the opulent robe of the great city one can hear its tremendous heart +beating peacefully. + +It was Grier’s first adult experience of London, and I was certain +that it affected him powerfully. He told me later that he was tempted +many times to expand those awesome caverns of his brain, and seek to +understand with their seemingly immeasurable receptive capacity the +giant influences at work amidst that vast aggregation of humanity. +But he resisted successfully, feeling somewhat awed, even a little +frightened, by the belief that he alone, among the passing thousands, +was endowed with almost omniscient knowledge of the actions and +utterances of his fellow-men. Not of their thoughts. There was +something of that to come--a grand expansion of that sympathetic +transmission of ideas vaguely known to men and animals since the Spirit +moved over the face of the waters, and the heavens and the earth and +all the host of them were designed. But not yet. The most sceptical +of scientists could not accuse Karl of flights of imagination, for +he recorded naught save positive facts of contemporary occurrence. +That, to me, was the most startling feature of his sixth sense. There +scarcely exists a man or woman of any real intelligence who has not, at +one time or another, communicated the unspoken thought to another at +a distance. Truly, this comparatively general attribute of mankind is +a far more stupendous and less comprehensible achievement than Karl’s +telegnomy. But, as Hooper said about the wheel and the use of fire, we +soon become surfeited with wonders. + +The hands of the great clock over the fireplace crept slowly past 11.30 +P.M., the hour named in the telegram from the shipping company as that +at which the _Merlin_ passengers would reach Euston. Thence, with the +best intentions, otherwise a fast hansom, the Hutchinson ladies could +not arrive at the hotel much before midnight. + +Nevertheless, at a quarter to twelve, Grier showed some signs of +restlessness. I have often thought that these physical indications +of the psychic force pent up in certain tiny pyramidal cells situate +within the cortex of the gray matter of the brain greatly resembled +the throbbings and strainings and extraordinarily minute movements of +a boiler getting up steam. Your inch-thick, riveted cylinder may be +bolted to iron beams imbedded in granite-like concrete, yet the living +power of steam makes its presence felt long ere the engineer bids the +impatient giant get to work. + +And it was so now with Karl. He could not sit still. The vestibule +was full of people waiting to meet the _Merlin_ contingent--oh, no, +not of English people, but of Americans, anxious to welcome other +Americans--yet Karl and I, amidst all the lively throng, enlisted the +sustained attention of the inquiry clerk. + +Once, after catching his eye, an impulse of sheer devilment sent me to +greet Mr. Schmidt most warmly. The manager, of course, being an affable +man who liked to stand on pleasant terms with his patrons, was quite +amenable to that kind of polite attention. We entered into a lively +conversation for a minute or two, and I kept darting expressive glances +towards the clerk. + +I am sure the poor fellow quaked. Quitting Mr. Schmidt, I rejoined +Karl, and the inquiry clerk ran across the vestibule. He was most +anxious now to be civil. + +“I have just heard of a telephone message from Euston,” he said to me. +“There are ninety passengers for this hotel, and they will be here in a +few minutes.” + +“The first station omnibus is just coming round the corner,” said Karl, +quietly. “Maggie and her mother are in the next one, not in a hansom.” + +Now, from where we stood, there was no visible vehicle of the type +mentioned. The clerk looked puzzled, as well he might, thinking my +companion had commented on his statement. I knew what had happened. +During my momentary talk with Schmidt, Karl had taken a peep beyond. + +Sure enough, almost at once a London and North Western Railway ’bus +deposited the first consignment of _Merlin_ folk at the hotel +entrance. Out of the next conveyance stepped two ladies whom I +recognized, from the description supplied by Karl, as Mrs. Hutchinson +and her daughter. + +I must confess that the sight of them gave me a shock, well prepared +though I was for their appearance. Yet it is one thing to expect a +certain experience, but quite another to undergo it--as, to wit, being +ready for the sensation of a needle-bath and receiving the impact of +the icy jets of water on your bare skin. + +It was so exceedingly strange to see the mother and daughter, +unconscious objects of experiments of epoch-marking importance, quietly +appearing at the door of a London hotel under ordinary conditions open +to any of the well-dressed, unheeding crowd within or the hurrying +multitude without. + +They passed through the revolving doors, and looked about them. +Karl stepped forward, somewhat shyly, though there was an instant +charm in his smiling disingenuousness. You see, he fancied he had to +introduce himself, being now a tall man in place of the little boy Mrs. +Hutchinson had last seen, and whom Maggie must wholly fail to remember. + +So far as mama was concerned, be sure she could not distinguish Grier, +at first glance, from any other man present. + +But Maggie saw him instantly. She became very pale, and her eyes, +extremely pretty eyes they were (and are), dilated. + +“Oh, mother!” she cried aloud. “There he is!” + +So curiously perturbed was she, so timid and childlike in her words and +attitude, that Grier’s conventional welcome died away in his throat. +Yet he held out his hand, and the girl, stepping forward impulsively, +caught it in both of hers. + +But her eyes filled with tears, and the corners of her mouth quivered, +and not another word could she utter. The scene was unexpected, +embarrassing, and, of course, dreadfully un-English. And what did it +all signify? + + + + +CHAPTER X + +MAGGIE TELLS WHAT BEFEL HER + + +I think I came to the rescue, but I was so flurried, so completely +driven out of myself, that ordered recollection begins only in the +middle of the blather which usually serves as conversational counters +at such meetings. I made myself known to Mrs. Hutchinson, and she, +worthy soul, much perplexed by certain mysterious incidents soon to be +made clear (after a fashion), extricated us from a difficult situation +by the true motherliness of her surprise and admiration at finding Karl +grown to be a bigger man than his father. + +She was a Scotswoman, and she delighted in proclaiming the fact. Thus, +although a lady of good birth and refined manners, she did not disdain +to use the homely phrases of “her ain people” when they expressed +her thoughts better than the polished slang which passes current for +English in society nowadays. + +“Eh, but it’s a cure for sair e’en to see you, honey,” she cried, when +she had assured herself that this six-footer was really the young Grier +whom she had heard so much about of late. (This cryptic remark will +explain itself presently.) “I was sure my letter to your mother would +bring you quickly to us if you were not abroad. Did she telegraph to +you? I suppose she could not have written in the time. And how kind it +is of you to hurry up to London in time to receive us! Did you say you +came from Oxford? Well, from what I have heard of young gentlemen at +the ’Varsity, they seldom object to an urgent call that brings them to +London.” + +Now that sort of rattling talk is admirably calculated to dissipate +metapsychic puzzles into thin air. I was exceedingly grateful to Mrs. +Hutchinson. From that moment dated my lasting admiration for her dear, +outspoken, open-hearted qualities. Excellent soul! She was trustworthy +as oak, and quite as dense to anything beyond the circle of her +comprehension. + +The two young boobies gazing so pathetically at each other were enabled +in the interim to recover their speech and their every-day faculties. +Karl’s eyes kindled with a friendly interest which threatened +developments, and Maggie gazed at him with a smiling, fawn-like +wistfulness calculated to drive any heart-whole and well-regulated +young man frantic in five minutes by the clock. + +It was my first actual, if vicarious, acquaintance with that pleasant +malady known as love at first sight, and, judging by the symptoms of +this well-matched pair, the disease is one which, like measles in +childhood, is calculated to do the cynic good. + +I suppose it is my duty, right here, as Hooper would say, to describe +Maggie Hutchinson. I would prefer to give a definition of the +differential calculus--one can hunt up these things so readily in +any work of reference--but to what encyclopedia can a man turn when +he wishes to limn in mere words the elusive charms of a beautiful, +well-educated girl, in whom a delightful femininity is blended with the +rare artistic temperament--blended, too, with the deftness of a skilled +gardener who grafts one lovely and sweet-scented plant on another? If +the human soul were ever visible to our mortal senses it must most +nearly attain tangible form in fragrant young womanhood. Every artist +who seeks inspiration in nature, every poet who writes a stanza to +Spring or the Dawn, knows that this is so. And that is why it is not +good for mankind that woman should, by training or environment, weaken +the God-given maternal instinct which is the golden halo of the Madonna. + +Some such thought came to me when I first set eyes on Maggie +Hutchinson. She realized an ideal and that is saying much. Not that +she was so strikingly handsome that men must stare and women sniff +merely because she passed, nor that her pose of head and general +shapeliness would have enraptured a Greek sculptor. No, I am compelled +to state that by the generality of critics Maggie would only be placed +among the nondescript “good-looking” section of young ladies, and she +might, or might not, be molded like the Capuan Venus for all that her +orthodox “tailor-built” (that is the right description, I believe) +traveling costume revealed. + +But the peculiar circumstances under which I met her, and the rapt +spirituality of that look which she flashed at Karl through the +gathering tears, added a spice of romance to an otherwise colorless +incident. The musician who extracts a thousand tumultuous words out +of a single _lied ohne wörte_ can best understand the emotional flood +of thought which conveys a whole volume of meaning. For an instant I +experienced some glimmering perception of Karl’s sixth sense. I fancied +I actually felt the physical and psychic influence of that “magnetic +personality” which we all of us talk about but seldom endeavor to +explain. + +And then “Miss Hutchinson” told me that she was not tired, “not the +least little bit”; that mother and she had “dined on the train”; +that it was, indeed, most kind on my part to have secured a private +sitting-room for the joint and several use of our party and our +party’s friends. So you see, the first impression fled quickly +enough, leaving behind it a glowing streak of recollection like unto +the half-remembered track of a shooting star. But, thank Heaven, +in Maggie’s case it was renewed and developed and perfected until, +whether under the spell of her unwavering friendship or thrilled to +ecstasy by the inarticulate rapture which, at times, she drew from the +infinite storehouse of the violin, in order to please those near and +dear to her, I can say candidly that she was the goddess of one small +circle, its Athéne and Euterpe rolled into one. Nor was it long before +my wife claimed her as her greatest friend. That last saving clause +is necessary. This is not _my_ love story, but, as the astute reader +must have perceived long since, Maggie’s and Karl’s. Yet I shall be +exceedingly surprised--almost as greatly taken aback as I was by the +discoveries of the next hour--if the said reader, though an expert +dissector of love stories, from the long-drawn-out wooing of Rachel +by Jacob, down to the _motif_ of the very latest _crime passionel_ in +Paris, shall have guessed already the reason why Maggie wept when first +she met Karl in the vestibule of the Pall Mall Hotel. + +Apparently, we have all been standing there an unconscionably long +time. Really, we have done nothing of the sort, for I am quite adept +in bringing about the right combination of luggage porters, lift +attendants, chambermaids and waiters, to secure the best and quickest +results in making people at home in a modern big hotel. + +“I am so glad to be off the steamer,” sighed Mrs. Hutchinson, +gratefully, as she sank into a spacious chair in our sitting-room. +“Walking along the corridor just now, I caught myself wondering why the +other folk using it did not lean over at absurd angles. Even yet the +carpet seems to heave gently each half-minute.” + +That was just the sort of remark calculated to place us at our ease. We +chatted freely while the ladies drank a little champagne and nibbled a +biscuit; I sampled the hotel whisky, and smoked, together with Karl, at +the earnest request of our fair companions. + +Karl, by the way, did not know the taste of alcohol, or of any +intoxicant. The wisdom of the gods kept him free from that obsession. +Goodness only knows what would have happened if the man with a +superhuman sense (which it was, according to our present lights) +yielded to drink! + +Hence, when Mrs. Hutchinson, beginning at the end of the story, told +us that she wrote to Mrs. Grier from Queenstown, and a computation of +hours revealed that the mystery of the telegram was no mystery at all, +the way was paved by growing familiarity to permit the conversation +to wander off into less well-defined paths. For the good lady made no +secret of the _raison d’être_ of her letter. + +“Maggie had a dream, or a vision--something akin to what my old +Highland nurse used to call _taichitaraugh_, a Gaelic mouthful meaning +‘shadow-sight.’ It was so realistic that it nearly made her ill, and +she startled me considerably, when she confided it to me, which was not +until twenty-four hours later.” + +Mrs. Hutchinson, of course, could not guess what a spark on tinder was +one of those time-worn words in Karl’s ears. I glanced at him to see +if the winged barb had struck home, but I was not long in discerning +that Maggie’s presence occupied his ordinary senses quite sufficiently +to keep his telegnomic sense dormant. It might, indeed, stimulate and +intensify the others, but no man would use a telephone or an opera +glass to hear or see his best girl when she was seated in the same room +as himself, would he? Science can do a lot for us, but I will back Dame +Nature’s idea of a magnet in the shape of a pretty woman against any +wizard device of the latter-day alchemist. + +Then the mother, at Maggie’s request, essayed to give us the history +of an afternoon dream on board the good ship _Merlin_. The day was +Sunday, and the weather had been bad. The ship was traversing that +choppy belt of the Atlantic which makes the day of rest so particularly +unrestful in the majority of vessels sailing from New York or Liverpool +on a Wednesday. Indeed, the “White Star Sunday” is an ocean proverb. + +“Neither of us felt equal to taking luncheon in the saloon,” said she, +“so a deck-steward brought us some tempting dishes. The sea subsided +rapidly under the change of wind, and we were comfortable enough after +our meal. I fell into a slight doze. Maggie says she did not.” + +“No, mother, I am sure I was awake, because I was running over in +my mind Almaviva’s song, ‘Ecco ridente il cielo,’ with the guitar +accompaniment for the violins,” interrupted Maggie. + +Then why, my dear young lady, should your cheeks flutter _now_ between +white and pink, like a Marie Vornhoot rose, beneath the most attractive +and healthy brown with which sun and sea have decorated you? And why, +with even greater emphasis, should you have been warbling to yourself +_then_ the love-sick outpourings of the Seville gallant to his Rosina? +I thought those old operas were, if not dead, for they are immortal, +at least buried alive beneath a mound of Gaiety muslin and the striped +cotton habiliments of many musical comedy coons. + +“Girls get such whimsies in their heads that they often do not know +what they are thinking about,” replied practical Mrs. Hutchinson. “Yet +there can be no doubt, my dear, that something extraordinary did occur.” + +“When I woke up,” she continued, addressing Karl and me, “I found +Maggie crying softly to herself. Naturally I was alarmed, and when she +did not answer I caught her arm. Then she appeared to recover her wits, +but she frightened me even more thoroughly by murmuring something about +the utter bliss--” + +“Mother!” broke in the girl, evidently nerving herself for an ordeal, +though her face was aflame, “let me describe what happened.” + +“Well, well!” said Mrs. Hutchinson, “tell it your own way. I admit I +never got the hang of it to rights.” + +It was impossible to watch both Karl’s face and Maggie’s, so I devoted +myself to an intent study of the subtle emotions which sent their +undecipherable shadows across the girl’s eyes. But the woman does not +breathe, or is not worthy of breath, who cannot be an actress when +the great crises of existence throb across life’s stage. Indeed, she +controlled her expression and chose her words so well that she soon led +my rambling fancy back to the sufficiently bewildering climax of her +own adventure. + +“Mother has left out what you might call a predisposing influence,” she +said, smiling, and she spoke to me, not to Karl. “Have you ever heard +of the agonic line?” + +“Has it anything to do with the ‘Personal’ column in the _Times_?” was +my banal reply. + +“No!” It was Karl who answered, and there was a timbre in his voice +I had not heard before. It silenced Maggie for the moment. Perhaps +it suggested a chord drawn with nerve-thrilling effect from her own +beloved violin. Anyhow, he took up the parable. + +“An agonic line is an irregular line, running generally north and +south, which marks those parts of the earth’s surface where the +magnetic needle points to the true north. There are three of them, and +they are slowly changing their positions,” he said. + +“Thank you! I could not have explained it so clearly,” smiled Maggie, +though she persistently averted her eyes. “Well, during the morning, +the Chief Officer had been telling me things about the deviation of the +compass, the importance of the agonic lines, the magnetic vagaries of +some parts of the globe, and the great value to sailors of a recent +discovery that at a certain point in front of the foremast the compass +ceases to be affected by the polarization which is set up in all iron +ships.” + +Ting! Some tiny nerve-bell jingled in my head. Polarization! Karl and +I exchanged looks. We had rapidly made the same calculation. Allowing +for difference of sun-time, Miss Margaret’s disturbing dream-vision, +whatever it disclosed, must have been exactly contemporaneous with +Karl’s poker-juggling in the Mitre Hotel. + +“_Now_ what is it?” demanded Mrs. Hutchinson, whose shrewd Scottish +eyes were quick to detect the secret telegraphy between the others, +for Maggie flushed most charmingly again, and we three established a +circuit of intelligence. “Why do you all gowp like that? You make my +flesh creep. The next thing you will be telling me is that there are +ghosts in the room!” + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +THE KEY OF THE TREASURE-HOUSE + + +Well might Mrs. Hutchinson rail at us with a certain peevishness; here +was true midsummer madness, if ever the dog-days’ frolic gamboled +within the bounds of staid London. And what a wild jostling of ideas, +apparently remote as the poles, contributed to the medley; agonic +lines, polarization of ships and fire-irons, a curious experiment in +an hotel at Oxford, and a girl humming _Il Barbiere di Siviglia_ in +mid-Atlantic--these were the magic passwords, it would seem, to a new +wonder-cave of Ali Baba. I fancied I could hear those fiddles singing +the accompaniment to the lovelorn count’s impassioned verses. In this +latest version of the immortal comedy I was playing Figaro, and Mrs. +Hutchinson, if judged by her present impatient mood, provided a fair +substitute for Dr. Bartholdo. + +Yet, what did it all mean? Karl, to my own knowledge, had not +despatched his telegnomic sense on a roving commission that Sunday +afternoon at Oxford. He had subjected a poker to what he termed +“magnetic induction” merely in order to illustrate his unimpaired +bodily and mental vigor when I expressed some anxiety about the effect +on his health of practising too often a new and perhaps dangerous +force. Again, if not at that moment, he had striven subsequently to +glean some intelligence of Maggie’s doings, only to encounter repeated +failure day after day, until she met Signor Bocci in Liverpool a few +hours previously. Nevertheless, I was sure that communication between +those two was established in that instant, a sympathetic contact, +conscious in the maiden’s case, unconscious in the youth’s. Perhaps, +while humming Almaviva’s strains, the Rosina of the _Merlin_ applied +the words to herself. + + And certain stars shot madly from their spheres + To hear the sea-maid’s music. + +I turned my eyes for a second from Maggie’s face and looked at Karl. +He reminded me of a youthful warrior of the age of chivalry, who, +guarding his armor in some holy fane during the still watches of the +night, found a sweet vision smiling on him instead of the stone saint +or stained-glass picture of crude daylight. Evidently he was unaware +of having exerted any perturbing influence on Maggie. He was quite +genuinely surprised by the coincidence revealed by her words. + +The girl herself seemed to be anxious that we should not answer her +mother’s question. + +“It is difficult to tell you exactly what happened,” she exclaimed +hurriedly. “I was so confused afterwards that I scarcely could form a +coherent idea, and that is why mama complains that I have not said much +about it. But I can give you certain incidents which stood out clearly. +In the first place, I seemed to lose my senses. I had a curious +sensation akin to that felt if one’s arm goes to sleep, as we say; +only this was general in its effect, and I had not been sitting in an +awkward position. Then I heard voices. Everything was dark, though, of +course, you understand it was broad daylight on board the ship. Still, +I thought I heard two men talking about me, and their remarks were so +peculiar that I could not help listening. I should explain that the men +were not on board. Indeed, I believe, they were then, and are now, in +New York.” + +“Were they Wilhelm Steindal and Paul Constantine?” said Karl, eagerly. + +The question was out before he realized that it had better have +remained unspoken. The effect was as instantaneous as any writer of +melo-farce could hope for. Mrs. Hutchinson clapped her hands in her +excitement, and Maggie became very red indeed. + +“So you, too, knew all about it,” she murmured. + +“No,” said Karl. “I know absolutely nothing of any incident on board +the _Merlin_ which affects, in any way, the experience you are +relating.” + +“Or afterwards?” + +“None, whatever. But I am interrupting you. I am sorry. It was quite +involuntary on my part.” + +Miss Hutchinson appeared to gain confidence after this. She and Karl, +and, to a certain extent, I myself, were in the position of ships of +different nationalities on the high seas, using the same code-signals, +but unable to interpret them without reference to a translation. + +“It is very astonishing to my mother and me to hear you mention those +names,” she said. “We only met Mr. Constantine a week before we left +the States. He introduced us to Mr. Steindal. At that time, and, +indeed, during the past year, I entertained the hope of earning some +degree of fame as a violinist. I have made successful appearances in +Berlin, London, New York, Boston, and other places, and Mr. Steindal +should have proved to be an exceedingly valuable acquaintance. But Mr. +Constantine offended me the evening before we sailed, and the words I +heard in my dream bore out his previous conduct so completely that I +have almost resolved to abandon the idea of a professional career.” + +“Did you ever hear anything like it?” demanded Mrs. Hutchinson, who +was brought back with a bump from psychical manifestations to the +hard matter-of-fact details of existence. “Here is this foolish girl +thinking of foregoing the results of several years of expensive tuition +and some very flattering public receptions, just because she had a +queer vision in mid-Atlantic.” + +“Mother, dear, there was no vision about Mr. Constantine’s behavior at +Manhattan Beach?” + +“No, but that wretched Armenian is not all the world! It is a nice +thing if two Anglo-Indians allow a dark person of his type to affect +their lives.” + +Neither Karl nor I moved a muscle when Manhattan Beach was mentioned. +But how quaintly these youngsters’ careers had become interwoven after +so many years of separation! And what an amazing thing it was that +Maggie _heard_ but did not _see_, when one remembered that music broke +the seal of Karl’s spiritual hearing! However, I must restrain my +speculative thoughts, for Maggie was speaking again. + +“I call it a dream,” she said earnestly, “but I use that word for want +of a better. I feel in my heart, in my brain, that I really did hear +what Constantine and Steindal said to each other. They planned a great +many things, and, if proof were wanted, Steindal’s agent met us at +Liverpool to-day and made the offer I told my mother of last Sunday.” + +Mrs. Hutchinson, poised on the very pinnacle of doubt, nodded her head. + +“That is true enough,” she admitted, smiling in her perplexity, “and it +is all through you, Mr. Grier, or shall I call you Karl? That is why I +wrote to your mother. We were delayed by fog in the Irish Sea, or we +should have been in London before her telegram could have reached you.” + +Karl only smiled in reply. It was almost impossible for either him or +me to comment on the broken narrative which reached us. How bewildered +and unnerved the two ladies would be if they realized the minuteness +with which we fitted each statement they made into the detailed story +we already possessed! + +“Yes,” said Maggie, speaking very slowly, “no doubt you have been +wondering how you can possibly be bound up with my affairs?” + +She paused, as if to permit Karl to give some hint that he already +possessed the clue to her wanderings in the maze of intangible things. +He helped her by saying: + +“We have a story to tell, Miss Hutchinson. I, too, have undergone some +extraordinary experiences, but most certainly I did not encounter +you in spirit-land while you crossed the Atlantic. I may say that +I endeavored to do so, for reasons that shall be made clear, but I +failed.” + +She smiled delightedly. It occurred to me that Karl had said exactly +that which she wanted him to say. I pictured Hooper reveling in +analytical hair-splitting when we related this conversation to him. +Nevertheless, the solution of this latest problem in occultism baffled +both him and me for many a day. + +“I will pass from Steindal and Constantine,” she said, “and come to the +next phase of my novel experience. Their voices ceased, and I seemed +to recover some sense of my true surroundings. I knew I was at sea in +a moving vessel. I could feel the vibration of the propeller, but the +only human being of whose presence I was conscious was you, Mr. Grier.” + +“What an unreceptive soul I must possess!” cried Karl, gallantly. + +“You came and took hold of my left hand,” she went on. “You said, +‘Maggie, don’t you remember me? I am Karl Grier.’ I think I endeavored +to reply, but the words seemed to die away in my throat. You bent over +me and told me not to accept the contract Steindal’s agent would offer +me at Liverpool. Then, you gave me a lot of news about yourself and +your father and mother. The years seemed to slip back until we were +children again in the Kalanullah tea-garden. I don’t believe I have +ever been so delighted as I was by the knowledge that we had both gone +back to our childhood. Have you really no knowledge whatever of all +this?” + +Hooper himself could not have discharged that final question with more +unexpected forensic skill than did this mere girl. It seemed to afford +her the supreme test of his assurance. Thenceforth, she gave herself no +further trouble on that point. + +Her natural vivacity now replaced the somewhat hysterical restraint +which she had exercised hitherto. She told us that she had both seen +Karl and heard his voice on three subsequent occasions, and these +visitations, though in no way alarming while they lasted, were so +mysterious in their semblance of actuality, and dwelt so constantly in +her thoughts, that her mother, to whom she had related each incident +after its occurrence, determined to seek an interview with Karl, at +the earliest opportunity which presented itself on their arrival in +England. The mother bore out her daughter’s story at all points, though +she stoutly held to the opinion that the whole affair was the outcome +of over-study--Maggie having worked very hard during her visit to the +States--combined with the exercise of some telepathic gift which Karl +had undoubtedly exercised when a child. + +But even Mrs. Hutchinson was compelled to retreat from this logical +fortress when Karl asked me to tell his old friends all that had taken +place at Oxford. Maggie listened with a ferverish intentness that did +not escape me. Her shining eyes and parted lips betrayed her. She +impressed me as searching for some key which should open the door of +complete understanding, but the search was not rewarded--that much I +knew when we bade each other “good-night” at a late hour. + +Karl and I escorted the ladies to the corridor in which their room +was situated, the hotel being so full that we were scattered over +three floors. Mrs. Hutchinson, glad to escape from the brain-tangling +problems which we could not shirk in discussing recent events, was +chatting with Karl about his father and mother, and I seized the +opportunity to put a question to pretty Miss Margaret as she walked by +my side. + +“In your subsequent visions of Karl,” I said, “did you ever attempt to +speak to him?” + +“No. It was either impossible or I did not experience the desire.” + +She answered so readily that I was encouraged to go a step further. + +“Did you, of your own will, strive to resist these appearances, +notwithstanding their seemingly pleasurable nature?” + +She looked at me quickly, and the ghost of a smile dimpled her cheeks. + +“Yes,” she said simply. “I do not mind confessing that they frightened +me terribly, afterwards, when I thought about them, but not at the +time.” + +“Were you thinking of Karl when you met Bocci this afternoon?” + +“How could we help it, when his predictions were verified the instant +we stepped off the steamer’s gangway? I must have spoken of him to my +mother just before he saw us standing in the Customs shed. Oh, how +strange it all is! What will be the outcome?” + +A man passed us and glared at me as though he would like to wring my +neck. I imagine he thought I was worrying Maggie. She had changed +her travelling costume for a dinner-blouse and a light silk skirt. I +noticed that her bosom heaved tumultuously and a soft light leaped +into her eyes. But I pursued the topic no further, and we parted a few +seconds later. + +Next morning, Karl and I were waiting in the vestibule to take the +ladies in to breakfast, when the inquiry clerk slipped from behind his +desk and approached me with a business-like air. + +“Are you Mr. Grier, sir?” he asked. + +“No, this is Mr. Grier.” + +Karl looked at the little man, who seemed half prepared to tremble +before another Olympian glance. But Karl’s face would reassure a timid +child when, as Hooper put it, he was “disconnected.” + +“I beg your pardon,” said the clerk, “but I thought you would like to +know that there was a man here last night inquiring for you.” + +“A man?” said Karl, blankly. + +The hotel official, even if he had curt manners with unprotected +travellers, was smart enough to discriminate between real mahogany and +veneer. + +“Yes,” he answered off-handedly, “a foreigner, an Italian, I think. He +did not want to see you, but he seemed anxious to find out if you were +staying here, and if you had met Mrs. and Miss Hutchinson. Of course I +told him you were in the hotel, but as for the ladies, I knew nothing +whatever about them.” + +“Did he give you his name?” + +“No, sir.” + +Karl described Bocci, and the inquiry clerk recognized him instantly. + +“That’s him,” he cried (people always do say “That’s him,” no one save +a parson or a school-master uses the nominative); “I hope I did right +in choking him off?” + +“You’re a wonder,” said Karl, laughing, and the clerk quitted us, +feeling that he must have greatly mistaken the looks and utterances of +this exceedingly nice young gentleman on the previous day. