Author: Various
Date: 0101-01-01T00:00:00+00:00
Description: Another Anthology of out-of-copyright stories in Life+70 jurisdicitions, gathered from newspapers, magazines, and other sources. There are some well-known names among them. 1: The Partner / Joseph Conrad 2: Mr. Lobel's Apoplexy / Irvin S. Cobb 3: The Real Thing / Arthur Savage 4: The Thing in the Upper Room / Arthur Morrison 5: Hermann the Irascible / "Saki" 6: The Miracle of Zobéide / Pierre Mille 7: Catalyst Poison / Malcolm Jameson 8: Brought Down in Flames / F. Britten Austin 9: The Royal Visit / Ethel Lina White 10: Pugh's Poisoned Ring / Richard Marsh 11: The Prince Has The Mumps / Richa

PAST MASTERS 138

Produced and Edited by Terry Walker from short stories in magazines, newspapers and other sources, and all in the Life + 70 years public domain.

17 September 2023

Contents

1: The Partner / Joseph Conrad

2: Mr. Lobel's Apoplexy / Irvin S. Cobb

3: The Real Thing / Arthur Savage

4: The Thing in the Upper Room / Arthur Morrison

5: Hermann the Irascible / "Saki"

6: The Miracle of Zobéide / Pierre Mille

7: Catalyst Poison / Malcolm Jameson

8: Brought Down in Flames / F. Britten Austin

9: The Royal Visit / Ethel Lina White

10: Pugh's Poisoned Ring / Richard Marsh

11: The Prince Has The Mumps / Richard Connell

12: A Twin Identity / Edith Stewart Drewry

13: Go East, Young Man / Sinclair Lewis

14: The Ghost of Grave Gully / Anonymous

15: Dick Thornton's Mistake / Rolf Boldrewood

16: The Gold Brick Twins / Irvin S. Cobb

17: Don't Dream on Midsummer's Eve / Ethel Lina White

_____________________

1: The Partner

Joseph Conrad

1857-1924

Harper's Magazine, Nov 1911

Józef Teodor Konrad Korzeniowski

"AND THAT be hanged for a silly yarn. The boatmen here in Westport have been telling this lie to the summer visitors for years. The sort that gets taken out for a row at a shilling a head— and asks foolish questions— must be told something to pass the time away. D'ye know anything more silly than being pulled in a boat along a beach?… It's like drinking weak lemonade when you aren't thirsty. I don't know why they do it! They don't even get sick."

A forgotten glass of beer stood at his elbow; the locality was a small respectable smoking-room of a small respectable hotel, and a taste for forming chance acquaintances accounts for my sitting up late with him. His great, flat, furrowed cheeks were shaven; a thick, square wisp of white hairs hung from his chin; its waggling gave additional point to his deep utterance; and his general contempt for mankind with its activities and moralities was expressed in the rakish set of his big soft hat of black felt with a large rim, which he kept always on his head.

His appearance was that of an old adventurer, retired after many unholy experiences in the darkest parts of the earth; but I had every reason to believe that he had never been outside England. From a casual remark somebody dropped I gathered that in his early days he must have been somehow connected with shipping— with ships in docks. Of individuality he had plenty. And it was this which attracted my attention at first. But he was not easy to classify, and before the end of the week I gave him up with the vague definition, "an imposing old ruffian."

One rainy afternoon, oppressed by infinite boredom, I went into the smoking-room. He was sitting there in absolute immobility, which was really fakir-like and impressive. I began to wonder what could be the associations of that sort of man, his "milieu," his private connections, his views, his morality, his friends, and even his wife— when to my surprise he opened a conversation in a deep, muttering voice.

I must say that since he had learned from somebody that I was a writer of stories he had been acknowledging my existence by means of some vague growls in the morning.

He was essentially a taciturn man. There was an effect of rudeness in his fragmentary sentences. It was some time before I discovered that what he would be at was the process by which stories— stories for periodicals— were produced.

What could one say to a fellow like that? But I was bored to death; the weather continued impossible; and I resolved to be amiable.

"And so you make these tales up on your own. How do they ever come into your head?" he rumbled.

I explained that one generally got a hint for a tale.

"What sort of hint?"

"Well, for instance," I said, "I got myself rowed out to the rocks the other day. My boatman told me of the wreck on these rocks nearly twenty years ago. That could be used as a hint for a mainly descriptive bit of story with some such title as 'In the Channel,' for instance."

It was then that he flew out at the boatmen and the summer visitors who listen to their tales. Without moving a muscle of his face he emitted a powerful "Rot," from somewhere out of the depths of his chest, and went on in his hoarse, fragmentary mumble. "Stare at the silly rocks— nod their silly heads [the visitors, I presume]. What do they think a man is— blown-out paper bag or what?— go off pop like that when he's hit— Damn silly yarn— Hint indeed!… A lie?"

You must imagine this statuesque ruffian en-haloed in the black rim of his hat, letting all this out as an old dog growls sometimes, with his head up and staring-away eyes.

"Indeed!" I exclaimed. "Well, but even if untrue it is a hint, enabling me to see these rocks, this gale they speak of, the heavy seas, etc., etc., in relation to mankind. The struggle against natural forces and the effect of the issue on at least one, say, exalted—"

He interrupted me by an aggressive—

"Would truth be any good to you?"

"I shouldn't like to say," I answered, cautiously. "It's said that truth is stranger than fiction."

"Who says that?" he mouthed.

"Oh! Nobody in particular."

I turned to the window; for the contemptuous beggar was oppressive to look at, with his immovable arm on the table. I suppose my unceremonious manner provoked him to a comparatively long speech.

"Did you ever see such a silly lot of rocks? Like plums in a slice of cold pudding."

I was looking at them— an acre or more of black dots scattered on the steel-grey shades of the level sea, under the uniform gossamer grey mist with a formless brighter patch in one place— the veiled whiteness of the cliff coming through, like a diffused, mysterious radiance. It was a delicate and wonderful picture, something expressive, suggestive, and desolate, a symphony in grey and black— a Whistler. But the next thing said by the voice behind me made me turn round. It growled out contempt for all associated notions of roaring seas with concise energy, then went on—

"I— no such foolishness— looking at the rocks out there— more likely call to mind an office— I used to look in sometimes at one time— office in London— one of them small streets behind Cannon Street Station…."

He was very deliberate; not jerky, only fragmentary; at times profane.

"That's a rather remote connection," I observed, approaching him.

"Connection? To Hades with your connections. It was an accident."

"Still," I said, "an accident has its backward and forward connections, which, if they could be set forth—"

Without moving he seemed to lend an attentive ear.

"Aye! Set forth. That's perhaps what you could do. Couldn't you now? There's no sea life in this connection. But you can put it in out of your head— if you like."

"Yes. I could, if necessary," I said. "Sometimes it pays to put in a lot out of one's head, and sometimes it doesn't. I mean that the story isn't worth it. Everything's in that."

It amused me to talk to him like this. He reflected audibly that he guessed story-writers were out after money like the rest of the world which had to live by its wits: and that it was extraordinary how far people who were out after money would go…. Some of them.

Then he made a sally against sea life. Silly sort of life, he called it. No opportunities, no experience, no variety, nothing. Some fine men came out of it— he admitted— but no more chance in the world if put to it than fly. Kids. So Captain Harry Dunbar. Good sailor. Great name as a skipper. Big man; short side-whiskers going grey, fine face, loud voice. A good fellow, but no more up to people's tricks than a baby.

"That's the captain of the Sagamore you're talking about," I said, confidently.

After a low, scornful "Of course" he seemed now to hold on the wall with his fixed stare the vision of that city office, "at the back of Cannon Street Station," while he growled and mouthed a fragmentary description, jerking his chin up now and then, as if angry.

It was, according to his account, a modest place of business, not shady in any sense, but out of the way, in a small street now rebuilt from end to end. "Seven doors from the Cheshire Cat public house under the railway bridge. I used to take my lunch there when my business called me to the city. Cloete would come in to have his chop and make the girl laugh. No need to talk much, either, for that. Nothing but the way he would twinkle his spectacles on you and give a twitch of his thick mouth was enough to start you off before he began one of his little tales. Funny fellow, Cloete. C-l-o-e-t-e— Cloete."

"What was he— a Dutchman?" I asked, not seeing in the least what all this had to do with the Westport boatmen and the Westport summer visitors and this extraordinary old fellow's irritable view of them as liars and fools. "Devil knows," he grunted, his eyes on the wall as if not to miss a single movement of a cinematograph picture. "Spoke nothing but English, anyway. First I saw him— comes off a ship in dock from the States— passenger. Asks me for a small hotel near by. Wanted to be quiet and have a look round for a few days. I took him to a place— friend of mine…. Next time— in the City— Hallo! You're very obliging— have a drink. Talks plenty about himself. Been years in the States. All sorts of business all over the place. With some patent medicine people, too. Travels. Writes advertisements and all that. Tells me funny stories. Tall, loose-limbed fellow. Black hair up on end, like a brush; long face, long legs, long arms, twinkle in his specs, jocular way of speaking— in a low voice…. See that?"

I nodded, but he was not looking at me.

"Never laughed so much in my life. The beggar— would make you laugh telling you how he skinned his own father. He was up to that, too. A man who's been in the patent-medicine trade will be up to anything from pitch-and-toss to wilful murder. And that's a bit of hard truth for you. Don't mind what they do— think they can carry off anything and talk themselves out of anything— all the world's a fool to them. Business man, too, Cloete. Came over with a few hundred pounds. Looking for something to do— in a quiet way. Nothing like the old country, after all, says he…. And so we part— I with more drinks in me than I was used to. After a time, perhaps six months or so, I run up against him again in Mr. George Dunbar's office. Yes, that office. It wasn't often that I … However, there was a bit of his cargo in a ship in dock that I wanted to ask Mr. George about. In comes Cloete out of the room at the back with some papers in his hand. Partner. You understand?"

"Aha!" I said. "The few hundred pounds."

"And that tongue of his," he growled. "Don't forget that tongue. Some of his tales must have opened George Dunbar's eyes a bit as to what business means."

"A plausible fellow," I suggested.

"H'm! You must have it in your own way— of course. Well. Partner. George Dunbar puts his top-hat on and tells me to wait a moment…. George always looked as though he were making a few thousands a year— a city swell…. Come along, old man! And he and Captain Harry go out together— some business with a solicitor round the corner. Captain Harry, when he was in England, used to turn up in his brother's office regularly about twelve. Sat in a corner like a good boy, reading the paper and smoking his pipe. So they go out…. Model brothers, says Cloete— two love-birds— I am looking after the tinned-fruit side of this cozy little show…. Gives me that sort of talk. Then by-and-by: What sort of old thing is that Sagamore? Finest ship out— eh? I dare say all ships are fine to you. You live by them. I tell you what; I would just as soon put my money into an old stocking. Sooner!"

He drew a breath, and I noticed his hand, lying loosely on the table, close slowly into a fist. In that immovable man it was startling, ominous, like the famed nod of the Commander.

"So, already at that time— note— already," he growled.

"But hold on," I interrupted. "The Sagamore belonged to Mundy and Rogers, I've been told."

He snorted contemptuously. "Damn boatmen— know no better. Flew the firm's house-flag. That's another thing. Favour. It was like this: When old man Dunbar died, Captain Harry was already in command with the firm. George chucked the bank he was clerking in— to go on his own with what there was to share after the old chap. George was a smart man. Started warehousing; then two or three things at a time: wood-pulp, preserved-fruit trade, and so on. And Captain Harry let him have his share to work with…. I am provided for in my ship, he says…. But by-and-by Mundy and Rogers begin to sell out to foreigners all their ships— go into steam right away. Captain Harry gets very upset— lose command, part with the ship he was fond of— very wretched. Just then, so it happened, the brothers came in for some money— an old woman died or something. Quite a tidy bit. Then young George says: There's enough between us two to buy the Sagamore with…. But you'll need more money for your business, cries Captain Harry— and the other laughs at him: My business is going on all right. Why, I can go out and make a handful of sovereigns while you are trying to get your pipe to draw, old man…. Mundy and Rogers very friendly about it: Certainly, Captain. And we will manage her for you, if you like, as if she were still our own…. Why, with a connection like that it was good investment to buy that ship. Good! Aye, at the time."

The turning of his head slightly toward me at this point was like a sign of strong feeling in any other man.

"You'll mind that this was long before Cloete came into it at all," he muttered, warningly.

"Yes. I will mind," I said. "We generally say: some years passed. That's soon done."

He eyed me for a while silently in an unseeing way, as if engrossed in the thought of the years so easily dealt with; his own years, too, they were, the years before and the years (not so many) after Cloete came upon the scene. When he began to speak again, I discerned his intention to point out to me, in his obscure and graphic manner, the influence on George Dunbar of long association with Cloete's easy moral standards, unscrupulously persuasive gift of humour (funny fellow), and adventurously reckless disposition. He desired me anxiously to elaborate this view, and I assured him it was quite within my powers. He wished me also to understand that George's business had its ups and downs (the other brother was meantime sailing to and fro serenely); that he got into low water at times, which worried him rather, because he had married a young wife with expensive tastes. He was having a pretty anxious time of it generally; and just then Cloete ran up in the city somewhere against a man working a patent medicine (the fellow's old trade) with some success, but which, with capital, capital to the tune of thousands to be spent with both hands on advertising, could be turned into a great thing— infinitely better-paying than a gold-mine. Cloete became excited at the possibilities of that sort of business, in which he was an expert. I understood that George's partner was all on fire from the contact with this unique opportunity.

"So he goes in every day into George's room about eleven, and sings that tune till George gnashes his teeth with rage. Do shut up. What's the good? No money. Hardly any to go on with, let alone pouring thousands into advertising. Never dare propose to his brother Harry to sell the ship. Couldn't think of it. Worry him to death. It would be like the end of the world coming. And certainly not for a business of that kind!… Do you think it would be a swindle? asks Cloete, twitching his mouth…. George owns up: No— would be no better than a squeamish ass if he thought that, after all these years in business.

"Cloete looks at him hard— Never thought of selling the ship. Expected the blamed old thing wouldn't fetch half her insured value by this time. Then George flies out at him. What's the meaning, then, of these silly jeers at ship-owning for the last three weeks? Had enough of them, anyhow.

"Angry at having his mouth made to water, see. Cloete don't get excited…. I am no squeamish ass, either, says he, very slowly. 'Tisn't selling your old Sagamore wants. The blamed thing wants tomahawking (seems the name Sagamore means an Indian chief or something. The figure-head was a half-naked savage with a feather over one ear and a hatchet in his belt). Tomahawking, says he.

"What do you mean? asks George…. Wrecking— it could be managed with perfect safety, goes on Cloete— your brother would then put in his share of insurance money. Needn't tell him exactly what for. He thinks you're the smartest business man that ever lived. Make his fortune, too…. George grips the desk with both hands in his rage…. You think my brother's a man to cast away his ship on purpose. I wouldn't even dare think of such a thing in the same room with him— the finest fellow that ever lived…. Don't make such noise; they'll hear you outside, says Cloete; and he tells him that his brother is the salted pattern of all virtues, but all that's necessary is to induce him to stay ashore for a voyage— for a holiday— take a rest— why not? … In fact, I have in view somebody up to that sort of game— Cloete whispers.

"George nearly chokes…. So you think I am of that sort— you think me capable— What do you take me for?… He almost loses his head, while Cloete keeps cool, only gets white about the gills…. I take you for a man who will be most cursedly hard up before long…. He goes to the door and sends away the clerks— there were only two— to take their lunch hour. Comes back…. What are you indignant about? Do I want you to rob the widow and orphan? Why, man! Lloyd's a corporation, it hasn't got a body to starve. There's forty or more of them perhaps who underwrote the lines on that silly ship of yours. Not one human being would go hungry or cold for it. They take every risk into consideration. Everything I tell you…. That sort of talk. H'm! George too upset to speak— only gurgles and waves his arms; so sudden, you see. The other, warming his back at the fire, goes on. Wood-pulp business next door to a failure. Tinned-fruit trade nearly played out…. You're frightened, he says; but the law is only meant to frighten fools away…. And he shows how safe casting away that ship would be. Premiums paid for so many, many years. No shadow of suspicion could arise. And, dash it all! a ship must meet her end some day….

"I am not frightened. I am indignant, says George Dunbar.

"Cloete boiling with rage inside. Chance of a lifetime— his chance! And he says kindly: Your wife 'll be much more indignant when you ask her to get out of that pretty house of yours and pile in into a two-pair back— with kids perhaps, too….

"George had no children. Married a couple of years; looked forward to a kid or two very much. Feels more upset than ever. Talks about an honest man for father, and so on. Cloete grins: You be quick before they come, and they'll have a rich man for father, and no one the worse for it. That's the beauty of the thing.

"George nearly cries. I believe he did cry at odd times. This went on for weeks. He couldn't quarrel with Cloete. Couldn't pay off his few hundreds; and besides, he was used to have him about. Weak fellow, George. Cloete generous, too…. Don't think of my little pile, says he. Of course it's gone when we have to shut up. But I don't care, he says…. And then there was George's new wife. When Cloete dines there, the beggar puts on a dress suit; little woman liked it; … Mr. Cloete, my husband's partner; such a clever man, man of the world, so amusing! … When he dines there and they are alone: Oh, Mr. Cloete, I wish George would do something to improve our prospects. Our position is really so mediocre…. And Cloete smiles, but isn't surprised, because he had put all these notions himself into her empty head…. What your husband wants is enterprise, a little audacity. You can encourage him best, Mrs. Dunbar…. She was a silly, extravagant little fool. Had made George take a house in Norwood. Live up to a lot of people better off than themselves. I saw her once; silk dress, pretty boots, all feathers and scent, pink face. More like the Promenade at the Alhambra than a decent home, it looked to me. But some women do get a devil of a hold on a man."

"Yes, some do," I assented. "Even when the man is the husband."

"My missis," he addressed me unexpectedly, in a solemn, surprisingly hollow tone, "could wind me round her little finger. I didn't find it out till she was gone. Aye. But she was a woman of sense, while that piece of goods ought to have been walking the streets, and that's all I can say…. You must make her up out of your head. You will know the sort."

"Leave all that to me," I said.

"H'm!" he grunted, doubtfully, then going back to his scornful tone: "A month or so afterwards the Sagamore arrives home. All very jolly at first…. Hallo, George boy! Hallo, Harry, old man!….. But by and by Captain Harry thinks his clever brother is not looking very well. And George begins to look worse. He can't get rid of Cloete's notion. It has stuck in his head…. There's nothing wrong— quite well…. Captain Harry still anxious. Business going all right, eh? Quite right. Lots of business. Good business…. Of course Captain Harry believes that easily. Starts chaffing his brother in his jolly way about rolling in money. George's shirt sticks to his back with perspiration, and he feels quite angry with the captain…. The fool, he says to himself. Rolling in money, indeed! And then he thinks suddenly: Why not?… Because Cloete's notion has got hold of his mind.

"But next day he weakens and says to Cloete… Perhaps it would be best to sell. Couldn't you talk to my brother? and Cloete explains to him over again for the twentieth time why selling wouldn't do, anyhow. No! The Sagamore must be tomahawked— as he would call it; to spare George's feelings, maybe. But every time he says the word, George shudders…. I've got a man at hand competent for the job who will do the trick for five hundred, and only too pleased at the chance, says Cloete…. George shuts his eyes tight at that sort of talk— but at the same time he thinks: Humbug! There can be no such man. And yet if there was such a man it would be safe enough— perhaps.

"And Cloete always funny about it. He couldn't talk about anything without it seeming there was a great joke in it somewhere…. Now, says he, I know you are a moral citizen, George. Morality is mostly funk, and I think you're the funkiest man I ever came across in my travels. Why, you are afraid to speak to your brother. Afraid to open your mouth to him with a fortune for us all in sight…. George flares up at this: no, he ain't afraid; he will speak; bangs fist on the desk. And Cloete pats him on the back…. We'll be made men presently, he says.

"But the first time George attempts to speak to Captain Harry his heart slides down into his boots. Captain Harry only laughs at the notion of staying ashore. He wants no holiday, not he. But Jane thinks of remaining in England this trip. Go about a bit and see some of her people. Jane was the Captain's wife; round-faced, pleasant lady. George gives up that time; but Cloete won't let him rest. So he tries again; and the Captain frowns. He frowns because he's puzzled. He can't make it out. He has no notion of living away from his Sagamore…."

"Ah!" I cried. "Now I understand."

"No, you don't," he growled, his black, contemptuous stare turning on me crushingly.

"I beg your pardon," I murmured.