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +THE SCENE IN THE GARDEN COURT + + +Of course, it was not to be expected that these morning hours of +sunshine (London having embarked, as it turned out, on a giddy whirl +of a fortnight’s fine weather) would find us in the tension to which +we were strung over-night. Such a thing would be unreasonable, almost +inhuman. The merry jingle of the hansoms coming through the open +windows, the glimpses of omnibus tops freighted with wearers of flower +hats and frivolous muslins, the gay horn-blown ta-ran-ta-ra of the +coaches crossing Trafalgar Square or climbing the Haymarket--this +gladsome medley must banish problems which appealed to either science +or credulity. London was astir and enjoying itself, and who were we +that we should resist its decorus gaiety? + +At that period motor-cars were still sufficiently uncommon in England +to lend a piquant novelty to my suggestion that we should avail +ourselves of a friend’s offer to me and borrow his car for the day. +That was soon arranged. I sat with the chauffeur on the front seat, +Karl and the ladies occupied the tonneau, and when Mrs. Hutchinson and +her daughter had recovered from the silent dread of whirring past all +other traffic and utilizing apparently impossible openings between +heavy vehicles, they began to enjoy the ride immensely. + +We ran through Surbiton, Esher, and Guildford, over the Hog’s Back +to Farnham, where we ate with the normal appetites of four healthy +Britons. We came home by way of Aldershot, Virginia Water, Windsor +Great Park and Staines, driving gloriously not only through the royal +domain but through several Acts of Parliament as well. + +Karl, by reason of the nearing end of the Midsummer Term, must return +to Oxford that night, so it was interesting to note how much he made +of those flying hours of freedom. At least a year a minute fell away +from the conventional coating of the decade which had sped since he and +the girl were children together. “Mr. Grier,” and “Miss Hutchinson” +quickly gave place to “Karl” and “Maggie.” We were not at Barnes Bridge +on the outward journey before Karl had declared his fixed resolution +to wheedle a motor-car out of his father the day he quitted the +University, and the pair of them were planning where “we” should drive +this chariot of delight during the wonderful summer of next year! + +Maggie, it appeared, was much enamored of cathedrals. Here was a +fine inspiration to provide excursions for long summer days! Bless +you, they had seen Canterbury, Salisbury and Ely in a sentence, and +were doing sums in the following breath to find out if far-away York +were achievable. Ah, how potent the engineer who constructs that +magic machine which carries the day-dreams of the young! What feats +it accomplishes, how smoothly do its noiseless wheels glide over the +most perfect of roads! Yet we all possess the treasure, and happy the +man or woman who has not lost the joy of living, losing with it the +willing slave which carries them whither they list. This wonder-coach +is capable of astounding performances. It shall whisk you through many +cities and strange lands. What does it matter if the scene be new to +your eyes when you are brought to it by the sober stuffiness of a +railway plus a return ticket? You have been there twice, that is all, +and surely the first visit, in imagination, far surpassed the second, +in reality. + +Indeed, we enjoyed ourselves so greatly that the crassness of things +in general was sure to bring about some unpleasantness. There is a +substratum of truth in the old Celtic idea of certain people being fey +before death. None of us died, I am glad to say, but we should have +been wise had we outrageously made off with that motor-car, scurrying +far from London ere nightfall, and leaving it to my ingenuity to +explain matters to my lending friend. + +We reached the hotel at six o’clock, and there was Signor Bocci +impatiently awaiting the return of Mrs. Hutchinson and her +violin-playing daughter. “Business is business,” you know, and really I +could see no reason why the girl should not accept the splendid offer +made by Steindal’s agent. He showed no disinclination to discuss it +before Karl and me. Nay more, the little man said he was glad of our +presence. + +“You are-a men of affairs, yes,” he said volubly, “and in-a dis oafer +I haf-a displayed to de signorina de career mos’ magnificent, is it-a +not?” + +Certainly his words were justified to outward seeming, though the very +hyalescence of Steindal’s undertaking should have warned us that things +were not so clear as they looked. Here was a girl of little more than +eighteen, yet _the_ agent, one of the few men in the world of music who +could make or break an artiste, was binding himself to give her two +“star” performances in London, with full orchestra and distinguished +vocal soloists, guaranteeing an expenditure of £200 on each concert, +one in the autumn and another in the spring of the following year, +agreeing to hand her three fourths of the proceeds after (and if) +they exceeded the sum named, and, finally, pledging at least thirty +public appearances at a fee of twenty guineas each within the ensuing +twelve months! Think of it, ye budding geniuses! How the strings would +twank and the pens splutter if some moon-frenzy seized impresario or +publisher to give _you_ a start like that! + +Karl, like Mrs. Hutchinson and myself, advised acceptance, though I +discovered afterwards that he had a great repugnance to the notion of +Maggie appearing on a public platform. That was natural enough, poor +fellow. He didn’t want to have all the young sparks about town telling +each other, and, what was even less endurable, telling Maggie, that +she was the most beautiful creature under the sun. No man, short of an +actor, can pretend that he likes his inamorata to face the footlights. +Stageland has its own domestic idylls, to be sure--and very sweet and +wholesome they oft may be--but they are of a different blend to those +which find general acceptance. + +Yet Maggie, who listened seriously to us all, urged with gentle +insistence that no harm would be done if we gave Steindal’s +magnanimity another day’s thought, and, when I saw that her mother +was quite willing to accede to this request, I backed it up, with the +result that Signor Bocci’s eyebrows became very fierce, and he murmured +something about the impossibility of his principal keeping the offer +open indefinitely. + +“I do not think my daughter is asking for any unreasonable delay,” +replied Mrs. Hutchinson with some spirit. “This is practically our +first business interview. Your meeting with us on the landing-stage, +though exceedingly kind on your part, can hardly be regarded as giving +us an opportunity for full discussion. Therefore, to promise a decision +to-morrow is speedy enough in all conscience, seeing that when I wrote +to Mr. Steindal eight months ago he never even replied to my letter.” + +This was a facer for Bocci. Nevertheless, he struggled gamely. + +“Herr Steindal has a great-a many letters from-a de amateur,” he said. +“He hear in New-a-York ’ow Mees Ootchinson blay--” + +“He did nothing nothing of the kind,” cried the elder lady. “That is +the extraordinary part of it. He met her, it is true, but he admitted +he had not been to any of her concerts. I am beginning to think, +signor, that my daughter is right and we others are wrong. Will you +leave a copy of the contract for our consideration?” + +“O-ah, yes,” said he instantly, and, being a man of rapid perception, +he did not press any more for completion that day. + +Certainly I was puzzled by Steindal’s tactics. Allowing that he was +actuated by the basest motives, that Constantine was paying the bill, +and that their precious compact would reveal its intent before many +weeks had passed, it was, nevertheless, a singular course they had +chosen. What possible harm could result to Maggie Hutchinson if she +seized the splendid opening dangled before her eyes by the Jew? All he +asked in return was a reasonable monopoly, voidable by his failure to +carry out his undertakings in their entirety. From her point of view, +it was the most convincing case of “Heads I win, tails you lose” I ever +heard of in connection with a profession where contracts are apt to be +one-sided. + +And the haze did not lessen when Maggie became confidential that +evening after dinner. Karl had gone, Mrs. Hutchinson was writing +letters, and I had secured two chairs beneath the palms in the Garden +Court. Here we could hear the band, watch the celebrities of the hour, +and talk without listeners. + +“I hope you are not a materialist,” said the girl, after I had uttered +some truism about modern life. + +“Perish the thought!” I answered, “though, as one more than double your +extreme age, will you permit me to ask what is your definition of a +materialist?” + +“A gross person--a species of pig man,” was her sufficiently amazing +reply. + +“Are you thinking of Steindal?” I asked involuntarily, though I had +resolved to keep clear of the topic for the hour. + +“Oh, no. He was not in my mind at all. The music, the lights, the soft +tones of the women’s dresses, all the harmony to eye and ear of our +present surroundings, carried a thought to me. I cannot help knowing +that within a very short distance of this pleasant place one can find +great misery. Which of these states reveals the truth in life?” + +“Both. It is well to hold a balance between them.” + +“Thank you. Now, one has read how rich and well-born men and women, +in other days, have had a vision which so influenced their lives that +they forthwith abandoned wealth and rank, and devoted themselves to +the painful service of their suffering brethren. Such visions may not +be so frequent to-day, but it is a matter of constant occurrence for a +similar result to be achieved, and achieved in a single hour, whereby +the future years of existence are cast irrevocably into a new mold.” + +“You are speaking solely of spiritual influences?” I asked. + +She moved slightly. My question was unexpected. Some of these tender +plants of human growth are so delicately constituted that they wince +physically if you prod their souls with a verbal arrow. + +“I can scarce distinguish between states,” she said, “nor have I +thought or read deeply enough to claim any clear idea as to what +constitutes spirituality. I suppose it sounds strange to hear a girl +not yet nineteen talking of such matters at all. But in Berlin one is +taught to think earlier than in England, and a musical training is +prone to develop fanciful moods.” + +She was fencing with me. I determined to risk another of those +insidious arrow-flights. + +“May I take it that your present introspective condition of mind arises +from your experiences on board the _Merlin_?” I said. + +“Yes.” + +Her lips set with a snap. It was quite clear that however little +Karl’s supernormal powers affected him they had exerted a truly +remarkable influence on Maggie Hutchinson, an influence, too, so novel +and mysterious that she seemed almost to fear its analysis. So I +endeavored to help her. + +“The man would be a fool who denied the enduring effect on the mind +of a moment’s inspiration,” I said. “He might as well argue that the +inconceivably rapid passage of an electric current through the body +could not contort it permanently or even shrivel it into practical +annihilation.” + +“Ah!” she cried impulsively, “that is how it seems to me. Our poor +frail human form cannot choose but obey the soul. At least it must be +so if we would be governed by noble instincts and strive ever to reach +a higher individual ideal. When the soul yields to the body there you +have the downfall, the yielding of the man to the ape.” + +She leaned forward, with her right elbow on her knee and her +well-modeled chin supported by the thin, long, nervous fingers which +bespoke the artistic faculty. Spatulate-fingered folk should keep away +from strings and easels. + +As it pleased her to attach an ethical significance to my words I did +not gainsay her. Indeed, something told me to leave her to her thoughts +for a little while, and, as she appeared to be listening intently +to the music, I sank back into my chair and gave her the choice of +continuing the conversation or not, as she saw fit. + +The band, a small but most excellent orchestra, had just rendered +a soft and harmonious prelude. I did not recognize the air until a +violoncello, exquisitely played, struck into the swelling grandeur of +Vulcan’s song from _Philemon et Baucis_. Perhaps the girl knew the +words as well as the music. I did not. Looking them up afterwards, in +Santley’s translation, I found them curiously à propos of the strange, +all-surmounting force which was in our minds at the moment. + + Where loud the brazen hammers sound, + With lurid light the furnace glowing, + Down in my kingdom underground, + Aside vain ceremony throwing, + I’m sovereign of all around. + +Certainly my companion was given a glimpse of some underground kingdom +illuminated by lurid light, for I quickly discovered that she was rapt +into a state of exaltation which paid no heed to the visible world of +fashion and light and music which surrounded us. I spoke to her gently +more than once. It was useless. She sat there, with tireless eyelids +and glistening eyes, to all outward semblance absorbed in Gounod’s +majestic chant, but really, as I alone knew, unseeing and unhearing +save to sights and sounds not given to my comprehension. + +The suddenness of the thing was positively startling. According to +Hooper’s experiences, supplemented by my own with Karl, it was probable +she would regain ordinary consciousness if touched. Yet I forbore, +hovering between anxiety on the girl’s behalf and desire not to break +in on a trance which might yield some knowledge of actual value. I have +often wondered since if any observant eyes among the crowd of loungers +were watching us. We must have offered a queer picture, a scene +from the charade of life as it is staged in a big London hotel--the +wistful-eyed girl, in a graceful pose, gazing blankly into space, as +it seemed, and pondering some wordless problem, and the gray-haired, +sparely built man watching her with a keenness that must have been very +puzzling to any onlooker. + +At last the music ceased. There was some applause, and, to my great +relief, Maggie regained her wits. + +Then a spasm of real passion convulsed her face, as though some fierce +gust had swept from a thunder-cloud to distort the smooth mirror of a +lake. Reasoned thought was slow in resuming its sway. I was sure she +would spring to her feet and scream aloud. Yet it was evident that each +instant she was becoming more conscious of her environment and gaining +strength to repress the agony which wrung her bosom. + +With all my world-wandering and its consequent carelessness of mere +outward effect, notwithstanding that wayward Celtic temperament which +is apt to set Mrs. Grundy at defiance, the upper British crust of +conventionality was sufficiently hard on me to demand a rapid glance +around the Garden Court _to see if anybody was looking_! + +The whole roomful of people might have been gaping at us with twenty +scandal-power for all I cared a moment later. Maggie grasped my wrist +with a strength which I would not have credited her with, though your +skilled violinist must need have good muscles. + +“I have heard Constantine raving most terribly,” she whispered, in +tense accents, close to my ear. “He has arranged to sail from New York +on Saturday, and his object in coming to England is to murder Karl!” + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +CONSTANTINE TAKES A JOURNEY + + +My first lucid intent was to lead the girl away from that place of +gapers. She was overwrought. Perhaps the music, flooding her soul +with harmony, had proved a mischievous adjunct to the somewhat +exciting topic of our discourse. But, with a little gasp or two, she +recovered her self-possession. Some experience of a platform, of +facing singly the dim rows of upturned faces, is of utmost value in +these emergencies. In my youth, being both shy and nervous, I was +speedily cured from those ailments by becoming a newspaper reporter. +Many a time, walking towards the platform through a densely packed +audience, have I been cheered loudly as the candidate, or lecturer, +and then boohed vehemently by people annoyed at their own mistake. +This treatment, repeated every night for a week, will remove the worst +attack of bashfulness. + +So Maggie, now, with a well-simulated laugh, drove the terror from her +lips if not from her eyes. + +“No,” she said; “it has passed. Let us remain here.” + +She seated herself again. To deceive the curious, in case we were being +watched, I lit a cigarette, strolled towards the orchestra, and asked +the leader, whom I knew, to play a favorite waltz, one of Waldteufel’s. +The obliging Hungarian (whose name was O’Rourke!) promptly exhibited +an “Extra” card, and I returned to our alcove, “the cynosure of every +eye,” as we used to say in good journalese. + +Maggie’s brown eyes had grown larger and darker, her face smaller and +white, during my brief absence. + +“Better not risk another experiment like that,” I suggested, feeling +guilty in not insisting that her mother should be warned at once. + +“You need have no fear in that regard. I am quite incapable of +undergoing such an ordeal again to-night.” + +Certainly her appearance bore out her words. It occurred to me +instantly that she shared with Karl the intuitive knowledge of a +temporary exhaustion of the dynamic store which fed this wonderful +sixth sense. It was not a continuous endowment, like sight or hearing. +Its use drew upon a fund, obviously of limited extent in Maggie’s case, +which, when depleted, restored itself by slow, natural processes. I +fitted this discovery into other parts of the puzzle. Like a child +arranging one of those interesting toys made of a number of equal cubes +bearing a section of a picture on each face, no sooner did I identify +any special feature in telegnomy than I marked its assigned place on +the chart I had constructed in my mind. + +“You seem to have had a trying experience,” I said, encouragingly. + +“Do I? What did I say, how did I look, when I awoke?” + +When a girl asks a question of that sort she is quite normal. I +reassured her. + +“I have no recollection of being afraid while I was listening to +Constantine,” she explained. “It was the half-waking remembrance of +what he said that terrified me. I seemed to think that he was about +to--to stab Karl with a knife that very instant. Oh, it was dreadful!” + +“Tell me what took place. Did you see him?” + +“No. I only heard vaguely, as one might hear violent words and the +sound of blows through a thin partition. When the ’cello began to +play the lament of Vulcan, I suddenly understood that a great many +mythological attributes of gods and goddesses must have arisen from a +more or less accurate perception by studious ancients of unknown or, +rather, little-used human powers. But why are you smiling? Is that a +very old discovery?” + +“It becomes newer every day. Forgive me, Miss Hutchinson. I was really +congratulating myself on my own perspicacity. I was sure that the +words, as well as the music, had affected you.” + +“But why am I so helpless against these attacks?” she murmured, +pathetically. “What is this man, Constantine, to me that his voice +should sound in my ears though half the earth intervenes?” + +Her eyes became suspiciously limpid, but she lifted her head defiantly. + +“Why should I dread him, too?” she cried. “It seems, somehow, that were +it not for him I should not have met you and Karl. There can be no +doubt that we should not have met so soon. And, with you two to help, +it should certainly be an easy matter to circumvent Constantine.” + +“Is it placing too great a strain on you to ask what you have heard?” + +She bent nearer. Almost a child in years, she seemed to be +changing into a woman--with all a woman’s passion and capacity for +endurance--changing even while we sat there amidst the babel of talk in +many a foreign tongue, with the tender voluptuous plaint of the waltz +beating like a heart in rhythmic diapason. + +“This is the time I grow frightened of myself,” she said, with a +wistful little smile. “Just now I was afraid on Karl’s behalf. I +wish--and yet I do not wish--that some one else were favored with these +visions. Sometimes they are--quite--thrilling. But this one thrilled +me in an exceedingly unpleasant way. Have you seen Sarah Bernhardt in +that awful play, wherein she hears her lover being tortured to make him +confess a secret which she knows? Well, I felt something like that when +I came to a knowledge of my whereabouts. What time is it now in New +York?” + +I glanced at my watch. It was 9.30 P.M. + +“A little after four o’clock in the afternoon,” I said. + +“Then Constantine is in his office. He deals in grain, among other +things. One day he explained to me the manner in which a silver +currency in Russia and India affects the business done on a gold +standard in Canada and the States. Sometimes his agents are instructed +to buy above the market rate so as to equalize quotations. He is +reputed to be a very clever financier.” + +“You know him fairly well?” I asked. There was never a woman born +who could tell a story without parentheses. These side issues are as +essential to her recital as gussets to a dress. + +“I have met him several times. I must confess he was interesting until +he asked me to marry him.” + +“Oh, he reached that stage?” + +“You can put it that way if you like. Such a thought had never crossed +my mind previously. He became hateful to me at once. I could not endure +his presence. I would as soon think of embracing something cold and +clammy, like a snake.” + +I did not point out that a snake is neither cold nor clammy. A nice +young python, for instance, in his multi-colored spring suit, is as +grateful and comforting to the touch as a roll of soft plush. But the +antipathy of woman for the serpent is an old feud, harking back, I +fancy, to the beginning of things. You ought to hear some of the queer +tales about snakes current among the natives of India. + +Maggie brushed away the memory of the Armenian’s love-making with a +gesture of disdain. + +“Gounod’s music set me a-dreaming,” she said. “If you indulge in +composition there is no better jumping-off place than one of those +delicious minor chords wherein the motif flutters for a moment before +it enters upon a new phase. I had run away ahead of the air when I +experienced that pins-and-needles sensation I have spoken about----” + +“Were you cold?” I broke in. + +“Slightly. Not as one feels an icy draught of air, but rather the +chilliness of sitting motionless in a cold room. Instead of the music +I heard a telephone bell. Constantine’s voice answered. There was +a pause, and some one, Steindal I expect, told him that Karl Grier +was with me in London, and that I was unwilling to sign the contract +offered by Bocci. Constantine’s exclamations made me understand so +much. There was more ringing, and I distinctly heard Constantine +reserving a cabin on a steamer which sails on Saturday. Then he +appeared to give way to a fit of passion. He used horrid words, and +he vowed to stab Karl through and through. I actually heard the blows +of his hand on the table, and he almost shrieked in his rage. Yet I +thought there was fear in his voice, too. Oh, please tell me, do you +think that this is all madness? I am afraid again, now, not of that +man, but of myself!” + +Here was a bright and imaginative girl on the verge of hysteria owing +to the startling exercise of a sense the existence of which neither +she nor any one connected with her had even suspected a week earlier. +To my thinking, the best way to calm her natural fears was to insist +on the scientific accuracy of impressions which might otherwise be +regarded as dangerous delusions. So I took her, with the preciseness +of a road-surveyor, along the strange path already traversed by Karl, +and took care to prove that the human machine, so far as hearing was +concerned, only acted more speedily and over greater distances than its +iron and copper imitators. Its limits were exactly the same. + +“If I were favored as you and Karl are, I should strive to cultivate +my knowledge rather than retard its growth by needless alarm,” I said. +“Luckily, in these days men have learnt to inquire causes instead of +falling flat on their faces in superstitious awe when they encounter +some new trick of nature. It is only a few months since a patient, +lying in a hospital ward containing a crucifix, had a complete +facsimile of the sacred image imprinted on the skin of his shoulder +during a thunderstorm. More recently, a man bathing in the sea, running +for shelter when a storm broke, was struck by lightning. When picked +up, a perfect photograph of a neighboring building was found on his +breast. Now, these incidents are rightly regarded as exceedingly +interesting, but they are neither supernatural nor conducive to +insanity. Nature acted as a photographer, dispensing with the tripod, +the camera, and the black cloth. That is all.” + +“It is a good deal,” said Maggie, a trifle awestricken, but +nevertheless pleased, I thought, to know that others than herself were +subjected to disturbing phenomena. + +Not far distant was sitting a lady of pronounced shapeliness rendered +impressive by her exceedingly décolleté dress. I recognized in her +the widow of a wealthy provision merchant. I pointed her out to my +companion. + +“The pity is that such genuine lightning effects are so rare,” I said. +“Otherwise our adipose friend there, passing one of her late husband’s +shops some day, might be indelibly branded ‘Best Home-cured Bacon’ +across the broad of her back.” + +A harmless joke of that kind, even as the humble necessary worm, can +serve a useful purpose. Maggie was kind enough to laugh, and we dropped +from the clouds forthwith. Mrs. Hutchinson joined us, but her daughter +was so quiet--being ordinarily a lively girl, with all a girl’s +readiness to quiz good-humoredly her neighbors’ dresses and looks--that +the sharp maternal scrutiny quickly detected her abstracted air. + +So there was nothing for it but an adjournment to our sitting-room, +where, after prolonged conclave, we decided that Maggie should not +only decline Steindal’s help, but place herself in the hands of ---- +another agent, and risk the Polish-Jew’s hostility. Again, when Karl’s +murder was being spoken of--though I attributed little weight to the +love-sick Armenian’s threats--it was essential that his father should +be taken into our counsels. By this time I was as convinced of the +reliability of these telegnomic sights and sounds as of the existence +of animalculæ invisible to the naked eye but seen through a microscope. + +Early next morning I telegraphed to my friend, Grier senior, asking him +to come to London on important business. I also cabled to a firm in New +York, saying it would oblige me if they ascertained definitely whether +or not Mr. Paul Constantine sailed from that port during the following +day. + +Now, Karl had promised me that, in the event of any further trances +taking place, he would write to me without delay, giving details and +carefully noting exact times. It came as no surprise when I opened a +telegram from him: + + “Constantine sails by to-morrow’s Cunarder. Letter follows.” + +I showed it to Maggie. + +“You two are beginning to indulge in simultaneous magnetization,” I +said. “You may depend upon it, Karl had a look round New York about +half-past nine last night, Greenwich time. He brought you with him. If +you were not so timid you would soon be able to see as well as hear.” + +“You forget that I can see _him_,” she said, and her voice was so low +that I glanced at her and was surprised to find her cheeks suffused +with color. + +“Did you see him last night?” I demanded. + +“No, but I was conscious of his presence.” + +“Conscious! How?” + +“I cannot tell,” she answered simply. “I only know that it is so.” + +“Yet you have astonished me frequently by your direct way of expressing +your meaning. There are so many forms of consciousness.” + +“Some of them are new to me. When Karl magnetized your hands did you +know what was happening?” + +“I felt a numbing cold from the wrists to the finger-tips.” + +“That is akin to my sensation, too, but it is general, as I have told +you already.” + +I laughed. Being an old fogy, I had omitted a most important factor in +the affairs of these young people. If, as I suspected, Maggie was as +badly smitten as Karl with that curable disease of the heart called +love, it was fairly certain that these two were thinking of each other +at every spare moment of the day, not to mention their dreams. + +Karl’s letter, explicit enough in all details, bore out Maggie’s +statement. Constantine was behaving like an incipient homicidal maniac. +He had purchased a deadly looking dagger, of Sicilian manufacture; +hence, it was a reasonable assumption that the blade would be efficient +if properly used. + +“I purpose meeting the scoundrel and kicking him into his senses,” +wrote Karl, coolly; but his father and I, assured that Constantine had, +indeed, quitted the States, considered the matter far too serious to +be left to such a haphazard method of treatment. Grier _père_, what +between anxiety on his son’s account and annoyance that the dawn of a +splendid career should be clouded by this rejuvenescence of a faculty +which he fondly believed was long since dead as a doornail, was not the +best of counselors at this crisis. + +In view of the tragedy which did actually take place, I have often +wondered, in those quiet hours when a man reviews the past without +prejudice, whether any better course was open to us than that which we +adopted. + +Our difficulties were many and embarrassing. It was not Constantine +but we who were liable to be treated as lunatics if we told our story +to any self-respecting policeman. Imagination boggles at the picture +of the “intelligent officer” when asked to arrest a man on telegnomic +information. As it is not my design to treat jocosely a most lamentable +chapter of Karl’s biography, I must omit any analysis of the official +mind on that topic. + +After much debate, we decided to deal with the situation ourselves, and +collectively. I must insist that this was the elder Grier’s plan. True, +I fell in with it, but not without grave foreboding. Your prosperous, +hard-headed man of affairs does not lay sufficient stress on the +overwhelming power of the primary instincts, and Grier would have +scoffed at any theory that in the triangular conflict of positive and +negative forces set up by Karl, Maggie, and the Armenian, we had gone +back æons in the life-history of humanity. + +However, I was a party to the scheme, so I must share its +responsibility. Karl’s tutor set him free for the requisite twenty-four +hours, and we three went to Liverpool to meet the mail steamer. We +intended to persuade Constantine to remain in that city a few hours, +talk over the whole matter fully and squarely, and point out to him the +utter folly of his pursuit of Maggie and his design on Karl’s life. + +It was so very straightforward and easy when viewed in the +“common-sense aspect.” As if muddle-headed saws and statutes would +avail against a law of creation! Will you believe it, we two grayheads +completely omitted Karl’s sixth sense from our calculations! There +were we, full of wise aphorisms and sapient advice, ready to deal with +Constantine on the basis of a transaction in wheat, awaiting on the +landing-stage the coming of the big steamer, when Karl, whom neither of +us had addressed for a minute or two, suddenly attracted our attention +by a choking noise. + +He would have fallen had not his father caught him. His face, usually +so cheerfully healthy, wore a distressing pallor, his lips were +tremulous, his eyes distended. + +I knew, too late, what had happened. + +“Good heavens, Grier!” I whispered, “Karl has seen Constantine on board +the ship!” + +“Yes,” murmured Karl, hoarsely, gazing wildly from one to the other of +us. “I saw him, and he saw me. He has just committed suicide! He jumped +overboard! His body was caught by the screw! Oh, may the Lord pardon +me! I believe I impelled him to it!” + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +CONSTANTINE ENCOUNTERS THE SHARK + + +Some brass-buttoned official of the railway company or harbor authority +was near enough to pay heed to our strange behavior. He also caught +sufficient of Karl’s excited words to attach some significance to them, +though, of course, they must have sounded in his ears like the broken +gabble of dementia. Quite civilly (seeing that we bore the tip-giving +appearance) the man approached. + +“Is the young gentleman ill?” he asked. “Can I git him anythink?” + +Karl turned and looked at him. The man’s jaw fell and he stepped back +a pace. Away out in mid-stream of the Mersey I saw the Cunarder stop; +a tug in attendance reversed engines and dropped astern. There was no +need to tell me that Karl was not mistaken. Constantine’s soul was even +then passing, somewhere out there amidst the swirling waters. Within +twenty minutes, at the utmost, the tragedy would be reported ashore, +and there was no knowing what this suspicious policeman might say, +if, as I suspected, he were able to piece together Karl’s disjointed +sentences. + +The situation demanded coolness--it was no time for vain regrets. I +advised Grier to take Karl to our hotel without an instant’s delay, and +there await my arrival. + +“Make him talk to you,” I insisted. “Keep him occupied incessantly +until I join you.” + +The older man was dazed, frightened a little, I think, by the glimpse +he had caught of a strange light in Karl’s eyes, but still incredulous, +as we mortals are apt to be when faced with truth. Indeed we only +yield prompt and unquestioning belief to glib imposture, and the more +outrageous it is the more perfervid dupes do we become. + +“For Karl’s sake and your own, Grier,” I whispered, emphatically, “do +not hesitate. You can trust me. I will bring all news. Constantine is +surely dead, but, if we are wrong and he still lives, I will bring him +to you.” + +My earnestness had its effect. Grier hurried his son away from the +landing-stage. Then I tackled the policeman. + +“You saw that my young friend had a sudden and severe attack of +neurosthenia?” I said. + +The bewilderment left the man’s face. + +“Is that it, sir?” he said. “By gum! it must be an awful thing. He +fairly scared me.” + +“He scares every one connected with him. It is not really serious, but +it is induced by excitement, and he often receives strangely accurate +impressions of events that are taking place at a distance. Just now he +imagined that a friend of his had fallen overboard from the liner.” + +“So I heard him say, sir, and, s’elp me, if somethink hasn’t gone +wrong!” + +Nothing could be clearer now. The huge vessel was motionless, her rails +were black with passengers gazing aft, and the tug had lowered a boat. + +“Well,” I said, “whatever it is there is little to be gained by adding +to the publicity of it, and you know what fiends these newspaper men +are when they get hold of a sensational paragraph.” + +My hand went to my pocket, a fine instance of hypnotic suggestion. + +“I never did see anythink like his eyes, sir,” said the man, dubiously. +I produced a sovereign. + +“Poor fellow!” I murmured in commiseration. “He is a great trial to us. +We really should not have brought him here. But you can quite see that +we do not want any comment on his--er--peculiar--” + +“Oh, of course, sir. We chaps often have to keep eyes and ears open +and mouths shut, sir.” + +We moved apart. The Cunarder gained her berth after a quarter of an +hour’s delay. A stream of passengers flowed down the broad gangway. +Running through the boisterous greetings of friends and the turmoil of +people anxious to secure their luggage, I heard a crescendo of broken +exclamations which carried their special import to me alone: + +“Oh, my dear, it was perfectly shocking. It has quite spoiled my trip.” + +“Must have been cracked!” + +“A young man like him! Just fancy it!” + +“Guess he was tired of bein’ rich. Never had that complaint myself.” + +There was no need to ask of whom they spoke. It was an awkward +moment to seek information from the ship’s officers. The triumph of +organization which marks the Atlantic mail service would speedily +empty the crowded decks, and already two cataracts of boxes and +steamer trunks were hurtling over the side into the Customs shed. My +opportunity would soon arrive. So, stifling my horrible imaginings as +best I might, I mixed with the throng, and thus, by chance, encountered +one who had been an eye-witness of Constantine’s last madness. + +My most recent acquaintance, the man in uniform, while helping a +passenger with his portmanteau, asked if there had been an accident +before the vessel warped alongside the landing-stage. The answer he +received led him to hail me in passing. + +“Here’s a gentleman who can tell you all about it, sir,” he said, +thinking, no doubt, he ought to consolidate the gift of that sovereign. + +“Are you a friend of Mr. Constantine’s?” demanded the stranger, a +pleasant-looking, square-faced man, whom I found afterwards to be the +London partner of an important Anglo-American house of discount brokers. + +“No. I only happened to accompany some people who came here to meet +him.” + +“Are they waiting yet?” + +“No. They heard of the affair and have gone. Of course it upset them a +good deal.” + +“By Jove, it was ghastly. I knew Constantine--have done business with +him for years, in fact. He was always a quiet, sober sort of fellow. I, +for one, never suspected he was given to drink.” + +“Was he?” I asked. + +“Well, I am not exactly an expert where delirium tremens is concerned, +but surely this could be nothing else?” + +“All I have been told is that he threw himself overboard.” + +“That was the finish, natural enough when one comes to review things +again. He kept very much to himself on board, rather avoided me and +others, we thought; but we put that down to illness. He had a deck +cabin, and seldom appeared unless the sea was rough. Then he would +find a sheltered place and gaze at the waves for hours. Yet, whenever +I spoke to him, he was quite civil, a trifle reserved, perhaps, but as +sane as I am myself. Like everybody else, he seemed to brighten up when +we entered the Mersey. He was standing on the promenade deck, near the +saloon hatch, within a yard of me, and, like the rest of us, looking at +the shipping in the docks. Suddenly he let out a screech like a wild +Indian. He made me jump, I can assure you. He was a swarthy-skinned +chap, but his color was green when I turned towards him. He seemed to +be gazing at something in the water, and so far as I could understand +his words, gurgled deep in his throat, he thought he saw a shark.” + +“A shark!” + +“Yes. It was all utter rot, of course. I was so taken aback that +I could only stare at him. Several ladies screamed, they were so +frightened; but Constantine put his hand inside the left breast of his +waistcoat, whipped out a dagger, and began to stab savagely at the air. +I was certain he had gone mad, until, a few minutes later, a steward +told me he had practically lived on champagne all the way from New +York. Like other men in the neighborhood, I was thinking seriously of +grappling with him from behind, when he gave another yell and bounded +across the top of the companionway to the starboard side. That is the +Birkenhead side of the ship, you know, and the deck there was almost +deserted. He knocked three people down who were in his way, and began +to climb the rail. I made after him, but just missed him, though my +hand touched his heel. He struck the water, vanished, and just then the +ship swung round towards the landing-stage.” + +“So the screw caught him when he rose,” I blurted out involuntarily. + +“Ah! you heard of that? I never saw him again, but his bedroom steward +said that when the tug’s dingey picked him up he was still living, +though a propeller blade had taken a leg clean off.” + +“Do you mean to say--” + +“Oh, he died while they were lifting him out of the water. Strange +thing he should have had that notion about the shark and then lose a +leg, wasn’t it?” + +I managed to find words to thank my informant, whose name and address I +obtained, though I was so agitated that he expressed his regret if he +had harrowed my feelings with his recital. Luckily, he was discovered +by a Liverpool merchant whom he knew, and we parted with a promise to +meet in London. + +Though I have seen many distressing sights during the course of +a varied life, I have never felt so near sickness, so physically +overcome, as amidst that cheery, bustling, chatting crowd. I drifted +away aimlessly, filled with an absurd terror, which caused me almost +to cringe when I passed a policeman. Ridiculous as the notion was, I +fancied that Karl, his father, Maggie, and myself were _participes +criminis_, sharers in the awful secret which led to that poor mangled +body being carried to a mortuary. It is all very well now to smile at +the shaken nerves which induced this shrinking, self-condemnatory frame +of mind. It was very real and terrible then, nor was it lessened by the +knowledge that my friends would probably suffer from the same delusion +in their turn. + +Slinking, conscience-stricken, through the barrier, I saw a refreshment +buffet. To this day I can recall the surprise of the barmaid when I +grabbed a bottle of French brandy and poured out what she said was +two-shillings’ worth of best cognac, “warranted pure,” which I drank +neat. + +“Well, I never!” she gasped. + +“Nor I, hardly ever,” I managed to say, for the ardent spirit +reinvigorated me. And let me interpolate here, as a breathing-space +in a thrilling moment, that it is a fine thing never to drink brandy +when in good health; thus it becomes an invaluable tonic in physical +suffering or mental depression. + +Well, I hastened to the hotel, refusing a cab, in the belief that +the brandy and the exercise would restore the disturbed poise of my +faculties. The walk was a trifle longer than I had counted on, so a +full hour elapsed between our parting and our meeting. As I expected, +Karl was in a very distressed state, and I was called on to deride in +him the foolish conceit which had shaken my very soul at the docks. His +father’s British phlegm was superb on this trying occasion. To him, +Constantine was an admitted scoundrel, and a “nigger” at that. + +“Never heard such nonsense in my life!” he declared, in the true +“Confound it, sir! what d’ye mean?” manner of John Bull, which a +Scotsman quickly makes his own when he comes South. “Of course, I +am sorry this Armenian firebrand has taken his own life, but it is +quite evident that if he did not face an Eternal Judge he would +soon be called on to face an earthly one. You talk about personal +responsibility for the death of a madman, a loony who has visions and +carries a long knife concealed on his person! What next, I wonder? +My firm belief is that his untimely decease was a dispensation of +Providence!” + +Having thus called in the big battalion of the British nation, Mr. +Grier preened his chest and was for an immediate return to Oxford, +where he would remain with his son until the end of term. You cannot +argue with a man who describes such a tragedy as Constantine’s as an +“untimely decease.” The phrase lent to our discussion a grim humor, of +which my excellent friend was sublimely unconscious. + +And, indeed, looking back in calmness to the tumultuous thoughts of +that day, I have ever been thankful that his stolid good sense came +to our aid. It must not be forgotten that Grier the elder had small +experience of Karl’s sixth sense. He remembered the events of early +years in India, of course, and had heard of Constantine’s rescue at +the time of its occurrence, while Mrs. Grier’s faithful reports told +him that his son remained a prodigy. But was there ever an only son +who, if ordinarily intelligent, had not some wonderful attribute known +only to his parents? “So many single chicks so many prodigies,” the +proverb might run. And since the tea-planter quitted India he had been +exceedingly prosperous in his financial undertakings, mostly connected +with the ever-expanding tea trade. He was one of the wise men who +resisted the temptation to grow the coarse leaf on his plantations, +and now he was reaping the reward, as the “large output” school was +discredited, whereas Grier’s “fine growth” companies were amassing +wealth. + +Hence, a mind which was wont to be receptive of esoteric ideas during +the long Calcutta nights of past years was now more occupied with the +affairs of commerce. He was piling up money, and for what? To enable +Karl to enter Parliament, marry well, and earn a peerage. That is one +form of heredity, when the father’s ambitions center wholly in the +son. So Grier senior valued foresight, but, as our cousins say, he had +no use for “far sight” as practised by Karl. I suspected that he was +profoundly annoyed with me for seeming to encourage the exercise of the +telegnomic sense (wherein he was misled by the accident of our coming +together again owing to its revelations), and it was a proud moment for +me when, not long ago, he confessed his error and recanted his opinions. + +However, he was a rock to which we clung for salvation during that +storm-tossed afternoon in a Liverpool hotel, for we had barely resolved +to take the next train to Oxford and London respectively, than there +came a telegram addressed to Karl. + +He opened and read the message with a strange listlessness. + +“I was expecting something of the kind,” he said, handing the slip +of pink paper to his father. “I knew it had ended; I knew it on the +landing-stage.” + +The telegram was from Maggie. It ran: + +“Sympathize with you in dreadful event. We leave England to-night. +Farewell.” + +“What does it mean?” I asked incredulously. “Why is she going so +suddenly? How does she know anything about Constantine? And what has +ended?” + +Karl turned aside and pretended to look out of the window. The +soft-hearted fellow was ashamed to let us see the tears in his eyes. + +I examined the telegram more closely. It had been a long time on +the way, nearly an hour. It was despatched before any one on the +landing-stage (save three people, none of whom could communicate with +her) had the least inkling of the Armenian’s suicide. + +Had Maggie, too, been a spellbound witness of that elfin spring into +the river? Had she seen all? And what was the significance of Karl’s +weary cry: “I knew it had ended?” + +I glanced at him again, but his head was bowed, his face hidden by his +hands. Silence was best, just then. + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +THE OTHER WOMAN + + +Where grown men are concerned--men of the Anglo-Saxon breed, that +is--emotion cannot be other than spasmodic. I have seen a gentlemanly +convict conduct himself with great dignity during the march to the +scaffold. It was not, poor devil, that he did not fear death, nor that +it was a grateful thing to be dropped ignominiously out of life on a +June morning, but rather that he, after breaking many of his country’s +laws, obeyed the one inflexible social edict which regulates good and +bad “form.” Therefore, with a wry grimace when he emerged from the +whitewashed corridor, and saw that his earthly pilgrimage would end +near the further wall of a small courtyard, he carried himself with +a composure far beyond that manifested by any other member of the +melancholy procession. A criminal in one instinct, he was a man in all +the rest. I suppose the real wrench had come and gone weeks before. + +Now, I had no knowledge of the torture Karl had undergone until he +turned towards me again, and I found a gravity in his face which +had not been there before. Since that morning two little lines had +developed between his eyebrows at the junction of nose and forehead. +That is nature’s way of minting her crude gold--just a touch of the +finger of experience, no matter if the agony be of soul or body, and +there is no machine can stamp its token more indelibly. + +“Maggie’s message is her last word to me,” he said. “She means that she +will endeavor never to see or hear from me again.” + +Even his father was troubled by the marked restraint in his voice, but +I felt that the mere effort of discussion would be helpful. + +“That is a blank impossibility,” I cried. “You two will find each other +whether you like it or not. You did so before and you will do it again. +The settlement is not in your hands, unless I err greatly.” + +“You do not understand,” said Karl. “Perhaps you may meet her sometime. +Please tell her what I have said. Let it rest at that.” + +“If you mean that all this tomfoolery is going to stop here and now +I am heartily glad of it,” broke in his father. “Had I been aware of +what was going on it would have been ended long since. Good gracious! +what was this unfortunate fellow, Constantine, to us that we should +bother our heads about him? I assure you, Karl, that the only thing +which troubles me is the fear lest this latter-day witchcraft of yours +may not be interfering with your work if not actually undermining your +health.” + +I regret to say that my respected friend reminded me just then of +Balaam smiting the ass when she refused to follow the path he had +chosen. But I did not urge the parable aloud. How could a modern man +of business agree to the contention that his son had set in motion an +irresistible natural force? Most certainly he “stood in a narrow place, +and there was no way to turn either to the right hand or to the left.” + +But Karl’s obvious wishes should be respected. I pretended to agree +with his father. I used the customary platitudes anent his career +and the necessity there was to endeavor in future to repress any +manifestation of his sixth sense. And while I was talking, I saw the +ghost of a sad smile flickering on Karl’s lips, because he knew that I +knew better. I laughed myself (ostensibly at some trivial remark by the +elder Grier that there would be some sense in telegnomy if Karl could +summon a waiter quickly by its exercise) when I thought of Hooper’s +scorn of the notion that a fellow shouldn’t see through a brick wall if +he had the power. I was sure that he would pounce on the suggestion as +another instance of British disinclination to adopt new ideas! + +We parted soon, and I regard it as not the least amazing feature of my +really close association with Karl that I did not see him again for +five years. + +That is the sort of queer prank the tides of existence will play +occasionally with the flotsam and jetsam of humanity. The great +highways of rail and ocean may be bringing the whole family of the +globe into closer communion, but they have, too, the strange result +of separating units in a way not dreamed of by our forefathers. Thus, +when my wife and I were in the Western States of America, Karl was +in Germany, making the acquaintance of his mother’s relatives, and +learning again the iron-clamped syllables which bind German thought in +words which are whole phrases. + +We came back to Europe, to watch the upspringing of our own youngster, +and we transferred bag and baggage to Heidelberg at the time chosen by +Mr. and Mrs. Grier to establish themselves in a house in Curzon Street, +Mayfair. + +Of course we kept in touch by correspondence. Mrs. Grier and my wife +sent each other family news, Grier gave me occasional “tips” which, by +operation of that wonderful machine, the Stock Exchange, took money +from some stranger’s pocket and put it into mine, merely because one of +us bought and the other sold stock, which neither of us possessed, in a +railway, or a mine, or an industrial company, in which we had not the +slightest commercial interest. + +Karl, beyond semi-humorous hints, said little about telegnomy. He +kept me duly advised of his progress in the University. During the +month of May of the year following Constantine’s death he obtained +that much-sought document of little future value which set forth +the degree of: “GRIER, KARL, é Coll. Æn. Fac., die 30° Mensis Maii, +Anni--Examinatus, prout Statuta requirunt,” and the rest of it. Then, +with other youthful sages, he wrote his name in a leather-covered book, +subscribed himself “Filius Generosis,” and was finally admitted “ad +gradum Baccalaurei in Artibus.” + +He did not secure honors, and in this respect justified his father’s +fear that the adjectival sixth sense was anything but a help to him. +The truth was that Karl, to whom scholastic work was too easy, was +prone to dream away many an hour which might have been applied more +profitably from the “Ita testamur” point of view of the examiners. + +He never alluded to Maggie in his letters, and his omission in this +respect reminds me that I also have been slow in recording the one +really interesting bit of news I learnt from Hooper when I met him in +New York. + +After Constantine’s death, who do you think hunted up the whereabouts +of the girl and her mother and brought back into their lives, with +redoubled poignancy, the unhappy memory of a tragedy? None other than +Constantine’s solicitors! The unfortunate Armenian made a holograph +will in New York (which, though self-written, was quite to the point +and properly witnessed), leaving to Margaret Vane Hutchinson, daughter +of the late William Hutchinson, tea-planter, Darjeeling, Bengal (an +archaic description of Darjeeling), and at that present date residing +with her mother, Mrs. Alice Holroyd Hutchinson, in the Pall Mall Hotel, +London, England, “all the real and personal estate” of which he died +possessed. To account for this astounding bequest he stated that the +said “Margaret Vane Hutchinson is the woman I intend to marry,” a +written testimony of his views which is all the more to his credit +seeing that Steindal’s Mephistophelian method of securing the girl’s +submission contemplated no such honorable course. Indeed, I have +thought better of the Armenian ever since I heard of that clause in the +will. + +Naturally, Constantine’s Armenian and Levantine relatives were +very wroth. They would have liked to torture with hot irons the +straightforward American secretary who found the will among his +employer’s papers, and took good care that it reached the hands of +the trustees and solicitors to the estate. They wanted to contest it +on various grounds, none creditable, it may be safely inferred, and +had the matter been left to the girl herself she would have executed +any legal transfer of the property to the disappointed crew without +consideration. + +Her mother, however, thought they had done quite enough already for +Constantine’s sake. Maggie, after a terrible scene in London on the +day we were in Liverpool, obtained Mrs. Hutchinson’s consent to the +abrupt closing of a professional career and a departure forthwith to +the Italian Lakes, where they could live in economical retirement, and +Maggie might devote herself to painting. + +The mother yielded because she feared for her daughter’s reason. In +sober earnest, the girl was nearly distraught, and was not in her right +mind until they quitted England. But although adamant in her resolve to +withdraw from the world (had Maggie been a Roman Catholic nothing could +have kept her from entering some religious community), she rapidly +recovered her normal good health and abounding good spirits. Hence, +Mrs. Hutchinson exercised her native shrewdness when the solicitors ran +her to earth, and it was proposed that her daughter should forego the +fortune thrust upon her. + +She referred the lawyers to the firm who looked after her own moderate +investments; there was much legal squabbling, and, you may be sure, +some nice grapes off the bunch fell into the legal maw. Ultimately, the +other Constantines purchased the business interests of their kinsman +at about half their value--it would never do for Christian accountants +to be taking annual stock of their dealings--and Maggie received, from +this source and from the dead man’s personal investments, nearly three +quarters of a million sterling! + +“Yes, sir,” said Hooper, in whom the keen air of New York had brought +out the latent financial instinct, “over three and a half million +dollars”--how he rapped out those wonderful syllables in clear staccato +accents--“that was what Maggie scooped out of the pot when Karl called +Paul and she saw both hands.” + +“Where are Maggie and the millions now?” I asked admiringly. + +“I’ve bin thinkin’. There ain’t much in this codification-of-laws +notion anyhow. Guess I’ll take a vacation, an’ work up some sort of +telegnomy that will materialize,” said he. + +But he was not serious. He was already earning a reputation as a +smart young lawyer, having passed with distinction all the qualifying +examinations in the States, and, indeed, he told me later that he +was “chewing on,” the offer of a post as legal adviser to the Paris +Embassy. So far as he knew, the Hutchinson ladies never left Italy. +In the winter, Maggie might be seen copying pictures in the galleries +of Florence or studying architectural effects in Rome or Venice--her +pictures having attained some fame for their vivid handling of sunlight +on the brilliant Italian exteriors. In the summer, she and her mother +dwelt in a small castle, the Castello Rondo, to be precise, on a wooded +hill overlooking Lake Como. These details Hooper had gathered from +people who had friends among the American colony at Florence. Maggie +was very pretty, very reserved, devoted to her art and to old silver. +That was all he knew about her. + +I was in Heidelberg when the curtain rose again on the Grier drama. +“Adventures come to the adventurous,” says the old saw, and the +homeless literary free-lance of to-day has his surfeit of excitement, +full measure, just as spicy a draught as ever tickled the palate of +any wanderer through the Dark Ages. I have already commented on the +peculiar way in which the tragedy of life obtains its stage effects, +for all the world like any writer of those thrilling “spectacular” +plays which in England used to be labelled “transpontine.” Here is a +typical first act. Scene, a peaceful village; the good young man and +the rustic beauty are discovered living in Sunday-school innocence with +their bucolic parents. Enter two well-dressed villains, of both sexes, +and, after quarter of an hour’s excitement, the stalwart hero is lugged +off, R., to penal servitude for a crime he never committed, and the +heroine falls fainting, L., while the cloth descends to slow music, +_tremolo con molto espressione_. Something of the kind happened to me. +We, that is Mr., Mrs., Master and friends, had been enjoying a boating +excursion on the Neckar, with a grand drive through the Schonau woods, +a fine meal in an ancient inn, and a moonlight-cum-mandolin journey +homewards. + +And there, at our comfortable lodgings, I found a telegram awaiting me: + + “Karl is causing us some trouble. Can you come and help?