"H'm! Very well, then. Captain Harry looks very stern, and George crumples all up inside…. He sees through me, he thinks…. Of course it could not be; but George, by that time, was scared at his own shadow. He is shirking it with Cloete, too. Gives his partner to understand that his brother has half a mind to try a spell on shore, and so on. Cloete waits, gnawing his fingers; so anxious. Cloete really had found a man for the job. Believe it or not, he had found him inside the very boarding-house he lodged in— somewhere about Tottenham Court Road. He had noticed down-stairs a fellow— a boarder and not a boarder— hanging about the dark part of the passage mostly; sort of 'man of the house,' a slinking chap. Black eyes. White face. The woman of the house— a widow lady, she called herself— very full of Mr. Stafford; Mr. Stafford this and Mr. Stafford that…. Anyhow, Cloete one evening takes him out to have a drink. Cloete mostly passed away his evenings in saloon bars. No drunkard, though, Cloete; for company; liked to talk to all sorts there; just habit; American fashion.

"So Cloete takes that chap out more than once. Not very good company, though. Little to say for himself. Sits quiet and drinks what's given to him, eyes always half closed, speaks sort of demure…. I've had misfortunes, he says. The truth was they had kicked him out of a big steam-ship company for disgraceful conduct; nothing to affect his certificate, you understand; and he had gone down quite easily. Liked it, I expect. Anything's better than work. Lived on the widow lady who kept that boarding-house."

"That's almost incredible," I ventured to interrupt. "A man with a master's certificate, do you mean?"

"I do; I've known them 'bus cads," he growled, contemptuously. "Yes. Swing on the tail-board by the strap and yell, 'tuppence all the way.' Through drink. But this Stafford was of another kind. Hell's full of such Staffords; Cloete would make fun of him, and then there would be a nasty gleam in the fellow's half-shut eye. But Cloete was generally kind to him. Cloete was a fellow that would be kind to a mangy dog. Anyhow, he used to stand drinks to that object, and now and then gave him half a crown— because the widow lady kept Mr. Stafford short of pocket-money. They had rows almost every day down in the basement….

"It was the fellow being a sailor that put into Cloete's mind the first notion of doing away with the Sagamore. He studies him a bit, thinks there's enough devil in him yet to be tempted, and one evening he says to him … I suppose you wouldn't mind going to sea again, for a spell? … The other never raises his eyes; says it's scarcely worth one's while for the miserable salary one gets…. Well, but what do you say to captain's wages for a time, and a couple of hundred extra if you are compelled to come home without the ship. Accidents will happen, says Cloete…. Oh! sure to, says that Stafford; and goes on taking sips of his drink as if he had no interest in the matter.

"Cloete presses him a bit; but the other observes, impudent and languid like: You see, there's no future in a thing like that— is there? … Oh! no, says Cloete. Certainly not. I don't mean this to have any future— as far as you are concerned. It's a 'once for all' transaction. Well, what do you estimate your future at? he asks…. The fellow more listless than ever— nearly asleep. I believe the skunk was really too lazy to care. Small cheating at cards, wheedling or bullying his living out of some woman or other, was more his style. Cloete swears at him in whispers something awful. All this in the saloon bar of the Horse Shoe, Tottenham Court Road. Finally they agree, over the second sixpennyworth of Scotch hot, on five hundred pounds as the price of tomahawking the Sagamore. And Cloete waits to see what George can do.

"A week or two goes by. The other fellow loafs about the house as if there had been nothing, and Cloete begins to doubt whether he really means ever to tackle that job. But one day he stops Cloete at the door, with his downcast eyes: What about that employment you wished to give me? he asks…. You see, he had played some more than usual dirty trick on the woman and expected awful ructions presently; and to be fired out for sure. Cloete very pleased. George had been prevaricating to him such a lot that he really thought the thing was as well as settled. And he says: Yes. It's time I introduced you to my friend. Just get your hat and we will go now….

"The two come into the office, and George at his desk sits up in a sudden panic— staring. Sees a tallish fellow, sort of nasty-handsome face, heavy eyes, half shut; short drab overcoat, shabby bowler hat, very careful-like in his movements. And he thinks to himself, Is that how such a man looks! No, the thing's impossible…. Cloete does the introduction, and the fellow turns round to look behind him at the chair before he sits down…. A thoroughly competent man, Cloete goes on…. The man says nothing, sits perfectly quiet. And George can't speak, throat too dry. Then he makes an effort: H'm! H'm! Oh yes— unfortunately— sorry to disappoint— my brother— made other arrangements— going himself.

"The fellow gets up, never raising his eyes off the ground, like a modest girl, and goes out softly, right out of the office without a sound. Cloete sticks his chin in his hand and bites all his fingers at once. George's heart slows down and he speaks to Cloete…. This can't be done. How can it be? Directly the ship is lost Harry would see through it. You know he is a man to go to the underwriters himself with his suspicions. And he would break his heart over me. How can I play that on him? There's only two of us in the world belonging to each other….

"Cloete lets out a horrid cuss-word, jumps up, bolts away into his room, and George hears him there banging things around. After a while he goes to the door and says in a trembling voice: You ask me for an impossibility…. Cloete inside ready to fly out like a tiger and rend him, but he opens the door a little way and says softly: Talking of hearts, yours is no bigger than a mouse's, let me tell you…. But George doesn't care— load off the heart, anyhow. And just then Captain Harry comes in…. Hallo, George boy. I am a little late. What about a chop at the Cheshire, now?… Right you are, old man…. And off they go to lunch together. Cloete has nothing to eat that day.

"George feels a new man for a time; but all of a sudden that fellow Stafford begins to hang about the street, in sight of the house door. The first time George sees him he thinks he made a mistake. But no; next time he has to go out, there is the very fellow skulking on the other side of the road. It makes George nervous; but he must go out on business, and when the fellow cuts across the road-way he dodges him. He dodges him once, twice, three times; but at last he gets nabbed in his very doorway…. What do you want? he says, trying to look fierce.

"It seems that ructions had come in the basement of that boarding-house, and the widow lady had turned on him (being jealous mad), to the extent of talking of the police. That Mr. Stafford couldn't stand; so he cleared out like a scared stag, and there he was, chucked into the streets, so to speak. Cloete looked so savage as he went to and fro that he hadn't the spunk to tackle him; but George seemed a softer kind to his eye. He would have been glad of half a quid, anything…. I've had misfortunes, he says softly, in his demure way, which frightens George more than a row would have done…. Consider the severity of my disappointment, he says….

"George, instead of telling him to go to the devil, loses his head…. I don't know you. What do you want? he cries, and bolts up-stairs to Cloete…. Look what's come of it, he gasps; now we are at the mercy of that horrid fellow…. Cloete tries to show him that the fellow can do nothing; but George thinks that some sort of scandal may be forced on, anyhow. Says that he can't live with that horror haunting him. Cloete would laugh if he weren't too weary of it all. Then a thought strikes him and he changes his tune…. Well, perhaps! I will go down-stairs and send him away to begin with…. He comes back…. He's gone. But perhaps you are right. The fellow's hard up, and that's what makes people desperate. The best thing would be to get him out of the country for a time. Look here, the poor devil is really in want of employment. I won't ask you much this time: only to hold your tongue; and I shall try to get your brother to take him as chief officer. At this George lays his arms and his head on his desk, so that Cloete feels sorry for him. But altogether Cloete feels more cheerful because he has shaken the ghost a bit into that Stafford. That very afternoon he buys him a suit of blue clothes, and tells him that he will have to turn to and work for his living now. Go to sea as mate of the Sagamore. The skunk wasn't very willing, but what with having nothing to eat and no place to sleep in, and the woman having frightened him with the talk of some prosecution or other, he had no choice, properly speaking. Cloete takes care of him for a couple of days…. Our arrangement still stands, says he. Here's the ship bound for Port Elizabeth; not a safe anchorage at all. Should she by chance part from her anchors in a north-east gale and get lost on the beach, as many of them do, why, it's five hundred in your pocket— and a quick return home. You are up to the job, ain't you?

"Our Mr. Stafford takes it all in with downcast eyes…. I am a competent seaman, he says, with his sly, modest air. A ship's chief mate has no doubt many opportunities to manipulate the chains and anchors to some purpose…. At this Cloete thumps him on the back: You'll do, my noble sailor. Go in and win….

"Next thing George knows, his brother tells him that he had occasion to oblige his partner. And glad of it, too. Likes the partner no end. Took a friend of his as mate. Man had his troubles, been ashore a year nursing a dying wife, it seems. Down on his luck…. George protests earnestly that he knows nothing of the person. Saw him once. Not very attractive to look at…. And Captain Harry says in his hearty way, That's so, but must give the poor devil a chance….

"So Mr. Stafford joins in dock. And it seems that he did manage to monkey with one of the cables— keeping his mind on Port Elizabeth. The riggers had all the cable ranged on deck to clean lockers. The new mate watches them go ashore— dinner hour— and sends the ship-keeper out of the ship to fetch him a bottle of beer. Then he goes to work whittling away the forelock of the forty-five-fathom shackle-pin, gives it a tap or two with a hammer just to make it loose, and of course that cable wasn't safe any more. Riggers come back— you know what riggers are: come day, go day, and God send Sunday. Down goes the chain into the locker without their foreman looking at the shackles at all. What does he care? He ain't going in the ship. And two days later the ship goes to sea…."

At this point I was incautious enough to breathe out another "I see," which gave offence again, and brought on me a rude "No, you don't"— as before. But in the pause he remembered the glass of beer at his elbow. He drank half of it, wiped his mustaches, and remarked grimly—

"Don't you think that there will be any sea life in this, because there ain't. If you're going to put in any out of your own head, now's your chance. I suppose you know what ten days of bad weather in the Channel are like? I don't. Anyway, ten whole days go by. One Monday Cloete comes to the office a little late— hears a woman's voice in George's room and looks in. Newspapers on the desk, on the floor; Captain Harry's wife sitting with red eyes and a bag on the chair near her…. Look at this, says George, in great excitement, showing him a paper. Cloete's heart gives a jump. Ha! Wreck in Westport Bay. The Sagamore gone ashore early hours of Sunday, and so the newspaper men had time to put in some of their work. Columns of it. Lifeboat out twice. Captain and crew remain by the ship. Tugs summoned to assist. If the weather improves, this well-known fine ship may yet be saved…. You know the way these chaps put it…. Mrs. Harry there on her way to catch a train from Cannon Street. Got an hour to wait.

"Cloete takes George aside and whispers: Ship saved yet! Oh, damn! That must never be; you hear? But George looks at him dazed, and Mrs. Harry keeps on sobbing quietly: … I ought to have been with him. But I am going to him…. We are all going together, cries Cloete, all of a sudden. He rushes out, sends the woman a cup of hot bovril from the shop across the road, buys a rug for her, thinks of everything; and in the train tucks her in and keeps on talking, thirteen to the dozen, all the way, to keep her spirits up, as it were; but really because he can't hold his peace for very joy. Here's the thing done all at once, and nothing to pay. Done. Actually done. His head swims now and again when he thinks of it. What enormous luck! It almost frightens him. He would like to yell and sing. Meantime George Dunbar sits in his corner, looking so deadly miserable that at last poor Mrs. Harry tries to comfort him, and so cheers herself up at the same time by talking about how her Harry is a prudent man; not likely to risk his crew's life or his own unnecessarily— and so on.

"First thing they hear at Westport station is that the life-boat has been out to the ship again, and has brought off the second officer, who had hurt himself, and a few sailors. Captain and the rest of the crew, about fifteen in all, are still on board. Tugs expected to arrive every moment.

"They take Mrs. Harry to the inn, nearly opposite the rocks; she bolts straight up-stairs to look out of the window, and she lets out a great cry when she sees the wreck. She won't rest till she gets on board to her Harry. Cloete soothes her all he can…. All right; you try to eat a mouthful, and we will go to make inquiries.

"He draws George out of the room: Look here, she can't go on board, but I shall. I'll see to it that he doesn't stop in the ship too long. Let's go and find the coxswain of the life-boat…. George follows him, shivering from time to time. The waves are washing over the old pier; not much wind, a wild, gloomy sky over the bay. In the whole world only one tug away off, heading to the seas, tossed in and out of sight every minute as regular as clockwork.

"They meet the coxswain and he tells them: Yes! He's going out again. No, they ain't in danger on board— not yet. But the ship's chance is very poor. Still, if the wind doesn't pipe up again and the sea goes down something might be tried. After some talk he agrees to take Cloete on board; supposed to be with an urgent message from the owners to the captain.

"Whenever Cloete looks at the sky he feels comforted; it looks so threatening. George Dunbar follows him about with a white face and saying nothing. Cloete takes him to have a drink or two, and by and by he begins to pick up…. That's better, says Cloete; dash me if it wasn't like walking about with a dead man before. You ought to be throwing up your cap, man. I feel as if I wanted to stand in the street and cheer. Your brother is safe, the ship is lost, and we are made men.

"Are you certain she's lost? asks George. It would be an awful blow after all the agonies I have gone through in my mind, since you first spoke to me, if she were to be got off— and— and— all this temptation to begin over again…. For we had nothing to do with this; had we?

"Of course not, says Cloete. Wasn't your brother himself in charge? It's providential…. Oh! cries George, shocked…. Well, say it's the devil, says Cloete, cheerfully. I don't mind! You had nothing to do with it any more than a baby unborn, you great softy, you…. Cloete has got so that he almost loved George Dunbar. Well. Yes. That was so. I don't mean he respected him. He was just fond of his partner.

"They go back, you may say fairly skipping, to the hotel, and find the wife of the captain at the open window, with her eyes on the ship as if she wanted to fly across the bay over there…. Now then, Mrs. Dunbar, cries Cloete, you can't go, but I am going. Any messages? Don't be shy. I'll deliver every word faithfully. And if you would like to give me a kiss for him, I'll deliver that too, dash me if I don't.

"He makes Mrs. Harry laugh with his patter…. Oh, dear Mr. Cloete, you are a calm, reasonable man. Make him behave sensibly. He's a bit obstinate, you know, and he's so fond of the ship, too. Tell him I am here— looking on…. Trust me, Mrs. Dunbar. Only shut that window, that's a good girl. You will be sure to catch cold if you don't, and the Captain won't be pleased coming off the wreck to find you coughing and sneezing so that you can't tell him how happy you are. And now if you can get me a bit of tape to fasten my glasses on good to my ears, I will be going….

"How he gets on board I don't know. All wet and shaken and excited and out of breath, he does get on board. Ship lying over, smothered in sprays, but not moving very much; just enough to jag one's nerve a bit. He finds them all crowded on the deck-house forward, in their shiny oilskins, with faces like sick men. Captain Harry can't believe his eyes. What! Mr. Cloete! What are you doing here, in God's name?… Your wife's ashore there, looking on, gasps out Cloete; and after they had talked a bit, Captain Harry thinks it's uncommonly plucky and kind of his brother's partner to come off to him like this. Man glad to have somebody to talk to…. It's a bad business, Mr. Cloete, he says. And Cloete rejoices to hear that. Captain Harry thinks he had done his best, but the cable had parted when he tried to anchor her. It was a great trial to lose the ship. Well, he would have to face it. He fetches a deep sigh now and then. Cloete almost sorry he had come on board, because to be on that wreck keeps his chest in a tight band all the time. They crouch out of the wind under the port boat, a little apart from the men. The life-boat had gone away after putting Cloete on board, but was coming back next high water to take off the crew if no attempt at getting the ship afloat could be made. Dusk was falling; winter's day; black sky; wind rising. Captain Harry felt melancholy. God's will be done. If she must be left on the rocks— why, she must. A man should take what God sends him standing up…. Suddenly his voice breaks, and he squeezes Cloete's arm: It seems as if I couldn't leave her, he whispers. Cloete looks round at the men like a lot of huddled sheep and thinks to himself: They won't stay…. Suddenly the ship lifts a little and sets down with a thump. Tide rising. Everybody beginning to look out for the life-boat. Some of the men made her out far away and also two more tugs. But the gale has come on again, and everybody knows that no tug will ever dare come near the ship.

"That's the end, Captain Harry says, very low…. Cloete thinks he never felt so cold in all his life…. And I feel as if I didn't care to live on just now, mutters Captain Harry…. Your wife's ashore, looking on, says Cloete…. Yes. Yes. It must be awful for her to look at the poor old ship lying here done for. Why, that's our home.

"Cloete thinks that as long as the Sagamore's done for he doesn't care, and only wishes himself somewhere else. The slightest movement of the ship cuts his breath like a blow. And he feels excited by the danger, too. The captain takes him aside…. The life-boat can't come near us for more than an hour. Look here, Cloete, since you are here, and such a plucky one— do something for me…. He tells him then that down in his cabin aft in a certain drawer there is a bundle of important papers and some sixty sovereigns in a small canvas bag. Asks Cloete to go and get these things out. He hasn't been below since the ship struck, and it seems to him that if he were to take his eyes off her she would fall to pieces. And then the men— a scared lot by this time— if he were to leave them by themselves they would attempt to launch one of the ship's boats in a panic at some heavier thump— and then some of them bound to get drowned…. There are two or three boxes of matches about my shelves in my cabin if you want a light, says Captain Harry. Only wipe your wet hands before you begin to feel for them….

"Cloete doesn't like the job, but doesn't like to show funk, either— and he goes. Lots of water on the main-deck, and he splashes along; it was getting dark, too. All at once, by the mainmast, somebody catches him by the arm. Stafford. He wasn't thinking of Stafford at all. Captain Harry had said something as to the mate not being quite satisfactory, but it wasn't much. Cloete doesn't recognise him in his oilskins at first. He sees a white face with big eyes peering at him…. Are you pleased, Mr. Cloete …?

"Cloete is moved to laugh at the whine, and shakes him off. But the fellow scrambles on after him on the poop and follows him down into the cabin of that wrecked ship. And there they are, the two of them; can hardly see each other…. You don't mean to make me believe you have had anything to do with this, says Cloete….

"They both shiver, nearly out of their wits with the excitement of being on board that ship. She thumps and lurches, and they stagger together, feeling sick. Cloete again bursts out laughing at that wretched creature Stafford pretending to have been up to something so desperate…. Is that how you think you can treat me now? yells the other man all of a sudden….

"A sea strikes the stern, the ship trembles and groans all round them, there's the noise of the seas about and overhead, confusing Cloete, and he hears the other screaming as if crazy…. Ah, you don't believe me! Go and look at the port chain. Parted? Eh? Go and see if it's parted. Go and find the broken link. You can't. There's no broken link. That means a thousand pounds for me. No less. A thousand the day after we get ashore— prompt. I won't wait till she breaks up, Mr. Cloete. To the underwriters I go if I've to walk to London on my bare feet. Port cable! Look at her port cable, I will say to them. I doctored it— for the owners— tempted by a low rascal called Cloete.

"Cloete does not understand what it means exactly. All he sees is that the fellow means to make mischief. He sees trouble ahead…. Do you think you can scare me? he asks,— you poor miserable skunk…. And Stafford faces him out— both holding on to the cabin table: No, damn you, you are only a dirty vagabond; but I can scare the other, the chap in the black coat….

"Meaning George Dunbar. Cloete's brain reels at the thought. He doesn't imagine the fellow can do any real harm, but he knows what George is; give the show away; upset the whole business he had set his heart on. He says nothing; he hears the other, what with the funk and strain and excitement, panting like a dog— and then a snarl… A thousand down, twenty-four hours after we get ashore; day after to-morrow. That's my last word, Mr. Cloete…. A thousand pounds, day after to-morrow, says Cloete. Oh yes. And to-day take this, you dirty cur…. He hits straight from the shoulder in sheer rage, nothing else. Stafford goes away spinning along the bulk-head. Seeing this, Cloete steps out and lands him another one somewhere about the jaw. The fellow staggers backward right into the captain's cabin through the open door. Cloete, following him up, hears him fall down heavily and roll to leeward, then slams the door to and turns the key…. There! says he to himself, that will stop you from making trouble."

"By Jove!" I murmured.

The old fellow departed from his impressive immobility to turn his rakishly hatted head and look at me with his old, black, lack-lustre eyes.

"He did leave him there," he uttered, weightily, returning to the contemplation of the wall. "Cloete didn't mean to allow anybody, let alone a thing like Stafford, to stand in the way of his great notion of making George and himself, and Captain Harry, too, for that matter, rich men. And he didn't think much of consequences. These patent-medicine chaps don't care what they say or what they do. They think the world's bound to swallow any story they like to tell…. He stands listening for a bit. And it gives him quite a turn to hear a thump at the door and a sort of muffled raving screech inside the captain's room. He thinks he hears his own name, too, through the awful crash as the oldSagamore rises and falls to a sea. That noise and that awful shock make him clear out of the cabin. He collects his senses on the poop. But his heart sinks a little at the black wildness of the night. Chances that he will get drowned himself before long. Puts his head down the companion. Through the wind and breaking seas he can hear the noise of Stafford's beating against the door and cursing. He listens and says to himself: No. Can't trust him now….