--GRIER.” + +My wife had heard from Mrs. Grier only a month ago. There was no +mention of any shortcoming on Karl’s part in that missive. Indeed, it +was chiefly intended to warn us of an impending visit by a tremendous +person, the Baroness von Liebenzell-Zavelstein, one of Karl’s maternal +great-aunts, the stoutest and most aristocratic lady in the Grand Duchy. + +Yet Grier was not a man to telegraph for me without good cause. Never +did I regret more keenly the inspissated brains which refused to +exhibit the least sign of a sixth sense. How useful it would have been +now if I could “send out” Hertzian waves and “call up” Karl on our +private installation of wireless telephony! But my dense membranes +forbade any such short cut towards knowledge, even if the remainder of +the machinery were not rusty with disuse, so, while I was packing, I +could only indulge in theorizing. + +“The sure thing is that Maggie has vacated the Castello Rondo,” said I +to my better half. “A beautiful and rich young Englishwoman could never +immure herself for life in the Italian hinterland.” + +“It is the height of the season in town. Karl and she have met in +society,” was the practical response. + +“Um! A coincidence.” + +“What is the coincidence?” + +“It is just five years ago to-day since I went to London with Karl. It +was then the ‘height of the season’ as you call it.” + +“That is what everybody else calls it.” + +“My dear, the phrase is hackneyed. The wife of a writer should seek +a polished synonym. Let me help you to a selection: the fashionable +zenith, the apotheosis of Park Lane, even the saturnalia of society--” + +“Are you going without your boots?” + +Well, I reached Charing Cross next evening, and there, on the platform, +stood Grier _père_ to meet me. He was alone. + +“I have taken rooms at an hotel,” he said after our first hearty +greeting. “I don’t want you at the house, because I fancy you will do +more good by getting Karl to yourself of an evening, so I must ask you +to be my guest at the Pall Mall Hotel.” + +“That is odd,” I said. + +“You will understand better when we have had a talk.” + +I did not explain that my ejaculation referred to the choice of the +hotel and not to his action in sending me there. We entered his +carriage and quitted the station. + +“I hope there is nothing seriously wrong with Karl?” I began. + +“No, no. Not at all. But you are the only man who really knows, or +pretends to know, anything about this inf---- this wretched sixth +sense of his, and it has come on again, worse than ever, since his +engagement.” + +“Hertzblut! Is he going to marry Maggie after all?” + +“Maggie! Maggie! Why do you mention her? He is engaged to the Honorable +Nora Cazenove, daughter of Lord Sandilands.” + +I leaned back in the carriage. I could almost have chuckled. + +“Ah,” I murmured softly to myself. “The other woman has arrived! Now +there will be ructions!” + + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +WOMEN CALLED HIM “THE MAGNET” + + +Nevertheless, there must be some more convincing explanation of the +telegram which brought me from Heidelberg than Karl’s matrimonial +intentions. + +“Doesn’t the engagement meet with your approval?” I asked. + +“Most decidedly. It is a suitable match in every way. Karl has been +nursing a constituency for a year or more. He is sure to win the seat +at the next election. Lord Sandilands has such interest that his +son-in-law will be quite a personage in the parliamentary world if +he has any brains at all, and no one can deny Karl’s gifts in that +direction.” + +“It would be difficult indeed. I think I have heard that Lord +Sandilands himself is--er--” + +“A noodle, to put it mildly. But his daughter is a fine woman, an +amazingly fine woman when one sees her father. They tell me his wife +was an actress, and a great beauty; so perhaps the only wise thing his +lordship ever did was to marry her. Nora is an only child. Both title +and estates will pass to her son if she has one. So you see--” + +“I can see everything except the _raison d’être_ of my presence in +London to-night.” + +“For an expert in telegnomy--if that is what you call the thing--you +are surprisingly slow to grasp my meaning. Never since we said good-by +to you in Lime Street Station has this spook business troubled Karl in +the least. He has done some remarkable things, it is true. I have seen +him make people jump nearly out of their skins, but only by way of a +joke. The women call him ‘The Magnet,’ you know. Oh, you hadn’t heard +that? There is nothing in it but sheer fun. He wouldn’t look at a girl +until I spoke to him seriously a couple of months ago, and then he told +me that he was quite ready to marry the first girl I chose for him. So +Sandilands and I fixed matters.” + +“Did you?” + +There must have been a note of irony in my voice. Grier bounced +round in the carriage, and I may mention, as a matter of personal +observation, that the accumulation of riches tends to shorten a man’s +temper. + +“Yes, we did,” he snapped, “and, what is more, we fixed matters +uncommonly well. Karl cared as much for Nora as for any other nice +young woman of his acquaintance, while she was infatuated about him. +Just the right combination, to my thinking, in a marriage which is +intended to start a man on a great career.” + +“Ach Himmel!” I murmured. “Where is the planter of my youth? Does Mrs. +Grier subscribe to that sentiment?” + +Even as I spoke, I felt sorry for the bantering tone I was adopting. +It may be that I was tired after my journey, or that my old friend’s +sudden announcement of his son’s engagement had driven all other +considerations from my mind, but assuredly I would not have wrung a +father’s heart if I had guessed how he was suffering. + +He caught my arm, and the glare of light from the hotel entrance, at +which the carriage was then pulling up, showed me a face haggard and +convulsed with pain. + +“Don’t!” he almost sobbed. “I can’t stand it. My God, have you +forgotten how Constantine died?” + +“My dear fellow--” I began, but a Swiss hall-porter in the undress +uniform of a British field-marshal was at the open door. + +Though wretchedly ashamed of myself, what could I say? I was +tongue-tied with surprise. Had things reached such a pitch that +Grier was trembling for his son’s sanity? Nothing short of some +terrible crisis could have wrung that cry of despair from a man of +the money-making temperament. To be sure, we are apt to err greatly +when we describe a millionaire as “callous,” “steel-nerved,” and other +foolish epithets of that ilk. Constantine was a millionaire, and he was +as sensitive as a plate full of iron filings exposed to the influence +of static electricity. And then, look at A. and B., men whom you hear +of daily; their hyper-nervousness is a matter of common knowledge. + +Of course I put things right with Grier when we were alone once more. +By that time, the momentary rift in the cloud which revealed the grim +abyss had vanished. His face was impenetrable as a dense fog; the cold +intellect had subdued the throbbing heart. + +Calmly and carefully, with the precision he would exercise if +recounting the assets of one of his companies, he went through the full +history of recent events. It is not necessary to repeat his statements +here. Karl, when I met him, was more explicit, because he explained +causes as well as effects. Grier asked my help as a friend and +trustworthy counsellor. My mission was to win his son back to a more +rational view of life. As in many another desperate plight, of nations +as well as individuals, the _status quo ante_ was the one desirable +solution of the difficulty. + +I promised to co-operate to the best of my ability, and I was pleased +then to think, as I am now to know, that my distressed friend quitted +me in a more hopeful mood than he had experienced during the previous +month. It was no child’s task he imposed. A week earlier Karl had +promised his father, on his word of honor, that he would commit no +rash or desperate act until four weeks had passed. Seven days had gone +already, and the extraordinary circumstances which lay behind that +sinister promise were more potent than ever. “Young fool!” the cynic +may mutter, but even a cynic can be asked to suspend judgment until he +has heard the facts. + +Well, Grier had gone. I was going out for a light supper at a quiet +restaurant--the full-dress magnificence of the hotel dining-rooms was +distasteful to an Ishmael in tweed--when a waiter came with a card: +“Mr. Karl Grier!” + +Honestly, it did not occur to me at once how Karl became aware of +my presence, in view of his father’s assurance that the telegram to +Heidelberg was an absolute secret. Every man has his limitations, and +the use of a sixth sense in the ordinary affairs of life was ever new +to me. Nevertheless, here was Karl himself, and his appearance gave me +a shock productive of that imaginary shakiness which elderly ladies of +considerable weight describe when they say: + +“You might have knocked me down with a feather!” + +Light literature, helped by the stage, must have created a lean, +hollow-eyed, somewhat consumptive type of person when the ravages of +passion, aided and abetted by darkly mysterious natural attributes, +come to be portrayed. Of course, I last saw Karl in the heyday of +youth and physical perfection, when face and figure might have +served Phidias as model for the sculpture of Helios, the sungod. +I am not exaggerating. Even the famous Greek, contemplating some +chryselephantine marvel, found no higher ideal than the human form at +its best, and nature, having determined to break the fetters of that +long-imprisoned extra sense, took good care to select a notable subject +for its display. + +Therefore, while such a fine combination of athlete and thinker could +scarce have fallen to the poor standard of the popular novelist’s +cataleptic hero, the elder Grier’s revelations had prepared me, by +inference, for a wasted and shrunken Karl, a six-foot volcano whose +inner fire had wofully consumed the outer substance. Indeed, I may ask +what _you_ would have thought if told piteously to remember the manner +of Constantine’s death, and bidden to strive and avert a tragedy with +a definite date assigned to it. How would such facts look on a life +insurance proposal, for instance? + +Hence, the pleasant voice and outstretched hand of a Karl who had the +physique of one of Ouida’s Horse-Guard captains came as an agreeable +but nevertheless bewildering surprise. Here was a man whose splendid +proportions would attract attention anywhere. He was faultlessly +dressed, so far as modern fashion may garb the mere male. He carried +himself with the ease of good society. His eager face had the bronze +of the open air and the clear texture of healthy living. Altogether, +there could be no more astounding contrast submitted to a stubborn +intelligence than this fine-looking young man, with his distinguished +air, his happy insouciance, and his gray-haired father pleading for a +son’s life. + +“You didn’t expect to see me, eh?” cried he, throwing aside his +overcoat and subsiding into a chair. “Poor old dad! I’m a dreadful +worry to him just now, and I knew he had some scheme in his mind last +night when he kept glancing at me under those deep eyebrows of his. So +to-night, when he was late for dinner, I sent a telegnomic ray after +him. I was just as glad to see you step out of the train as he was. +And you are far more sympathetic. I simply can’t get him to realize +that I am unable to control my unhappy faculties at times. He thinks +you can cut off the sixth sense as one switches out the light. By Jove! +I wish I knew the electrician who could disconnect me!” + +“I don’t understand you, but I am delighted to find you looking so +well,” said I. “From your father’s brief report--” + +“You expected to meet a most wobegone individual. Well, I’m not. I was +never better in my life. But the pace cannot last. Unless something +happens, some planet-sent intervention which I fail to foresee, I am +condemned like any felon. Was I right in warning the old man of a +pending catastrophe? I think so. The news of my sudden death might be +fatal to him. Now, at any rate, he is prepared for it.” + +He caught my critical, not to say suspicious, glance and laughed. Never +did a “condemned felon” regard his doom so cheerfully. + +“That is quite right,” he said. “See if you can detect any signs of +insanity. Sir Harley Dresser did the same thing when, to please my +father, I went to him. He abandoned the idea, however, and gave me some +fever mixture, as he fancied I might have caught a chill after some +hard chukkars at polo.” + +“You have no need to convince _me_ that you are a phenomenon,” I +protested. + +“No. I should think not, indeed, after poor Constantine’s affair. +Nevertheless, you absolutely refuse to believe--and I am speaking only +of rational, scientific belief--that this most unpleasant telegnomy may +kill me as it killed him.” + +“Did it kill him?” + +“There is nothing more certain. I tell you that because you know I +was in no way responsible. I simply burnt him up, fused him, as the +motor-men say, and it was his own fault, because he persisted in +getting in my way. You know that resistance is the principle of the +incandescent electric lamp. Of malice aforethought, the electrician +sticks a thin carbon filament in the middle of a thick wire which +will carry a certain current. The filament cannot carry the load, so +it becomes red-hot and shrivels, the process being retarded by the +creation of a vacuum. Constantine was the filament; that is all.” + +“Have you--er--are there other human filaments--” + +“I hope not. I have not encountered any, I am glad to say; but there is +a reason for everything if only we can discover it, and my current is +not murderous unless it has a certain direction and intensity. Both of +those conditions have been absent for five years, so there are no other +crimes, even involuntary ones, to my charge.” + +“I hope you are overrating your power, even in the case of +Constantine,” I said. + +“It may be so. I am only guessing vaguely at a theory, and using the +analogy of known things. But Macpherson was right when he described me +as an induction coil. I give off magnetism at a terrific voltage. Apply +this interesting mechanism to the ordinary means of seeing and hearing, +which you may liken to a bar of soft iron, and you have the first +feasible definition of telegnomy.” + +“I shall be only too glad to hear an intelligent scientific explanation +of your sixth sense when the fog which has settled steadily over my +wits since I reached London has cleared away,” I broke in. “What +I am really concerned with now is the alarm which your father is +experiencing on your account, and quite needlessly, I suppose.” + +He leaned confidentially nearer, his arms resting on his knees; and his +finely chiseled face thrust forward with keen intentness. + +“You had better follow the track I am providing,” he said. “I have the +consoling belief that you will ultimately comprehend me, and that will +be something gained. Since we tried experiments in polarization in the +_Mitre_ at Oxford I have advanced somewhat in knowledge. Of course it +is difficult to describe thought in language adapted to mechanical +apparatus, though, when comparisons are set up, the similarity of the +body to a steam engine driving a dynamo, to which certain electrical +devices are attached, is simply amazing. Have you ever studied +electricity?” + +“No,” I said. + +“Well, then, I must explain two things to you. In the first place, you +can imagine a current passing along a wire from one side of a room to +the other. When a circuit is made a bell rings. Now, the wire which +carries that current may be insulated thoroughly, yet it diffuses +around it a certain quantity of static electricity, or magnetism, which +constitutes an aura.” + +“Ah, an old friend, met in many a clairvoyant novel and mesmeric +séance!” + +“Yet the aura has dynamic existence apart from fiction. Place a smaller +wire, equipped with an electro-magnet yielding to one tenth of the +force carried by wire No. 1, in the same field, but wholly separate, +and you will find that by completing the first circuit the resultant +magnetism affects the second wire, and _its_ bell rings also, only +with considerable diminished strength. Well, sweep away your visible +appliances, regard me as wire No. 1, and mankind in general as wire No. +2, and you have a fairly accurate notion of the manner in which I can +ascertain, and even control, other people’s words and movements at any +given moment.” + +“How about me?” I demanded. “I was exceedingly anxious to communicate +with you the other evening, but nothing happened, to _my_ knowledge.” + +“Had I known your wish, and you had given voice to it, it would have +been different. But that brings me to my second illustration. The +force, whatever it is, which travels forth comes back again with +absolutely unimpaired vigor, though possibly in some other form. You +can prove that little recognized fact by experiment with any sparking +machine. Now, there is only one human being alive, so far as I know, +who can actually supply the full magnetic complement of my electric +field. In different words, there is but one other creature on earth +tuned to my pitch. Owing to certain impending circumstances I fear +a collapse for her, or through her, which will, beyond question, be +accompanied by a more complete catastrophe for me.” + +Karl was speaking so seriously, his words were so evidently the outcome +of deep reflection, that I found myself as profoundly imbued with the +vital importance of the matter as he was himself. + +“Are you alluding to the Honorable Nora Cazenove or to Miss Margaret +Hutchinson?” I asked. + +The bewildering pendulum-swing from talk of sudden and unprovided death +back to light-hearted and careless gaiety was not the least puzzling +feature of Karl’s present attitude; he straightened himself in his +chair and laughed gleefully. + +“I wonder if you can discover the answer unaided!” he cried. “I’ll tell +you what. There’s a reception at Sandilands’ house to-night. Just slip +on your regulation clothes, and I’ll take you there. After you have +seen Nora, you shall give me your opinion!” + + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +I MEET NORA CAZENOVE + + +“Having carried what may be termed your technical exposition so far, +why do you stop short at the really important issue?” I asked. + +“Oh, come now!” he cried with ready raillery, “when a patient describes +his symptoms to a doctor he does not pass to the next stage and name +his disease.” + +Amidst present perplexities and the confusion of quickly gathering +memories of earlier years, there was one distinctive characteristic of +Karl’s Mahatmalike faculty which stood out prominently. The exercise of +his sixth sense never affected his gay personality. If he showed anger +or concern it was wholly vicarious, a sympathetic sentiment inspired +by certain facts which influenced the lives of others. Once, indeed, +to my knowing, if not more frequently, he had obtained a reflex or +sub-conscious knowledge of Maggie Hutchinson’s emotions. But even in +this instance my theory apparently held good. Alas for romance and +the first shaft of love! Five years ago he was not only ready, after +a pang or two, to fall in with her decree of banishment, but to-day +I was to meet his fiancée in a young woman of the market type! This +contradictory, self-effacing attitude was, of course, brought out more +pronouncedly than ever by the haphazard views he expressed on the +chance, or, it might be, the certainty, of his own early death. To see +Karl, the personification of manly strength and good health, sitting +in my room, and hear him coolly endorsing his father’s heart-broken +statement as to his approaching dissolution, was the most absurdly +exasperating experience ever vouchsafed to me. + +I know quite well that men and women of high degree--and by that I mean +the true aristocracy of man, not the base metal so often stamped with +misleading titles--will face unavoidable death with a sedateness, even +a sober humor, which is the topmost rung of the long ladder climbed +by human progress. A shipwreck, a battle, a lost cause--these are +tangible things and excuse all. “This is the most glorious day of my +life,” said the crippled Girondist, Sillery, when sentenced to death. +“What, Valazé,” said Brissot to another, who fell in seeming faintness, +“are you losing your courage?” “No, I am dying,” was the reply; Valazé +had plunged a dagger into his heart. A British officer, about to be +crucified by Chinese, was offered an easier death if he would admit +that China was greater than England. His enemies knew some French but +no English. His French was that of the provincial grammar school of +other days, but he cried boldly: “La Hongleterre est la première nation +de la monde!” They understood him, not being Frenchmen, and an enraged +mandarin gave the signal for his instant execution. Well, you take off +your hat to the memory of the brave, and you hope that, in similar +straits, you would carry yourself with equal dignity. + +But I do not think the man breathes who could gage Karl’s dispassionate +mood in that hour. I admit that I was utterly befogged. I went into +my bedroom to change my clothing. The door was open, and I heard Karl +rise, approach the window, obviously with no more serious intent than +a glance into the street, and begin to whistle. That might be the +stoicism of despair. But the whistling changed to humming, and from +humming he verted to singing: + + For she was the Belle of New York, + The subject of all the town talk. + She made the whole Bowery + Fragrant and flowery + When she went out for a walk.... + +This was too much. I stuck my enraged head round the corner of the +door. He stopped his lilting. + +“By Jove!” he said, “you must be a lightning change artist.” + +“Karl!” I cried indignantly, “for goodness’ sake jump into a hansom, +go to your father, and tell him to dismiss from his mind the stupid +nightmare with which you have managed to imbue him.” + +“You have evidently missed the exact point of some of my remarks,” he +retorted pleasantly. “I told you, among other things, that I wrestled +with the problem of candor versus concealment some time ago.” + +“But you cannot be in earnest. Either you are mad or I am.” + +“Both, my dear fellow. Believe me, temporary insanity is largely on +the increase. The average man cannot withstand the strain. I fancy you +will find there is a quaint analogy between the number of maniacs per +mille and the number of editions published each day by the evening +newspapers. When the jaded intellect is called on, every few minutes, +to watch three race meetings, six county cricket matches, and probably +a test match, the war--there is always a war--the German Emperor, the +yacht race, the latest scandal, the latest play--” + +Pshaw! I let up, as Hooper would have said, and determined to drift +with the tide into the realm of queer happenings. The change in my +costume rendered the hotel’s restaurant approachable. Eat to-day I +must, no matter who died to-morrow. Karl agreed to keep me company +while I tackled the homeliest _plat_ which a £3,000 per annum chef +would condescend to cook, and thus, unwittingly, was I advanced a stage +in my inquiry. + +We found the palatial apartment tenanted by late diners and early +suppers. A waiter would have whisked us into an inconvenient corner, +but Karl stayed him. + +“Where is Jules?” he asked. + +“Le voilà, m’sieur,” and the man indicated the bulky form of the head +waiter in the far depths of white and gold. + +Karl looked steadily across the little tables with their twos that were +company and their threes that were not. Had he fired at Jules with +an air-gun that ponderous person could not have wheeled round more +readily. Moreover, he came straight to us, his broad face set in a wide +grin. + +“Ah, dere you are, M’sieur Karl!” he cried. “I alvays know ven you come +in, is it not?” + +“Always,” replied Karl, imperturbably. After compliments, I gave my +order. The manner of Jules’ summoning was hidden from both the head +waiter himself and his satellite. + +“Is that what the women mean when they call you ‘The Magnet’?” I +inquired. + +He laughed, with that contagious merriment which sends ripples of +content across his hearers’ faces whether they are in his company or +not. But he took care that his answer reached no other ears than mine. + +“No,” he said, “the women mean something quite different. At any +ordinary distance I can attract practically any one whom I know. They +come and talk to me, without being aware that I have summoned them. It +is not a very remarkable feat when you realize that we all do something +like that, in any church, or theater, or other place where people are +gathered together. The magnetic effect is doubled, at least, when you +use opera-glasses. Why?” + +These red herrings drawn across the trail were useless. + +“What _do_ the women mean?” I persisted. + +“Ask ’em, my dear fellow. Perhaps they may explain. The dear creatures +adore sensation. I am told that some of them will stick on a switchback +railway until their purses are emptied. A woman’s nervous system is +more refined than a man’s. That is why she likes swinging, or, to be +accurate, being swung. It thrills her.” + +Karl, in this bantering mood, was a revelation. Were I not really +very much distressed and concerned by the statements made by him and +his father I should have been somewhat annoyed with him. As it was, I +determined to meet him on his own ground. + +“You have evidently become quite a man about town since last I saw +you,” I said. + +“How have I earned that questionable distinction in your eyes?” + +“On the _post hoc propter hoc_ principle. Your nickname, your +philosophy, your light generalities about the opposite sex, are labels +of the brand.” + +“Ah! It has not struck you that both you and the women may be mistaken?” + +I looked up quickly. The mocking laugh had gone. The grave, earnest +face of the Karl of five years ago was before me. Nevertheless, his +fencing had stirred within me the spirit of resistance. + +“I am prepared to vouch for the fact that one woman knew you well +enough not to be mistaken,” I said. + +“May not her knowledge explain her attitude? Of course you are speaking +of Maggie Hutchinson. Do not forget that she shut the door in my face.” + +“If it be not treason to the Honorable Nora Cazenove, may I say that +the door might yield to a resolute attack?” + +For answer he leaned on the table, intertwined his fingers, and gazed +at me straight in the eyes. + +“Never was fortress besieged more patiently,” he said. “It is only +within the past few weeks, that I have received any answer, and that is +why--But surely you will agree with me that the full and explicit story +of my life had better be deferred until a more convenient occasion.” + +Now, lest I be accused of romancing, I shall not endeavor to analyze +very closely the most curious and agreeable illusion which held +me during the few seconds needed for the delivery of his protest. +Instead of the crowded restaurant I saw a moonlit lake, with the +terraces of an Italian garden rising in black and white lines of +closely clipped hedges, gravel paths, smooth lawns, and broad stairs +with curving balustrades. On the topmost and widest lawn, where the +grass had the resemblance of a black carpet owing to the shadows +cast by a castellated building in the background, three people were +walking--actually in motion, that is--not in the fixed attitudes of +a picture, but moving. Two were women, one dressed in black and the +other in white, and the moonlight glinting on their robes had an effect +worthy of Gustave Doré, so startling was the contrast, so instantly did +they hold the eye. With them was a man, a tall man; but that was all I +caught of the scene, for my ears were listening to Karl throughout, and +the change in his voice brought back my scattered senses. + +And a waiter spoke. + +“Your fish, sir. Sole Colbert, sir.” + +I think I must have gazed at him blankly, but Karl came to my +assistance. + +“Tell the chef we are in a hurry,” he said. “Then there will be no +delay in the kitchen.” + +The man quitted us. I stuck a needless fork into the amiable sole. + +“Have you been hypnotizing me?” I demanded angrily. + +“You may call it that if you like,” he said calmly. “You saw Maggie and +her mother.” + +“Did I!” I snapped. “And who was the man?” + +“I do not know his name. I decline to listen. But I am fairly certain +he is an Italian, of good birth, and he is madly in love with Maggie.” + +I thawed. There was a reason for the trick he had played me. + +“And she?” I demanded. + +“Like me, she thinks that marriage is a duty.” + +“There appears to be material for a neurotic novel in the present +situation.” + +“Far more. It may supply two tragedies. But why are you harpooning +that unresisting fish?” + +Again I resolved to drift. It was clear that Karl meant me to travel +along the road he had already mapped out. So I ate my dinner, and drank +a couple of glasses of wine, and kept asking myself how it was possible +for my young friend to produce so easily a slight but distinct hypnosis +in a veteran like me. + +Then I remembered the poker-polarizing of the Mitre Hotel, and I dug my +elbow into his ribs as a hansom carried us westwards. + +“By Jove!” I cried, “I have it! Constantine’s death interfered, in +some way, with the private telegnomy line Maggie and you had set up; +but recent events have repaired the breakage. Constantine, living, +supplied the earth contact for your ethereal wires. When he died you +were forcibly separated, practically torn asunder, and his place had to +be filled again before you could resume communication on the same basis +as before.” + +“You are not far wrong,” he said dryly. “But you have lived so much +abroad that you forget the propriety due to the British hansom. If you +wave your arms so excitedly, the policeman at the top of St. James’ +Street will stop us, and I shall be compelled to magnetize him.” + +“Could you?” I inquired irrelevantly. + +“Ask the guv’nor what I did to the _douanier_ at the Gare du Nord who +wished to confiscate a pound of the only tobacco the old man can smoke. +I made him chalk a whole ship-load of luggage like an automaton. I +have progressed somewhat since I left Oxford. Were it not for other +less agreeable features, I could get a fair amount of amusement out of +my powers of suggestion. It is not altogether puzzling when you come +to reason it out. Granted that I am a sort of human magnet, I must +obviously be able to control my fellow-men, especially those who are +most susceptible to external influences.” + +“When I extricate Maggie and you from your present dilemma I shall +demand your aid for the utter squelching and making everlastingly +ridiculous of some of my dearest enemies,” I said cheerfully. + +“Better use me soon,” said he lightly, yet there was a chilling and +somber significance in his words that recalled me to the reality of the +peril of which he spoke so jestingly. + +When we reached Lord Sandilands’ town house our cab took rank behind +a score of broughams and other conveyances setting down guests at the +striped canvas alley which shut off the sacred portal of fashion from +the vulgar gaze. _Odi profanum vulgus et arceo_: “I hate the common +rabble and keep it at a distance,” wrote Horace, who must have lived in +the Berkeley Square of Old Rome. What stern barriers are those strips +of canvas and lengths of red carpet. + +We passed several gorgeous footmen (it is an old phrase, but the +truth is ever thus) and two detectives, deposited our hats and coats +somewhere, made our way up a flight of broad stairs, and my inquisitive +eyes fell on a very handsome young woman, exquisitely dressed, but a +trifle on the heavy side of the scale to my thinking, whose position, +no less than the equal delight with which she welcomed all comers, +proclaimed that this was the hostess, Nora Cazenove. + +The conventional smile flew from her face as painted scenes grow +mawkish in sunlight when she saw Karl. She blushed very prettily, and +her very soul leaped to her eyes. + +“I have been looking for you this hour or more,” she cried, and I half +expected her to throw her splendid arms around his neck. + +“I would have been here sooner were I not detained by the unexpected +arrival of an old friend. Let me present him.” + +She extended her hand to me. + +“The older the friend of Karl’s the more pleased I am to see him,” she +said. + +“And now that I have met you I can only wonder that any friendship +could have resisted the strain he must have felt during the last hour.” + +There we stood, the three of us, two men and a woman, murmuring +nice artificialities, bowing and smirking in the glare of a London +drawing-room, while in an Italian garden, at that hour, three others, +two women and a man, were talking of Heaven knows what topic, which, +nevertheless, was indissolubly bound up with our trivial discourse. + +For a fleeting instant I had a glimpse of some strong, imperishable, +intangible bond which held together the hidden things of life. Then I +heard Nora Cazenove’s aristocratic accents. + +“Soon I shall be relieved from my present duty. Then you and I must +have a nice long talk.” + +So I passed on with the crowd. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +THE PROBLEM TAKES SHAPE + + +There are certain mortals, I suppose, who take delight in “At Homes,” +receptions, musicales, and the rest of the social devices which +enable fashionable folk to meet of evenings and learn the latest +scandal. Personally, I would pass an hour far more agreeably in a +fever hospital, provided the resident doctor were a good fellow, and +not too busy to smoke a pipe with me. Hence, because of the unusual +transactions of that memorable night, the proceedings at Sandilands’ +house stand out in my mind in quite cameo-like precision as contrasted +with other similar gatherings I have attended. Nor was this result +achieved by meeting notable personages. There was the same setting of +tow-headed fiddlers and stout sopranos--judicious artistes who earn +a bank manager’s annual salary in twenty minutes--the same well-bred +insolence on the part of some, the same toadying by others, the same +ruthless incivility in the supper rooms by all, that may be seen at any +like festival in the West End of London any night during the season. +But, as shall be revealed speedily, the unrehearsed incidents of this +particular society comedy were such as cut notches in the memory. + +I met a man with a grievance. He insisted on telling me why the +Government had denied him the poet-laureateship. That was a safe topic. +Politeness demanded an occasional “Dear me!” or “You don’t say so!” +from me: he did the rest. + +From the safe anchorage of his eloquence I was able, at leisure, to +watch and, to a certain extent, sum up, Nora Cazenove. Her genealogy, +briefly sketched by the older Grier, partly accounted for certain +deficiencies in her. It was reasonable to assume that her mother was a +beautiful woman, of extraordinary acuteness within a somewhat narrow +sphere. Like the girl in the ballad, her face was her fortune, and she +deemed herself well paid, I doubt not, when she bartered her good looks +and faultless form for a title and a big annual rent-roll. + +Lord Sandilands, whom I had never seen until that night, instantly +reminded me of that scathing dictum of Swift’s: “A weak, diseased body, +a meager countenance, and sallow complexion are the true marks of noble +blood.” Gulliver, you will find, if you look the passage up, gave his +horse friend an even more drastic explanation of an occasional lapse +by the aristocracy into robustness of physique; but Lord Sandilands, +judged by the Dean’s standard, was a genuine peer. Yet he was a +harmless little creature. I fancy he received a mild shock every time +his Juno-like daughter called him “father.” + +At any rate, I amused myself by studying the girl, and I came to the +conclusion that had Karl scoured the earth he could not have found a +more exact antithesis to Maggie Hutchinson than her successful rival, +the Honorable Nora Cazenove. + +They had the common attributes of good looks, good style, and what +passes current for good education among young ladies of twenty-three +or thereabouts. In all else they differed. If I were seeking worthy +tabernacles for merely intellectual concepts of what we mean when we +speak of soul and body, I should choose those two girls as supplying +the requisite shrines. Though my recollection of Maggie was not quite +definite, I could recall her Madonna expression, the spirituality +which diffused its mild beams over a grateful world from her brown +eyes. Nora, on the other hand, was what her lineage proclaimed, a +purchased standard of bodily excellence. Maggie could forget all, +even life itself, in the exaltation of music, the passion of a song, +the transient loveliness of a sunset, whereas Nora must be a fine +equestrian, fond of good food and hearty exercise, a woman in whom +the wonderful maternal instinct would be less divine than human. I am +not blind to the lack of precision in that last distinction. Some day +a man may be free to write as he thinks, provided always that he has +honorable and useful intent, but that day is not yet. + +I was so wrapped up in my thoughts that I made a rather bad break with +the would-be laureate. + +“What would you have said,” he fiercely demanded, “if the Prime +Minister told you that your latest volume of poems was a collection of +turgid nonsense?” + +“I would have said that he was quite right,” I answered blithely, for a +man can always run down his own work with safety. + +Then it dawned on me that the Prime Minister had expressed himself thus +strongly, not on my book, but on the poet’s. + +“Of course,” I added, “it was quite evident that he had not read a line +of your verse.” + +“Confound it, haven’t I just related to you how I found him in the +summer-house, and compelled him to listen? yes, blocked up the only +exit, until I recited to him the whole of my ode to ‘Eternity.’” + +“The subject was too vast for his intelligence.” + +“Not it. It is a shameful fact that no man of poetic tastes can gain +a politician’s ear nowadays unless he titillates it with a patriotic +jingle. As a forlorn hope I have written a threnody on the fleet. If +I can find a good rhyme for ‘guns’ I am made. Can you help? ‘Buns,’ +‘duns,’ ‘nuns’ and ‘tuns,’ are hardly suitable. ‘Suns,’ ‘runs,’ and +‘shuns,’ I have used. Just come into this corner while I--” + +Miss Cazenove rescued me. + +“At last I have a moment,” she cried, showing her perfect teeth in a +thoroughly good-natured smile. “You don’t mind my carrying him off, do +you?” she went on sweetly, as she noted the look of disappointment on +my companion’s face. “I have such a lot to say to him.” + +We hurried away. She laughed merrily when I told her of my escape. + +“He is a real terror,” she agreed. “One day he tackled dad after +luncheon. Do you know my father? He says ‘Gad’ to everything he doesn’t +understand, and most other things as well. But on that occasion he lost +his temper and said ‘Rats!’” + +That put us on good terms. I looked forward to an agreeable if not +very soulful chat with my radiant hostess, but I was fated to learn, +for the hundredth time, that every woman is a born actress. Even the +angelic Maggie was a stage adept when it became necessary to cloak her +emotions from the public ken. + +“Are you hungry?” asked Miss Cazenove, guiding me skilfully through the +crowded suite of rooms. + +“No,” I said, flattering myself that the question was only prompted by +hospitality. + +“Then come this way.” + +Before I well knew what was happening, I was whisked through a +curtained door into a passage left purposely unlighted. Clinging to my +arm, but really compelling me onward, the girl led me to another door. +She entered, and switched on the electric light. Evidently this was her +boudoir, but she left me little time to take stock of my surroundings. + +“Sit down here,” she said. “I don’t care what people think. I _must_ +talk with you about Karl. Of course I might have waited until to-morrow +and asked you to call, but now that you are here I am consumed with +impatience. No, sit just where you are, please. I want to see your +face.” + +“I am a most skilled prevaricator,” I said, for her maneuvering was +of the Napoleonic order. I was to be attacked by horse, foot, and +artillery, cross-examined and scrutinized at the same time. We sat on +a roomy Chesterfield, an article of furniture which suggests insidious +confidences; a cluster of lamps equipped with reading reflectors shot +their rays directly at us. Moreover, she did not seem to heed the fact +that she laid herself open to equally searching criticism on my part. +The first shot fired in the encounter showed that my adversary scorned +subterfuge. + +“Who is she?” + +“Really--” I protested. + +“Oh, you know very well whom I mean. Karl is engaged to me now, and is +going to marry me--I shall see to that. But I must know who the girl is +with whom he has been in love since five years ago.” + +I temporized. + +“Five years ago! You can hardly expect me to recollect anything of +serious importance concerning the love affairs of a young gentleman at +college and a young lady who may have worn her hair in two plaits, tied +at the ends with a big bow--” + +“Please, please!” she insisted. “As if I did not know how some girl has +entered his very life, until he regards all other women with unheeding +eyes, and even conducts himself towards me in what he considers to be +the correct attitude of an engaged man. What is the spell she has cast +upon him? Is she more beautiful than I, more sympathetic, more capable +of devotion? Why is his father so troubled about him? Why have you +been brought from Heidelberg to help in dispelling the cloud which has +settled on him?” + +“Did Mr. Grier, senior, tell you that?” + +“No. No one tells me anything. Won’t _you_ have pity on me? I have the +wildest dreams, but I know some of them are true. And I dreamed of you. +I even saw you. I would have known you anywhere. When you came up the +stairs with Karl to-night I could have shrieked aloud, but I dug my +nails into my hands and restrained myself. See, here are the gloves I +wore. I have changed them for others, but I kept them to prove to you +how truly I am speaking.” + +She took from a pocket a crumpled pair of white gloves, _peau de +chevreau_. The finger seams were burst, the palms cut in four half +moons. So, though the words nearly choked me, I was forced to say +soothingly: + +“I imagine you are troubling your pretty head about a matter of little +moment, Miss Cazenove. I am quite certain you have no serious rival. +Karl is the soul of honor--” + +She started to her feet and grasped my shoulder with a vehemence she +was hardly conscious of. + +“You men everlastingly prate of honor. Honor explains everything. +Provided Karl is scrupulously attentive to me he can take another woman +to his heart, kiss her lips, her eyes, her hair, breathe her breath, +inhale her fragrance, mingle his very soul with hers--that may be +honorable to me, but it is the madness of love for her.” + +“Surely, Miss Cazenove, you are saying that which is not,” I cried, and +I, too, facing her angrily, jumped up from the cushioned depths of the +Chesterfield. + +“Am I? Then you do not understand Karl, and still less do you +understand Maggie Hutchinson. Ah! _touché_? Think me a jealous woman, +if you choose. I am, and I glory in it. But I have a woman’s wits as +well, and you know in your heart I am not mistaken.” + +Something must be done to allay the tempest. I had to fling the sixth +sense to the winds, and trust to the five of our common heritage to +calm this excited beauty. + +“I speak in all honesty and truth,” I said, “when I tell you that, to +the best of my belief, Karl Grier has neither seen, nor spoken to, nor +written to Maggie Hutchinson since he was an undergraduate at Oxford.” + +She wrung her hands passionately. + +“Heaven keep me from tears!” she wailed. “If I cry I shall yield +utterly. Oh, dear, oh, dear! I so looked forward to meeting you and +securing your help. Are you really so ignorant of Karl’s powers that +you lay stress on what we call seeing and hearing? They mean nothing to +him. I am not blind if others are. Oh, if only I did not love him so I +might perhaps be more to him!” + +I am free to admit that her words stirred me strangely. Could it be +that while I was puzzling my brains with the formulæ of the least +considered branches of science, this girl, unaided, almost untaught, +had solved the mystery which enfolded the broken love story of Karl +and Maggie? Did she share with the dead and gone Armenian the most +disastrous attribute of a vector equation to the unmeasured force which +united the spiritual existences of her rival and her lover? From the +apparently secure foundation of physics and magnetic attraction I was +projected into an astral shadow-land, whirled away on an unbridled +steed into a kingdom of wild imaginings. + + On a sudden in the midst of men and day, + And while I walk’d and talk’d as heretofore, + I seemed to move among a world of ghosts + And feel myself the shadow of a dream. + +Yet it was no mystic but a real woman who faced me in that delightful +room, with its Louis Seize furniture, its charming little Corots and +water-colors by David Cox, its fragrant perfume of Provençal flowers, +and all that air of subtle refinement which clings to the abode of a +young and beautiful girl as a well-made gown clings to the contour +of her body, never obtrusive, always in exquisite taste, and ever +revealing fresh harmonies of line and tint. + +Her actress-mother dowered her with the trick of speech, of impassioned +gesture. She flung an accusing hand towards me. + +“Why do you stand silent?” she demanded. “Is it because of a wayward +phantasy that I should have revealed my torturing thoughts to you, a +mere stranger? Why are you here to-night? To help Karl, you may say. +Then help me, also, or you may go through the rest of your life haunted +by most unpleasing specters.” + +“I will gladly do all in my power to help Karl, my dear young lady, and +it will be an added joy if the counsel and assistance I can lend to my +friend prove equally beneficial to you. But surely you must see that I +am moving in a maze. You speak of that which I do not comprehend. If, +indeed, you and others are subject to unexplained manifestations, it is +all-important that we should discuss them fully, rationally, and in an +environment more suitable than the present time and place. Then, and +only by such means, can we reach anything in the nature of a logical +conclusion.” + +I felt that my speech was stilted, but I was vainly searching for a +more equable base of action than her wild statements afforded. Her lips +curved into a bitter smile, but there was no softening in the gleaming +eyes. + +“Leave me to judge of conventions which appeal so powerfully to you, +a writer, a Bohemian, a man who stood on a Liverpool quay while Paul +Constantine was drowning!” she cried, and each word formed a crescendo +of scornful negation of my right to dictate to her. + +Nor did she pay heed to the positive start of alarm with which I marked +her utterance of the Armenian’s name. Her mood changed in an instant. +She caught my arm again in pitiful entreaty. + +“Forgive me if I say that which may sound outrageous in your ears,” she +said. “I am so unstrung, so much in need of one who will sympathize +rather than chide, believe rather than question.” + +“I take you at your word, Miss Cazenove. Now, let me recant my +momentary lapse into smug propriety. I admit my belief. I am convinced +that Karl possesses some dreadful force which is quite demoralizing +when it meets resistance. It is not his fault, nor Miss Hutchinson’s, +nor yours, nor was its influence wholly condemnable in the man whose +name you have just mentioned. It is something outside and beyond our +ordered senses. Very well, we can only deal with it by the use of +those same senses. The first requisite is candor, the second, critical +analysis. But, however distraught you may be, you must admit that +midnight, in your boudoir, in a house overrun with your guests, gives +us no opportunity of sanely examining a disturbing problem. Come now, +be guided by me; I have a son nearly your age, and you may trust me to +take a calm view of these things which excite you so terribly.” + +“And you will not deem me mad when I tell you that when Karl marries me +it will kill me if I still feel that his soul belongs to another woman?” + +“Indeed I shall not hold any such vain thought. Don’t you see that +marriage, under such conditions, is not to be thought of? But there! +Let us not commence our inquiry now. I am even resisting the temptation +to ask you how you knew of Constantine’s death. No! please begin by +being patient. I shall perhaps ask for a little obedience, standing, as +I do, _in loco parentis_. Let us arrange a meeting to-morrow. What do +you say to a stroll in the Park after luncheon? Or, if the weather is +wet, shall I call here if you can count on being alone?” + +Tacitly, we ignored both Lord Sandilands and Mrs. Grundy. They were +estimable persons, doubtless, but they would need electrocution ere +they understood telegnomy. + +She was about to answer when a light knock on the half-open door +announced a visitor. It was Karl. He smiled wistfully. He had the +semblance of one who knows that a catastrophe has occurred, a +catastrophe foreseen yet unpreventable. + +“I expected to find you here, Nora,” he said. “In fact, I followed +you here in my mind, and I agree that it will be better for you, and +possibly for others, if certain explanations are given. Let you two +meet to-morrow, by all means. Then, you must send for me and tell me +what has to be done.” + +He spoke with a weariness which the tender inflection of his voice +did not disguise from me. He knew already _what was to be done_. It +came upon me with a shuddering dread that the only way to destroy his +inexplicable power was to destroy its origin. Had he the right to live, +and, whether conscious or not, inflict mental suffering and ultimate +death on certain unfortunate human beings who strove helplessly to +check the overpowering force of the magnetism which flowed from him? +That was an affrighting problem. Nor was it made easier by Nora +Cazenove’s present amazing attitude. + +The fiery anguish which convulsed her lithe frame and blazed up in +her eyes while she poured forth her woes to me had gone with the mere +sight of him. The change was miraculous, as wonderful in its way as the +conversion of Pygmalion’s marble goddess into flesh and blood. + +A moment ago she was the central figure of a tragedy; now she was just +a girl hopelessly in love, and she clung to Karl’s arm and gazed up +into his face, as they passed before me along the corridor, for all the +world as any smitten Phyllis might fondle and adore her Corydon. And +then, an astounding thing happened. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +THE UNBIDDEN GUEST + + +The corridor was a short, broad passage. It was adorned with Raeburn +portraits, a Lely or two, and some small Sheraton cabinets laden with +rare china--treasures dimly revealed by rays borrowed from the electric +lamps in Miss Cazenove’s boudoir. The open door of her room permitted +a bright panel of light to fall across the parquet floor. Beyond lay +artistic gloom, bounded, as I knew, by the curtained entrance to the +suite of apartments given over to the reception. + +My eyes were fixed directly on Karl’s tall figure and on the +magnificent creature, in some wonderful Paris gown worthy of her +statuesque proportions, who clung so trustingly to his arm. My +thoughts--well, my thoughts were busy enough, but I vouch for it that +my mind was clear and my perceptiveness neither alert nor abstracted. +Yet, no sooner did I step into the darker area than I saw distinctly a +glow, or radiance, emanating from the girl’s bare neck, shoulders, and +arms. + +Imagination played me no trick, or, if I were indeed the victim of +fancy, the delusion was extraordinarily accurate in detail, because it +seemed that clothing, however slight its substance, choked the feeble +gleam. Therefore, only the visible portions of her arms between the +semi-diaphanous shoulder-straps and the ends of the long gloves were +irradiated. The phosphorescent effect was indescribably beautiful. Of +course, in sober reflection, I think phosphorescence a misnomer, being +a sheer impossibility, and I am driven to adopt a natural simile in +likening it to the pure, green, shining light emitted by the female +glow-worm, so-called, to attract the male beetle of its species. + +I would have voiced my amazement, notwithstanding the spell cast on +me by the loveliness of this fascinating apparition, were it not +that, even as I tried to find words, both Karl and his companion +vanished from my sight, and I was confronted by a totally different +scene. Instead of the half-visible corridor, I tenanted a large room, +brilliantly illuminated. It is noteworthy, as testifying to my normal +condition, that I believed, for an instant, that the communicating door +had been opened to allow the pair in front to enter the music salon. + +This impression quickly yielded to realities. Yes, I repeat, +realities. No ambiguous phrase would describe the clear-cut +recollection I have of that vast square chamber, with its low, +Arabesque ceiling, its huge fireplace of Carrara marble, its deep +Italian windows, its wealth of carved wainscoting and antique +furniture. A log fire burned dully in the grate. Kneeling on a rug +near the hearth, but in such a position that I could see her profile, +was a slimly built girl, dressed in white, whom I recognized as Maggie +Hutchinson. + +Seemingly, she was alone. Tears were streaming from her eyes, and her +lips quivered, yet I had a queer belief that her agitation arose from +some unhappy combination of sorrow fraught with gladness, one of those +tantalizing experiences sent to vex frail mortality, wherein, if only +circumstances could be altered, abiding melancholy would forthwith +become extravagant joy. Were I a painter, seeking inspiration to depict +an angel tempted to rebel but faithful to an eternal vow, I should +strive to place on canvas the expression of Maggie Hutchinson’s face +caught in that transient glimpse. + +And that was all. + +The door leading to the heedless throng of guests was really flung +open, I heard the cackle of conversation blending with a piano +solo, my dazed eyes rested on Karl holding back the curtain with a +questioning smile on his face, and I returned to solid earth again. +Now, I had seen Nora Cazenove surrounded with a halo, and Maggie +Hutchinson on her knees crying, within the space of six and seven short +strides. Nevertheless, keen as my wits were to note these things, they +were slow enough to return to a just appreciation of my surroundings. + +Karl told me afterwards that I arranged to meet Nora at the Stanhope +Gate, or call at her house, at 2.30 P.M., next day, and he said that +I left it to the Meteorological Bureau to decide which rendezvous we +would attend. Anyhow, I forget using any such phrase or even making +the appointment, and I first regained my grasp of current events when +we were seated in the brougham which Karl had caused to be summoned by +telephone. + +“What do you think of it all now?” he asked in the unemotional voice +of a man who might be alluding to the singing and the fiddling and the +scandal. + +“Karl, I am worn out,” I answered. “I cannot center my ideas to-night.” + +“I also am worn out,” he said. “I shall be even more weary to-morrow, +but I must endure my weariness without complaint. Therefore, I wonder +what you will say when you know the truth.” + +“That light--on Nora--did you see it?” + +“Yes. Oh, yes.” + +“Was she conscious of it?” + +“Not of the light. That is resistance. You saw Maggie, too?” + +“Of course. You made me see her.” + +“That is better. You are on the right track. Soon you will understand +the magnitude of the task I am called on to accomplish during the next +few weeks--until I crack up, in fact. Here is your hotel. _À demain!_ +I shall dine with you, and then you can tell me what Nora says. I know +what she thinks, but women are secretive.” + +The drive through the cool night air restored my faculties, but I was +physically exhausted. The long journey, the shock of seeing Karl’s +father in a paroxysm of agonized fear, the change in Karl himself, and +the quite extraordinary æsthetic manifestations I had received--these +latter probably taking a good deal more out of me than I allowed +for--were sufficient to weary any man. Nevertheless, my brain was +active enough in a commonplace way, and the thought was borne in on me +that I needed assistance if the fiend which threatened the very lives +of several estimable persons were to be exorcised successfully. + +To appeal to some distinguished alienist was out of the question. He +would begin by assuming that Karl and Maggie and Nora, not to mention +Grier _père_ and my eminent self, were mad. In my dilemma I remembered +Hooper. Had he accepted that appointment at the Paris Embassy? There +was no harm in trying. I wrote a telegram, which I left with the night +porter for despatch early in the morning, and it was a real pleasure to +read the typewritten slip brought to my bedroom about 9 A.M.:-- + + “Charing Cross seven this evening. Get Karl to ring off until I + arrive--HOOPER.” + +His was a cheerful soul. The careless badinage of his message was +agreeable, and I ate my breakfast in good spirits. + +It was a fine morning, with a summer sun beaming from a cloudless sky. +It is taking a great risk to state this in cold print, because readers +have good memories, and many a dubious eye will be cast on a narrative +which records unbroken sunshine in London. Nevertheless, it is true, +and, as shall be seen, the weather was an essential factor in the +proceedings of that memorable time. + +After prolonged absence from Britain, my hats, ties, gloves, and boots +required to be Anglicized. Piccadilly and the Burlington absorbed the +morning comfortably; half-past two o’clock found me loitering, like +any young sprig awaiting his best girl, in front of the flower-beds at +Stanhope Gate. + +The minutes passed. Nora, like every other woman, was unpunctual. +The notion did not occur to me at the time, but I am fairly sure now +that the girl’s dilatoriness, adding a slight pique to the somewhat +clandestine nature of the appointment, helped to chase from my mind the +shadows of the previous night’s troubling experiences. + +She came at last. A flower-garden hat, a veil, a fine lace dress and +a pink parasol, were effective disguises after the candor of evening +attire. I did not recognize this frilly young lady until she spoke to +me. + +“So you really are here?” she cried, with a little laugh, and looking, +I fancied, a trifle embarrassed. + +“Did you not expect me?” I countered. + +“Oh, one never can tell. Things which look serious under the electric +light are apt to assume less dragon-like proportions on such an +afternoon as this, and in the Park, of all places.” + +“I am glad you think so. Some such thought has winged its way to me, +too.” + +Rather a neat allusion to the object of our meeting, don’t you +think?--a quiet reference to the sixth sense, without dragging it in +by the scalp, so to speak--but Miss Cazenove shied off the topic. + +“I chanced to remember that you said you would be here about this +time,” she said lamely. “I fear I bored you with my silly confidences +last night, even more than poor Mr. M---- with his poems.” + +_Que diable!_ Was this the fiery beauty who regaled me at midnight with +her tantrums because her lover was moistening with imaginary kisses the +lips, the eyes, the very hair of a rival? + +“Where a nice young woman is concerned I have neither memory nor +conscience,” said I, gaily. + +“If you keep the one unburthened I shall not trouble the other,” she +retorted. And then, with an airy dismissing of the subject, she asked: +“Which way are you going?” + +Will you believe it, I escorted her across the Park, by the diagonal +path to Albert Gate, where she parted from me on some shopping pretext, +without another word being spoken which referred in any way to Karl +or her somewhat strenuous _fiançailles_! I was puzzled, annoyed, +elaborately sarcastic with myself, for how was I to know that this +youthful goddess’ veins were filled with a new ichor, her passions +soothed and her doubts dispelled by the wonder-working force which her +own heart-broken appeal for help had set loose? + +A thrice fortunate chance kept Karl and me apart in that hour. Nothing +could have restrained me from pooh-poohing the elaborate make-believe +in which he and the two girls were living. Had it been so, I tremble +now to picture the probable outcome. I can see Karl waving me aside in +his quiet way, disdaining to reclaim the pervert by compulsion, and +refusing me any further trust. I believe the sequel would have killed +me with grief. + +As it was, after some hours of undisturbed reflection, I saw the +stupidity of my reasoning. Nora Cazenove was natural in her boudoir, +artificial in the Park. Once launched on this new stream of logic, I +was carried along with a rapidity that left me gasping. Why should +I, in a mere pet induced by a woman’s vagary (as I fancied it), be +so ready to deny that which I had affirmed during several years? +Was there aught outrageous in Karl’s telegnomic equipment? He, a +man--mentally and physically almost perfect according to the precise +enough laws which govern human perfection in its ideality--might well +possess additional sense-activities when the lowest forms of creation +are similarly gifted. There is hardly a vertebrate fish in the sea +which has not, on both sides of its body, a mucous canal bristling +with nerves to enable it to perceive changes in water pressure, or +other unknown properties of the element in which it lives--unknown, +that is, to us, but quite thoroughly known to the fish. Even man’s +legitimate sense-organs are inferior to the specialized functions of +certain animals. How would Nimrod’s nose compare, in the sense of +smell, with the fine scent of his favorite hound, or the range of my +lady’s vision with that of the very much smaller eye of a vulture? As +for hearing, ask some friend, learned in anatomy, to discourse to you +upon the higher sensitiveness and comparative size of the cochlea, or +snail-shell, formation in the internal ear of a desert-bred animal as +contrasted with the same appliance in the _genus homo_. This branch of +research chastens and humbles the mere man. + +While dressing early for dinner, so as to reach the vestibule in good +time to welcome Hooper, I wondered how Karl had passed the day. “Worn +out” last night, he expected to be “even more weary” when next we met. +And then an explanation of his words suggested itself which caused a +sudden nerve-shock similar, in some respects, to that felt by the man +who, in a crowded house, slept on a made-up bed over the bath, and, +awaking drowsily, pulled the string of the shower-bath when he wanted +hot water in the morning. + +“By Jove!” I yelled, “I have it!” + +“Qu’ est-ce que vous avez trouvé, m’sieu’?” demanded the startled valet +who was arranging my studs. + +I suppose the civil young Frenchman thought I was ill, but I reassured +him, though my excitement must have made him believe that I was on the +verge of lunacy. Karl was using his magnetic force continuously in +order to preserve Nora from the torturing consequences of her love for +him. That explained her attitude in the Park. He had beaten down in her +what he termed “resistance.” She was quite passive, utterly permeated +with his influence. And Maggie? In all probability she, too, was +unconsciously benefiting by her affinity to this human loadstone, while +he was wearing himself out, actually consuming himself, in the fierce +persistence of the effort to spare them further suffering. + +This theory--I might almost term it a positive knowledge so thoroughly +did it hold me--explained nearly every feature of the strange events +of the preceding twenty-four hours. It fitted in with and amplified +my views on the happenings of earlier years, and it gave me the first +satisfactory clue to the emotions exhibited by two such contradictory +personalities as Nora Cazenove and Maggie Hutchinson. + +I am sure the valet was glad to see the back of me. I jammed my right +foot into the left boot, tried to put on my waistcoat inside out, and +fumbled with my tie until he volunteered to arrange it, being prepared +(I could see it in his eye) to fight for his life if I grappled with +him. + +At last, I raced to the elevator. I wanted to telephone to the Griers’ +house and ask Karl to come at once. But he saved me that period of +suspense. He was standing in the atrium, smoking a cigarette. He +strolled towards me, and not even my tensely nervous condition--all +the more soul-devouring in that I was forced to appear outwardly +calm--prevented me from seeing the discreet admiration he won from such +ladies as were seated there. + +“Ah! there you are!” he cried in his frankly pleasant way. “The papers +report another fiasco in the yacht race. Is there ever any wind in New +York Bay?” + +“Heaps,” I said, “or so many hoodlums would not have blown into the +States.” + +We were near enough to shake hands. + +“How is Nora?” he asked. + +“Just about the same as Maggie.” + +He winced. In the absorption of my new discovery I had forgotten that +any flippant allusion to the woman for whose sake he was ready to lay +down his life must be painful. Yet, with a single keen glance into my +face, he read my true feelings, which, goodness knows, were far removed +from the pert words of my lips. + +“Forgive me,” I said. “I am unnerved by reaching what you described +last night as the ‘right track!’” + +“It must be disturbing.” + +“If my conclusions are justified,” I went on, surveying him with +as much coolness as I was capable of, “you ought not to have that +appearance of abounding vitality which you undoubtedly possess.” + +“That is because the weather is clear,” he answered lightly. “If it +were cloudy, I should be a mere wreck. When the sun shines, or the +stars are visible, I have five times the potentiality of a dull day. +But you must eat, man alive. Why are we discoursing here? Shall I +telephone Jules?” + +“No. Wait a few minutes. Hooper is coming.” + +“Hooper? Frank E. of that ilk?” + +“Yes. Luckily, I located him in Paris and wired him. He is due here any +moment.” + +“Well, I shall be delighted to meet him. But I cannot allow my affairs +to travel outside a very small circle.” + +“And I cannot allow you to wither away on my own responsibility.” + +“My dear fellow, don’t be vexed with me. I am so eaten up with the mad +helplessness of it all that I