"When he gets back to the top of the deck-house he says to Captain Harry, who asks him if he got the things, that he is very sorry. There was something wrong with the door. Couldn't open it. And to tell you the truth, says he, I didn't like to stop any longer in that cabin. There are noises there as if the ship were going to pieces…. Captain Harry thinks: Nervous; can't be anything wrong with the door. But he says: Thanks— never mind, never mind…. All hands looking out now for the life-boat. Everybody thinking of himself rather. Cloete asks himself, will they miss him? But the fact is that Mr. Stafford had made such poor show at sea that after the ship struck nobody ever paid any attention to him. Nobody cared what he did or where he was. Pitch dark, too— no counting of heads. The light of the tug with the life-boat in tow is seen making for the ship, and Captain Harry asks: Are we all there? … Somebody answers: All here, sir…. Stand by to leave the ship, then, says Captain Harry; and two of you help the gentleman over first…. Aye, aye, sir…. Cloete was moved to ask Captain Harry to let him stay till last, but the life-boat drops on a grapnel abreast the fore-rigging, two chaps lay hold of him, watch their chance, and drop him into her, all safe.

"He's nearly exhausted; not used to that sort of thing, you see. He sits in the stern-sheets with his eyes shut. Don't want to look at the white water boiling all around. The men drop into the boat one after another. Then he hears Captain Harry's voice shouting in the wind to the coxswain, to hold on a moment, and some other words he can't catch, and the coxswain yelling back: Don't be long, sir…. What is it? Cloete asks, feeling faint…. Something about the ship's papers, says the coxswain, very anxious. It's no time to be fooling about alongside, you understand. They haul the boat off a little and wait. The water flies over her in sheets. Cloete's senses almost leave him. He thinks of nothing. He's numb all over, till there's a shout: Here he is! … They see a figure in the fore-rigging waiting— they slack away on the grapnel-line and get him in the boat quite easy. There is a little shouting— it's all mixed up with the noise of the sea. Cloete fancies that Stafford's voice is talking away quite close to his ear. There's a lull in the wind, and Stafford's voice seems to be speaking very fast to the coxswain; he tells him that of course he was near his skipper, was all the time near him, till the old man said at the last moment that he must go and get the ship's papers from aft; would insist on going himself; told him, Stafford, to get into the life-boat…. He had meant to wait for his skipper, only there came this smooth of the seas, and he thought he would take his chance at once.

"Cloete opens his eyes. Yes. There's Stafford sitting close by him in that crowded life-boat. The coxswain stoops over Cloete and cries: Did you hear what the mate said, sir?… Cloete's face feels as if it were set in plaster, lips and all. Yes, I did, he forces himself to answer. The coxswain waits a moment, then says: I don't like it…. And he turns to the mate, telling him it was a pity he did not try to run along the deck and hurry up the captain when the lull came. Stafford answers at once that he did think of it, only he was afraid of missing him on the deck in the dark. For, says he, the captain might have got over at once, thinking I was already in the life-boat, and you would have hauled off perhaps, leaving me behind…. True enough, says the coxswain. A minute or so passes. This won't do, mutters the coxswain. Suddenly Stafford speaks up in a sort of hollow voice: I was by when he told Mr. Cloete here that he didn't know how he would ever have the courage to leave the old ship; didn't he, now? … And Cloete feels his arm being gripped quietly in the dark…. Didn't he now? We were standing together just before you went over, Mr. Cloete? …

"Just then the coxswain cries out: I'm going on board to see…. Cloete tears his arm away: I am going with you….

"When they get aboard, the coxswain tells Cloete to go aft along one side of the ship and he would go along the other so as not to miss the captain…. And feel about with your hands, too, says he; he might have fallen and be lying insensible somewhere on the deck…. When Cloete gets at last to the cabin companion on the poop the coxswain is already there, peering down and sniffing. I detect a smell of smoke down there, says he. And he yells: Are you there, sir?… This is not a case for shouting, says Cloete, feeling his heart go stony, as it were…. Down they go. Pitch dark; the inclination so sharp that the coxswain, groping his way into the captain's room, slips and goes tumbling down. Cloete hears him cry out as though he had hurt himself, and asks what's the matter. And the coxswain answers quietly that he had fallen on the captain, lying there insensible. Cloete without a word begins to grope all over the shelves for a box of matches, finds one, and strikes a light. He sees the coxswain in his cork jacket kneeling over Captain Harry…. Blood, says the coxswain, looking up, and the match goes out….

"Wait a bit, says Cloete; I'll make paper spills…. He had felt the back of books on the shelves. And so he stands lighting one spill from another while the coxswain turns poor Captain Harry over. Dead, he says. Shot through the heart. Here's the revolver…. He hands it up to Cloete, who looks at it before putting it in his pocket, and sees a plate on the butt with H. Dunbar on it…. His own, he mutters…. Whose else revolver did you expect to find? snaps the coxswain. And look, he took off his long oilskin in the cabin before he went in. But what's this lot of burnt paper? What could he want to burn the ship's papers for?…

"Cloete sees all the little drawers drawn out, and asks the coxswain to look well into them…. There's nothing, says the man. Cleaned out. Seems to have pulled out all he could lay his hands on and set fire to the lot. Mad— that's what it is— went mad. And now he's dead. You'll have to break it to his wife….

"I feel as if I were going mad myself, says Cloete, suddenly, and the coxswain begs him for God's sake to pull himself together, and drags him away from the cabin. They had to leave the body, and as it was they were just in time before a furious squall came on. Cloete is dragged into the life-boat and the coxswain tumbles in. Haul away on the grapnel, he shouts; the captain has shot himself….

"Cloete was like a dead man— didn't care for anything. He let that Stafford pinch his arm twice without making a sign. Most of Westport was on the old pier to see the men out of the life-boat, and at first there was a sort of confused cheery uproar when she came alongside; but after the coxswain has shouted something the voices die out, and everybody is very quiet. As soon as Cloete has set foot on something firm he becomes himself again. The coxswain shakes hands with him: Poor woman, poor woman, I'd rather you had the job than I….

"Where's the mate?" asks Cloete. He's the last man who spoke to the master…. Somebody ran along— the crew were being taken to the Mission Hall, where there was a fire and shake-downs ready for them— somebody ran along the pier and caught up with Stafford…. Here! The owner's agent wants you…. Cloete tucks the fellow's arm under his own and walks away with him to the left, where the fishing-harbour is…. I suppose I haven't misunderstood you. You wish me to look after you a bit, says he. The other hangs on him rather limp, but gives a nasty little laugh: You had better, he mumbles; but mind, no tricks; no tricks, Mr. Cloete; we are on land now.

"There's a police office within fifty yards from here, says Cloete. He turns into a little public house, pushes Stafford along the passage. The landlord runs out of the bar…. This is the mate of the ship on the rocks, Cloete explains; I wish you would take care of him a bit to-night…. What's the matter with him? asks the man. Stafford leans against the wall in the passage, looking ghastly. And Cloete says it's nothing— done up, of course…. I will be responsible for the expense; I am the owner's agent. I'll be round in an hour or two to see him.

"And Cloete gets back to the hotel. The news had travelled there already, and the first thing he sees is George outside the door as white as a sheet waiting for him. Cloete just gives him a nod and they go in. Mrs. Harry stands at the head of the stairs, and, when she sees only these two coming up, flings her arms above her head and runs into her room. Nobody had dared tell her, but not seeing her husband was enough. Cloete hears an awful shriek…. Go to her, he says to George.

"While he's alone in the private parlour Cloete drinks a glass of brandy and thinks it all out. Then George comes in…. The landlady's with her, he says. And he begins to walk up and down the room, flinging his arms about and talking, disconnected like, his face set hard as Cloete has never seen it before…. What must be, must be. Dead— only brother. Well, dead— his troubles over. But we are living, he says to Cloete; and I suppose, says he, glaring at him with hot, dry eyes, that you won't forget to wire in the morning to your friend that we are coming in for certain….

"Meaning the patent-medicine fellow…. Death is death and business is business, George goes on; and look— my hands are clean, he says, showing them to Cloete. Cloete thinks: He's going crazy. He catches hold of him by the shoulders and begins to shake him: Damn you— if you had had the sense to know what to say to your brother, if you had had the spunk to speak to him at all, you moral creature you, he would be alive now, he shouts.

"At this George stares, then bursts out weeping with a great bellow. He throws himself on the couch, buries his face in a cushion, and howls like a kid…. That's better, thinks Cloete, and he leaves him, telling the landlord that he must go out, as he has some little business to attend to that night. The landlord's wife, weeping herself, catches him on the stairs: Oh, sir, that poor lady will go out of her mind….

"Cloete shakes her off, thinking to himself: Oh no! She won't. She will get over it. Nobody will go mad about this affair unless I do. It isn't sorrow that makes people go mad, but worry.

"There Cloete was wrong. What affected Mrs. Harry was that her husband should take his own life, with her, as it were, looking on. She brooded over it so that in less than a year they had to put her into a Home. She was very, very quiet; just gentle melancholy. She lived for quite a long time.

"Well, Cloete splashes along in the wind and rain. Nobody in the streets— all the excitement over. The publican runs out to meet him in the passage and says to him: Not this way. He isn't in his room. We couldn't get him to go to bed nohow. He's in the little parlour there. We've lighted him a fire…. You have been giving him drinks too, says Cloete; I never said I would be responsible for drinks. How many?… Two, says the other. It's all right. I don't mind doing that much for a shipwrecked sailor…. Cloete smiles his funny smile: Eh? Come. He paid for them…. The publican just blinks…. Gave you gold, didn't he? Speak up!… What of that! cries the man. What are you after, anyway? He had the right change for his sovereign.

"Just so, says Cloete. He walks into the parlour, and there he sees our Stafford; hair all up on end, landlord's shirt and pants on, bare feet in slippers, sitting by the fire. When he sees Cloete he casts his eyes down.

"You didn't mean us ever to meet again, Mr. Cloete, Stafford says, demurely…. That fellow, when he had the drink he wanted— he wasn't a drunkard— would put on this sort of sly, modest air…. But since the captain committed suicide, he says, I have been sitting here thinking it out. All sorts of things happen. Conspiracy to lose the ship— attempted murder— and this suicide. For if it was not suicide, Mr. Cloete, then I know of a victim of the most cruel, cold-blooded attempt at murder; somebody who has suffered a thousand deaths. And that makes the thousand pounds of which we spoke once a quite insignificant sum. Look how very convenient this suicide is….

"He looks up at Cloete then, who smiles at him and comes quite close to the table.

"You killed Harry Dunbar, he whispers…. The fellow glares at him and shows his teeth: Of course I did! I had been in that cabin for an hour and a half like a rat in a trap…. Shut up and left to drown in that wreck. Let flesh and blood judge. Of course I shot him! I thought it was you, you murdering scoundrel, come back to settle me. He opens the door flying and tumbles right down upon me; I had a revolver in my hand, and I shot him. I was crazy. Men have gone crazy for less.

"Cloete looks at him without flinching. Aha! That's your story, is it?… And he shakes the table a little in his passion as he speaks…. Now listen to mine. What's this conspiracy? Who's going to prove it? You were there to rob. You were rifling his cabin; he came upon you unawares with your hands in the drawer; and you shot him with his own revolver. You killed to steal— to steal! His brother and the clerks in the office know that he took sixty pounds with him to sea. Sixty pounds in gold in a canvas bag. He told me where they were. The coxswain of the life-boat can swear to it that the drawers were all empty. And you are such a fool that before you're half an hour ashore you change a sovereign to pay for a drink. Listen to me. If you don't turn up day after to-morrow at George Dunbar's solicitors, to make the proper deposition as to the loss of the ship, I shall set the police on your track. Day after to-morrow….

"And then what do you think? That Stafford begins to tear his hair. Just so. Tugs at it with both hands without saying anything. Cloete gives a push to the table which nearly sends the fellow off his chair, tumbling inside the fender; so that he has got to catch hold of it to save himself….

"You know the sort of man I am, Cloete says, fiercely. I've got to a point that I don't care what happens to me. I would shoot you now for tuppence.

"At this the cur dodges under the table. Then Cloete goes out, and as he turns in the street— you know, little fishermen's cottages, all dark; raining in torrents, too— the other opens the window of the parlour and speaks in a sort of crying voice—

"You low Yankee fiend— I'll pay you off some day.

"Cloete passes by with a damn bitter laugh, because he thinks that the fellow in a way has paid him off already, if he only knew it."

My impressive ruffian drank what remained of his beer, while his black, sunken eyes looked at me over the rim.

"I don't quite understand this," I said. "In what way?"

He unbent a little and explained without too much scorn that Captain Harry being dead, his half of the insurance money went to his wife, and her trustees of course bought consols with it. Enough to keep her comfortable. George Dunbar's half, as Cloete feared from the first, did not prove sufficient to launch the medicine well; other moneyed men stepped in, and these two had to go out of that business, pretty nearly shorn of everything.

"I am curious," I said, "to learn what the motive force of this tragic affair was— I mean the patent medicine. Do you know?"

He named it, and I whistled respectfully. Nothing less than Parker's Lively Lumbago Pills. Enormous property! You know it; all the world knows it. Every second man, at least, on this globe of ours has tried it.

"Why!" I cried, "they missed an immense fortune."

"Yes," he mumbled, "by the price of a revolver-shot."

He told me also that eventually Cloete returned to the States, passenger in a cargo-boat from Albert Dock. The night before he sailed he met him wandering about the quays, and took him home for a drink. "Funny chap, Cloete. We sat all night drinking grogs, till it was time for him to go on board."

It was then that Cloete, unembittered but weary, told him this story, with that utterly unconscious frankness of a patent-medicine man stranger to all moral standards. Cloete concluded by remarking that he had "had enough of the old country." George Dunbar had turned on him, too, in the end. Cloete was clearly somewhat disillusioned.

As to Stafford, he died, professed loafer, in some East End hospital or other, and on his last day clamoured "for a parson," because his conscience worried him for killing an innocent man. "Wanted somebody to tell him it was all right," growled my old ruffian, contemptuously. "He told the parson that I knew this Cloete who had tried to murder him, and so the parson (he worked among the dock labourers) once spoke to me about it. That skunk of a fellow finding himself trapped yelled for mercy…. Promised to be good and so on…. Then he went crazy… screamed and threw himself about, beat his head against the bulkheads… you can guess all that— eh?… till he was exhausted. Gave up. Threw himself down, shut his eyes, and wanted to pray. So he says. Tried to think of some prayer for a quick death— he was that terrified. Thought that if he had a knife or something he would cut his throat, and be done with it. Then he thinks: No! Would try to cut away the wood about the lock…. He had no knife in his pocket…. He was weeping and calling on God to send him a tool of some kind when suddenly he thinks: Axe! In most ships there is a spare emergency axe kept in the master's room in some locker or other…. Up he jumps…. Pitch dark. Pulls at the drawers to find matches and, groping for them, the first thing he comes upon— Captain Harry's revolver. Loaded too. He goes perfectly quiet all over. Can shoot the lock to pieces. See? Saved! God's providence! There are boxes of matches too. Thinks he: I may just as well see what I am about.

"Strikes a light and sees the little canvas bag tucked away at the back of the drawer. Knew at once what that was. Rams it into his pocket quick. Aha! says he to himself: this requires more light. So he pitches a lot of paper on the floor, set fire to it, and starts in a hurry rummaging for more valuables. Did you ever? He told that East-End parson that the devil tempted him. First God's mercy— then devil's work. Turn and turn about….

"Any squirming skunk can talk like that. He was so busy with the drawers that the first thing he heard was a shout, Great Heavens. He looks up and there was the door open (Cloete had left the key in the lock) and Captain Harry holding on, well above him, very fierce in the light of the burning papers. His eyes were starting out of his head.Thieving, he thunders at him. A sailor! An officer! No! A wretch like you deserves no better than to be left here to drown.

"This Stafford— on his death-bed— told the parson that when he heard these words he went crazy again. He snatched his hand with the revolver in it out of the drawer, and fired without aiming. Captain Harry fell right in with a crash like a stone on top of the burning papers, putting the blaze out. All dark. Not a sound. He listened for a bit then dropped the revolver and scrambled out on deck like mad."

The old fellow struck the table with his ponderous fist.

"What makes me sick is to hear these silly boat-men telling people the captain committed suicide. Pah! Captain Harry was a man that could face his Maker any time up there, and here below, too. He wasn't the sort to slink out of life. Not he! He was a good man down to the ground. He gave me my first job as stevedore only three days after I got married."

As the vindication of Captain Harry from the charge of suicide seemed to be his only object, I did not thank him very effusively for his material. And then it was not worth many thanks in any case.

For it is too startling even to think of such things happening in our respectable Channel in full view, so to speak, of the luxurious continental traffic to Switzerland and Monte Carlo. This story to be acceptable should have been transposed to somewhere in the South Seas. But it would have been too much trouble to cook it for the consumption of magazine readers. So here it is raw, so to speak— just as it was told to me— but unfortunately robbed of the striking effect of the narrator; the most imposing old ruffian that ever followed the unromantic trade of master stevedore in the port of London.

_______________

2: Mr. Lobel's Apoplexy

Irvin S. Cobb

1876-1944

In: Sundry Accounts, 1922

Irvin Shrewsbury Cobb

THE REAL PURPOSE of this is to tell about Mr. Lobel's attack of apoplexy. What comes before must necessarily be in its nature preliminary and preparatory, leading up to the climactic stroke which leaves the distinguished victim stretched upon the bed of affliction.

First let us introduce our principal. Reader, meet Mr. Max Lobel, president of Lobel Masterfilms, Inc., also its founder, its chief stockholder and its general manager. He is a short, broad, thick, globular man and a bald one, wearing gold—rimmed spectacles, carrying a gold—headed cane and using a private gold—mounted toothpick after meals. His collars are of that old—fashioned open—faced kind such as our fathers and Mr. John D. Rockefeller, Sr., used to wear; collars rearing at the back but shorn widely away in front to show two things– namely, the Adam's apple and that Mr. Lobel is conservative. But for his neckwear he patronizes those shops where ties are exclusively referred to as scarves and cost from five dollars apiece up, which proves also he is progressive and keeps abreast of the times. When he walks he favors his feet. Mostly, though, he rides in as good a car as domestic currency can buy in foreign marts.

Aside from his consuming desire to turn out those surpassing achievements of the cellular-cinema art known as Lobel's Masterfilms, he has in life two great passions, one personal in its character, the other national in its scope— the first a craving for fancy waistcoats, the second a yearning to see the name of Max Lobel in print as often as possible and in as large letters as likewise is possible; and for either of these is a plausible explanation. Mr. Lobel has a figure excellently shaped for presenting the patternings of a fanciful stomacher to the world and up until a few years ago there were few occasions when he might hope to see the name Lobel in print. For, know you, Mr. Lobel has not always been in the moving-picture business. Nobody in the moving-picture business has always been in the moving-picture business– excepting some of the child wonders under ten years of age. And ten years ago our hero was the M. Lobel Company, cloak and suit jobbers in rather an inconspicuous Eastern town.

What was true of him as regards his comparatively recent advent into the producing and distributing fields was true of his major associates. Back in 1911 the vice president and second in command, Mr. F. X. Quinlan, moved upward into a struggling infantile industry via the stepping-stone of what in the vernacular of his former calling is known as a mitt joint— summers at Coney, winters in store pitches— where he guided the professional destinies of Madame Zaharat, the Egyptian seeress, in private, then as now, Mrs. F. X. Quinlan née Clardy.

The treasurer and secretary, Mr. Simeon Geltfin, had once upon a time been proprietor of the Ne Plus Ultra Misfit Clothing Parlors at Utica, New York, a place where secondhand habiliments, scoured and ironed, dangled luringly in show windows bearing such enticing labels as "Tailor's Sample— Nobby— $9.80," "Bargain— Take Me Home For $5.60," and "These Trousers Were Uncalled For— $2.75."

The premier director, Mr. Bertram Colfax, numbered not one but two chrysalis changes in his career. In the grub stage, as it were, he had begun life as Lemuel Sims, a very grubby grub indeed, becoming Colfax at the same time he became property man for a repertoire troupe playing county—fair weeks in the Middle West.

As for the scenario editor and continuity writer, he in a prior condition of life had solicited advertisements for a trade journal. So it went right down the line.

At the time of the beginning of this narrative Lobel Masterfilms, Inc., had attained an eminence of what might be called fair-to-medium prominence in the moving-picture field. In other words, it now was able to pay its stars salaries running up into the multiples of tens of thousands of dollars a year and the bank which carried its paper had not yet felt justified in installing a chartered accountant in the home offices to check the finances and collect the interest on the loans outstanding. Before reaching this position the concern had passed through nearly all the customary intervening stages. Nearly a decade rearward, back in the dark ages of the filmic cosmos, the Jurassic Period of pictures, so to speak, this little group of pathfinders tracking under the chieftainship of Mr. Lobel into almost uncharted wilds of artistic endeavor had dabbled in slapstick one reelers featuring the plastic pie and the treacherous seltzer siphon, also the trick staircase, the educated mustache and the performing doormat.

Next— following along the line of least resistance— the adventurers went in more or less extensively for wild-western dramas replete with stagecoach robberies and abounding in hair pants. If the head bad man— not the secondary bad man who stayed bad all through, or the tertiary bad man who was fatally extinguished with gunfire in Reel Two, but the chief, or primary, bad man who reformed and married Little Nell, the unspoiled child of Death Valley— wore the smartest frontier get-up of current year's vintage that the Chicago mail-order houses could turn out; if Little Nell's father, appearing contemporaneously, dressed according to the mode laid down for Forty-niners by such indubitable authorities as Bret Harte; if the sheriff stalked in and out of lens range attired as a Mississippi River gambler was popularly supposed to have been attired in the period 1860 to 1875; and if finally the cavalry troopers from the nearby army post sported the wide hats and khaki shirts which came into governmental vogue about the time of the Spanish War, all very well and good. The action was everything; the sartorial accessories were as they might be and were and frequently still are.

Along here there intruded a season when the Lobel shop tentatively experimented with costume dramas— the Prisoner of Chillon wearing the conventional black and white in alternating stripes of a Georgia chain gang and doing the old Sing Sing lock step and retiring for the night to his donjon cell with a set of shiny and rather modern-looking leg irons on his ankles; Mary Queen of Scots and Catharine de' Medici in costumes strikingly similar; Oliver Goldsmith in Sir Walter Raleigh's neck ruff and Captain Kidd's jack boots.

But this season endured not for long. Costume stuff was nix. It was not what the public wanted. It was over their heads. Mr. Lobel himself said so. Wake him up in the middle of the night and he could tell you exactly what the public did and did not want. Divining the popular will amounted with him to a gift; it approximated an exact art; really it formed the corner stone of his success. Likewise he knew— but this knowledge perhaps had come to him partly by experience rather than altogether by intuition— that historical ten reelers dealing with epochal events in the life of our own people were entirely unsuited for general consumption.

When this particular topic untactfully was broached in his presence Mr. Lobel, recalling the fate of the elaborate feature entitled Let Freedom Ring, had been known to sputter violently and vehemently. Upon this production— now abiding as a memory only, yet a memory bitter as aloes— he had spared neither expense nor pains, even going so far as personally to direct the filming of all the principal scenes. And to what ends? Captious critics, including those who wrote for the daily press and those who merely sent in offensive letters— college professors and such like cheap highbrows— had raised yawping voices to point out that Paul Revere galloping along the pre-Revolutionary turnpike to spread the alarm passed en route two garages and one electric power house; that Washington crossing the Delaware stood in the bow of his skiff half shrouded in an American flag bearing forty-eight stars upon its field of blue; that Andrew Jackson's riflemen filing out from New Orleans to take station behind their cotton-bale breastworks marched for some distance beneath a network of trolley wires; that Abraham Lincoln signing the Emancipation Proclamation did so while seated at a desk in a room which contained in addition to Lincoln and the desk and the Proclamation a typewriter and a Persian rug; that at Manila Bay Admiral Dewey wore spats and a wrist watch.

But these primitive adventurings, these earlier pioneering quests into the realm of the speculative were all in limbo behind them, all wiped off the slate, in part forgiven, in a measure forgotten. Since that primitive beginning and those formulative middle periods Lobel Masterfilms had found their field, and having found it, now plowed and tilled it. To those familiar with the rise and the ever-forward movement of this, now the fourth largest industry in the civilized globe— or is it the third?— it sufficiently will fix the stage of evolutionary development attained by this component unit of that industry when I state that Lobel Masterfilms now dealt preponderantly with vampires. To be sure, it continued to handle such side lines as taffy-haired ingénues from the country, set adrift among the wiles and pitfalls of a cruel city; such incidentals as soft-pie comickers and chin-whiskered by-Hectors; such necessary by-products as rarely beautiful he-juveniles with plush eyelashes and the hair combed slickly back off the forehead in the approved Hudson seal effect— splendid, manly youths these, who might have dodged a draft or two but never yet had flinched from before the camera's aiming muzzle. But even though it had to be conceded that Goldilockses and Prince Charmings endure and that while drolls and jesters may come and go, pies are permanent and stale not, neither do they wither; still, and with all that, such like as these were, in the Lobel scheme of things, merely so many side lines and incidentals and by-products devised and designed to fatten out a program.

Where Mr. Lobel excelled was in the vamp stuff. Even his competitors admitted it the while they vainly strove to rival him. In this, his own chosen realm of exploration and conquest he stood supremely alone; a monarch anointed with the holy oils of superiority, coroneted with success's glittering diadem. Look at his Woman of a Million Sins! Look at his Satan's Stepchild, or How Human Souls are Dragged Down to Hell, in six reels! Look at A Daughter of Darkness! Look at The Wrecker of Lives! Look at The Spider Lady, or The Net Where Men Were the Flies! Look at Fair of Face Yet Black of Heart! All of them his, all box-office best bets and all still going strong!

Moreover by now Lobel Masterfilms had progressed to that milestone on the path of progress and enterprise where genuine live authors— guys that wrote regular books— frequently furnished vehicles for stardom's regal usages. By purchase, upon the basis of so much cash or— as the case might be— so little cash down on the signing of the contract and the promise of so much more— often very very much more— to be paid in royalties out of accrued net profits, the rights to a published work would be acquired. Its name, say, was A Commonplace Person, which promptly would be changed in executive conclave to The Cataract of Destiny, or perhaps Fate's Plaything, or in any event some good catchy title which would look well in electrics and on three sheets.

This important point having been decided on, Mr. Ab Connors, the scenario editor, would take the script in hand to labor and bring forth the screen adaptation. If the principal character in the work, as originally evolved by her creator, was the daughter of a storekeeper in a small town in Indiana who ran away from home and went to Chicago to learn the millinery business, he, wielding a ruthless but gifted blue pencil, would speedily transform her into the ebon-hearted heiress of a Klondyke millionaire, an angel without but a harpy within, and after opening up Reel One with scenes in a Yukon dance hall speedily would move all the important characters to New York, where the plot thickened so fast that only a succession of fade-outs and fade-ins, close-ups and cut-backs saved it from clabbering right on Mr. Connors' hands.

The rest would be largely a matter of continuity and after that there was nothing to worry about except picking out the cast and the locations and building the sets and starting to shoot and mayhap detailing a head office boy to stall off the author in case that poor boob came butting in kicking about changes in his story or squawking about overdue royalty statements or something. Anyhow, what did he know— what could he be expected to know— about continuity or what the public wanted or what the limitations and the possibilities of the screen were? He merely was the poor fish who'd wrote the book and he should ought to be grateful that a fellow with a real noodle had took his stuff and cut all that dull descriptive junk out of it and stuck some pep and action and punch and zip into the thing and wrote some live snappy subtitles, instead of coming round every little while, like he was, horning in and beefing all over the place.

And besides, wasn't he going to have his name printed in all the advertising matter and flashed on the screen, too, in letters nearly a fifth as tall as the letters of Mr. Lobel's name and nearly one-third as tall as the name of the star and nearly one-half as tall as the name of the director and nearly— if not quite— as tall as the name of the camera man, and so get a lot of absolutely free advertising that would be worth thousands of dollars to him and start people all over the country to hearing about him? Certainly he was! And yet, with all that, was there any satisfying some of these cheap ginks? The answer was that there was not.

There was never any trouble, though, about casting the principal rôle. That was easy— a matter of natural selection. If it could be played vampishly from the ground up, and it usually could— trust Mr. Connors for that— it went without question to Vida Monte, greatest of all the luminaries in the Lobel constellation and by universal acknowledgment the best vampire in the business. In vampiring Vida Monte it was who led; others imitatively followed. Compared with her these envying lady copy cats were as pale paprikas are to the real tabasco. Five pictures she had done for Lobel Masterfilms since placing herself under Lobel's management and a Lobel contract, all of them overpowering knock-outs, sensations, sure-fire hits. On the sixth she now was at work and her proud employer in conversation and in announcements to the trade stood sponsor for the pledge that in its filming Monte literally would out-Monte Monte.

Making his word good, he took over volunteer supervision of the main scenes. His high-domed forehead glistening with sweat, his spectacles aflame like twin burning glasses, his coat off, his collar off, his waistcoat off, he snorted and churned, a ninety-horse dynamo of a little fat man, through the hot glary studio, demanding this improvement, detecting that defect, calling for this, that or the other perfect thing in a voice which would have detained the admiring ear of an experienced bull whacker. Before him Josephson, the little camera man, quailed. From his path extra people departed, fleeing headlong; and in his presence property men were as though they were not and never had been. Out of the hands of Bertram Colfax, born Sims, he wrenched a megaphone and through it he bellowed:

"Put more punch in it, Monte— that's what I'm asking you for— the punch! Choke her, Harcourt! Choke him right back, Monte! Now-w-w then, clinch! Clinch and hang on! Good! And now the kiss! You know, Monte, the long kiss— the genuwine Monte kiss! Oh, if you love me, Monte, give me footage on that kiss! That's it— hold it! Hold it! Keep on holding it!"

"But, Mr. Lobel, now," protested Colfax, born a Sims but living it down and feeling that never more than at this minute, when rudely the steersman's helm had been snatched from his grasp, was there greater need that he should be a Colfax through and through–– "but, Mr. Lobel, it was my idea that up to this point anyway the action should be played with restraint to sort of prepare the way for–—"

"What do you mean restraint?"

"Well, I thought to emphasize what comes later— for a sort of comparative value— that if we were just a little subtle at the beginning—"

"Sufficient, Colfax! Listen! Don't come talking to me about no subtles! When you're working the supporting members of the cast you maybe could stick in some subtles once in a while to salve them censors, but so far as Monte is concerned you leave 'em out!"

"But— but—"

"Don't but me any buts! Listen! Ain't I taken my paralyzed oath that this here picture should make all the other vamp pictures which ever were taken look like pikers? I have! Listen! For Monte, the way I feel, I shouldn't care if she don't do a single subtle in the whole damn picture."

He had taken his paralyzed oath and he kept it. It was a wonderful story. The queen of the apaches, ruling the Parisian underworld by her fire, her beauty, her courage, accepts German gold to betray her country, and attempts by siren wiles to seduce from the path of duty Capt. Stuyvesant Schuyler of the U. S. A. general staff; almost succeeds too because of his blind passion for this glorious, sinful creature. At the crucial moment, when about to surrender to his Delilah secrets which would destroy the entire Allied cause and open the gates of Paris to the conquering foe, he is saved by a vision of his sainted, fade-in-and-fade-out mother's face. Overcome with remorse, he resigns his commission, and fleeing from temptation returns to America, a broken-hearted man; proves heart is broken by constantly pressing clenched hand to left breast as though to prevent pieces from slipping down into the abdominal cavity. Distress of the apache queen on finding her intended victim gone. Suddenly a real love, not the love of the wanton, but a purer, deeper emotion wakens in her breast. Close-up showing muscular reflexes produced upon the human face by wakening processes in the heart.

Quitting the gay life, she follows him to Land of Free. Finds him about to marry his sweetheart of childhood, a New York society girl worth uncounted millions but just middling looking. Prompt bust-up of childhood sweetheart's romance. Abandonment of social position, wealth, everything by Schuyler, who declares he will make the stranger his bride— accompanying subtitle, "What should we care what the world may say? For after all, love is all!" Discovery on day before marriage of papers proving that Lolita— that's the lady apache's name— is really Schuyler's half sister, due to carryings-on of Schuyler's late father as a young art student in Paris with Lolita's mother, a famous gypsy model. Renunciation by Lolita of Schuyler. Her suicide by imbibing poison from secret receptacle in ring. Schuyler, after registering copious grief, reënters American Army under assumed name as a private in the ranks. Returns to battlefield in time to take part in decisive action of the war. All the officers in his brigade above the rank of corporal having apparently been killed by one devastating blast of high explosive, he assumes command and leads dauntless charge of the heavy artillery through the Hindenburg Line. Is made a colonel on the spot. Rides up Fifth Avenue alongside of Pershing in grand triumphant parade of homecoming First Division, carrying a large flag and occasionally chatting pleasantly with Pershing. On eve of marriage to childhood's sweetheart, who remains faithful, he goes to lonely spot where Lolita lies buried and places upon the silent mound her favorite flower, a single long—stemmed tiger lily. Fade out— finish!

Artistically, picturesquely, from the standpoint of timeliness, from the standpoint of vampirishness, from any standpoint at all, it satisfied fully every demand. It was one succession of thrilling, gripping, heart-lifting scenes set amid vividly contrasting surroundings— the lowest dive in all Paris; the citadel at Verdun; grand ballroom of the Schuyler mansion at Newport; the Place Vendôme on a day when it was entirely unoccupied except by moving-picture actors; Fifth Avenue on its most gala occasion— these were but a few samples. The subtitles fairly hissed to the sibilant swishing of such words as traitress, temptress, tigress and sorceress. And the name of it— you'd never guess— the name of it was The She-Demon's Doom! When Mr. Lobel spoke those words inspired he literally took them up in his arms and fondled them and kissed them on the temples. And why not? They were his own brain children.

He had kept his paralyzed word and he could prove it. For because this Vida Monte was one of those mimetic pieces of flesh which, without any special mental co-operation, may alter the body, the face, the muscles, the expression, the very look out of the eyes, to suit the demands of prompters and teachers; because of the plan of direction so powerfully engineered by the master mind of Lobel and, under Lobel, the lesser mind of Colfax, born Sims; because of the very nature of the rôle of Lolita the abandoned, this picture was more daring, more sensual, more filled up with voluptuous suggestion, with coiling, clinging, writhing snakiness, with rampant, naked sexuality— in short and in fine was more vampirishly vampiratious than this, the greatest of all modern mediums for the education, the moral uplift and the entertainment of the masses, had ever known.

And then one week to the day after Mr. Lobel shot the last scene she up and died on him.

That is to say, a woman named Glassman, a Hungarian by birth, in age thirty-two years, widowed and without children or known next of kin, died in a small bungalow in a small town up in the coast range north of Los Angeles. When the picture was done and Vida Monte took off the barbaric trappings and the heavy paste jewels and the clinging reptilian half gowns of the rôle she played, with them she took off and laid aside the animal emotionalism, the theatricalistic fever and fervor, the passion and the lure that professionally made up Vida Monte, movie star. She took off even the very aspect of herself as the show shop and as patrons of the cinemas knew her; and she put on a simple traveling gown and she tucked her black hair up in coils beneath a severely plain hat and she became what really she was and always had been— a quiet, self-contained, frugal and— except for her splendid eyes, her fine figure and her full mobile mouth— a not particularly striking-looking woman, by name Sarah Glassman, which was, in fact, her name; and quite alone she got on a train and she went up into the foothills to a tiny bungalow which she had rented there for a month or so to live alone, to do her own simple housekeeping, to sew and to read and to rest.

It was the day after the taking of the last segment of the picture that she went away. It was four days later that she sickened of the Spanish influenza, so called. It was not Spanish and not influenza, though by any other name it would have been as deadly in its devastating sweep across this country. And it was within forty-eight hours after that, on a November afternoon, that word came to the Lobel plant that she was dead. Down there they had not known even that she was sick.

"The doctor in that there little jay town up there by the name Hamletsburg is the one which just gets me on the long-distance telephone and tells me that she died maybe half an hour ago."

Mr. Lobel in his private office was telling it to Vice President Quinlan and Secretary-Treasurer Geltfin, the only two among his associates that his messenger had been able to find about the executive department at the moment. He continued:

"Coming like a complete shock, you could 'a' knocked me down with a feather, I assure you. For a minute I couldn't believe it. This doctor he has to say it to me twice before I get it into my head. Shocking— huh? Sudden— huh? Awful— what? You bet you! That poor girl, for her my heart is bleeding. Dead and gone like that, with absolutely practically no warning! It don't seem possible! Taken down day before yesterday, the doctor says, and commenced getting from bad to worse right away. And this morning she goes out of her head and at two-forty-five this afternoon all of a sudden her heart gives out on her and she is dead before anybody knows it. Awful, awful!"

Mr. Lobel wagged a mournful poll.

"More than awful— actually it is horrifying!" quoth Mr. Geltfin. Visibly at least his distress seemed greater than the distress of either of the others. "All off alone up there by herself in some little rube town it must come to her! Maybe if she had been down here with specialists and surgeons and nurses and all she would 'a' been saved. Too bad, too bad! People got no business going away from a big town! Me, I get nervous even on a motor trip in the country and—"

"Everything possible which could be done was done," resumed Mr. Lobel. "So you don't need you should worry there, Geltfin. The doctor tells me he can't get no regular trained nurse on account there is so much sickness from this flu and no regular nurses there anyway, but he tells me he brings in his wife which she understands nursing and he says the wife sticks right there day and night and gives every attention. There ain't nothing we should reproach ourselves about, and besides we didn't know even she was sick— nobody knew.

"Dead and gone, poor girl, and not one week ago— six days, if I got to be exact— she is sitting right there in that same seat where you're sitting now, Geltfin, looking just as natural and healthy as what you look, Geltfin; looking just as if nothing is ever going to happen to her."

Mr. Geltfin had hastily risen and moved nearer the outer door.

"An awful thing— that flu!" he declared. "Lobel, do you think maybe she could 'a' had the germs of it on her then?"

"Don't be a coward, Geltfin!" rebuked his senior severely. "Look at me how I am not frightened, and yet it was me she seen last, not you! Besides, only today I am reading where that big doctor in Cincinnati, Ohio— Silverwater— says it is not a disease which you could catch from somebody else until after they have actually got down sick with it. Yes, sir, she sits right there telling me good-by. 'Mr. Lobel,' she says to me— I had just handed her her check— 'Mr. Lobel,' she says, 'always to you,' she says, 'I should be grateful. Always to you,' she says, 'I should give thanks that two years ago when I am practically comparatively unknown you should 'a' given me my big chance.' In them very words she says it, and me setting here at this desk listening at her while she said so!

"Well, I ain't lost no time, boys. Before even I sent to find you I already got busy. I've got Appel starting for up there in half an hour in my car to take charge of everything and with orders to spare no expense. The funeral what I am going to give that girl! Well, she deserves it. Always a hard worker, always on the job, always she minds her own business, always she saves her money, always a perfect lady, never throwing any of these here temperamentals, never going off in any of these here highsterics, never making a kick if something goes wrong because it happens I ain't on the lot to run things, never–—"

It threatened to become a soliloquy. This time it was Quinlan who interrupted:

"You said it all, Lobel, and it's no need that you should go on saying it any more. The main points, I take it, are that we're all sorry and that we've lost one swell big asset by her dying— only it's lucky for us she didn't take ill before we got through shooting The She-Demon."

"Lucky? Huh! Actually, lucky ain't the right word for it!" said the president. "When I think of the fix we should 'a' been in if she hadn't finished up the picture first, I assure you, boys, it gives me the shivers. Right here and now in the middle of being sorry it gives me the shivers!"

"It does, does it?" There was something so ominous in Mr. Geltfin's sadly ironic remark— something in tone and accent so lugubriously foreboding that his hearers swung about to stare at him. "It does, does it? Well, all what I've got to say is, Lobel, you've got some shivers coming to you! We've all got some shivers coming to us! Having this girl die on us is bad business!"

"Sure it is," agreed the head, "but it might be worse. There's one awful big salary cut off the pay roll and if we can't have her with us no longer there's nobody else can have her. And the profits from that last picture should ought to be something positively enormous— stupendous— sensational. Listen! I bet you that from the hour we release–—"

"You ain't going to release!" broke in Geltfin, his wizen features sharpening into a peaky mask of grief.

"Don't talk foolishness!" snapped Mr. Lobel. "For why shouldn't we be going to release?"

"That's it— why?" Mr. Quinlan seconded the demand.

"Because you wouldn't dare do it!" In his desire to make clear his point Mr. Geltfin fairly shoveled the words out of himself, bringing them forth overlapping one another like shingles on a roof. "Because the public wouldn't stand for it! Always you brag, Lobel, that you know what the public want! Well then, would the public stand for a picture where a good, decent, straight girl that's dead and will soon be in her grave is for six reels doing all them suggestive vampire stunts like what you yourself, Lobel, made her do? Would the public stand for calling a dead woman names like she-demon? They would not— not in a thousand years— and you should both know it without I should have to tell you! With some pretty rough things we could get by, but with that thing we could never get by! The public, I tell you, would not stand for it. No, sir; when that girl died the picture died with her. You just think it over once!"

Out of popped eyes he glared at them. They glared at him, then they looked at each other. Slowly Mr. Lobel's head drooped forward as though an unseen hand pressed against the back of his neck. Quinlan casting his eyes downward traced with one toe the pattern of the rug under his feet.