resent the least prying by sceptical +outsiders. But if Hooper, or any other man on God’s earth, can save me +and others from the doom which awaits one or all of us, lay me on the +dissecting table before him. I am ready.” + +Knowledge on his part, and a simple imitative action on mine, turned +our eyes simultaneously towards the revolving door of the hotel. Mr. +Frank E. Hooper entered, spick and span as if a troubled channel +and grimy railway were not. He was followed by a rotund personage, +olive-green in complexion, bearing all the outward and visible signs of +an inward Jewishness. The sight of this stranger gave me an indefinable +thrill, a compound of surprise and fear, with, perhaps, a touch of +bewilderment. Why, I cannot tell, but I knew him instantly. I was +so taken aback that I found myself staring stupidly at Hooper, who +advanced with a cheery cry: + +“Well now, who’d have thought to find you both here, and lookin’ so +fine and dandy, too. This is real good.” + +He winked at us portentously. + +“That’s Steindal!” he muttered in a stage aside. “Met him in the Gare +du Nord, and talked him into comin’ to this hotel. Guessed you’d like +to see him.” + +“We are delighted,” said Karl, gently. “Won’t you introduce us?” + +“Eh? Oh, this is great. Mr. Steindal! lend me thine ear a moment. I +want to make you and my good friends known to one another. Mr. Karl +Grier--” + +No sooner did Steindal hear Karl’s name than he flushed uncomfortably +and backed away. He was perturbed so greatly that Hooper’s flow of +language stopped abruptly. + +But Karl advanced a pace, and there was a steady dominance in his +glance which seemed to fascinate while it disconcerted the Jew. + +“It is, indeed, a pleasure to meet you,” he said. “Come and dine with +us. Come just as you are; and you, too, Hooper. It is too late to +change.” + +Without another spoken word he wheeled towards the restaurant, walking +across the vestibule with head erect and hands clasped behind his back. + +And we three followed, Steindal with the sulkiness of a stricken dog, +Hooper somewhat awed by the unexpected outcome of the surprise he had +planned, and I--well, I felt as though some wizard had converted me +into an electric eel. + + + + +CHAPTER XX + +STEINDAL GIVES A PUBLIC PERFORMANCE + + +“Say,” whispered Hooper to me, “Karl looks like a high priest of Baal +leading Steindal to slaughter as a sacrificial bull.” + +I babbled something, it matters not what. All my eyes were bent on the +strange meeting between those two. Karl, suavely stern, motioned the +Jew to a chair at a table laid for four. They faced each other. Hooper +and I took the vacant places. Jules, of course, hastened to us, and his +attendant sprites relieved the travelers of overcoats and hats. + +Steindal, manifestly ill at ease, glanced around the crowded +restaurant. He soon recognized several _habitués_. One man, a +well-known Stock Exchange broker, hastened to greet him. While they +were speaking, I murmured to Karl: + +“Under the circumstances, is this wise?” + +“At any cost, I shall punish the man,” he said. “I had almost forgotten +his existence. Fate sent him here to-night. I regret it, for one +reason, but I rejoice for many.” + +The one reason, I fancied, was that the strain on his already weakening +powers entailed by the subjugation of Steindal would demand a +corresponding relaxation of the tension needed to preserve the woman he +loved and the woman who loved him from relapsing into their lamentable +excitations. I was right in this, as also in the surmise that the +erstwhile purveyor of musical celebrities (Steindal was now a mining +expert and a man of great wealth in share certificates) would prove a +most stubborn subject before he yielded to the demands of telegnomic +reciprocity. + +It was to be a contest of Mind against Matter, of the Soul in man +against the Brute in man. That is a primeval fight, a battle begun ere +many of the hills were fashioned or the oceans charted as we know them; +nor did I doubt the issue of its latest renewal. But what form would it +take? Would Karl kill Steindal? If Steindal were the bull of sacrifice, +would Karl supply the fire to consume him before our very eyes? + +Haply, I had no opportunity for ordered thought. Events began to march, +as they say on the Boul Mich, and, for a little time, I remained an +outwardly quiet spectator of doings which soon set the restaurant in an +uproar. + +Steindal, who had drawn somewhat apart in earnest conversation with +his friend from Capel Court, came back to us. He looked confidently +enough at Karl. Evidently he was determined to brazen out a difficult +situation. + +“I feel a little _hors de concours_ in these garments,” he said, quite +affably, speaking in the smooth, sibilant voice which reminded me of +Karl’s likening his utterance to that of a boa-constrictor. + +“Ah, you speak French, too!” exclaimed Karl with a grim geniality. “The +last time we met you indulged mostly in Spanish.” + +“The last time! We have never met before. I--er--think I have heard of +you from a man named Constantine.” + +Certainly Steindal had splendid nerves. He arranged himself comfortably +at the table. The chef of the Pall Mall Hotel had a great name for +appetizing dishes, and Jules was hovering about with alert pencil and +memoranda tablets. + +“Yes. Poor Constantine! Killed himself, didn’t he? Did you ever hear +why?” + +Karl, I noticed, had his hands clasped and resting on the table. The +significance of this attitude dawned upon me then. He thus completed +some magnetic circuit of intense potency. + +“Never heard a word,” said Steindal, who seemed to accept Karl’s +presence with greater complacency each moment. “That is to say, I knew +he was worried about some girl. As if any woman were worth suicide! +_Sango la Madonna!_” + +“That is more like the Steindal of old, though the appeal is to a +strange patroness,” cried Karl. “Oh, do not worry, Jules! Give us fish, +flesh, and fowl, and bring the best wine of France. We leave details to +you.” + +The head waiter whisked off. That sort of order is comprehensible. The +diner surrenders at discretion, no matter what the charge. + +“Your references to past acquaintance puzzle me,” said the Jew, +politely keeping to the thread of the conversation. + +“Then I must be mistaken. Perhaps Constantine gave me a picture so +vivid that it burnt itself into my memory.” + +“That is a popular attribute of the fiend, and hardly flattering to +me,” laughed the other. + +“Well, there is some truth in it, and it may even contain a germ of +adulation. Unless I err again, you played Mephisto to Constantine’s +Faust, eh?” + +“Very likely. I knew many Margarets in those days.” + +I expected an explosion after that singularly apt, yet unfortunate, +reply, but, beyond a slight contraction of the eyelids and twitching +of the nostrils, Karl gave no sign. Steindal was so unctuously candid, +so shielded by the armor of money and conceit, that I deemed him +impenetrable by the hidden lightning with which Karl was enveloping +him. I changed my opinion ere many minutes passed. + +“Many Margarets,” repeated Karl, musingly, “and many Fausts, but only +one devil, Steindal.” + +“Do you think so? Then he exists in numerous forms. _Sapristi!_ Here is +another and familiar imp in a _sole diable_. And an ’84 champagne! You +can’t get this wine in Paris.” + +Steindal had that insufferable habit of tucking a napkin under his +chin. He began to eat. He swallowed two glasses of wine with surprising +haste. Karl relapsed into silence. Hooper and I spoke of generalities. +An orchestra was tuning up, and Karl whispered to a waiter. I saw that +the conductor held a confabulation with the bassoon-player, and the +band struck into an allegro movement which I did not recognize at once. + +Suddenly Karl leaned forward. His eyes blazed with fire. Had the hotel +clerk of former years been in the room he would have remembered that +look. + +“That is your cue, Mephisto,” he said, his low-pitched voice vibrating +with intense energy. “Up you get! On the chair! You know the words: + + Dio dell’ or del mondo, signor, + Sei possente risplendente + Culto hai tu maggior quaggiù. + +That’s it! Now!” + +And Steindal, skipping to his feet, mounted the chair with surprising +agility, and began to sing, with a fine assumption of the basso +profundo manner, the rollicking song with which Mephistopheles +disturbed the village revels. What could be more amazing than the +action, more appropriate than the air? It has been rendered in English: + + Clear the way for the Calf of Gold! + In his pomp and pride adore him; + East or West, in heat or cold, + Weak and strong must bow before him! + Wisest men do homage mute + To the image of the brute.... + +Steindal, posturing on the chair in absurd caricature of a Plançon +or Edouard de Reszke, was fairly launched into the opening strofa +before Hooper or I quite realized what was happening. Some ladies at +neighboring tables shrank from us with alarm. People farther away +rose and gazed at us wide-eyed. A sharp-witted genius, scenting some +mischief, shouted “Bravo!” and the band, thinking an artistic joke was +in train, kept up the accompaniment. Jules and an under-manager hurried +towards us, but, seeing that the diners were, if anything, inclined to +applaud, they resolved to defer their appeal for orderly behavior on +Steindal’s part until he made an end. He sang both verses admirably, +the band helping in the chorus, and, with the final wild phrase: + + Tuo ministro è Belzebù, + +a perfect hurricane of encouraging cries and rattling of cutlery came +from all sides. + +Steindal bowed in the approved style, and descended from his rostrum. +He was not disturbed in the least. Obviously, Karl held him in a state +of complete aphanasia, and this magnate of a Rand which he had never +seen had not the remotest notion that he was making a supreme ass of +himself. Nor was it altogether patent that others took that severe +view. Certainly, the stock-broker regarded him with a pained curiosity, +but most of those present seemed to look upon the escapade as the +light-hearted ebullience of a foreigner. + +Our waiters brought some variety of meat, goodness knows what, and +Steindal tackled it with keen zest, first sluicing his strained vocal +cords with more wine. The orchestra swung off into a pleasing waltz. +Hooper and I, though disconcerted by the covert attention our party +attracted, were beginning to take an intelligent interest in the dinner +when Karl called on his medium for another “turn.” + +“In your vanished youth, Steindal,” he hissed, “you were a circus +acrobat. Before you gorge too much give us a contortion or two!” + +Instantly the unhappy Wilhelm sprang upright again. He grabbed his +chair, set it apart from the table with a professional bang on the +floor, and forthwith stood on his head and hands. His coat and the +white napkin flapped down over his face, coins rattled from his +pockets, and his obese figure looked exceedingly comical as he poised +himself feet upwards and slowly turned, so that all might see and +admire. After a pause, he bounced back to the floor, but only to grasp +the chair in a new way and extend himself horizontally, resting on his +hands. + +This time there were no plaudits. Something approaching a panic reigned +throughout the room. The song was deemed a pardonable extravagance, but +these grotesque posturings savored of madness. Like everybody else, I +was so taken up with Steindal’s antics that I paid no heed to Karl, nor +did my flurried thoughts credit him with creating the wave of fear and +disgust which now converted popular tolerance into disapprobation. + +Women shrieked; there was a rush of excited guests and perplexed +waiters. Then somebody--probably the gentleman who cried “Bravo” a few +minutes before--bawled: + +“Turn him out! He is either mad or drunk!” + +Absolutely heedless of the commotion he was causing, Steindal finished +his balancing, gave a little skip reminiscent of the ring, smiled +blandly, and kissed his finger-tips. Then he squatted on the carpet, +and endeavored to do that which was impossible for a man of his build +by trying to cross his feet over his shoulders. + +This was too much. Jules, aided by a couple of waiters, clutched +Steindal and pulled him out of the knot. He became very angry, swore +outlandishly, fought, kicked, squealed, and was hauled out by main +force, while a man gathered up his scattered money. + +“And now,” said Karl, with an air of placid relief, “now that I have +made that self-satisfied little wretch the laughing-stock of London, +let us have some dinner.” + +So that was the explanation of the extraordinary scene! Karl had not +forgotten Steindal’s outspoken rage when the hapless Armenian created +a similar disturbance in a New York restaurant. He divined that +Steindal could only be scarified through his colossal vanity. “The +laughing-stock of London!”--that would be a barbed shaft; its wound +would never heal. When Steindal regained possession of his senses he +would learn the disastrous truth. Even if he escaped prosecution for +disorderly conduct, some kind friend would surely tell him how he +sang, and balanced, and contorted! He would howl and writhe in impotent +fury. There was no legal redress. None would credit him, nor would he +dare take that course. He could only accuse Karl of exercising some +terrible influence upon him, and, in that event, the laughter would be +even more wide-spread, while his overbearing reputation, which stood +him in good stead in financial circles, must be lost irrecoverably. + +The disordered diners were beginning to arrange themselves once +more. The band, owing to the conductor’s happy thought, broke into +the magnificent trio, “O del Ciel,” for those Italians can play you +anything of Gounod’s or Verdi’s right off the reel, and a great many +persons smiled broadly as they caught the musical satire. + +The stock-broker hurried out. + +“He has gone to look after his friend. It is a kindly act,” I said. + +“Guess he has gone to glue himself on to the Paris telephone,” +commented Hooper, dryly. “Steindal’s stocks are mainly held in France. +Let it once get round that he is cracked, and they will drop into the +place beneath like the gentle dew from heaven.” + +Hooper’s perversion of Shakespeare was condoned by his knowledge of +human nature. The telephone girl told me afterwards that the broker +paid a fabulous sum for half an hour’s talk with Paris that night. + +“What will happen to Steindal, do you think?” I asked Karl. + +“He is gradually recovering. In less than an hour he will be all right. +I expect the hotel people, knowing his identity, will put him to bed +and send for a doctor. But he wants no doctor. He will clamor for a +purveyor of guns and daggers.” + +“You believe he will plan vengeance against you?” + +“Most decidedly. He is no coward. His mother was a Mexican dancer. She +taught him to throw a knife before he learnt the alphabet. Ask him the +meaning of _la cuchillada_ and you will see his eyes glisten.” + +Here was a nice outcome of a freak worthy of some light-headed +schoolboy with a taste for practical joking. In addition to his other +troubles, Karl had saddled himself with a mortal feud. + +“Oh,” I cried in a sudden heat, “this is intolerable. What a counselor +your father brought from Heidelberg when he summoned me!” + +“Have no fear,” said Karl, toying with a salad; “Steindal cannot injure +me. The little beast! I could paralyze his uplifted hand.” + +Karl could do that, I knew. Nevertheless, I was a prey to disquieting +thoughts. + +Hooper, blessed with a temperament which could take an equable view of +the Day of Judgment, began to review events in his practical way. + +“I can credit you with accomplishing almost anything in the present +tense, Karl,” he said; “but I am taken out of my stride when you dip +into history. How did you know Steindal had been a circus acrobat?” + +“_You_ knew.” + +“Yes. Some one told me years ago. I thought of it while he was singing, +but I have never mentioned it to you.” + +Karl smiled wearily. + +“That was enough,” he said. + +“My dear fellow, can you read my thoughts?” + +“A little while ago I read the thoughts of every living being in this +room. And what is more, I supplied the thoughts of most of them. Now, I +would like to forget Steindal. Why did you fail to let me know you were +in Paris?” + +“I have a notion that any giving of information on my part would be +kind of superfluous,” laughed Hooper. + +“You are mistaken. Here you are at my mercy; in Paris you are safe. +The world holds nearly two thousand millions of people. Except under +special circumstances, I cannot pretend to single out individuals.” + +I listened to their talk with little real comprehension. I was +wondering what would be the outcome of the scene I had just witnessed. +I seemed to be sitting in some theater, watching a drama of intense +interest, with its thrills of pathos and human agony, and its snatches +of comic relief. While the clown was setting the audience in a roar +with his unconscious buffoonery the sad-hearted heroine was waiting in +the wings to harrow us in the next breath. + +And was it so in sober earnest? Was Maggie Hutchinson waiting, in +her far-off Round Castle on the shores of Como, fully aware of the +farce being enacted in the restaurant, and ready to take her cue when +the moment arrived for her tribulation? How could I be sure? Was it +possible to be certain of anything when all the common laws of nature +were being turned topsy-turvy by a youngster whose weird powers were as +yet but vaguely acknowledged by those few doubting believers acquainted +with them? + +I have often looked back on that extraordinary dinner in the Pall +Mall Hotel. I know now that a great deal was revealed to me in that +hour, but I was so overcome by the exciting outward aspects of the +manifestations that I missed the inward message they carried. I am not +alone in this crass blindness to hidden truth. When Gounod wrote the +opera which gave Karl the text for Steindal’s undoing, Mr. Gye, the +then chief operatic manager of London, saw nothing in it but “a waltz +and a chorus of old men.” Paris would not have it. The Théâtre Lyrique +produced it with financial loss. And one man, Choudens, thought he was +taking a tremendous risk when he purchased the publishing rights for +£400. Happy Choudens! He cleared nearly £120,000 by the venture. + +Yet _Faust_ was as great in 1839 as it is to-day. Only man has become +enlightened. + +I was brought to see things clearly in much less than half a century. +But it saddens me to know how much I missed while Steindal was singing +his devil’s song and gyrating on his head and hands! + + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +HOOPER SUGGESTS A WAY OUT + + +Though Steindal was gone, we remained the center of observation. +Perhaps others wondered, like Scapin, what the deuce he was doing in +our boat. Karl, who was distinctly fatigued, did that which I had never +seen him do before--he drank some wine. He seemed to be willing enough +to talk freely, but held in leash by the presence of so many strangers. +Hooper, I knew, was consumed with impatience, but he preserved the +outward demeanor of a North American Indian. So there was a common +agreement when I suggested that my sitting-room was the right place in +which to smoke. Once there, Hooper threw aside the mask. + +“I have the accumulated questions of five years to fire at you. Are you +ready?” he said to Karl. + +“Quite ready. I would only ask you to remember that a Hindu ascetic +once devoted thirty years to the consideration of one great question: +‘Whence?’ and when he emerged from retirement he astonished his +disciples by merely propounding another: ‘Whither?’” + +“I go one better by putting both. Whence comes this amazing sense of +yours, and whither does it tend?” + +“If it amuses you to hear my guesses on those points, I am not +disinclined to bring them into the light. Have either of you heard +of Paul Flechsig’s ‘organs of thought’ theory? Yes? Well, he holds, +as you know, that in the gray bed of the brain there are four inner +spheres of sensation--the sphere of touch in the vertical lobe, the +sphere of sight in the occipital lobe, the sphere of smell in the +frontal lobe, and the sphere of hearing in the temporal lobe. These +are the sense-centers. Between, and in active communication with +them, lie the four great thought-centers, containing an elaborate +and peculiar nerve-structure. Take away the enveloping tissues and +bones, and you have a wonderfully complex instrument, balanced, so to +speak, on the spinal cord. This, in the descent of man, is not the +outcome of, but an essential preliminary to, the brain. I imagine +that a comparative anatomist would assign far more importance to the +spinal cord than, let us say, a philosopher would give it. Be that +as it may, I am quite certain, in my case, that the spine possesses +magnetic polarity to an extraordinary degree. Without going into an +extensive lecture on the subject, I believe that I have answered your +first question. The second bristles with difficulties. I can only +tell you that I affect others, who have the same latent attributes, +by the exercise of the principle roughly known to science as magnetic +induction. Notwithstanding the curious things you have seen, my +powers are strictly limited. At a given moment I can induce varying +sensations in different subjects, and these sensations, carried to the +thought-centers, set in motion the sense-centers. If such faculties +were common to all, life would be more simple, and, perhaps, less +mechanical.” + +“That is an extraordinary conclusion,” I broke in. + +“It sounds contradictory, but I think analysis of my meaning will bear +me out. Come now, Hooper, I look to you for support. I recall your +famous thesis that man contains within himself all the possibilities +of invention. Man required the power to communicate speedily with his +fellows. After long ages, he has evolved the electric telegraph and the +telephone. I reach the same end without the cumbrous means. Certain +people would dub my sixth sense supernatural, or transcendental, +meaning thereby something which can exist and operate without a +material basis. That is ridiculous. If such well-known beverages +as tea and coffee can stimulate thought, if alcohol can intensify +feeling, if musk can reanimate the fainting consciousness and ether +deaden it, is it not clear that the ordinary senses have an anatomical +basis yielding to chemical action? My sixth sense is a true natural +phenomenon, and, when I come to be dissected in the interests of +science, you must ask the anatomist to explain--” + +There was a sound at the door as of one fumbling at the handle. + +I rose, surprised that any one should seek to enter without knocking. +Then the door opened, and Steindal appeared. I learned afterwards +that he had recovered very rapidly from his seeming madness, and had +persuaded the hotel attendants to leave him alone, on the plea that he +would sleep. A doctor, too, summoned hastily, bore out his statement +that he was in a normal condition of health. By tipping a housemaid, +who knew nothing of the scene in the restaurant, he reached my room. + +So far as I could judge, he was unarmed. Nevertheless, I barred the +way, but he paid no heed to me. He dodged, in order to see Karl. + +“I want to speak to you,” he said thickly, addressing Karl. + +“Come in, then,” was the answer. + +Thinking that three of us could surely overpower him at once if he +attempted violence, I stood aside. + +Seen in the half-light of the corridor, Steindal looked his own tubby, +commonplace self, but the bright interior of the room revealed the +rough usage to which he had been subjected. His chin was scratched, his +collar and shirt loosened by the breaking of a stud, the breast-pocket +of his coat was torn, and his long, black, smooth hair ruffled. + +The expression of his face offered a study in physiology. The corners +of his thick, salacious lips turned upward with the scowl of an enraged +animal. His eyes, usually black and beady, were now dark red, and +darting shifting glances at all parts of Karl’s body. Their constant +movement was fascinating. If you have ever seen a bull-fight, and +watched the last stand of the Andalusian monarch of the herd as he +faces the matador, well aware that the bright straight blade in the +man’s right hand is ready to seek his heart’s blood, yet compelled +to watch the flutterings of a bit of red silk on the _muleta_ in his +predestined slayer’s left hand, you will form some notion of the +suppressed fury which gleamed from Steindal’s quickly-moving eyes. + +Yet his voice, though it had lost its smoothness, was well under +control. + +“Whatever else you may be, I don’t suppose you are a coward,” said he. + +I believe, to this day, that Steindal could actually smell blood in +that instant. His nostrils twitched slightly, and his tongue darted +forth to salivate his lips. Hooper and I might have been non-existent +for all the heed he paid to us. + +“No, I am not,” said Karl. + +“Then you will travel with me to France to-morrow?” + +“That would be useless, Steindal. I can paralyze your arm, root you +immovable to the ground.” + +“Ah, but that would make you, indeed, a coward. Yet, I take the chance. +I will fight you with my hands tied, if need be. My teeth will serve.” + +“I cannot fight you,” said Karl, slowly. “I refuse to murder you, and +certainly I shall not let you murder me. No, Steindal, you must live. I +am sorry to be so hard on you, but you really must continue to exist.” + +“Is that your final answer?” + +“Absolutely.” + +“Do you assign a cause?” + +“For you, punishment, and, it may be, retribution, to be followed +perhaps by the emergence of a soul from your bloated body. For me, +suffering too, in a form you cannot understand.” + +“I decline your terms,” murmured Steindal, moistening his lips again +and advancing a pace. + +“Go!” said Karl, sternly, and, to my utter surprise, the other man +turned and quitted the room. We heard him walk steadily down the +corridor, and caught the click of his boots as he stepped on to a +marble staircase. It was Hooper who broke the queer silence which fell +on us. + +“You seem to have taken the measure of Steindal’s backbone, at any +rate?” he commented. + +“Where I am concerned, he is no longer a free agent,” said Karl, +wearily. + +“Tell me,” I interposed, “why you deal so harshly with a man you have +never actually met before to-night?” + +“Because I loathe such a creature. He represents the pig in man. He has +brought horror and abasement to hundreds. Now he must wallow in the +only degradation that makes him contemptible in his own esteem. But +forgive me if I leave you. You and Hooper can find much to discuss, and +I must be alone.” + +He stood upright, and drew a hand across his eyes. I seemed to perceive +a slackening of the muscles of his finely molded frame which was +almost a symptom of complete enervation. It was a new and unaccountable +alarm which impelled me to say: + +“Will you go home, Karl, and promise me to try and sleep?” + +“I am going home,” he replied. “Good-night!” + +Clearly, he did not desire any courteous leave-taking in the vestibule. +I did not offer to accompany him. When I knew that he had descended +the stairs--thus avoiding the elevator and its possible publicity--I +rejoined Hooper. + +He was smoking, and his gaze was fixed on the ceiling. I was in no mood +for talk just then. More by force of habit than otherwise, I rang for a +waiter and ordered whisky and soda. The mere presence of the man, with +his servile affability and his laden tray, was a tonic in itself. He +brought me back from illimitable depths to the workaday world. + +“Do you partake?” I asked Hooper. + +“Yep.” + +The cigar wedged between his teeth rendered the final labial the easier +manner of speech. I found his presence soothing, too. I poured out a +small quantity of spirit, and, while the waiter was uncorking a bottle +of soda water, I looked out of the window. It was a glorious summer +evening when last I saw the streets. Now the flaring lights were +reflected in wavering zigzags on road and pavements, while the shining +capes of ’bus-drivers and cabmen caught the eye as moving pyramids. + +“Good heavens!” I cried, “it is raining!” + +There was a loud report. The attendant had drenched himself. + +“I beg your pardon, sir,” he stammered, “but you did make me jump, an’ +no mistake.” + +“Better have the remainder of the soda poured over your head,” snapped +Hooper at me. + +“But I tell you it is raining,” I shouted excitedly. + +“Give it to me, waiter, if you are afraid,” said Hooper, firmly. + +“Oh, I had forgotten you did not know that Karl has to exert many times +the force in unsettled weather that he requires when the sky is clear. +Hooper, he may not live days, let alone weeks.” + +I quailed before the American’s warning glance, and ceased speaking. +The waiter was glad to close the door on us, I am sure. Hooper led me +to a chair. + +“Sit down, partner,” he said. “I have been trying to theorize. A +certain Greek gentleman named Empedocles, dated 500 B.C., believed that +he had solved the puzzle of life when he defined the love and hatred +of the elements. I think we have reached his track. But you know the +kind of elements we have to deal with, and I do not. Discourse to me of +Karl, and Maggie, and--is there another woman?” + +“There is,” I said. + +“Bully for me!” he cried delightedly. “The eternal feminine would have +the shortest life on record if there weren’t two of ’em. Now, let’s +have the whole yarn. I am a good listener.” + +So I told him everything, fact and fancy, until my voice gave out, and +we were amazed to find I had been talking for nearly three hours. It +was long past midnight when I noticed the clock. + +“Let us to bed,” I wheezed. “We must consult in the morning.” + +He, in his turn, looked out at the weather. + +“It has ceased raining and the stars are visible,” he said. + +“Thank goodness for that! Karl will experience some relief.” + +“I think not. If he and the rest of us are not qualifying for an asylum +by believing the truth of what you have told me, don’t you see that +the strain is cumulative? He cannot, I may almost say he dare not, +sleep. He is deliberately sacrificing himself to save those women. He +thinks, and we agree with him, that his death will snap the tension. +They will grieve over his loss, no doubt, but their tears will be a +measure of salvation. I tell you, my friend, we are up against a hard +proposition. Were it not utterly selfish, I could almost wish you had +left me in Paris.” + +“I was tempted to share the responsibility with some one whom I could +trust.” + +“Yes, I see that. And don’t think I would shirk my duty to a comrade +like Karl. Yet, I fear for him. Something must be done, and done +quickly, if we would rescue him. Oh, if only I knew more of science and +less of law! What is the meaning of this resistance we hear so much of? +Is it the same thing in Steindal and Nora Cazenove? It seems to stir +up ignoble passion in both, though the manner of it is so different to +our perception. And that is strange, unless the question of sex enters +largely into it.” + +“Affinity and repulsion are the two fundamental principles of all +creation. I have heard you say, years ago, that Karl threw us back to +first causes.” + +“We are dealing now with men and women of to-day,” he cried, pacing up +and down the room. + +I had never before seen him so genuinely disturbed. His artificial +coolness had melted, as ice might fall off a volcano in eruption after +long quiescence. I had great respect for the clearness of his mental +vision; there was also a certain consolation in witnessing this sudden +upheaval. That a skilled lawyer, a man of great acumen in affairs, +and, for one of his years, an astonishingly cool-headed judge of human +nature, should be