On top of one sudden blow, heavy and hard to bear, another now had followed. Since Lobel had become one of the topnotchers with a reputation to maintain, expenses had been climbing by high jumps, but receipts had not kept pace with expenses. There were the vast salaries which even the lesser drawing cards among the stars now demanded— and got. There were war taxes, excess profit taxes, amusement taxes. There was to be included in the reckoning the untimely fate of Let Freedom Ring, a vastly costly thing and quickly laughed to death, yet a smarting memory still. Its failure had put a crimp in the edge of the exchequer. This stroke would run a wide fluting of deficit right through the middle of it.

The pall of silence lasted no longer than it has here taken to describe how it fell and enveloped them. Mr. Geltfin broke the silence without lifting the prevalent gloom. Indeed his words but depressingly served to darken it to a very hue of midnight.

"Besides," he added, "there is anyhow another reason. We know what a nice clean girl she was in private life. We know that all them wild romance stories about her was cooked up in the press department to make the suckers believe that both on and off the screen she was the same. But she wasn't, and so I for one should be afraid that if we put that fillum out she'd come back from the dead to stop it!"

He sank his voice, glancing apprehensively over his shoulder.

"Lobel, you wouldn't dare do it!"

"Lobel," said Quinlan, "he's right! We wouldn't dare do it!"

"Quinlan," admitted Lobel, "it's right— I wouldn't dare do it."

In that same instant of his confession, though, Mr. Lobel bounded out of his chair, magically changing from a dumpy static figure of woe into the dynamo of energy and resourcefulness the glassed-in studios and the out-of-door locations knew.

"I got it!" he whooped. "I got it!" He threw himself at an inner door of the executive suite and jerked it open. "Appel," he shouted, "don't start yet! I got more instructions still for you. And say, Appel, you ain't seen nobody but only Quinlan and Geltfin— eh? You ain't told nobody only just them? Good! Well, don't! Don't telephone nobody! Don't speak a word to nobody! Don't move from where you are!"

He closed the door and stood against it as though to hold his private secretary a close prisoner within, and faced his amazed partners.

"It's a cinch!" he proclaimed to them. "I just this minute thought it up myself. If I must say it myself, always in a big emergency I can think fast. Listen! Nobody ain't going to know Monte is dead; not for a year, not maybe for two years; not until this last big picture is old and worn out; not until we get good and ready they should know. Vida Monte, she goes right on living till we say the word."

"But— but—"

"Wait, wait, can't you? If I must do all the quick thinking for this shop shouldn't I sometimes get a word in sideways? What I'm telling you, if you'll please let me, is this: The girl is dead all right! But nobody knows it only me and you, Quinlan, and you, Geltfin, and Appel in this next room here. Even the doctor up there at Hamletsburg he don't know it and his wife she don't know it and nobody in all that town knows it. And why don't they know? Because they think only it is a woman named Sarah Glassman that is dead. Actually that sickness no doubt changed her so that even if them rubes ever go to see high-class feature fillums there didn't nobody recognize her. If they didn't suspect nothing when she was alive, for why should they suspect something now she is dead? They shouldn't and they won't and they can't!

"What give me the idea was, I just remembered that when the doctor called me up he spoke only the name Glassman, not the name Monte. He tells me he calls up here because he finds in her room where she died a card with the name Lobel Masterfilms on it. And likewise also I just remembered that in the excitement of getting such a sad news over the telephone I don't tell him who really she is neither."

"Holy St. Patrick!" blurted Quinlan, up now on his feet. "You mean, Lobel—"

"Wait, wait, I ain't done— I ain't hardly started!" With flapperlike motions of his hands Mr. Lobel waved him down. "It's easy— a pipe. Listen! To date her salary is paid. The day she went away I gave her a check in full, and if she done what always before she does, it's in the bank drawing interest. Let it go on staying in the bank drawing interest. So far as we know, she ain't got no people in this country at all. In the old country, in Hungary? Maybe, yes. But Hungary is yet all torn up by this war— no regular government there, no regular mails, no American consuls there, no nothing. Time for them foreigners that they should get their hands on her property one year from now or two years or three. They couldn't come to claim it even if we should notify them, which we can't. They don't lose nothing by waiting. Instead they gain— the interest it piles up.

"Should people ask questions, why then through the papers we give it out that Miss Vida Monte is gone far off away somewhere for a long rest; that maybe she don't take no more pictures for a long time. That should make The She-Demon go all the better. And tomorrow up there in that little rube town very quietly we bury Sarah Glassman, deceased, with the burial certificate made out in her own name." He paused a moment to enjoy his triumph. "Boys, when I myself think out something, am I right or am I wrong?"

He answered his own question.

"I'm right!"

By the look on Quinlan's face he read conviction, consent, full and hearty approval. But Geltfin wavered. Inside Geltfin superstition wrestled with opposing thoughts. Upon him then Lobel, the master mind, advanced, dominating the scene and the situation and determined also to dominate the lesser personality.

"But— but say— but look here now, Lobel," stammered Geltfin, hesitating on the verge of a decision, "she might come back."

"Geltfin," commanded Lobel, "you should please shut up. Do you want that we should make a lot of money or do you want that we should lose a lot of money? I ask you. Listen! The dead they don't come back. When just now you made your spiel, that part of it which you said about the dead coming back didn't worry me. It was the part which you said about the public not standing for it that got me, because for once, anyhow, in your life you were right and I give you right. But what the public don't know don't hurt 'em. And the public won't know. You leave it to me!"

It was as though this argument had been a mighty arm outstretched to shove him over the edge. Geltfin ceased to teeter on the brim— he fell in. He nodded in surrender and Lobel quit patting him on the back to wave the vice president into activity.

"Quinlan," he ordered as he might order an office boy, "get busy! Tell 'em to rush The She-Demon! Tell 'em to rush the subtitles and all! Tell 'em to rush out an announcement that the big fillum is going to be released two months before expected— on account the demand of the public is so strong to see sooner the greatest vampire feature ever fillumed."

Quinlan was no office boy, but he obeyed as smartly as might any newly hired office boy.

IF IT WAS Mr. Lobel's genius which guided the course of action, energizing and speeding it, neither could it be denied that circumstance and yet again circumstance and on top of that more circumstance matched in with hue and shade to give protective coloration to his plan. Continued success for it as time should pass seemed assured and guaranteed, seeing that Vida Monte, beyond the studios and off the locations, had all her life walked a way so secluded, so inconspicuous and so utterly commonplace that no human being, whether an attaché of the company or an outsider, would be likely to miss her, or missing her, to pry deeply into the causes for her absence. So much for the contingencies of the future as those in the secret foresaw it. As for the present, that was simplicity.

As quietly as she had moved in those earlier professional days of hers, when she played small rôles in provincial stock companies; as quietly as she had gone on living after film fame and film money came her way; as quietly as she had laid her down and died, so— very quietly— was her body put away in the little cemetery at Hamletsburg. To the physician who had ministered to her, to his good-hearted wife, to the official who issued the burial certificate, to the imported clergyman who held the service, to the few villagers who gathered for the funeral, drawn by the morbid lure which in isolated communities brings folk to any funeral— to all of these the dead woman merely was a stranger with a strange name who, temporarily abiding here, had fallen victim to the plague which filled the land.

Of those who had a hand in the last mortal rôle she would ever play only Lobel's private secretary, young Appel, who came to pay the bills and take over the private effects of this Sarah Glassman and after some fashion to play the rôles of next friend and chief mourner, kenned the truth. The clergyman having done his duty by a deceased coreligionist, to him unknown, went back to the city where he belonged. The physician hurried away from the cemetery to minister to more patients than he properly could care for. The townspeople scattered, intent upon their own affairs. Appel returned to headquarters, reporting all well.

At headquarters all likewise went well— so briskly well in fact that under the urge for haste things essential were accomplished in less time by fewer craftsmen than had been the case since those primitive beginnings when Lobel's, then a struggling short-handed concern, frequently had doubled up its studio staffs for operative service in the makeshift laboratory. Reporting progress to the president, Mr. Quinlan expanded with self-satisfaction.

"I'm fixing to show you something in the way of a speed record," he proudly proclaimed. "The way I looked at it, the fewer people I had rushing this thing through the factory the less chance there was for loose talk round the plant and the less loose talk there was going on round the plant the less chance there was for maybe more loose talk outside. Yes, I know we'd figured we'd got everything caulked up air-tight, but I says to myself, 'What's the use in taking a chance on a leak if you don't have to?'

"So I practically turned the big part of the job— developing and all the rest of it— over to Josephson, same as we used to do back yonder when we was starting out in this game and didn't have a regular film cutter and the camera man had to jump in and develop and cut and assemble and print and everything. Josephson shot all the scenes for The She-Demon— he knows the run of it better even than the director does. Besides, Josephson is naturally close—mouthed. He minds his own business and never butts in anywhere. To look at him you can't never tell what he's thinking about. But even if he suspected anything— and, of course, he don't— he's the kind that'd know enough to keep his trap shut. So I've had him working like a nailer and he's pretty near done.

"Soon as he had the negative ready, which was late yesterday afternoon after you'd went home, I had it run off with nobody there but me and Josephson, and I took a flash at it— and, Lobel, it's a bear! No need for you to worry about the negative— it was a heap too long, of course, in the shape it was yesterday, but it had everything in it we hoped would be in it— and more besides.

"So then without losing a minute I stuck Josephson on the printing machine himself. I'd already gave the girl on the machine a couple of days off to get her out of the way. Josephson stayed on the job alone pretty near all last night, I guess. He had things to himself without anybody to bother him and I tell you he shoved it along.

"Connors ain't lost no time neither. He's got the subtitles pretty near done, and believe it or not, as you're a mind to, but, Lobel, I'm telling you that this time tomorrow morning and not a minute later I'll have the first sample print all cut and assembled and ready for you to give it a look! Then it'll just be a job of matching up the negative and sticking in the subtitles and starting to turn out the positives faster than the shipping—room gang can handle 'em. I guess that ain't moving, heh?"

"Quinlan," said Mr. Lobel, "I give you right."

BY MAKING his word good to the minute the gratified Mr. Quinlan derived additional gratification. At the time appointed they sat in darkness in the body of the projection room— Lobel, Quinlan, Geltfin and Appel, these four and none other— behind a door locked and barred. Promptly on Quinlan's order the operator in the box behind them started his machine and the accomplished rough draft of the great masterpiece leaped into being and actuality upon the lit square toward which they faced.

The beginning was merely a beginning— graphic enough and offering abundant proof that in this epochal undertaking the Lobel shop had spared no expense to make the production sumptuous, but after all only preliminary stuff to sauce the palate of the patron for a greater feast to come and suitably to lead up to the introduction of the star. Soon the star was projected upon the screen, a purring, graceful panther of a woman, to change at once into a sinuous python of a woman and then to merge the feline and the ophidian into a sinister, splendid, menacing composite bespeaking the dramatic conception and the dramatic presentment of all feminine evil, typifying in every move of the lithe, half-clad body, in every shift of the big eyes, wickedness unleashed and unashamed.

Mr. Lobel sitting unseen in the velvet blackness uttered grunts of approbation. The greatest of all film vampires certainly had delivered the goods in this her valedictory. Never before had she so well delivered them. The grunting became a happy rumble.

But all this, too, was in a measure dedicatory— a foretaste of more vivid episodes to follow, when the glorious siren, displaying to the full her powers of fascination over the souls and the bodies of men, would rise to heights yet greater and the primitive passion she so well simulated would shine forth like a malignant jewel in a setting that was semibarbaric and semicivilized, too, and altogether prodigal and lavish. The first of these bigger scenes started— the scene where the queen of the apaches set herself to win the price of her hire from the Germans by seducing the young army officer into a betrayal of the Allied cause; the same scene wherein at the time of filming it Mr. Lobel himself had taken over direction from Colfax's hands.

The scene was launched, acquired headway, then was halted as a bellow from Mr. Lobel warned the operator behind him to cut off the power.

"What the hell!" sputtered the master. "There's a blur on the picture here, a sort of a kind of smokiness. Did you see it, Geltfin? Right almost directly in front of Monte it all of a sudden comes! Did you, Quinlan?"

"Sure I seen it," agreed Geltfin. "Like a spot— sort of."

"It wasn't on the negative when I seen it day before yesterday," stated Quinlan. "I can swear to that. A little defect from faulty printing, I guess."

"All right then," said Mr. Lobel. "Only where you got efficiency like I got it in this plant such things should have no business occurring.

"Go on, operator— let's see how goes it from now on."

Out again two shadow figures— the vampire and the vampire's prey— flashed in motion. Yes, the cloudy spot was there, a bit of murky shadow drifting between the pair of figures and the audience. It thickened and broadened— and then from the suddenly constricted throats of the four watchers, almost as though all in the same moment an invisible hand had laid gripping hold on each of their several windpipes, came a chorused gasp.

For they saw how out of the drifting patch of spumy wrack there emerged a shape vague and indistinct and ghostly, but taking on instantly the sharpened outlines of one they recognized. It was the shape, not of Vida Monte, the fabled wrecker of lives, but the shape of her other self, Sarah Glassman, and the face it wore was not the face of the stage vampire, aflame with the counterfeited evil which the actor woman had so well known how to simulate but the real face of the real woman, who lay dead and buried under a mound of fresh-cut sods seventy miles away— her own face, melancholy and sadly placid, as God had fashioned it for her.

Out from the filmy umbra it advanced to the center, thus hiding its half-naked double writhing in the embrace of the deluded lover, and clearly revealed itself in long sweeping garments of pure white— fit grave clothes for one lately entombed— with great masses of loosened black hair falling like a pall about the passionless brooding face; and now lifting reproachful eyes, it looked out across the intervening void of blackness into their staring eyes, and from the folds of the cerement robes raised a bare arm high as though to forbid a lying sacrilege. And stood there then as a wraith newly freed from the burying mold, filling and dominating the picture so that one looking saw nothing else save the shrouded figure and the head and the face and those eyes and that upheld white arm.

Cowering low in his seat with a sleeve across his eyes to shut out the accusing apparition, Mr. Geltfin whispered between chattering teeth: "I told him! I told him the dead could maybe come back!"

Mr. Quinlan, a bolder nature but even so terribly shaken, was muttering to himself: "But it wasn't in the negative! I swear to God it wasn't in the negative!"

It is probable that Mr. Lobel heard neither of them, or if he heard he gave no heed. He had a feeling that the darkness was smothering him.

"Shut off the machine!" he roared as he wrenched his body free of the snug opera chair in which he sat. "And turn on the lights in this room— quick! And let me out of here— quick!"

Lunging into the darkness he stumbled over Appel's legs and tumbled headlong out into the narrow aisle. On all fours as the lights flashed on, he gave in a choking bellow his commands.

"Burn that print— you hear me, burn it now! And then burn the negative too! Quick you burn it, like I am telling you!"

"But, Lobel, I'll swear to the negative!" protested Quinlan, jealous even in his fright for his own vindication. "If you'll look at the neg—"

"I wouldn't touch it for a million dollars!" roared Lobel. "Burn it up, I tell you! And bury the ashes!"

Still choking, still bellowing, he scrambled to his feet, an ungainly embodiment of mortal agitation, and ran for the door. But Mr. Geltfin beat him to it and through it, Quinlan and Appel following in the order named.

Outside their chief fell up against a wall, panting and wheezing for breath, his face swollen and all congested with purple spots. They thought he was about to have a stroke or a seizure of some sort. But they were wrong. This merely was Nature's warning to a man with a size seventeen neckband and a forty-six-inch girth measurement. The stroke he was to have on the following day.

Probably Quinlan and Geltfin as experienced business men should have known better than to come bursting together into the office of a stout middle-aged man who so lately had suffered a considerable nervous shock and still was unstrung; and having after such unseemly fashion burst in, then to blurt out their tidings in concert without first by soft and soothing words preparing their hearer's system to receive the tidings they bore. But themselves, they were upset by what they just had learned and so perhaps may be pardoned for a seeming unthoughtfulness. Both speaking at once, both made red of face and vehement by mingled emotions of rage and chagrin, each nourishing a perfectly natural and human desire to place the blame for a catastrophe on shoulders other than their own two pairs, they sought to impart the tale they brought. Ensued for an exciting moment a baffling confusion of tongues.

"It was that Josephson done it— the mousy little sneak!"

These words became intelligible as Quinlan, exerting his superior vocal powers, dinned out the sputtering inarticulate accents of Geltfin.

"He fixed it so that you'd spill the beans, Lobel! He fixed The She-Demon— Josephson. And me trusting him!

"How should I be knowing that all this time him and that girl was secretly engaged to be married? How should I be knowing that he would find out for himself the day after the funeral that she was dead and yet never say a word about it? How should I be knowing that he would have all tucked away somewhere a roll of film showing her dressed up like a madonna or a saint or a martyr or a ghost or something which he took privately one time when they was out together on location— slipping away with her and taking 'em without nobody knowing about it? How should I be knowing that without tipping his hand he would cook up the idea to work a slick fake on you, Lobel, and scare you into killing off the whole thing? How should I be knowing that while he was on the printing machine all by himself the other night that he would work the old double exposure stunt and throw such a scare into you in the projecting room yesterday?"

By reason of his valvular resources Mr. Quinlan might shout louder than Geltfin. But he could not shout louder than Mr. Lobel. Nobody in that section of Southern California could. Mr. Lobel outblared him:

"How should you be knowing? You come now and ask me that when all along it was you that had the swell idee to stick him into the laboratory all by himself where he could play some funny business? You!"

"But it was you, Lobel, that wouldn't listen to me when I begged you to wait and not burn up the negative. I tried to tell you that the negative was O. K. when I'd seen it run off."

"You told me? It's a lie!"

"Sure I told you! Geltfin remembers my telling you, don't you, Geltfin? You're an old bird, Lobel— you ought to know by now about retouching and doctoring and all. You know how easy it is to slip over a double exposure. But it was only the sample print that was doctored. The negative was all right, but you wouldn't listen."

"That's right too, Lobel!" shrilled Geltfin. "I heard him when he yelled out to you that you should wait!"

Quinlan amplified the indictment.

"Sure he heard me— and so did you! But no, you had to lose your nerve and lose your head just because you'd had a scare throwed into you."

"I never lose my head! I never lose my nerve!" denied Mr. Lobel. He turned the counter tide of recriminations on Geltfin.

"Anyhow,— it was you started it, Geltfin— you in the first place, right here in this room, with your craziness about the dead coming back. Only for your fool talk I would never have had the idee of a ghost at all. And now— now when the cow is all spilt milk you two come and—"

"Oh, but Lobel," countered Geltfin, "remember you was the one that made 'em burn up the negative without giving it a look at all!"

"He said it, Lobel!" reinforced Quinlan. "You was the one that just would have the negative burned up whether or no. And now it's burned up!"

Mr. Lobel was not used to being bullied in his own office or elsewhere. If there was bullying to be done by anyone, he was his own candidate always. Surcharged with distracting regrets as he was, he had an inspiration. He would turn the flood of accusation away from himself.

"Where is that Josephson?" he whooped. "He is the one actually to blame, not us. Let me get my hands on that Josephson once!"

"You can't!" jeered Quinlan. "He's quit— he's gone— he's beat it! He wrote me a note, though, and mailed it back to me when he was beating it out of town, telling me to tell you how slick he'd worked it on you." He felt in his pockets. "I got that note here somewhere— here it is. I'll read it to you, Lobel— he calls you an old scoundrel in one place and an old sucker in another."

"Look out— catch him, Quinlan!" cried Mr. Geltfin. "Look at his face— he's fixing to faint or something."

THE PRIME INTENT of this recital, as set forth at the beginning, was to tell why Mr. Max Lobel had an attack of apoplexy. That original purpose having been now carried out, there remains nothing more to be added and the chapter ends.

______________

3: The Real Thing

Arthur Savage
fl. 1928-1940

The 20-Story Magazine  June 1930

Australian Women's Weekly 16 Sep 1933

"MY GOD." he says, "what is it?"

I had to look twice myself. I've seen some yachts in my time, but this particular one took my breath away almost. It was like a floating palace. Painted in silver and gold. Flashing in the sun.

"Some Yankee millionaire making a tour round the world, I reckon," I suggested at last. "I'll bet that yacht didn't cost much less than a quarter of a million, and I'm a pretty fair judge of such things as that."

Then, as she got closer, we began to make out things.

"What's that thing she's got flying?" Kelly wants to know. "It's too big for a flag, ain't it?" "I reckon," I agreed.

Because it wasn't a flag. It was a gold and silver banner, "streaming gyroscopically," so to speak. A beautiful banner. Bigger with more flauntings and flouncings to it than any that belonged to "King Kelly's Cannibal Cruises, Limited." Much.

Reality Pictures Corporation.

That was what the gold and silverbanner said.

"Why," I says, "it must be one of them big film companies. I daresay they're making a picture out here."

Kelly makes a face.

"Reality," he says, "humbug! How in Hell can there be anythin' real about such play actin'?" He glares at the beautiful yacht. "All I hope," he says, "is that the particular guy who's runnin' that show doesn't go tryin' to queer my pitch for me. Attractin' my patrons, I mean. If he does—"

The instincts of showmanship in "King" Kelly were touched on the raw by that gold and silver banner, I reckon. It seemed like a kind of chal-lenge. Anyhow, it got Kelly's back up right away.

Next morning, into the black and gold ticket office, comes the great Dwight B. Goldbigger himself. Hanging on his arm is the slimmest, slinkiest little seraph I ever set eyes on.

Eyes as big as saucers, almost, that looked at me and Kelly with a glowing lovelight inside 'em.

Kelly breathes into my ear.

"This is one of them slimming demons from Hollywood or somewhere," he says. "I've read about 'em in the papers. Well, sir, what can I do for you? This is just the morning, sir, to take a trip in one of my marvellous little speedboats to the Cannibal Creeks. Satisfaction guaranteed by 'King' Kelly, sir"— with a little bow— "or your ticket money re-funded in full immediately upon your return.

"What could be fairer than that?" Kelly goes on, beginning to wax eloquent. "The real thing, sir! There's nothin' like it! Nothin'! That's the only reason why 'King' Kelly's Cannibal Cruises are provin' such a tremendous success, sir. The folk you see clamourin' outside the window now, sir, all get satisfaction for their money. Real, dyed-in-the-wool cannibals— practically the last of their kind now in existence— seen in their natural ele-ment, sir. The real thing, sir. That's my motto. There's nothin' to beat the real thing, Sir. Nothin.' "

"Sure," says the great Dwight B Goldbigger, "I guess you and me won't fall out on that little old argument anyhow, young man. The real thing! That's it, young man! It can't be beat. I know!" He beamed at me and Kelly "Now, young man, here's my card. I represent Reality Pictures Corporation I guess you've heard of it?"

"No," says Kelly, telling the truth for about the first time in his life. I reckon, "I ain't. Leastways—"

"Well, I guess some folk ain't never heard of the Wyoming National Park an' the Statue of Liberty," says the great D.B.G., a bit on the sarcastic side. "My little card, young man. This young lady is Miss Poppy Pilchington, our leadin' lady. Reality Pictures Corporation, young man, is the real big noise in the motion picture industry just now. All the other little noises can't make themselves heard when Reality Pictures Corporation is lettin' itself go. No, sir! They can't! Reality Pictures Corporation, young man, deals in realism. I guess you know the meanin' of that word. I can tell you—"

"My patrons," says Kelly grandiloquently, "are satisfied ones. Why are they satisfied ones? You may well ask sir. I can tell you. My patrons are satisfied patrons because I give 'em the real thing."

"I guess you've got horse sense young man. I'm real glad to meet a fellow-being whose views so entirely coincide with my own. Real glad. Now, Reality Pictures Corporation has built up its great reputation because we give the public the real thing. That's why, young man, the entire cast has been brought out here, all the way from the Pacific Coast, to shoot half-a- dozen scenes in the picture we are now makin', 'White Flames in the Southern Seas.' The other little noises in the motion picture industry might have shot these scenes in a 60-foot studio or on the Pacific Coast of America. Yes, sir, so they might! But not Reality Pictures Corporation, young man.

"If I could show you some of the notices which have appeared from time to time in the press of the United States— Well, I guess I'm runnin' away with myself. But I want you to know, young man, that Reality Pictures Cor-poration is never satisfied to indulge in half measures. When Reality Pictures Corporation requires a wreck, the job's done properly. There is a wreck. Why, in San Francisco last fall, Reality Pictures Corporation burnt down a whole block of buildings, at immense cost, just because it insisted upon having the real thing, young man. In a war picture Reality Pictures Corporation made quite recently, three members of the cast were blown through a three inch plate glass roof when a bomb exploded just because we insisted upon reality.

"I guess you begin to understand the kind of concern I have the honor to represent," says the great Dwight B. Goldbigger

"Now, young man, let's get down to business right away. You keep some cannibals on show, eh? Well, young man, Reality Pictures Corporation has need of the services of these cannibals. In the last scene of all, when the ship has been wrecked off the desert island in the midst of the tropic seas, and the crew cast away for several days, strict adherence to the script we are workin' on demands that there shall be a savage encounter between two rival tribes of cannibals, one tribe tactically succeedin' in exterminatin' the other, greatly to the relief of the the hero and heroine and the rest of the castaway crew.

"Now, young man I guess you can get me to rights? I'm here to ask for the temporary services of these cannibals because Reality Pic-tures Corporation always insists upon the real thing. And that, young man, is what you appear to possess. I guess I make myself clear now?"

"Clear as mud," says Kelly. "Clearer in fact."

And it was so.

NEXT MORNING, bright and early, me and Kelly watches Reality Pictures Corporation shooting a scene on the beach below the pier. Poppy Pilchington is there. Just as Nature made her—or almost. She's got on a lovely little green bathing costume, with dinky little shoulder-straps and no back to it, and hardly anything else worth mentioning.

The great D-B.G. is there, too. With a megaphone about as big as a cathedral. And the bloke with the tripod-camera. He keeps clicking away and stopping all of a sudden and the great D.B.G. keeps shouting and cursing, and rushing up and down in a terrible temper most of the time. Hesketh Montgomery— he's the villain of the piece, according to a copy of the script the great D.B.G. has given us— is attempting things with the green bathing costume.

At this point, the hero-in the shape of Jim White, the rough and ready sea captain— jumps into the limelight. There's a Hell of a shemozzle. Leastways, there ought to be a Hell of a one. Only there ain't.

Kelly screws up his face in disgust. Likewise your humble.

"If that's what Reality Pictures Corporation means by the real thing," says Kelly, very disgruntled with the whole affair, "then all I can say is that it's high time Reality Pictures Corporation got found out. Why, I've seen better fights— more realistic ones— between a crab and a lobster before now!"

WELL I'm skipping over much that followed, with Kelly getting more and more disgruntled and talking more and more disrespectfully about Reality Pictures Corporation. Skipping over all that, and lots in between, to the particular date when "King Kelly's Cannibal Cruises, Limited," got busted sky-high. Mind you, I'm not blaming the great Dwight B. Goldbigger entirely. I daresay, when you come to weigh things up, he had some cause for grievance. Still, and all that, I always reckon he showed a nasty nature on top of all else.

I know there's lot of bad feeling and ugly talk on the way back from the gruesome-looking island. I know Kelly and the great D.B.G. are snapping and snarling at one another like wild dogs. But I don't get the real hang of things until the day after we strike land again, because Kelly has insisted on keeping me on board the beautiful gold and silver yacht most of the time. Then, when I'm about to step on shore the great D.B.G. collars hold of me.

"Young man," he says, gnashing his teeth almost, "do you know that you are in partnership with a dirty crook? A twister? A low-down sneakin' bum of a racketeer?" he shouts at me.

"Well, there," I says. "You don't say so," I says. "Well, well. Who would ever have believed it?"

He snarls at me some more before he takes himself off again. And I can see that "King" Kelly himself is on tenterhooks He has need to be. Be-cause the next morning, bright and early, me and Kelly goes along the toy pier and there is the great Dwight B. Goldbigger stamping and raging on an empty crate in front of two or three hundred boneheaded tourists who'd just landed from a steamboat. Kelly goes white round the gills. From white he goes to green. Because the great Dwight B. Goldbigger is talking to them boneheaded tourists, and the boneheaded tourists have got their mouths open listenin' to him. Which looks bad, I will say.

"Ladies an' gentlemen," the great D. B. G. is shouting. "I guess most of you have heard the name of Reality Pictures Corpor-ation at one time or another, I guess, you folks. Reality Pictures Corporation is an institution, like the House of Representatives or the Tower of London! To-day, you folks, Reality Pictures Corporation is the real big drum in the whole of the motion picture industry.

"Right now, I want to put a question to you all. Why is Reality Pictures Corporation the biggest and loudest commercial and entertainment drum that has ever heard itself beaten? I guess I'll answer that little query my-self, folks. It's because Reality Pictures Corporation is never satisfied to give the public anythin' that ain't the real thing! That's why, folks. I'll just give you one little instance of what I mean, because your time, like mine, happens to be valuable, I guess. Well, folks, when Reality Pictures Corporation was makin' its famous picture two summers ago, called 'Fightin' Birds,' it built a real live up-to-date aeroplane factory just outside Concord, New Hampshire—which, as most of you folks know, is called the 'Switzerland of North America.'

"WELL, folks, I don't want to keep you hangin' around until you get cold feet. Perhaps some of you have seen the picture? You have? Well, I guess that kind of sim-plifies my little job here this mornin', anyhow. Folks, when Reality Pictures Corporation made this film, seven brand-new, first-class fighting machines were destroyed and two intrepid pilots who had served in the United States Air Force in the Big Blaze lost their lives merely be-cause Reality Pictures Corporation insisted that the fight scenes which took place should be photographed as they actually might have happened. I could give you a whole list, folks— but none of us ain't got time for that, I fancy. All I want to say, right now, is that Reality Pictures Corporation is now engaged on the makin' of a new picture which is to be called, White Flames in the Southern Seas. We all know the usual South Sea pictures, I guess. The world is sick of 'em. Sick, friends. The world is askin' to be given the real thing in South Seas picturisation. And Reality Films Corporation is now out to give it the real thing, because Reality Pictures Corporation is the one and only concern which can handle such a job."

I looks at Kelly and Kelly looks at me. He gives a sickly sort of smile. Then, as the great D.B.G. takes up the thread of his narrative, so to speak, I can hear Kelly begin to grind his teeth together in fury. And, when you come to consider, you can hardly blame the man.

"Folks, I am not here to advertise Reality Pictures Corporation. I guess the kind of thing Reality Pictures Corporation turns out is sufficient advertisement in itself. What I want to tell you folks is just this: 'Don't be taken in by them flauntin' black and gold banners which are now wavin' over your heads. I say, folks, don't be taken in by 'em. Or by the cheap talk of the feller they belong to. Folks, I ain't the kind of man to bear malice. But I want to tell you all that this feller is out to get your dough anyhow he can— and, if you give him half a chance he'll get it! Folks, let me draw your attention for one moment to them flauntin' banners overhead. Do you see 'em? What does this feller advertise in order to get your dollars? I'll tell you myself. He advertises the real things. In what? Friends, let me answer for you again. He ad-vertises the real thing in cannibals. Cannibals.

"Well, folks, I'm goin' to tell you right now that them cannibals he advertises are a lot of hamstrung humbug. I've seen 'em and I know what I'm talkin' about. Folks, I don't mind admittin' that I've got a particular grievance against 'King Kelly's Cannibal Cruises.' But that grievance ain't everythin'. I'm an artist, friends, and, what's more important still, I represent one of the greatest concerns now existing in the United States of America or any other country on the globe which has built up tradition in the entertainment line by giving the world the real thing.

"And when I come across a low-down cheapjack like this feller, 'King' Kelly, it turns my stomach sour, folks." The great D.B.G. turned and glared at me and Kelly. "Folks, there's the very feller I'm tellin' you about. Right now I'm goin' to challenge him to step up here and tell me. I'm a pie-faced prevaricator of the truth!"

He beckons invitingly to me and Kelly, but Kelly only shakes with temper and curses under his breath. "Folks, 'King Kelly's Cannibal Cruises' are a stinking swindle! Them canni-bals are a walkin' disgrace to the real thing in cannibalism! Them cannibals, folks, are so fat and futile tney couldn't spear a pound of butter. They just ain't got it in 'em, that's all."

He stares round upon the bone-headed tourists and me and Kelly don't feel entirely comfortable for the time being. "Folks, Reality Pictures Corporation has a soul. Yes, friends, I said a soul! Reality Pictures Cor-poration has already spent ten hun-dred thousand dollars in its effort to give you and the rest of the world the real thing in South Seas pictures.

"And now, folks, that ten hundred thousand dollars is practically thrown on the dust-heap because of them rotten cannibals! Folks, Reality Pictures Corporation wanted to film a scene in which two tribes of cannibals practically exterminated each other. For that purpose we got 'King' Kelly to loan us his gang of chocolate-colored vegetarians. Folks, you ought to have been there along with Reality Pictures Corporation and seen that fight. You'd have laughed so much your eyebrows, would have come unstuck. But it ain't a laughin' mat-ter for me, or the rest of us, and that's why, folks. I've come here this mornin', bright an' early, to acquaint you all with the true facts of 'King Kelly's Cannibal Cruises'— to open your eyes, if I can do it, to the cheap, low-down swindle it is. Folks and friends all, I guess I've shot you the whole barrelfull!"

The great D.B.G. climbs down off the crate and the boneheaded tourists all turn and look at me and Kelly. Next moment, we're on the run, with the boneheaded tourists in full cry. It was the beginning of the end of "King Kelly's Cannibal Cruises, Ltd."

PRETTY soon me and Kelly were taking down the black and gold banners. Pretty soon the beautiful little speedboats with the little black and gold flags and the smart young black and gold officers had ceased to speed. "King Kelly's Cannibal Cruises" was bankrupt.

But the old concern, although it was as dead as a doornail, had it up against Reality Pictures Corporation. Kelly was half-witted with rage and thoughts of vengeance. But Reality Pictures Corporation still hung around in the beautiful gold and silver yacht, still went on shooting scenes and scenery, while me and Kelly got lower and lower until the lines of latitude were threatened with curvature of the spine.

All that Kelly had left out of the mess was the ancient little schooner the Merry Mermaid, which had been falling to bits long before President Wilson ever thought up them Fourteen Points of his.

"I'll get even with Reality Pictures Corporation," Kelly would swear at me, "if it takes me the rest of my days to do it in!"

WELL , he always did have ideas, as I've already mentioned, I think. One afternoon we see Reality Pictures Corporation doing things outside the harbor entrance.

"Reality Pictures Corporation," I says, "is now about to stage the wreck. Let's go along and watch how a wreck ought to be wrecked."

Well, it was wrecked. Kelly made a trumpet of his hands and shouted across the water at the great D.B.G.

"My life," he shouts, "d'you call that the real thing? Why," he shouts, "I've, seen better wrecks than that on the kids' pond in Hyde Park!"

"I guess you know as much about wrecks as you do about the ways an', means of man-eaters with two legs and no tails!" the great D.B.G. yells back at him. "Close your gate and take a long sideslip! I don't require no low-down beachcombers to be hangin' around this set!"

Kelly pushes me into the limelight.

"See this fellow?" he shouts. "Well, he's been in three wrecks. Real ones. He's so tickled to death he's turned into a dumb-bell!"

Well, I'm skippin' over a lot more. Because, as Reality Pictures Corporation was always telling folks, time's precious. It only happens once.

Mind you, we never did have an official standing with Reality Pictures Corporation. Kelly had to have some money somehow, so he persuades the great D.B.G. to buy the Merry Mermaid for two hundred dollars, and that was dear at the price, I reckon. But, anyhow, everyone seems satisfied with the deal, even the great D.B.G. him-self. He is going to use the Merry Mermaid in the wreck scene.

That's just where Kelly jumped in again. He could talk the hind leg off a donkey, could Kelly. Even the great D.B.G. was impressed. Kelly told him he knew a lovely place for the wreck to happen in— a tiny bay, as beautiful as Heaven almost— where there was a big reef that stuck up out of the water.

"If you want to do this wreck scene properly," he says, "it's the very place. Now, if you like to pay me and Bill Brown something for our trouble, I'll run you across to it myself."

He did.

Poppy Pilchington and the hero are serenading on deck when Kelly puts the schooner on the reef. You can hear the wood smashing underneath and the water pouring in. Poppy Pilchington starts to scream and the heroic sea captain turns the color of secondhand margarine. As for the great D.B.G.— well, he's like a madman at first, tearing his hair almost. Only Kelly seems to be mildly surprised about things.

"What's the matter now?" he says indignantly. "What are you all shoutin' at me about? You wanted a wreck, didn't you? Well, you've got one!"

We had. There was no going against that argument, anyhow.

"The real thing," says Kelly, who's walking about openly offering congratulations to himself upon the realism which he has conjured up for the express benefit of Reality Pictures Corporation. "The real thing," he says. "It can't be beat, Mr. Goldbigger. I've heard you say so yourself many a time. All you got to do now is to get your cameraman to work and—"

"You crazy fool!" shouts the great D.B.G. "We may get drowned!"

Kelly looks hurt at the suggestion.

"Well, of course," he says, "there's that to be thought of. Still, there's reasonable chances about our survival. And anyhow, think of them poor people who got blown through that plate-glass window," he says, brightly, "and them unfortunate sky pilots. They didn't mind givin' their lives to the great cause, Mr. Goldbigger. In this moment," he says, giving himself a pat on the back, '"we must all bear in mind the cause we are upholdin". Ladies and gentlemen, sea captains included. Nelson expects— I mean," he corrects himself, "Reality Pictures Corporation expects—"

Actually, the chances of our survival were a hundred per cent., because the water inside the reef wouldn't have drowned a pigmy, but Reality Pictures Corporation didn't discover the fact until long after the event so to speak.

The fuss Reality Pictures Corporation was kicking up was shocking. Poppy Pilchington had fainted in the villain's arms. The villain, curiously enough, seemed to be about the only one who hadn't lost his head completely. But the sea captain hero manages to recover himself next moment and snatches Poppy Pilchington out of Hesketh Montgomery's unwilling arms. People were pushin' and shovin' all over the place, and the cameraman wanted to jump over the side, thinking the schooner was going to turn turtle, camera and all. Only Kelly got hold of him. It was Kelly who started to work the camera while the Merry Mermaid was settling her-self well inside the reef and dropping to pieces under our feet.

We all got ashore at last. The hero puts the heroine down on the lovely white beach and bends above her beautiful prostrate form.

"Register emotion," says Kelly encouragingly. "This is the real thing, you know. You ain't actin' now. You're in love with the girl, your heart's on fire," he says, a bit surprised by his own eloquence, "you have just been shipwrecked off a desert island, in the midst of the tropic seas, with the girl you love, and the villain somewhere around, and you don't know if the girl's dead, or dying, or anythin.' Come on, now! That's better!"

Click-click-click...

The great D.B.G. is ragin' on the beach like a lunatic, with the rest of the company looking about as happy as a lot of half-drowned cats in a two-foot crate in the guard's van of the Flying Scotchman doing seventy miles an hour through a raging snowstorm. Suddenly the great D. B. G ceases his stamping and collars hold of Kelly.

"Say, you loon," he screams, "what kind of place are we in now?"

"Why," says Kelly, "I believe it's an island."

"I guess it's an island all right!" The great D.B.G. is foaming at the mouth almost. "But what kind of an island, you goat?"

Kelly pushes him away.

"Don't shout," he says, "I ain't deaf. I reckon this is one of them real desert islands, Mr. Goldbigger," he says, with a pleas-ant little smile. "I said I'd do the job properly, knowing how particular you always are about such things. Look around you, Mr. Goldbigger. The green palms swayin' gently in the white winds of the Southern Seas, the lovely beach, the clear blue skies," he says. "What more could Reality Pictures Corpora-tion ask of one? Why, if we're here a few years—"

"I— I kind of guess you're jokin', young man," says the great D.B.G., all the wind taken out of his sails, so to speak

"Joking? Not me," says Kelly, righteously. "No, I wouldn't do a thing like that, Mr Goldbigger. This is the real thing. A real desert island in the midst of the tropic seas—"

It was, too. There wasn't any chance of floating the Merry Mermaid. Kelly had seen to that all right. But me and Kelly made some trips out to her later in the day and fetched some provisions and clear water.

"Some people are an ungrateful crowd," says Kelly, winking at me. "After the way I've striven to give Reality Pictures Corporation the real stuff to work with—"

TIME glides by.

Reality Pictures Corporation has become a pretty ragged lot. Reality Pic-tures Corporation has whiskers on it. Even the heroine begins to look the real thing in castaway maidens, according to Kelly, who ought to know. Then there's another thing. The hero, Jim White, has fallen in love with her. The real thing, not just play actin', as Kelly contemptuously calls it. And one day, when the sun is streaming down, a fight starts. A real one, too. Between the hero and the villain, who wants the girl.

Kelly rushes across to the great D.B.G., who's looking pretty sick.

"Now's your chance," he says. "Them two fellows are goin' at it hammer an' tongs down on the beach. They look like they're goin' to kill one another any time. Come on, where's that lazy hound of a cameraman?" he shouts.

I daresay we did look much like the real thing by that time, anyhow. Half-starved, in rags, snappin' and snarlin' at each other all day long— and half the night as well. All except Kelly, who seemed to be getting real enjoyment out of the affair. He spends most of his time lugging the great D.B.G. around the island, in the blazing sun, taking bits of film, anything that happens to catch his eye. Sometimes the great D.B.G. is almost sobbing when he gets back along with Kelly. But Kelly's the encouraging kind all right.