so perturbed by the issues submitted to him, offered +some proof that I had not magnified their gravity. + +“Do you think we can regard Steindal as a negligible quantity?” he +asked, halting in front of me and piercing me with his large earnest +eyes. + +“It would seem to be reasonable from his latest attitude,” I admitted. + +“Then we are driven back on the women. What of this girl, Nora? She +is the chief difficulty. It is perfectly evident that the sympathetic +bond, or whatever it is, which exists between Karl and Maggie, was +broken, or remained in abeyance, from the day of Constantine’s death +until there sprang up some lover-like relationship between Karl and +Nora. Then Maggie intervened, whether by her own volition or not +is unknown, and, to an extent, inconsequent. Karl recognized the +impossibility of marriage with Nora, but it was beyond him to give a +reason that would be accepted by his father, nor was he so callous as +to offer up Maggie as a holocaust. Therefore, he has definitely adopted +a course of action which demands his own death. There is no other +alternative. Either Maggie or he must die. The way out--if there is +one--lies with Nora--or Maggie.” + +“But what can we do? We cannot kill one of them, even for the sake of +our friend.” + +“No, but we can bring them together before it is too late.” + +“What good purpose will that accomplish?” + +“It may achieve a hundred different purposes which are impracticable +when one woman is in Italy and the other woman in England. Let us get +them face to face and things will happen. Sit right down and write me a +letter of introduction to Nora. Just say I am a friend of all parties, +and leave the remainder of the explanation to me. I will take care of +her, and of Karl, too, not to mention Steindal, until you bring Maggie +from the Castello Rondo.” + +“Until I--bring--” + +“Repetition is the vainest form of argument. Don’t speak, there’s a +good fellow. Indeed, you can’t. When all this trouble is through, I +would advise you to consult a specialist. Weakness of the vocal chords +is an early symptom of decay. Now write, while I look up the train +service.” + +I compared Hooper to a volcano; I might go further and say that the +lava-stream of his impetuosity quite swept me off my feet. It is a +splendid thing, in a crisis, to have a masterful ally. His confidence +lent me new life. He rushed off to make inquiries beneath, and I sat +down to write a note to Nora. In black and white the task was not so +easy as Hooper would have it. + +Ultimately, I wrote as follows: + + “It would not be just to you or to Karl were I to conceal my firm + conviction that you both are faced with a most serious problem. + Certain events which took place in this hotel to-night, combined + with my own observations of Karl’s health, force me to tell you that + the ensuing week may see the gravest developments, so far as he is + concerned. In my opinion, I can best help him by taking a journey to + Italy, without losing an unnecessary hour. I want you also to help, + and I am sending you this letter by the hands of one who is a friend + of Karl’s, anxious to be of service to you, and thoroughly acquainted + with the present critical condition of affairs. Trust him, as I hope + you will trust me, to act for the common good.” + +I read through what I had written, not once, but half a dozen times. +Letters to excitable young ladies are dangerous as the boomerang in the +hands of a novice. If the worst came to the worst, and Karl died, who +could tell what hubbub might be raised by Nora Cazenove? At any rate, +it was quite inadvisable to allude more specifically to the uncanny +workings of a sixth sense. + +“Telegnomy and a coroner’s jury do not run in tandem,” said Hooper, +taking my view of the need there was to use guarded phrases. + +He also approved of the reference to Italy. + +“She has jumped Maggie’s claim and she knows it. It may be my +regrettable duty to make that clear right away,” he remarked. + +“Do not blame the girl,” I said. “Remember that the match was made by +Mr. Grier and Lord Sandilands.” + +“I guess that didn’t worry Nora. But your best train leaves at nine in +the morning, and you have a voice like a crow. If you don’t give it a +rest you will not be able to ask for your ticket. Leave Nora to me, +there’s a good chap. I’ll fix her.” + +I had seen Nora ablaze with the fire of the gods, so I doubted the +effect of Hooper’s coercion or persuasiveness. Yet he had brought +action where there was uncertainty, substituted ordered effort for +chaos, and I was grateful to him. + +Hence, I slept and breakfasted, and caught the first morning express +for the Continent. + + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +NORA FACES THE INEVITABLE + + +I am inclined to believe that each one of my fair readers, and a +majority of those mere males of less account, would gladly accompany me +in my journey south by east across the map of Europe. I say this, not +by reason of over-weening pride in my personal charm as a _compagnon de +voyage_, but because of the journey’s objective. At the present stage +of my story, Maggie Hutchinson is surely an interesting personage. Have +you ever heard or read of another heroine so situated? Mark you, she +knew Karl when she was a little child. After ten years’ separation she +met him, under very peculiar conditions, for a few hours in a London +hotel. And now, five years later, without ever a word exchanged between +them during all that long time, her life was indissolubly bound up with +his, a passionate love united her to him with ties never dreamed of by +tender Juliet or devoted Héloïse, and to crown the midsummer madness of +it all, Karl was deliberately killing himself to save another woman’s +life. + +It is a pardonable assumption, therefore, that every true devotee of +romance should be eager to meet her face to face. I know that I was. +I quitted Charing Cross in a state of nervous exaltation to which my +seasoned heart had long been a stranger. + +But Fate, the master playwright, had ordained that influences I had +not foreseen should fill the stage for many an hour ere I reached the +Castello Rondo in far-off Italy. In fact, none of us had taken into +account Karl’s mother. + +Mrs. Grier was not enamored of high society as it is understood in +London. She was a German, and she had never lost her Teuton’s tastes. +First, and necessarily, a good housekeeper, she gave her spare time to +reading. She hardly ever glanced at a newspaper, nor did she dawdle +through more than one novel a year. She kept her household accounts, +contrived economies in an annual expenditure of many thousands, looked +after the practical management of certain estates, and, for the rest, +saw as little as possible of fashionable folk, but isolated herself +with some portentous professorial treatise on the more serious matters +of life, or sought relaxation in the pages of her beloved Schiller. + +This was excellent while Grier senior was accumulating riches, and +Karl followed the beaten track leading to a suitable marriage and a +peerage. But she had lost none of her maternal love for her wonderful +son, and her shrewd eyes soon divined the anxiety of her husband, the +silent endurance of Karl. At first, her questions encountered a certain +gentle evasiveness. She persisted, and the elder Grier admitted that +all was not well between Karl and Nora. + +Then the mother entered the arena, and you need never ask in whose +behalf she drew the sword. + +“If Karl does not want to marry Nora Cazenove, why are you trying to +force him into a distasteful match?” she demanded of her distressed +partner. + +“I am doing nothing of the kind,” was the instant answer. + +“Then who _is_ doing it?” + +“No one. He seemed to be happy in his engagement. All went well until +this inf--this dreadful sixth sense of his seized upon him, threatening +to wring the very soul out of him.” + +“I believe he has always hankered after Maggie Hutchinson.” + +“How can that be? We have not coerced his judgment. He has not +made the slightest effort to meet her for years. I am not prone +to superstition, but there are times when I imagine that the watch +Constantine gave him is an evil thing, a constant reminder of the man’s +unhappy death.” + +To what a depth of misery must my old friend have been reduced before +he would seek such an ignoble explanation of his sorrows! + +“Unberufen! Unberufen!” cried Mrs. Grier, for she was born in the Black +Forest, and the scientific essay was not yet written which should +rescue her wholly from belief in cryptic omens of malign import. + +On the morning of my departure for Como, Karl did not appear at +breakfast. His mother went to him. She found him in his dressing-room, +smoking in seeming content. + +“Now, Karl,” she said, sitting on an arm of his easy chair and placing +a loving hand on his shoulder, “tell me all about it.” + +He was far too wise to pretend to misunderstand. + +“There is not much to tell, mother,” he said placidly. “I find that I +cannot marry Nora, and, in view of the wide-spread interest taken in +our engagement, that is a sad thing, is it not?” + +“What is stopping you from marrying her?” + +“Some intangible influence which you women call love. It is an affinity +whose properties are shared by all creation, from unicellular protozoa +up or down, to the highest anthropoids. Even air and water are composed +of sympathetic gases, so--” + +“Karl, be serious.” + +“Mother, I _am_ serious. Paris was drawn to Helen by a living force +which leaped the strongest walls of reason and morality, and the same +impetuous movement unites two atoms of hydrogen to one atom of oxygen +in order to form water. Now, wait a moment! Introduce a Menelaus or an +atom of nitrogen, and you have an explosion.” + +“You are fencing with me, _liebchen_.” + +“Indeed, I am not.” + +“Then, if Margaret Hutchinson is your Helen, and there is no Menelaus, +you must tell Nora Cazenove that it would not be fair to her to take +her as your wife when you love another.” + +“Do you think that is the best thing to do?” + +“I am so sure of it that if you dislike the task I will go to her +myself.” + +Karl saw that his mother meant what she said. Heavy-hearted by the +necessity of it, he set himself deliberately to deceive her. + +“There is no harm in waiting a few days,” he said. + +“There is every harm. Your father is quite beside himself with care. I +have never seen him so disturbed.” + +Karl bit his pipe firmly between his teeth. His father had kept the +secret, then? His mother did not know all. + +“I have a reason for saying that,” he continued, after a slight pause. +“However faithfully I may have worshiped Maggie from afar there is no +knowing how she regards me.” + +“But you _do_ know.” + +“Not in the accepted meaning of the term. I may be blinded by my own +conceit. To settle matters, an old friend has gone to Como to see how +my inamorata regards me.” + +“An old friend! Who is it that is so interested in my son?” + +He knew that his mother’s heart rebelled against the suggestion of a +stranger taking part in affairs so vital to himself of which she had +been kept in ignorance. + +With a well-assumed carelessness, he told her how Hooper and I were +planning to expedite his wooing, and he so insisted on the humor of our +dark conspiracy, when he was fully aware of each act and word, that he +won a smile to her kindly face. + +Yet her alarmed perplexity did not abate. There was a subtle change in +Karl which in no way escaped her. He was thinner, altogether unstrung +and devitalized. She was conscious, too, of a physical tension in his +attitude which was strangely at variance with the wonted suppleness of +an athletic youngster of his fine proportions. + +“When does this embassy return?” she asked musingly. + +“I cannot say. You forget that I have not been consulted,” he grumbled +with a well-feigned laugh. + +“And Mr. Hooper remains in London?” + +“That is a part of the plot.” + +“Very well. Be ready to take me to the hotel in half an hour. There is +a flower-show at Richmond which I wish to visit. We shall call for Mr. +Hooper, drive to Richmond, pass some time at the show, and return here +for tea.” + +In a word, Karl was to be tied to his mother’s apron-strings for +a while. And Hooper was to be drawn judiciously. It was a simple +expedient; for Mrs. Grier had failed utterly to recognize the real +nature of the problem which faced her, and not her alone, but all +of us. Her son’s sixth sense had always remained a thing apart and +wholly incomprehensible. She had heard little of it during recent +years. The pranks he used to play occasionally served but to amuse +her. Thus, he could summon any servant in the house by causing that +particular domestic to fancy he or she heard a bell or a voice. He +was exceedingly reliable as a weather prophet, especially when the +conditions were settled for either rain or sunshine. Once, when a +guest, a _malade imaginaire_, was bothering Mrs. Grier and her cook by +the multiplicity of dishes he could not eat and the few he could eat +but which disagreed with him, Karl made him tackle an outrageous meal +of many courses with a hearty gusto. The poor man’s famished digestion +stood the ordeal well, and he slept for twelve hours thereafter, to the +great joy of the household and his own confusion. + +I might multiply hundreds of these minor happenings, and it is not +surprising that Mrs. Grier came to regard them as of slight importance, +whereas the existing grave situation was not only of recent growth, +but its nature and extent had been sedulously kept from her. So, there +never was less tangible connection between trivial cause and actual +effect than between the mother’s resolve to keep an eye on her son for +a day or two and the outcome of that resolution. + +Examining events in critical review afterwards, I saw that a host of +things which might have occurred were diverted from their obvious +channels by Mrs. Grier’s interference at that moment. Some of these +became clear before many hours had sped. + +First and foremost of these baffled circumstances--Hooper’s +acquaintance with Miss Cazenove was delayed a whole day. Secondly--but +here I avail myself of the only chance given me in the course of a +singularly straightforward tale to whet the reader’s appetite somewhat +by refusing to raise the curtain on the last act of the drama before +the penultimate scene has been packed away with the other stage +accessories. + +And, indeed, I am concealing nothing from you in the ordered narration +of the story. Mrs. Grier kept the two young men busy all the day, and +insisted on Hooper remaining to dinner that evening. She learnt not a +word which cleared the puzzle. Hooper and Karl were chiefly reminiscent +in their talk. The shrewd American quickly took the cue of his friend’s +attitude. Neither by look nor speech did he betray the trust reposed in +him. + +Mrs. Grier twice swung the conversation round to the occupants of the +Castello Rondo. She did this neatly and without undue insistence, +and quite as cleverly did Hooper express his desire to meet such an +exceptionally gifted girl as Maggie Hutchinson was, by all accounts. + +Dear lady! She remained awake that night until assured that Karl was +safe and sound in his room. She was bewildered, but far from alarmed. +Yet she knelt and prayed long and earnestly for the welfare of her +loved ones, husband and son, and her last conscious words, uttered with +trembling lips ere she closed her tear-laden eyes, were:-- + +“Karl, mein liebchen, Gott befolen!” + +Little did she dream that she owed her restful sleep to the influence +which Karl exerted in her behalf, nor has she ever known the terrible +strain she imposed by her well-meant efforts to pierce the mystery +which surrounded him. That was mercifully kept from her. Had she ever +realized that the long-drawn-out programme she devised in order to +distract his mind was really the quickest means to bring him to utter +destruction, she would never have forgiven herself. + +Hooper was on the rack all the time. The signs which an anxious mother +interpreted as lassitude and a weariness of spirit were clear evidence +to him that Karl was suffering an agony of restraint. + +“I was at my wits’ end what to say or do,” he told me subsequently. “I +was afraid that Karl might crack up at any moment. Brain fever was the +best thing I could hope for him; but, somehow, though doctoring is a +science I know less of than conchology, I felt that relief would not +come in that way. Once or twice I managed to touch his hand as if by +accident. He was cool and firm as a block of ice. He knew what I was +up to, and smiled at me in such despair! Guess I had a cold chill down +my spine enough to give a rhinoceros influenza!” + +Strange, was it not, that Hooper should use such a simile after what +Karl had said? But I must guard against digression. There is a fitting +place for analysis, but a man may not stand up in a canoe and make a +speech on the laws of bodies in motion when his frail craft is hurtling +through rock-strewn rapids. + +“It was a heavy risk I took,” went on my fellow-conspirator, “but I was +sure that Karl was more taxed by his mother’s close observation than by +the manifold demands on his stamina entailed by other considerations. +So I bluffed. Oxford was a natural goal. I suggested that he and I +should visit our old ’Varsity next day, and Mrs. Grier approved of the +idea. That is how I managed to install him in our sitting-room at the +hotel early on the following morning. There he was at peace.” + +Karl showed a great desire, at that time, to discuss his sixth sense +fully and freely with one who might be trusted to listen without +scepticism. He acquainted Hooper with many marvels which reached my +ears in due course. And, happily, the freedom from restraint had the +good effect of inducing a slight drowsiness. He would not admit +it, but Hooper was quite convinced that he had not slept during the +preceding four days at least. + +That afternoon he yielded sufficiently to the demands of outraged +nature to sink into a heavy sleep, though we found, on inquiry--not +from him but from those whose well-being he was protecting at his own +irreparable loss--that his control over them never slackened for an +instant. + +Thinking that the best thing possible had happened, Hooper calmly +locked him in, and told the floor attendant to ask Mr. Grier to await +his (Hooper’s) return if he woke up and rang. + +Then, fast as a hansom could carry him, he hurried to Sandilands House, +there to learn that the Honorable Nora Cazenove had driven to the +Griers’, with laudable intent to take Mrs. Grier and Karl to Hurlingham. + +The pen almost refuses to write these colorless annals of ordinary life +in town when they are contrasted with the extraordinary incidents to +which they directly contributed. Yet they are essential to my story as +plain brick and mortar to some noble edifice which inspires the muse of +many generations of poets. + +Hooper ascertained that Miss Cazenove would return home about half-past +six, to dress for dinner and the opera. None but an American could +have extracted this information from a severe London footman. There +is a charming affability, a dramatic good-fellowship, about our +transatlantic cousins which ignores the traditional reserve of England. + +Racing back to the hotel, Hooper found Karl still asleep. At 6.35 P.M. +he coolly telephoned to Miss Nora, and quite as coolly read her my +letter of introduction over the wire. + +“I guess I shook her up good an’ hard,” he said to me, in the exchange +of further confidences, and I quite believe it. + +He pressed inflexibly for an immediate interview. At all hazards, now, +he was determined to make known to her the dangerous atmosphere in +which her fiancée was existing. + +“Her voice was a bit scared as she discussed things,” he declared, +“but, after chewing on it for a minute or two, she asked me to meet her +at the opera at eight o’clock sharp. The lady who would chaperon her, +and some other friends, would not be there until nearly nine. She would +go in advance, leaving a message for her chaperon, and we could talk +undisturbed. I allow I rather cottoned to a girl who could fix things +as slick as that.” + +Karl was seemingly sunk in the sleep of sheer weakness. Hooper counted +on meeting Nora and returning to the hotel in time to arouse Karl for +a late meal, and then see him safely home, or even detain him for the +night after explaining matters to his father and mother. + +Indeed, things were going so well that he was buoyed up with a new +hope. He dressed rapidly, reached Covent Garden, and saw a lady whom he +took to be Nora Cazenove descend from a brougham, cross the vestibule +while darting an interrogatory glance at its denizens, and hasten up +the stairs. + +He was right. An attendant took his card, the lady halted smilingly, +and Hooper made himself known. + +A well-bred, bright-eyed, alert young American is seldom at a discount +under such conditions. The spice of the unusual procedure, flavored by +a certain curiosity, led Nora to receive him graciously, if with a not +unnatural shyness arising from the innuendoes of my letter and Hooper’s +own persistence in seeking the meeting. + +He lost no time in tackling the subject for which she had accorded the +rendezvous. Once they were seated in the box, and the strains of the +orchestra (how remarkably was music interwoven with the vital events of +Karl’s career!) made it impossible for his voice to carry through the +thin partitions on each side, Hooper plunged into a clear, decisive, +and, to any ears save those of a woman in love, convincing history of +Karl’s sixth sense and its latest astounding developments. + +Though she protested vehemently, and threatened (though probably not +quite in earnest in this) to leave the theater, Hooper spared her no +shred of the evidence which proved that Karl was killing himself on her +account. + +Never did a nice young man carry out an harder self-imposed ordeal with +a nice young woman than Hooper that evening in his impassioned plea to +Nora Cazenove for his friend’s life. + +“I never let up on her for an instant,” he said in his own picturesque +way. “We had a heart-to-heart talk. The storming of San Juan Hill +was child’s play to the way in which I hurled my battalions of fact +against her entrenchments of romance. When I pictured Karl’s impending +collapse, the inconsolable despair of his parents, her own unending +self-reproach, and even the broken-hearted sorrow of her successful +rival, I got her to the point of yielding. I pitied her for her +suffering, but I promised her the reward of the consciousness of +having acted nobly. She, and Karl, and Maggie, were the victims of +circumstances. They could no more help what had happened than moths +driven out to sea by a summer hurricane. One of them must let go for +the good of all. If she renounced Karl voluntarily, there was a chance, +and perhaps only a remote chance, that a tragedy might be averted. I +could not guarantee that. But it was the one way out, in your judgment +and mine, while her marriage with Karl was simply not to be thought of, +because he would be dead within a week.” + +Think of this strenuous advocate piling Pelion upon Ossa to scale +the fortress of a woman’s fierce love, asking her to believe the +incredible, to sacrifice herself, not only for the sake of the man she +worshiped, but to secure the happiness of another woman! And yet, he +nearly won. Of that he was certain. + +He kept until the last the fact that Karl was even then lying in the +hotel, weary almost unto dissolution, utterly spent by the struggle +which he had waged in her behalf. It seemed to him that the intensity +of his convictions had borne down the barrier Karl himself had erected +in Nora’s heart and brain. She was on the point of yielding. The words +trembled on her lips which would set Karl free, but the dénouement came +in a fashion which neither of them expected. + +Hitherto she had been greatly distressed, yet the exigencies of the +time and place restrained her protests to the spoken word, the +flashing eye, the tremulous lip. + +Suddenly she rose to her feet and staggered back into the dark interior +of the box. Had not Hooper caught her in his arms she would have fallen. + +“Oh, take me home, take me home!” she wailed. “For pity’s sake, do not +leave me! Karl is dead!” + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +“A STRUGGLE ’TWIXT LOVE AND DEATH” + + +And now you shall hie with me to Italy. I had missed the over-night +Engadine Rapide to Lucerne, and Hooper’s enthusiasm sent me to Dover +two hours too early. As it happens, I take a lasting delight in getting +the better of the terrible line between London and the channel, which +any man may do by catching a fast train slightly in advance of the boat +express and carrying his grip from the town station to the pier. He +thus avoids the scandalous over-charge of the boat trains, and lays the +unction to his soul that he is not a holder of “Doras.” + +All day long I was looking at scenes familiar to my eyes. Lille, Douai, +St. Quentin, Laon--how the old cities of French Flanders and Picardy +brought the ghosts of past years trooping before me. Then, as night +fell, began that interminable running into and out of frontier stations +on rails laid in crescents, so that you are seldom certain where the +engine is, and it is hard to persuade your nervous fellow-passenger, +who has never taken the journey before, that he or she is not in the +wrong train. + +Thus, accompanied by the babel of funny noises inseparable from French +railways, I dozed through a rumbling journey and reached Basle in the +early morning. It will perhaps scarce be credited (seeing that I have +posed, and justly, as an experienced _voyageur_) that I quitted London +without ascertaining the exact locality of the Castello Rondo. At +Lucerne I purchased a guide-book to the Italian Lakes, virgin territory +to me, notwithstanding all my jaunts in strange lands. I discovered, to +my dismay, that the shores of Lake Como cover nearly a hundred miles, +while towns cluster round its “efflorescent loveliness” in a fine +profusion. Bellagio, Cadenabbia and Como I had heard of, but who was to +distinguish Domaso from Dongo, or Colico from Cremia? + +To add to my annoyance, the writer of the guide-book spread himself on +the fact that each jutting peninsula or verdant slope held “castles +with turreted towers, peeping out, ever and anon, from the sylvan +woods which hide them.” Cheerfully could I have wrung his neck for +that sentence. It tortured me until the slow Italian train deposited +me at Como at eleven o’clock, which, allowing for mid-Europe time, was +slightly in advance of the hour Frank Hooper called at Sandilands House. + +You will remember that Nora had gone out, meaning to drive Mrs. Grier +and Karl to Hurlingham. Karl, of course, was then asleep in the Pall +Mall Hotel, so the two ladies went together, and a fine fencing-match +they indulged in, without a doubt. But they, at least, used words which +they understood, even if they tried to cloak their meaning, while I +used a language which I did not understand in striving to wrest from +several voluble Italians the whereabouts of the Castello Rondo and the +Signora Hutchinson. One brigandish person reeled off fourteen likely +places, so I quitted the terminus in wrath, found the English-speaking +proprietor of a hotel, and luckily ascertained from him that the lady +and mansion I was in search of would surely be in the neighborhood of +Bellagio. + +I believed him, and took a steamer for a two hours’ journey on the +lake. When I saw the superb panorama opening up in front, when +the Villa d’Este spread its wondrous array of terraces, temples, +waterfalls, gardens, and fountains before my astonished eyes, I forgave +the guide-book man. Some day I mean to ramble along those enchanted +shores--some day, ere the world grows dim--if only to visit that +sixty-foot monument erected at Laglio by Joseph Frank to his own memory +and in grateful acknowledgment of his own worth. His was a noble idea. +If the rich and distinguished people we know would but adopt it, and +justly appraise themselves at their own valuation, the face of the +earth would soon be covered with costly memorials. + +The lake is shaped somewhat on the lines of the Three Legs of the Isle +of Man, with Bellagio perched on a dividing promontory. I reached the +landing-stage at exactly 6.45 P.M., Greenwich time. + +At no great distance, I noticed the round towers of a castellated +building nestling among the trees of a rock-guarded point. _Pace_ +Shakespeare, there is a good deal in a name. + +An intelligent-looking vetturino seized me, but, ere I yielded, I +pointed to the building which caught my eye. + +“Castello Rondo?” I cried. + +“Si, signor.” He smiled. + +“Signora Hutchinson?” + +“Per certo, signor.” He grinned all over his face. No doubt you have +noticed the stupid habit of foreigners (when you do not know their +language) in not replying “Yes” or “No” to your questions. + +Anyhow, the words had a reassuring sound. I gave him the name of the +hotel, and he appeared to regard my advent as a license to kill all who +dared to cross his path. I think I heard every bad word in the Italian +tongue before the vehicle deposited me, with a series of wild bounds +up hill and down dale, at the hotel portico. The coachman swore at +his horse, at pedestrians, chickens, dogs, and other charioteers, and +interlarded his scurrility with appeals to the saints. + +I believe he informed me that if I patronized him exclusively during my +stay in Bellagio he would always drive like that. To do him justice, he +kept his contract. I only saw him twice again, and in the second drive +we bagged a hen, an apple-barrow, and the crutch of a cripple, who +recovered miraculously when our fiery steed snorted down his neck. + +A tub and a change of raiment removed the dust of empires. Now that +I was actually in the same locality as Maggie Hutchinson, the means +whereby I was to achieve my object were not so clear as the object +itself. By hook or by crook I hoped to bring Miss Margaret and her +mother back with me to London. The first train, in reason, left Como +the following afternoon, and was timed to reach Victoria twenty-nine +hours later. + +So two whole days must pass before Hooper (to whom I had telegraphed +my arrival) could expect relief. Would it be too late? And, in any +event, would the ladies consent to accompany me? I was consumed with +impatience, so perplexed and worried that I despatched a second +telegram to Hooper, asking him to wire me news of some sort. I strove +to eat, but I was too eager for action to sit through a dinner of many +courses. + +Ultimately, I resolved to visit the Castello Rondo much earlier than +politeness permitted, on the supposition that its occupants dined at +the usual hour. + +Outside the hotel my vetturino was watching for me, vulture-like, as +his ancestors for many a generation had watched for the passing of +unwary travelers through Cis-Alpine gorges. I have already recounted +the exciting nature of our transit across Bellagio. The man was +evidently mad with the joy of securing an Englishman. + +The killing of the hen, the frenzy of the apple-vender, the curses of +the cured cripple, each in its way tended to fend off the weight which +a difficult task imposed on my spirits. Nevertheless, my heart sank in +my boots when I raised a ponderous knocker, a wrought-iron ring in the +mouth of a beautifully modeled lion’s head, and delivered the first +note of my mandate to Karl’s lady-love. + +That was a lasting peculiarity of my friend’s sixth sense. Once removed +from its aura, the mind began to deny it, faith wavered, the familiar +things of life forbade its acceptance. Its nature and influence stood +apart from all accepted theories of existence. It was inexplicable, +insoluble, more nebulous than the Nirvana of the Buddhists. One felt +as awkward as a professed scientist who purposed addressing a critical +audience on the demonstrable truths of astrology or the doctrines of +Mrs. Mary Baker G. Eddy. + +My Jehu promised to await me _tutta via_, and I was admitted into a +medieval courtyard--ancient in architectural design, that is--because +the building was not old. Troubled though I was, a glance showed +that the mansion was modern enough in its luxuries and equipment. +Beyond a Grecian colonnade lay a smooth carpet of grass. Behind it, a +series of terraces stretched down to the lake. Although the water was +crimson with the glory of the setting sun, although clipped shrubs and +ornamental flower-beds were still glorious in the light of day, I was +positively startled to see that the nearest lawn was the identical spot +I had visited during the momentary spell Karl had cast upon me when we +dined together on the night of my return from Heidelberg. + +The knowledge shocked distrust out of my heart. I was thrice armed now. +The whole crowd of extraordinary experiences which I had undergone +since the uneventful picnic in the Schonau Forest rushed in on my +memory. To lose belief in Karl was to account myself insane. + +In popular idiom, we speak of certain events serving to “stiffen our +backbone.” The phrase has an added peculiarity when examined in its +telegnomic significance, but, whatever its inward meaning, it had a +salutary force for me just then. I had scarce noted the landscape of +my waking dream when a tall elegant-looking young man came to me. I +recognized him at once. He was the third figure of that uncanny moonlit +scene--the “Italian, of good birth, madly in love with Maggie.” + +“I regret to say Miss Hutchinson is indisposed,” he said in excellent +English. + +I have encountered several well-born Italians who are warranted to get +up a frantic passion in five minutes for any nice young lady dowered +with great wealth. I am glad to say I took this cavalier’s measure at +a glance. Perhaps, by and by, I may cultivate a sixth sense of my own. +At any rate, I was quite sure he had snatched my card from the stupid +domestic who came with him to the courtyard, and was interposing a +barrier between Maggie and me. + +“Did Miss Hutchinson send that message to me?” I asked. + +“No; not exactly. She does not receive at this hour.” + +“You have mistaken an urgent matter for a mere social call,” I +answered. “I have come straight to this house from London. I must see +Miss Hutchinson immediately. Kindly send my card to her. She knows my +name.” + +To avoid a scene, I let him down lightly. But when one man wishes to +tell another that he is a cur, there are many varieties of speech. He +flushed darkly, yet he had the wit to take the _via media_ I offered. + +“I am sorry,” he said, with a bow of excessive courtesy. “The servant +did not explain matters.” + +He gabbled some instructions in Italian, handed over my pasteboard, +and proceeded to question me politely about my business. I found +this amusing, but I had no wish to quarrel with him, so I gave him +verbally what my old friend, Toff Wall, the “Brummagem Pet,” used to +call a “steadier on the breadbasket” by hinting at falling stocks, +and followed it up with a “smasher on the snuff-box” in the shape of +lachrymose comment on the sad reverses of fortune some people were +subjected to. + +This by-play was ended by the appearance of Maggie herself. In the rich +half-light of that evening in wonderland, I thought I had never seen a +woman so ethereally beautiful. + +The plump school-girl contour had given place to a delightfully piquant +femininity. Surprise, pleasure, a vague feeling of alarm, enlivened her +mobile face and incardinated her pale cheeks with a delicious rose tint. + +I was quick to note, too, that she glanced at the Italian with some +astonishment, even as she flitted towards me with outstretched hands, +nor did she pay heed to the explanatory lie he murmured rapidly in his +own language. I learnt afterwards that it was _his_ presence for which +she was “indisposed.” But let him pass. I only set eyes on him once +again--at the railway station. + +“I am delighted to see you,” she cried. “Remember you? Of course I do. +But is it true what Baptisto said--that you have traveled from London +on some errand of importance to me?” + +“It is quite true,” I said. + +“Oh, come this way. It is nothing serious, I hope? Is--is Mrs. Grier +ill?” + +“No. It is on Karl’s behalf I am here.” + +“Karl! Why Karl? I have not--met him for many years.” + +The slight pause, with its distinctive choice of a word, did not escape +me. She was leading me through the house, a treasury of art in canvas +and stone, and she had now ushered me into a room which, as I fully +anticipated, was the boudoir-studio in which I had already seen her. + +We were alone. I last beheld her on her knees in that identical +apartment, and the memory of her tear-stained face surged in on me. It +was no time to pick and choose expressions. The stereotyped language +which I had framed to convey my thoughts was wholly inadequate to the +demands of an interview fraught with such a momentous result. + +I placed a hand on her shoulder, and I fear there was somewhat of a +break in my voice as I said: + +“I know much about you two. I cannot hold back my message. Karl, in +this instant, is engaged in a desperate struggle between love and +death. I come to you for him if not from him. I want you to return with +me to England and save him.” + +“Save him!” she repeated, her large brown eyes dilating with a terror +the true cause of which I did not divine instantly. + +“Yes. I am speaking from my heart. Karl is at death’s door. I, and +another acquainted with all the circumstances, believe that you can +bring him back to life. But you must come quickly. Even now you may be +too late.” + +She faced me with a vehemence that was altogether unexpected. + +“What do you mean?” she cried. “You speak in riddles. What is Karl to +me? I have driven him out of my heart, crushed his very image in my +brain. He is nothing to me.” + +Her excited protest aroused my resentment. + +“You, too, are using words which are meaningless if judged only by the +common laws of entity. Yet it is not a week since you knelt here, in +a passion of tears, and wrapped Karl in your innermost soul. Do not +deceive yourself any longer. He is your preordained mate, and he is +pining for you. Yet he is giving his life to rescue you from emotions +which cause you poignant suffering. Go to him! Clasp him in your arms! +You cannot, you must not, continue to resist him.” + +Poor girl! She looked wildly into my eyes, and then shrank away from +me with a heartbreaking sob. She could not choose but believe me. In +some respects, I was as thoroughly unstrung as she. I did not stop to +consider whether or not I had taken the best way to win her to my point +of view. Yet I endeavored most desperately, and it is somewhat to my +credit, I fancy, to rescue the situation from the tornado into which it +was plunged so suddenly. + +“Try and listen to me calmly,” I said, for Maggie was crumpled up in +a low chair, and gasping, without tears, in that agonizing manner of +women when misery vanquishes them. “Karl loves you, and you love him. +The sovereign passion has made a battle-ground of your hearts. You are +at once happy and miserable, conscious of a superhuman ecstasy, yet +self-condemned to separation from the one being who is all in all to +you. The tension cannot endure. For five years the voluntary screen +erected by you placed him and you in a spiritual trance. It has fallen +now, and forever, yielding to the rude assault of those who dare to +sever the bond which unites you until death. Is it not time you flew to +your lover’s embrace? Do you hold your scruples dearer than his life?” + +“No, no, not that,” she whispered. “None can be to Karl what I have +been. But I am fearful of myself, fearful that I may destroy what I +cannot create. Oh, what shall I say to make you understand that I have +withheld myself from him not for my own sake but for his?” + +“Let me reassure you there. Though Karl has never spoken to me of his +love for you, I am sure he appreciates your self-sacrifice to the +uttermost degree. And I, too, vaguely yet sincerely as I conceive +a life beyond the grave, have formed some idea of the burthen you +have borne. You are an inseparable element of Karl’s existence. +Owing to you, and through you, he developed faculties whose potency +now threatens to overwhelm him. You are part of his very being, the +spontaneous Eve of his earthly Paradise. Joined with you, he rises +beyond the clouds of our present knowledge. Bereft of you, he sinks +back to the level of every-day humanity. Do not force me to say harsh +things of an obstinacy which keeps you apart.” + +“It was through me that Constantine died. I saw him torn to pieces. I +heard his last cry. Would you have me eternally branded with a crime?” + +Were it not for the tragic consequences of her decision, I could have +smiled at this despairing effort to divert me from the track of the +shadowy truth I was pursuing. + +“You know full well that Constantine paid the penalty of the heedless +man who touches a live wire,” I protested. “You must blame his folly, +not the relentless force which he incredulously despised. Come, now, +Miss Hutchinson, I have said sufficient to prove to you that one other +in the world, besides you and Karl, has probed the depths of the +enigma which has terrified you for years. You are a woman to-day, not +the timid girl who first saw visions on board the _Merlin_, and you +have all a woman’s capacity for boundless love. The fight and the dread +are ended. You must come with me to Karl, and all will be well.” + +Going back to-day to the memories of that astounding scene, when I, to +rescue my friend, flung prudence and a great many other wise restraints +to the winds, I am guiltily conscious that the possible effect on Nora +Cazenove of a marriage between Karl and Maggie did not weigh greatly +in the scale of my argument. A man who sees a ghost may be pardoned if +he uses certain extravagant expressions and entertains one-sided views +on the subject of specters. I was nearer to the mysterious essence +of telegnomy than I knew. Here, in the actual presence of the fair +creature who was symbolic of the everlasting revivification of nature, +I was carried out of myself, rapt to the skies in a mystical mood of +awestricken exaltation. “My heart was hot within me, and while I was +thus musing the fire kindled.” I seemed to be hovering on the very lip +of knowledge. That which is sown in weakness and raised in power, sown +a natural body and raised a spiritual body--that which men loosely +style eternity--was clothing its enduring divinity with the perishable +garments of earth. + +How long I stood there, dazed with the immensity of this new +intellectual horizon, I know not. The need of further speech had gone. +Maggie, clasping her hands on her knees, was gazing at me with eyes +which saw not, and I was waiting as though for some dread sentence +which should snap invisible chains of wondrous strength, when a great +change came over her face. + +From abounding melancholy her aspect altered to that of transfixed +horror. She sprang from the chair in which she was sitting and caught +my arm with the tenacious strength of partial dementia. + +“It is too late!” she muttered in a terrible voice. “Steindal has +murdered Karl! And I, too, have helped to kill him! Oh, may Heaven +forgive me!” + +She herself sank as one dead. I held her while I cried in a frenzy for +help. The wonder is that I did not collapse by her side. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +THE FALL OF THE CURTAIN + + +I suppose there are some supercilious mortals who will cavil at what +they may be pleased to term the sensationalism of those doings in +the London opera house and the Italian villa. There will surely be +others ready to scoff at the fine rage into which Hooper and I worked +ourselves in order to arrange the somewhat involved love affairs of a +friend. Well, to the one set of critics, I can only reply that Karl +did not die--in fact, if they turn back to the opening lines of this +history, they will find his future career, a peaceful life blessed by +an enchanted matrimony, set forth in the clearest words at my command. +As for the others, the utterers of jibes, I have no such logical hammer +with which to pound them to a jelly. There are those who have eyes and +see not, ears and hear not; and who shall give them the additional +senses the lack of which was thus deplored by the Evangelist Mark? + +Indeed, I must not expect a host of believers. Some few will understand +me when I say that it is possible for a man or a woman to love +at first sight, instantly, absolutely, and forever. But--goodness +me!--that doctrine will not go down with the multitude, and my natural +candor impels me to admit that it would be a very troublesome and evil +thing for the multitude if it did. + +Nevertheless, I wish to explain, for the benefit of the elect (and we, +dear fellow-visionary, you who are blessed with the full heart and +the dreaming brain, we are the elect--of that there can be no manner +of doubt in _our_ minds), why it came about that Nora Cazenove and +Maggie Hutchinson actually knew that Karl was suddenly stricken out of +consciousness, a state which, to their overladen souls, was equivalent +to his death. + +Karl, locked in the suite of rooms at the Pall Mall Hotel, awoke from +his restful sleep about eight o’clock. He was surprised to see by the +shadows and the appearance of the streets that the hour was really +as late as a glance at a clock revealed to his incredulous eyes. He +wondered why and where Hooper had gone. Thinking that his friend, +having evidently dressed for dinner, was dining alone rather than +disturb him, he rang for the valet, and then came the explanation of +the locked door. + +It was the easiest thing for Karl to discover what Hooper was doing. +The additional demand on his telegnomic sense made by such a quest +was infinitesimal. But, probably because he was exceedingly run down +and weak from want of food and sufficient rest, he yielded to a quick +anger, determinedly set himself against any inquiry, and ordered the +attendant to open the outer door immediately. + +Of course, he was obeyed. + +He could not change his clothing, but he laved his face and hands in +cold water. This was refreshing in itself, but thenceforth he became +aware of a steadily increasing strain on his magnetic energies. His +nervous system was a delicate organism vastly more sensitive than the +finest instrument known to science, though some have reached such +perfection that a suspended needle in England can scratch on a prepared +plate a record of the direction and magnitude of a ten seconds’ +earthquake at the Antipodes. He did not fear immediate dissolution as +the result of the added burthen. He had devoted himself continuously, +during many days, to maintaining the mental poise, so to speak, of the +two human beings whose lives were so intimately linked with his own. He +knew the exact strength of magnetic current needed for the task, and +the perceptible growth of the tension now puzzled but did not alarm +him. + +The slight feeling of irritation against Hooper was succeeded by a +species of teeth-setting, a back-to-the-wall attitude, which hardened +his resolve not to seek any information but simply to devote his +dynamic powers to the new and strange tax made on them. + +In a mood which may almost be termed one of bravado, he went +down-stairs and entered the restaurant. + +“Have you seen anything of Mr. Hooper?” he asked Jules, the head waiter. + +“Mais non, M’sieu’. He hass not been here at all.” + +“Perhaps he will turn up soon. Ask the chef to prepare us a _poulet en +casserole_. That will give the wanderer twenty minutes’ grace.” + +Jules, an acute observer of men, eyed his young patron covertly. + +“You don’d look ver’ well,” he hinted. “Let me bring you a leetle +pick-you-up--_un fortifiant_--shall it be a vermouth and Angostura?” + +“It shall not,” said Karl, a smile chasing the weariness from his face. +“Don’t worry about me, Jules. I am neither bull nor bear, backer nor +layer. Nor has my best girl proved fickle. What I really do lack is +that chicken.” + +Jules did not understand. But he knew that the trouble, whatever it +was, was not to be removed by the revivers of general acceptance. + +Left to himself, Karl’s thoughts began to wander. He asked himself how +Hooper and I were speeding on our missions, because, by this time, +he knew what Frank was doing. It is no matter for surprise that he +followed me rather than the American in his musings. He was aware of +that which I only suspected--that Maggie had deliberately shut him out +from the sanctity of her presence until her edict was burnt up in the +electric ardor of the new conditions set in motion by Karl’s proposed +marriage to Nora and the mere suggestion of her own union with the +Italian. + +Still fully alive to that ever-growing strain, which, of course, was +caused by the opposing influence Hooper and I were establishing, he +strove to keep his faculties within bounds. He shut his spiritual eyes, +guarded his ears against the far-off sounds which might have troubled +them, and endeavored to take a passive interest in the other people in +the restaurant. + +Notwithstanding his marvelous self-control, he was restless. He wished +Hooper would return and put an end to the suspense by his agreeable +rattle. He strove to eat some of the tempting _hors d’œuvres_ set +before him, but, like any sick child, he fancied he could touch nothing +except the dish he had ordered, and it seemed to be unreasonably long +in the cooking. + +Then he looked at his watch, Constantine’s gift, and, after noting the +hour, 8.40 P.M., he idly read the inscription inside the gold cover. +By a queer trick of memory, his mind went back to the starlit sky and +the black waters of the Bay of Bengal. He heard again the plash of the +oars, saw the Armenian clinging to the buoy and plunging frantically, +and renewed his childish awe at the long rows of shining lights in the +ship’s hull and the way in which her huge, dark bulk towered above the +tiny boat when the sailors pulled alongside. + +Then the black mass seemed to topple over on to him, there was a blaze +of vivid light, and Karl lost consciousness. + +What had happened was this. Steindal, vengeful as an infuriated ape, +entered the restaurant just as Karl opened his watch. His dark eyes +contracted and darted a lambent glare at the stalwart figure seated, +as it transpired, at the very table where the Jew had indulged in his +antics a few nights earlier. There came to him the maddening knowledge +that many of those present exchanged nods, and winks, and inaudible +asides, the moment he appeared. It may be that some subtle influence, +some weakened inductive current, leaped out at him without Karl being +either responsible for or aware of its action. The exact motive will +never be known, but its result was lamentably evident. Steindal +snatched a full bottle of champagne from the ice-pail in which it +rested beside a neighboring table, and dealt Karl a murderous blow with +it on the back of the head. + +Maggie, who actually saw and heard what took place, gave a far clearer +account of it than the horrified witnesses in the restaurant. + +“Steindal’s face assumed a demoniacal expression,” she said, when, long +afterwards, she was able to speak calmly of the unnerving spectacle. +“I have read of the lust of murder, but I never knew what it meant +until I saw his black eyes emitting a dull, red light, and his lips +parting with an animal snarl. He leaped forward at Karl in a peculiar +way. He seemed to bring down the bottle with an awful force just as +his feet touched the ground. The bottle burst, and its fragments flew +on all sides, some of the bits of glass cutting Steindal’s forehead. +With an activity I would not have credited in a man of his corpulence, +and which he certainly did not exhibit in his normal life, he turned +and ran out of the room, upsetting two tables and some chairs, and +disappearing through a narrow doorway. Some gentlemen rushed after him, +and others helped to raise Karl, who had fallen as one dead headlong +on the table. I cannot say why it is, but my last sight of Steindal, +bounding across the floor in the effort to escape, reminded me of that +dreadful orang-outang described by Edgar Allan Poe in the ‘Murders of +the Rue Morgue.’” + +Nora Cazenove knew nothing of this. She was only acutely aware of the +snapping of the invisible link which held her fast. Hence, it is easy +enough to understand the different cries of horror and bewilderment +with which each girl announced her dread discovery. + +A policeman, strolling past the Pall Mall exit from the hotel through +which Steindal gained the street, supplied a succinct narrative of +subsequent events so far as the would-be murderer was concerned. At the +kerb was standing an empty hansom, the driver of which was fastening +the nose-bag on its accustomed hook beneath the “dicky.” Steindal +sprang into the vehicle, leaned over the splash-board, seized the reins +and shook the horse into a fast gallop. + +The animal, a Londoner by adoption, was accustomed to this frenzied +leap into activity when a whistling fare was to be secured from a +rival. Being a careless beast, it kept on the right side of the road, +which, in England, is the wrong side, and after a brief career in +comparative safety, encountered a heavy ’bus crunching round the corner +from Waterloo Place. + +Steindal, yelling hysterically in Spanish (he went back to his Mexican +mother’s tongue, you see, when the lightning struck him), urged the +horse to charge the oncoming Colossus. But the horse knew better than +that, and swerved into the open space in front of the Duke of York’s +column. The unoccupied square was traversed at full speed. Ere the +steed, far wiser than the man, could check his wild progress, he was +flying down the long flight of steps into St. James’s Park. + +Most happily, the Jew’s lunacy involved no further tragedy. At that +particular hour, even on a summer night, central London is fairly +empty. Therefore, the few privileged spectators of this unparalleled +feat by a horse, cab, and man, saw the mad descent and heard Steindal’s +incoherent shrieks without being called on to tend some other unhappy +sufferer from the escapade. + +The horse, thoroughly frightened now, lost his coolness when the level +ground was reached once more. He dashed on blindly, caught the vehicle +against a tree, and the policemen and startled passers-by who then came +on the scene extricated the insensible Jew from the ruins of the cab. +He had been badly injured by the plunging hoofs, and fully six months +elapsed before he was restored to health and Paris. In that time a +great many things had happened. Steindal thenceforth passed out of +Karl’s life. No action was taken against him for the attempted murder. +The mad act was attributed to sudden mania, but he was warned that he +must avoid England in future, if he would not undergo the _peine forte +et dure_. + +Hooper was the first to restore order out of chaos. The manner in +which he rushed Nora Cazenove out of the box and into her own brougham +astonished the opera-goers and made the “front of the house” gasp. + +Did he take her to Sandilands’ House? If ever you meet him, ask him, +and you will hear an expressive Americanism. + +Somewhat unjustly, he rated Nora all the way from Covent Garden to the +hotel. His indignation was pardonable. Karl was his friend, and Nora he +had seen for the first time half an hour earlier. If Karl were really +dead, Hooper held that Nora’s unreasonable passion was the chief cause +of his death. Perchance, the masterful spirit he showed during that +turbulent drive went a long way towards taming the impulsive nature of +a very lovable and beautiful woman, for, queer whirligig of a world +that it is, Nora is now Mrs. Hooper, and a very dear friend, indeed, of +Maggie’s. Don’t imagine, for an instant, that Frank smirched the fair +fame of all American husbands by “bossing” his charming wife. Next to +Karl, and myself, he is a model Benedict. + +Well, the anguish of that night in Como has long passed away, so I will +not attempt to harrow your feelings by describing the heart-broken +grief of Maggie, the scarcely less frenzied anxiety of her mother, the +turmoil and worry and wild guessing at eventualities which racked us +during three weary hours. When Steindal vanished from the restaurant +so did Maggie’s perceptiveness fade away. She strove, with a fierce +longing, to follow the little _cortège_ which carried Karl up-stairs. +It was useless. The veil had fallen. She moved and spoke with the +hopeless air of a woman beaten to her knees. I think she was overborne +by the experiences of that trying period. Had Karl died, I am sure she +would not have survived him long. + +I quitted the castle at ten o’clock. Some English-speaking servant told +the vetturino to drive slowly. Yet, an hour later, I needed his daring, +because a lame horse brought me back all too slowly to show Maggie a +second telegram from Hooper: + + “Karl lives. Doctors predict recovery.” + +By some miracle it reached me that night. Be sure I pounded hard on the +lion’s head knocker of the Castello Rondo to convey the glad news. + +Other messages to hand in the morning rescued our journey to London +from the misery which must have attended it otherwise. The Italian +count saw us off from Como. I did not grudge him that happiness. It was +his parting glimpse of his divinity--and her fortune. + +Slow as the mail train seemed to us in its scurry through Italy, +Switzerland, and France, we passed many a weary hour in England before +Karl recovered his five senses, to say nothing of the sixth. During +four days he lay prone at the gate of death, his breathing slow, +labored, and stertorous, the pupils of his eyes dilated unequally. + +But splendid surgery saved him. The injury was so serious that a +prompt operation, carried out before his parents were even aware of +his condition, alone pulled him back from the void. Steindal’s blow, +delivered on the side rather than the back of the head, caused a +depressed fracture of the skull, a tiny bit of bone being driven into +the temporo-sphenoidal lobe. The resultant concussion, too, passed +rapidly into a compression of the brain arising from effusion of blood. +It was the breaking of the bottle which delivered Karl from instant +death. Had such a heavy implement retained its solidity, the shock must +necessarily have been fatal. + +The expert surgeon who carried out the requisite trephining gave me +these details after one of his visits. Karl was yet unconscious, and +this was the fourth morning after the attack! + +Maggie, frail ghost, waylaid us in the corridor. + +“Doctor,” she whispered, “may I see him?” + +Medical men are telegnomists in their way. He had noticed her on the +previous day, soon after our arrival, in fact, and his professional eye +was attracted by her ethereal beauty. + +“Yes,” he said. “That will do no harm. But you must promise to keep +quiet.” + +“I promise,” she answered. + +He led her to the room where Karl lay, tended by hospital nurses. None +hindered, so I went with them. Maggie was braver than I thought. She +moved noiselessly to the head of the bed and stooped over the recumbent +form. Karl was restless, almost fretful. The light was dim, yet I +distinctly caught the unspoken question on Maggie’s lips as she turned +and looked at the surgeon. He nodded. + +She bent and kissed Karl lightly on the forehead, where the bandages +left a little space. Then she murmured, ever so tenderly:-- + +“Karl, _mera piyárá_, I am here!” + +What heaven-sent inspiration moved that “maiden with the meek, brown +eyes” to utter those Persian words of endearment? Many a year had +passed since Karl and she spoke Hindustáni to each other. She had +almost forgotten the language, yet the first gush of impulse renewed +the fount, and here was she calling him her sweetheart as she was wont +to do in the lisping childhood of far-away Darjeeling. + +The doctor told me that it was coincidence--blessed explanation!--that +consciousness frequently returned on the fourth day in such cases--but, +however it may be, Karl looked up at Maggie in the most natural way and +said quite rationally: + +“I thought you would come, dear. Don’t leave me again.” + +He _thought_ she would come! And when had he done the thinking? +Oh, that wonderful, misunderstood brain of ours! How little do we +appreciate its awful mystery! + +Were I writing a mere novel I would, of course, dwell on the joys of +convalescence--describe in touching phrase the quiet content of those +two turtle doves, when one might sit and read the other bits of news of +the outer world, pausing ever and anon to ask, with the love-light in +her glance, if he was sure she was not tiring him. What between Mrs. +Grier, and Maggie, and two of those human angels who wore the uniform +of some great hospital, never was man so waited on. Plenty of good +fellows of my acquaintance have come a cropper at polo, scrunching +their craniums on a maidán hard as iron, without a quarter so much fuss +being made over them. Yet, seeing that I embarked on a semi-scientific +voyage with the pen, so must I end my quest in similar strain. The +surgeon who described Karl’s injuries so lucidly became curious as +to the meaning of certain hints dropped by Hooper and myself, more +especially when he chanced to hear the elder Grier denouncing telegnomy +and all its arts. + +Gradually, feeling my way with the wariness of a mole, I led him along +the underground paths of the sixth sense so far as I could track +them. He listened with increased interest. Ultimately, he asked me to +introduce him to Sir William Macpherson. They discussed learnedly for a +long time, and they agreed, at last, in a mild definition: + +“The upper temporo-sphenoidal lobe contains the cortical auditory +center,” they said. “The functions of the middle and lower lobes are +not definitely ascertained. Karl Grier is stated to have exhibited +abnormal manifestations of unrecognized cerebral activities, and, as +these seem to have ceased since he received the blow, it is advisable +to point out that the resultant fracture of the skull caused a lesion +of the two lobes in question.” + +They would go no further than that in writing. But they went a long +way further in speech, and, if any encouragement on the part of those +eminent specialists could have induced Karl to recover his lost +faculties, that encouragement was certainly forthcoming. + +He has unhesitatingly declined to attempt any such thing. He is happy +in his wife, his children, and his surroundings, and he is not willing +to tempt the fates again. He has admitted to me that he is still aware +of tidal influence (which, be it remembered, affects the solid earth +as well as the unstable water), and he believes he has the power, if +he chose to exert it, of seeing and hearing far more of other people’s +business than he desires to know. + +But he refuses to face the unknown again. He carried the experiment far +beyond the bounds of present scientific investigation. I have described +some part of the inquiry and its outcome. Both of us are content to +allow others to take up the threads of knowledge where they have fallen +from our hands. + + + + +TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES: + + + Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_. + + Perceived typographical errors have been corrected. + + Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized. + + Archaic or variant spelling has been retained. + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 76603 *** |