"We got to think of Reality Pictures Corporation." he keeps saying. "We can't let the public down."

"I guess I don't care a tin-whistle about the rotten public," shouts the representative of the biggest drum in the motion picture industry that ever heard itself beaten. "When are we goin' to be taken off this blitherin' island? I guess Reality Pictures Corporation can go and take care of itself!"

Then one morning, bright and early, out from the green jungles, comes a bunch of the most hideous-looking people you ever set eyes on. Rings through their noses. Carrying great clubs and spears.

"Cannibals!" says Kelly, clutching hold of the great D.B.G., who's shak-ing like a jelly. "What an opportunity!" he says. "Quick, get the camera in position!"

"I— I guess this is the end of us,'' says the great D.B.G., in a note of resignation. "I guess they'll knock us on the head right away."

"Not likely!" Kelly scoffs at him. "Why, the whole bunch of us wouldn't fill a good-sized cooking-pot! No, sir. we're all right for the time being. They'll keep us a while and fatten us up, and later on, if somethin' don't turn up—"

Click-click-click....

Kelly is working the camera like mad, when all of a sudden, he stops and stares with his mouth wide open.

"What's the matter?" I says. "What's hit you now, Kelly?"

He points with a shaking hand and his face has gone green. Round the headland, streaming towards us, were about a dozen or more canoes, all manned with dusky warriors.

"Well," I says, "I don't see that it matters a heap which lot get hold of us. It'll all be the same in the end, I daresay."'

Kelly's still working the camera, although he seems to be unaware of the fact.

"You idiotic fool," he says. "These other fellows are the real thing!"

Of course, the first lot weren't. They were part of "Kelly's Cannibal Cruises," all dressed up and brought over for the occasion. But the real fellows got busy pretty quick. The "hamstrung humbugs" scattered all over the shop. And then all in the same moment almost there's a terrific crash which knocks me and Kelly off our feet and a shell bursts on the beach below us. On the sea line there's a thin grey smudge of smoke.

"A warship!" says Kelly, beginning to laugh. "And British at that, by the look of her!" She was.

WELL, skipping over much that followed, we come to the time when me and Kelly is sittin' on the lonely beach at Tarookooki, with our rags flappin' on our bodies and the worms gnawing inside. It's about 18 months later on, I reckon, although it might have been a hundred.

"A fine condition for 'King Kelly's Cannibal Cruises' to have got to," says Kelly groaning.

"—wild duck an' green peas," I says, "and a big blackberry pie like my dear old grandmother used to make."

Suddenly we looks up and sees the coffee-colored postman from Taroo-kooki. He shoves a letter at Kelly.

His face works as he reads it. Then, with shaking hand, he passes it across to me.

Reality Pictures Corporation,

124th Street, New York, NY.

Dear Mr. Kelly,

I guess you'll be surprised to have a letter from me, but I've been reckon-ing for some little while that Reality Pictures Corporation owes you some slight acknowledgment for the services you have rendered us. Reality Pictures Corporation, my dear Mr. Kelly, is not the kind of concern to be swayed or influenced by trivial considerations. Reality Pictures Corporation, my dear sir, is far too big-minded to nurse any sense of grievance, either real or imagined, against anyone with whom it has had associations. Now, sir, if I have succeeded in making my meaning clear, I should like to quote you a few extracts from the 'Boston Metropolitan' upon Reality Pictures Corporation's latest release, "White Flames in the Southern Seas."

"Mr. Dwight B. Goldbigger's latest film, 'White Flames in the Southern Seas,' is proving quite a sensational success. In fact, it has taken the picture houses of the United States by storm. Reality Pictures Corporation, which Mr. Gold-bigger represents, has always been noted for the unusual realism of its productions, but it is generally admitted by film fans and critics alike that, on this occasion, it has excelled even its former magnificent achievements. 'White Flames in the Southern Seas' is a masterpiece of realistic acting and photography. The scene where the schooner is wrecked is so realistic in its conception that one might al-most believe it had actually taken place. Take again, just as an example, the fight between the sea captain and the blackguardly ship owner. Or the last scene of all, in which rival bands of cannibals meet on the island beach and fight to the death before they are interrupted by the arrival of a patrolling warship, by which the castaways are eventually rescued. There is only one expression which can do justice to this remarkable picture. Of late we have been surfeited with South Seas films, but it is generally conceded that 'White Flames in the Southern Seas' stands alone. It is the Real Thing."

"Take a look at this," says Kelly, and shoved a draft for five thousand dollars under my nose. "Payable to K. Kelly," he says, "and sent with the compliments of Reality Pictures Corporation.

"Come on," he says, jumping to his feet, "let's go along and cash it right away. Cheques are all right, of course, and I reckon I must have misjudged Reality Pictures Corporation, but you can't beat the real thing."

Well, can you?

_______________

4: The Thing in the Upper Room

Arthur Morrison

1863-1945

The Story-Teller, May 1910

Arthur George Morrison

A SHADOW hung ever over the door, which stood black in the depth of its arched recess, like an unfathomable eye under a frowning brow. The landing was wide and panelled, and a heavy rail, supported by a carved balustrade, stretched away in alternate slopes and levels down the dark staircase, past other doors, and so to the courtyard and the street. The other doors were dark also; but it was with a difference. That top landing was lightest of all, because of the skylight; and perhaps it was largely by reason of contrast that its one doorway gloomed so black and forbidding The doors below opened and shut, slammed, stood ajar. Men and women passed in and out, with talk and human sounds— sometimes even with laughter or a snatch of song; but the door on the top landing remained shut and silent through weeks and months. For, in truth, the logement had an ill name, and had been untenanted for years. Long even before the last tenant had occupied it, the room had been regarded with fear and aversion, and the end of that last tenant had in no way lightened the gloom that hung about the place.

The house was so old that its weather-washed face may well have looked down on the bloodshed of St. Bartholomew's, and the haunted room may even have earned its ill name on that same day of death. But Paris is a city of cruel history, and since the old mansion rose proud and new, the hôtel of some powerful noble, almost any year of the centuries might have seen the blot fall on that upper room that had left it a place of loathing and shadows. The occasion was long forgotten, but the fact remained; whether or not some horror of the ancien régime or some enormity of the Terror was enacted in that room was no longer to be discovered; but nobody would live there, nor stay beyond that gloomy door one second longer than he could help. It might be supposed that the fate of the solitary tenant within living memory had something to do with the matter— and, indeed, his end was sinister enough; but long before his time the room had stood shunned and empty. He, greatly daring, had taken no more heed of the common terror of the room than to use it to his advantage in abating the rent; and he had shot himself a little later, while the police were beating at his door to arrest him on a charge of murder. As I have said, his fate may have added to the general aversion from the place, though it had no in no way originated it; and now ten years had passed, and more, since his few articles of furniture had been carried away and sold; and nothing had been carried in to replace them.

When one is twenty-five, healthy, hungry and poor, one is less likely to be frightened from a cheap lodging by mere headshakings than might be expected in other circumstances. Attwater was twenty-five, commonly healthy, often hungry, and always poor. He came to live in Paris because, from his remembrance of his student days, he believed he could live cheaper there than in London; while it was quite certain that he would not sell fewer pictures, since he had never yet sold one.

It was the concierge of a neighbouring house who showed Attwater the room. The house of the room itself maintained no such functionary, though its main door stood open day and night. The man said little, but his surprise at Attwater's application was plain to see. Monsieur was English? Yes. The logement was convenient, though high, and probably now a little dirty, since it had not been occupied recently. Plainly, the man felt it to be no business of his to enlighten an unsuspecting foreigner as to the reputation of the place; and if he could let it there would be some small gratification from the landlord, though, at such a rent, of course a very small one indeed.

But Attwater was better informed than the concierge supposed. He had heard the tale of the haunted room, vaguely and incoherently, it is true, from the little old engraver of watches on the floor below, by whom he had been directed to the concierge. The old man had been voluble and friendly, and reported that the room had a good light, facing north-east— indeed, a much better light than he, engraver of watches, enjoyed on the floor below. So much so that, considering this advantage and the much lower rent, he himself would have taken the room long ago, except— well, except for other things. Monsieur was a stranger, and perhaps had no fear to inhabit a haunted chamber; but that was its reputation, as everybody in the quarter knew; it would be a misfortune, however, to a stranger to take the room without suspicion, and to undergo unexpected experiences. Here, however, the old man checked himself, possibly reflecting that too much information to inquirers after the upper room might offend his landlord. He hinted as much, in fact, hoping that his friendly warning would not be allowed to travel farther. As to the precise nature of the disagreeable manifestations in the room, who could say? Perhaps there were really none at all. People said this and that. Certainly, the place had been untenanted for many years, and he would not like to stay in it himself. But it might be the good fortune of monsieur to break the spell, and if monsieur was resolved to defy the revenant, he wished monsieur the highest success and happiness.

So much for the engraver of watches; and now the concierge of the neighbouring house led the way up the stately old panelled staircase, swinging his keys in his hand, and halted at last before the dark door in the frowning recess. He turned the key with some difficulty, pushed open the door, and stood back with an action of something not wholly deference, to allow Attwater to enter first.

A sort of small lobby had been partitioned off at some time, though except for this the logement was of one large room only. There was something unpleasant in the air of the place— not a smell, when one came to analyse one's sensations, though at first it might seem so. Attwater walked across to the wide window and threw it open. The chimneys and roofs of many houses of all ages straggled before him, and out of the welter rose the twin towers of St. Sulpice, scarred and grim.

Air the room as one might, it was unpleasant; a sickly, even a cowed, feeling, invaded one through all the senses— or perhaps through none of them. The feeling was there, though it was not easy to say by what channel it penetrated. Attwater was resolved to admit none but a common-sense explanation, and blamed the long closing of door and window; and the concierge, standing uneasily near the door, agreed that that must be it. For a moment Attwater wavered, despite himself. But the rent was very low, and, low as it was, he could not afford a sou more. The light was good, though it was not a top-light, and the place was big enough for his simple requirements. Attwater reflected that he should despise himself ever after if he shrank from the opportunity; it would be one of those secret humiliations that will rise again and again in a man's memory, and make him blush in solitude. He told the concierge to leave door and window wide open for the rest of the day, and he clinched the bargain.

It was with something of amused bravado that he reported to his few friends in Paris his acquisition of a haunted room; for, once out of the place, he readily convinced himself that his disgust and dislike while in the room were the result of imagination and nothing more. Certainly, there was no rational reason to account for the unpleasantness; consequently, what could it be but a matter of fancy? He resolved to face the matter from the beginning, and clear his mind from any foolish prejudices that the hints of the old engraver might have inspired, by forcing himself through whatever adventures he might encounter. In fact, as he walked the streets about his business, and arranged for the purchase and delivery of the few simple articles of furniture that would be necessary, his enterprise assumed the guise of a pleasing adventure. He remembered that he had made an attempt, only a year or two ago, to spend a night in a house reputed haunted in England, but had failed to find the landlord. Here was the adventure to hand, with promise of a tale to tell in future times; and a welcome idea struck him that he might look out the ancient history of the room, and work the whole thing into a magazine article, which would bring a little money.

So simple were his needs that by the afternoon of the day following his first examination of the room it was ready for use.

He took his bag from the cheap hotel in a little street of Montparnasse, where he had been lodging, and carried it to his new home. The key was now in his pocket, and for the first time he entered the place alone. The window remained wide open; but it was still there— that depressing, choking something that entered the consciousness he knew not by what gate. Again he accused his fancy. He stamped and whistled, and set about unpacking a few canvases and a case of old oriental weapons that were part of his professional properties. But he could give no proper attention to the work, and detected himself more than once yielding to a childish impulse to look over his shoulder. He laughed at himself—with some effort—and sat determinedly to smoke a pipe, and grow used to his surroundings. But presently he found himself pushing his chair farther and farther back, till it touched the wall. He would take the whole room into view, he said to himself in excuse, and stare it out of countenance. So he sat and smoked, and as he sat his eye fell on a Malay dagger that lay on the table between him and the window. It was a murderous, twisted thing, and its pommel was fashioned into the semblance of a bird's head, with curved beak and an eye of some dull red stone. He found himself gazing on this red eye with an odd, mindless fascination. The dagger in its wicked curves seemed now a creature of some outlandish fantasy— a snake with a beaked head, a thing of nightmare, in some new way dominant, overruling the centre of his perceptions. The rest of the room grew dim, but the red stone glowed with a fuller light; nothing more was present to his consciousness. Then, with a sudden clang, the heavy bell of St. Sulpice aroused him, and he started up in some surprise.

There lay the dagger on the table, strange and murderous enough, but merely as he had always known it. He observed with more surprise, however, that his chair, which had been back against the wall, was now some six feet forward, close by the table; clearly, he must have drawn it forward in his abstraction, towards the dagger on which his eyes had been fixed...The great bell of St. Sulpice went clanging on, repeating its monotonous call to the Angelus.

He was cold, almost shivering. He flung the dagger into a drawer, and turned to go out. He saw by his watch that it was later than he had supposed; his fit of abstraction must have lasted some time. Perhaps he had even been dozing.

He went slowly downstairs and out into the streets. As he went he grew more and more ashamed of himself, for he had to confess that in some inexplicable way he feared that room. He had seen nothing, heard nothing of the kind that one might have expected, or had heard of in any room reputed haunted; he could not help thinking that it would have been some sort of relief if he had. But there was an all-pervading, overpowering sense of another Presence— something abhorrent, not human, something almost physically nauseous. Withal it was something more than presence; it was power, domination— so he seemed to remember it. And yet the remembrance grew weaker as he walked in the gathering dusk; he thought of a story he had once read of a haunted house wherein it was shown that the house actually was haunted— by the spirit of fear, and nothing else. That, he persuaded himself, was the case with his room; he felt angry at the growing conviction that he had allowed himself to be overborne by fancy— by the spirit of fear.

He returned that night with the resolve to allow himself no foolish indulgence. He had heard nothing and had seen nothing; when something palpable to the senses occurred, it would be time enough to deal with it. He took off his clothes and got into bed deliberately, leaving candle and matches at hand in case of need. He had expected to find some difficulty in sleeping, or at least some delay, but he was scarce well in bed ere he fell into a heavy sleep.

Dazzling sunlight through the window woke him in the morning, and he sat up, staring sleepily about him. He must have slept like a log. But he had been dreaming; the dreams were horrible. His head ached beyond anything he had experienced before, and he was far more tired than when he went to bed. He sank back on the pillow, but the mere contact made his head ring with pain. He got out of bed, and found himself staggering; it was all as though he had been drunk— unspeakably drunk with bad liquor. His dreams— they had been horrid dreams; he could remember that they had been bad, but what they actually were was now gone from him entirely. He rubbed his eyes and stared amazedly down at the table: where the crooked dagger lay, with its bird's head and red stone eye. It lay just as it had lain when he sat gazing at it yesterday, and yet he would have sworn that he had flung that same dagger into a drawer. Perhaps he had dreamed it; at any rate, he put the thing carefully into the drawer now, and, still with his ringing headache, dressed himself and went out.

As he reached the next landing the old engraver greeted him from his door with an inquiring good-day. "Monsieur has not slept well, I fear?"

In some doubt, Attwater protested that he had slept quite soundly. "And as yet I have neither seen nor heard anything of the ghost," he added.

"Nothing?" replied the old man, with a lift of the eyebrows, "nothing at all? It is fortunate. It seemed to me, here below, that monsieur was moving about very restlessly in the night; but no doubt I was mistaken. No doubt, also, I may felicitate monsieur on breaking the evil tradition. We shall hear no more of it; monsieur has the good fortune of a brave heart."

He smiled and bowed pleasantly, but it was with something of a puzzled look that his eyes followed Attwater descending the staircase.

Attwater took his coffee and roll after an hour's walk, and fell asleep in his seat. Not for long, however, and presently he rose and left the café. He felt better, though still unaccountably fatigued. He caught sight of his face in a mirror beside a shop window, and saw an improvement since he had looked in his own glass. That indeed had brought him a shock. Worn and drawn beyond what might have been expected of so bad a night, there was even something more. What was it? How should it remind him of that old legend— was it Japanese?— which he had tried to recollect when he had wondered confusedly at the haggard apparition that confronted him? Some tale of a demon-possessed person who in any mirror, saw never his own face, but the face of the demon.

Work he felt to be impossible, and he spent the day on garden seats, at café tables, and for a while in the Luxembourg. And in the evening he met an English friend, who took him by the shoulders and looked into his eyes, shook him, and declared that he had been overworking, and needed, above all things, a good dinner, which he should have instantly. "You'll dine with me," he said, "at La Perouse, and we'll get a cab to take us there. I'm hungry."

As they stood and looked for a passing cab a man ran shouting with newspapers. "We'll have a cab," Attwater's friend repeated, "and we'll take the new murder with us for conversation's sake. Hi! Journal!"

He bought a paper, and followed Attwater into the cab. "I've a strong idea I knew the poor old boy by sight," he said. "I believe he'd seen better days."

"Who?"

"The old man who was murdered in the Rue Broca last night. The description fits exactly. He used to hang about the cafés and run messages. It isn't easy to read in this cab; but there's probably nothing fresh in this edition. They haven't caught the murderer, anyhow."

Attwater took the paper, and struggled to read it in the changing light. A poor old man had been found dead on the footpath of the Rue Broca, torn with a score of stabs. He had been identified— an old man not known to have a friend in the world; also, because he was so old and so poor, probably not an enemy. There was no robbery; the few sous the old man possessed remained in his pocket. He must have been attacked on his way home in the early hours of the morning, possibly by a homicidal maniac, and stabbed again and again with inconceivable fury. No arrest had been made.

Attwater pushed the paper way: "Pah!" he said; "I don't like it. I'm a bit off colour, and I was dreaming horribly all last night; though why this should remind me of it I can't guess. But it's no cure for the blues, this!"

"No," replied his friend heartily; "we'll get that upstairs, for here we are, on the quay. A bottle of the best Burgundy on the list and the best dinner they can do— that's your physic. Come!"

It was a good prescription, indeed. Attwater's friend was cheerful and assiduous, and nothing could have bettered the dinner. Attwater found himself reflecting that indulgence in the blues was a poor pastime, with no better excuse than a bad night's rest. And last night's dinner in comparison with this! Well, it was enough to have spoiled his sleep, that one-franc-fifty dinner.

Attwater left La Perouse as gay as his friend. They had sat late, and now there was nothing to do but cross the water and walk a little in the boulevards. This they did, and finished the evening at a café table with half a dozen acquaintances.

Attwater walked home with a light step, feeling less drowsy than at any time during the day. He was well enough. He felt he should soon get used to the room. He had been a little too much alone lately, and that had got on his nerves. It was simply stupid.

Again he slept quickly and heavily and dreamed. But he had an awakening of another sort. No bright sun blazed in at the open window to lift his heavy lids, and no morning bell from St. Sulpice opened his ears to the cheerful noise of the city. He awoke gasping and staring in the dark, rolling face-downward on the floor, catching his breath in agonized sobs; while through the window from the streets came a clamour of hoarse cries: cries of pursuit and the noise of running men: a shouting and clatter wherein here and there a voice was clear among the rest— "A l'assassin! Arrêtez!"

He dragged himself to his feet in the dark, gasping still. What was this— all this? Again a dream? His legs trembled under him, and he sweated with fear. He made for the window, panting and feeble; and then, as he supported himself by the sill, he realized wonderingly that he was fully dressed— that he wore even his hat. The running crowd straggled through the outer street and away, the shouts growing fainter. What had wakened him? Why had he dressed? He remembered his matches, and turned to grope for them; but something was already in his hand— something wet, sticky. He dropped it on the table, and even as he struck the light, before he saw it, he knew. The match sputtered and flared, and there on the table lay the crooked dagger, smeared and dripping and horrible.

Blood was on his hands— the match stuck in his fingers. Caught at the heart by the first grip of an awful surmise, he looked up and saw in the mirror before him, in the last flare of the match, the face of the Thing in the Room.

________________

5: Hermann The Irascible

A Story of the Great Weep

"Saki"

1870-1916

The Westminster Gazette, 24 Dec 1909

Hector Hugh Munro

IT WAS in the second decade of the twentieth century, after the Great Plague had devastated England, that Hermann the Irascible, nicknamed also the Wise, sat on the British throne. The Mortal Sickness had swept away the entire Royal Family, unto the third and fourth generations, and thus it came to pass that Hermann the Fourteenth of Saxe-Drachsen-Wachtelstein, who had stood thirtieth in the order of succession, found himself one day ruler of the British dominions within and beyond the seas. He was one of the unexpected things that happen in politics, and he happened with great thoroughness. In many ways he was the most progressive monarch who had sat on an important throne; before people knew where they were, they were somewhere else. Even his Ministers, progressive though they were by tradition, found it difficult to keep pace with his legislative suggestions.

"As a matter of fact," admitted the Prime Minister, "we are hampered by these votes-for-women creatures; they disturb our meetings throughout the country, and they try to turn Downing Street into a sort of political picnic-ground."

"They must be dealt with," said Hermann.

"Dealt with," said the Prime Minister; "exactly, just so; but how?"

"I will draft you a Bill," said the King, sitting down at his typewriting machine, "enacting that women shall vote at all future elections. Shall vote, you observe; or, to put it plainer, must. Voting will remain optional, as before, for male electors; but every woman between the ages of twenty-one and seventy will be obliged to vote, not only at elections for Parliament, county councils, district boards, parish councils, and municipalities, but for coroners, school inspectors, churchwardens, curators of museums, sanitary authorities, police-court interpreters, swimming-bath instructors, contractors, choir-masters, market superintendents, art-school teachers, cathedral vergers, and other local functionaries whose names I will add as they occur to me. All these offices will become elective, and failure to vote at any election falling within her area of residence will involve the female elector in a penalty of £10. Absence, unsupported by an adequate medical certificate, will not be accepted as an excuse. Pass this Bill through the two Houses of Parliament and bring it to me for signature the day after to-morrow."

From the very outset the Compulsory Female Franchise produced little or no elation even in circles which had been loudest in demanding the vote. The bulk of the women of the country had been indifferent or hostile to the franchise agitation, and the most fanatical Suffragettes began to wonder what they had found so attractive in the prospect of putting ballot-papers into a box. In the country districts the task of carrying out the provisions of the new Act was irksome enough; in the towns and cities it became an incubus. There seemed no end to the elections. Laundresses and seamstresses had to hurry away from their work to vote, often for a candidate whose name they hadn't heard before, and whom they selected at haphazard; female clerks and waitresses got up extra early to get their voting done before starting off to their places of business. Society women found their arrangements impeded and upset by the continual necessity for attending the polling stations, and week-end parties and summer holidays became gradually a masculine luxury. As for Cairo and the Riviera, they were possible only for genuine invalids or people of enormous wealth, for the accumulation of £10 fines during a prolonged absence was a contingency that even ordinarily wealthy folk could hardly afford to risk.

It was not wonderful that the female disfranchisement agitation became a formidable movement. The No-Votes-for-Women League numbered its feminine adherents by the million; its colours, citron and old Dutch-madder, were flaunted everywhere, and its battle hymn, "We don't want to Vote," became a popular refrain. As the Government showed no signs of being impressed by peaceful persuasion, more violent methods came into vogue. Meetings were disturbed, Ministers were mobbed, policemen were bitten, and ordinary prison fare rejected, and on the eve of the anniversary of Trafalgar women bound themselves in tiers up the entire length of the Nelson column so that its customary floral decoration had to be abandoned. Still the Government obstinately adhered to its conviction that women ought to have the vote.

Then, as a last resort, some woman wit hit upon an expedient which it was strange that no one had thought of before. The Great Weep was organized. Relays of women, ten thousand at a time, wept continuously in the public places of the Metropolis. They wept in railway stations, in tubes and omnibuses, in the National Gallery, at the Army and Navy Stores, in St. James's Park, at ballad concerts, at Prince's and in the Burlington Arcade. The hitherto unbroken success of the brilliant farcical comedy "Henry's Rabbit" was imperilled by the presence of drearily weeping women in stalls and circle and gallery, and one of the brightest divorce cases that had been tried for many years was robbed of much of its sparkle by the lachrymose behaviour of a section of the audience.

"What are we to do?" asked the Prime Minister, whose cook had wept into all the breakfast dishes and whose nursemaid had gone out, crying quietly and miserably, to take the children for a walk in the Park.

"There is a time for everything," said the King; "there is a time to yield. Pass a measure through the two Houses depriving women of the right to vote, and bring it to me for the Royal assent the day after to-morrow."

As the Minister withdrew, Hermann the Irascible, who was also nicknamed the Wise, gave a profound chuckle.

"There are more ways of killing a cat than by choking it with cream," he quoted, "but I'm not sure," he added, "that it's not the best way."

________________

6: The Miracle of Zobéide

Pierre Mille

1864-1941

Library of the World’s Best Mystery and Detective Stories, 1907

(Edited by Julian Hawthorne)

Translator unknown

ALWAYS WISE and prudent, Zobéide cautiously put aside the myrtle branches and peeped through to see who were the persons talking by the fountain in the cool shadow of the pink sandstone wall. And when she saw that it was only the Rev. John Feathercock, her lord and master, discoursing as usual with Mohammed-si-Koualdia, she went toward them frankly but slowly.

When she was quite near she stopped, and from the light that played in her deep black eyes you would have thought that surely she was listening with the deepest attention. But the truth is that with all her little brain, with all her mouth, and with all her stomach, she was craving the yellow and odorous pulp of a melon which had been cut open and put on the table near two tall glasses half filled with snowy sherbet. For Zobéide was a turtle of the ordinary kind found in the grass of all the meadows around the city of Damascus.

As she waited, Mohammed continued his story:

"And, as I tell you, O reverend one abounding in virtues, this lion which still lives near Tabariat, was formerly a strong lion, a wonderful lion, a lion among lions! To-day, even, he can strike a camel dead with one blow of his paw, and then, plunging his fangs into the spine of the dead animal, toss it upon his shoulders with a single movement of his neck. But unfortunately, having one day brought down a goat in the chase by simply blowing upon it the breath of his nostrils, the lion was inflated with pride and cried: 'There is no god but God, but I am as strong as God. Let him acknowledge it!' Allah, who heard him, Allah, the All-powerful, said in a loud voice, 'O lion of Tabariat, try now to carry off thy prey!' Then the lion planted his great teeth firmly in the spine of the animal, right under the ears, and attempted to throw it on his back. Onallahi! It was as though he had tried to lift Mount Libanus, and his right leg fell lamed to the ground. And the voice of Allah still held him, declaring: 'Lion, nevermore shalt thou kill a goat!' And it has remained thus to this day: the lion of Tabariat has still all his old-time power to carry off camels, but he can never do the slightest harm to even a new-born kid. The goats of the flocks dance in front of him at night, deriding him to his face, and always from that moment his right leg has been stiff and lame."

"Mohammed," said the Rev. Mr. Feathercock contemptuously, "these are stories fit only for babies."

"How, then!" replied Mohammed-si-Koualdia. "Do you refuse to believe that God is able to do whatever he may wish, that the world itself is but a perpetual dream of God's and that, in consequence, God may change this dream at will? Are you a Christian if you deny the power of the All-powerful?"

"I am a Christian," replied the clergyman with a trace of embarrassment; "but for a long time we have been obliged to admit, we pastors of the civilized Church of the Occident, that God would not be able, without belying himself, to change the order of things which he established when he created the universe. We consider that faith in miracles is a superstition which we must leave to the monks of the Churches of Rome and of Russia, and also to your Mussulmans who live in ignorance of the truth. And it is in order to teach you this truth that I have come here to your country, and at the same time to fight against the pernicious political influence exerted by these same Romish and Greek monks of whom I have just been speaking."

"By invoking the name of Allah," responded Mohammed with intense solemnity, "and by virtue of the collar-bone of the mighty Solomon, I can perform great miracles. You see this turtle before us? I shall cause it to grow each day the breadth of a finger!"

In saying these words he made a sudden movement of his foot toward Zobéide, and Zobéide promptly drew her head into her shell.

"You claim to be able to work a miracle like that!" said the clergyman scornfully. "You, Mohammed, a man immersed in sin, a Mussulman whom I have seen drunk!"

"I was drunk," replied Mohammed calmly, "but not as drunk as others."

"So you think yourself able to force the power of Allah!" pursued Mr. Feathercock, disdaining the interruption.

"I could do it without a moment's difficulty," said Mohammed.

Taking Zobéide in his hand he lifted her to the table. The frightened turtle had again drawn in her head. Nothing could be seen but the black-encircled golden squares of her shell against a background of juicy melon pulp. Mohammed chanted:

"Thou thyself art a miracle, O turtle! For thy head is the head of a serpent, thy tail the tail of a water rat, thy bones are bird's bones and thy covering is of stone; and yet thou knowest love as it is known by men. And from thy eggs, O turtle of stone, other turtles come forth.

"Thou thyself art a miracle, O turtle! For one would say that thou wert a shell, naught but a shell, and behold! thou art a beast that eats. Eat of this melon, O turtle, and grow this night the length of my nail, if Allah permit!

"And when thou hast grown by the breadth of a finger, O turtle, eat further of this melon, or of its sister, another melon, and grow further by the breadth of a finger until thou hast reached the size of a mosque. Thou thyself art a miracle, O shell endowed with life! Perform still another miracle, if Allah permit, if Allah permit!"

Zobéide, reassured by the monotony of his voice, decided at last to come out of her shell. First she showed the point of her little horny nose, then her black eyes, her flat-pointed tail, and finally her strong little claw-tipped feet. Seeing the melon, she made a gesture of assent, and began to eat.

"Nothing in the world will happen!" remarked the Rev. John Feathercock rather doubtfully.

"Wait and see," answered Mohammed gravely. "I shall come back to-morrow!"

The next morning he returned, measured Zobéide with his fingers and declared:

"She has grown!"

"Do you imagine you can make me believe such a thing?" cried Mr. Feathercock anxiously.

"It is written in the Koran," answered Mohammed: "'I swear by the rosy glow which fills the air when the sun is setting, by the shades of the night, and by the light of the moon, that ye shall all change, in substance and in size!' Allah has manifested himself; the size of this turtle has changed. It will continue to change. Measure it yourself and you will see."

Mr. Feathercock did measure Zobéide, and was forced to admit that she had indeed grown the breadth of a finger. He became thoughtful.

Thus day by day Zobéide grew in size, in vigor and in appetite. At first she had only been as big as a saucer, and took each day but a few ounces of nourishment. Then she reached the size of a dessert plate, then of a soup plate. With her strong beak she could split the rind of a melon at a blow; distinctly could be heard the sound of her heavy jaws as she crunched the sweet pulp of the fruits which she loved, and which she devoured in great quantities. In one week she had grown so tremendously that she was as big as a meat platter. The Rev. Mr. Feathercock no longer dared to go near this monster, from whose eyes seemed to glisten a look of deviltry. And, always and forever, apparently devoured by a perpetual hunger, the monster ate.

The members of Mr. Feathercock's flock came to hear that he was keeping in his house a turtle that had been enchanted in the name of Allah and not by the power of the Occidental Divinity: this proved to be anything but helpful to the evangelical labors of the clergyman. But he himself refused steadily and obstinately to believe in the miracle, although Mohammed-si-Koualdia had never set foot in the house since the day when he had invoked the charm. He remained outside the grounds, seated at the door of a little café, plunged in meditation or in dreams, and consuming hashish in large quantities. At the end of some time Mr. Feathercock succeeded in persuading himself that what he was witnessing was nothing more nor less than a perfectly simple and natural phenomenon, perhaps not well understood hitherto, and due entirely to the extraordinarily favorable action of melon pulp on the physical development of turtles. He decided to cut off Zobéide's supply of melons.

Finally there came a day when Mohammed, drunk with hashish, saw Hakem, Mr. Feathercock's valet, returning from market with a large bunch of fresh greens. He rose majestically, though with features distorted by the drug, and followed the boy with hasty steps.

"Miserable one!" cried he to Mr. Feathercock. "Wretched worm, you have tried to break the charm! Rejoice then, for you have succeeded and it is broken. But let despair follow upon the heels of your rapture, for it is broken in a way that you do not dream. Henceforth your turtle shall dwindle away day by day!"

The Rev. Mr. Feathercock tried to laugh, but he did not feel entirely happy. On Sundays, at the services, the few faithful souls who remained in his flock looked upon him with suspicion. At the English consulate they spoke very plainly, telling him unsympathetically that anyone who would make a friend of such a man as Mohammed-si-Koualdia and who would mingle "promiscuously" with such rabble, need look for nothing but harm from it.

Zobéide, when she was first confronted with the fresh, damp greens, showed the most profound contempt for them. Unquestionably she preferred melons. Mr. Feathercock applauded his own acumen. "She was eating too much; that was the whole trouble," he said to himself. "And that was what made her grow so remarkably. If she eats less she will probably not grow so much. And if she should happen to die, I shall be rid of her. Whatever comes, it will be for the best."

But the next day Zobéide gave up pouting and began very docilely to eat the greens, and when the boy Hakem carried her next bunch to her he said slyly:

"Effendi, she is growing smaller!"

The clergyman attempted to shrug his shoulders, but it was impossible to disguise the fact from himself— Zobéide had certainly shrunk! And within an hour all Damascus knew that Zobéide had shrunk. When Mr. Feathercock went to the barber shop the Greek barber said to him, "Sir, your turtle is no ordinary turtle!" When he went to call on Mrs. Hollingshead, a lady who was always intensely interested in all subjects that she failed to understand and who discussed them with a beautiful freedom, she said to him: "Dear sir, your turtle. How exciting it must be to watch it shrink! I am certainly coming to see it myself." When he went to the Anglican Orphanage, all the little Syrians, all the little Arabs, all the little Armenians, all the little Jews, drew turtles in their copy-books, turtles of every size and every description, the big ones walking behind the little ones, the tail of each in the mouth of another, making an interminable line. And in the street the donkey drivers, the water-carriers, the fishmongers, the venders of broiled meats, of baked breads, of beans, of cream, all cried: "Mister Turtle, Mister Turtle! Try our wares. Buy something for your poor stubborn beast that is pining away!"

And, in truth, the turtle continued to shrink. She became again the size of a soup plate, then of a dessert plate, then of a saucer, till finally one morning there was nothing there but a little round thing, tiny, frail, translucent, a spot about as big as a lady's watch, almost invisible at the base of the fountain. And the next day— ah! the next day there was nothing there, nothing whatever, neither turtle nor the shadow of turtle, or more trace of a turtle than of an elephant in all the grounds!

Mohammed-si-Koualdia had stopped taking hashish, because he was saturated with it. But he remained all day long, huddled in a heap at the door of the little café immediately opposite the clergyman's house, his eyes enlarged out of all proportion, set in a face the color of death, gave him the look of a veritable sorcerer. At this moment the Rev. Mr. Feathercock was returning from a visit to the English consul who had said to him coldly:

"All that I can tell you is that you have made an ass of yourself or, as a Frenchman would say, played the donkey to hear yourself bray. The best thing you can do is to go and hunt up a congregation somewhere else."

The Rev. John Feathercock accepted the advice with deference, and took the train for Bayreuth. That same evening Mohammed-si-Koualdia betook himself to the house of one Antonio, interpreter and public scribe, and ordered him to translate into French the following letter, which he dictated in Arabic. Afterwards he carried this letter to Father Stephen, prior to the monastery of the Greek Hicrosolymites:

May heaven paint your cheeks with the colors of health, most venerable father, and may happiness reign in your heart! I have the honor to inform you that the Rev. John Feathercock has just left for Bayreuth, but that he has had put upon his trunks the address of a city called Liverpool, which, I am informed, is in the kingdom of England; and also, everything points to the belief that he will never return. Therefore, I dare to hope that you will send me the second part of the reward you agreed upon as well as a generous present for Hakem, Mr. Feathercock's valet, who carried every day a new turtle to the house of the clergyman, and carried away the old one under his cloak.

I also pray you to tell your friends that I have for sale, at prices exceptionally low, fifty-five turtles, all of different sizes, the last and smallest of which is no larger than the watch of a European houri. I have been at infinite pains to find them, and they have served to prove to me with what exquisite care Allah fashions the members of the least of His creatures and ornaments their bodies with the most delicate designs.

_________________

7: Catalyst Poison

Malcolm Jameson

1891-1945

Astounding, April 1939

Malcolm Routh Jameson

OH yes, I knew Eddie Twitterly and I knew Rags Rooney. Come to think of it, I introduced them. And I know all about their stunt from the very beginning. It's my job to know people and what's going on. How do you think I could hold my job on the Star if I didn't?

My paper wouldn't print the low-down on the Big Day because they thought it was too fishy. That a fellow with literately millions a day income should jump the traces and behave like Eddie did, was too much for them. It shows you how little some editors understand human nature. There was nothing fishy about it to me, because I knew Eddie so well: knew how temperamental he was.

Eddie was smart as hell. All those degrees he had and the jobs he'd held are proof of that; but he was unreliable. He couldn't stand routine. That's why they kicked him out of the university faculty. He didn't fit in the factory atmosphere they had up there, the regular hours and same old grind, month in month out. Eddie was the kind that gets steamed up over something, goes at it hammer and tongs, day and night, and then all of a sudden drops it like a hot potato. Whenever he reached the fed-up stage, he'd go on a bat; and when I say bat I mean bat. He'd stay blotto for ten days and, likely as not, wind up in a psychopathic ward somewhere.

The psychiatrists said he had an inner conflict. He was part scientist, part artist, and it's a bad combination. His hobby was modeling. Sometimes right in the middle of a scientific investigation, he'd get the yen to do some sculpting, and off he'd go. It muddied his work in both fields and kept him from being a big success in either. Then he'd get to thinking about that and the next you'd know, he'd be draped across the bar somewhere telling the mahogany polisher all his troubles.

I BUMPED into him one night, shortly after he lost that physics professorship. It was at the Spicy Club, and from the looks of things, Eddie was celebrating his liberation from academic life. I had Rags Rooney with me. Now Rags is an utterly different type. He's a gambler and promoter; backs fighters and wrestlers, ordinarily, but he'll take a part of a Broadway show, or stake a nut inventor, or lay his money anywhere he sees a sporting chance. Sometimes he cleans up, sometimes he loses his shirt, but generally speaking he picks winners.

That night Eddie's hunch, as near, as I can remember it, was to build a machine based on those new-fangled notions of the atom. You know the idea; that there is no such thing as matter; that everything is simply a lot of electric charges zipping and zooming around and bouncing off each other. According to him, butter and steel are just different combinations of them, revolving at different speeds. All right, he'd say, if it's electrical, you can alter it by electricity: change one to the other, or to anything else— a brick, or even a pint of red ink.

From that, he went on to tell us that feelings and thought are electricity too. Brain cells are little batteries, and when you think, currents run back and forth. I hadn't heard that one before, but Eddie insisted that it was so; said that the current could even be metered. Well the payoff was he thought he could hook the two things together. If he had a machine to amplify his mental powerhouse and focus it on something— anything, even air, is always a flock of swirling electrons— he could make the electrons jump the way he wanted them to. Whatever picture was in his mind would form there.

"Just think." he said, "with my Psycho-Substantiator I could model without clay or tools. When my thoughts solidify and I see any faults and want to change them, all I have to do is think the revision. And if it comes out all right, then I imagine the material I want— marble or bronze, or even gold— and there it is! No casts to make, no chiseling, no manual work at all— a finished piece."

It must have been the crack about gold that made Rags sit up and take notice. Whatever it was, before I realized what was happening, they'd made a deal and were shaking on it. Rags was to put up the money, Eddie the brains, and split fifty-fifty on what came of it. I thought then—and I haven't changed my mind— that it was a mistake. I couldn't imagine the two of them getting together on what to do with the machine when they got it built. I spoke to Rags in the washroom about it, and warned him how flighty Eddie was.

"Hell," he said. "I've been handling sporting talent all my life, and they don't come any more temperamental. This guy'll be a cinch."

I didn't see either of them for a long time— months. One night. I dropped into Rags' apartment to chin a minute with him and his missus, and the minute I got inside, I knew I oughtn't to have come. There was a first-class family row going on. I tried to duck, but she grabbed me and began laying into me too.

"You started all this," she said scornfully, "you and your chiseling boyfriend! Thirty thousand smackers is what that no-good souse has taken this poor fish for— and look at what we get!"

Boy, she was sore.

She dragged me over to the where there was a little white statuette. It was a comical thing, not bad at all; a pot bellied little horse, made out of some white stone, but, of course, not good for much except a gimcrack.

Then she started raving again, and I learned more about Rags' home life in the next fifteen minutes than I ever dreamed of before.

"And him sounding off all the time about how he makes his living outta suckers," she snorted, "but if he hasn't been taken for a ride this time, I never saw it done. He's bought a half interest in what that dope thinks about! Imagine! Why, wine, woman and song is all that poor louse ever thinks about, and you know what a rotten voice he has."

"What's his voice got to do with it?" Rags growled.

She gave him a dirty look. "That's why he concentrates on the other two."

RAGS jammed on his hat and gave me the sign to come along. We went down to Mac's place and Rags threw down a coupla slugs before he said a word.

"Oh, everything's all right," he said in a minute, "only I see where I gotta get tough with the guy. He's not practical. The machine works like he said. What he thinks about comes out. But what the hell good is it if his mind runs to goofy doll horses? I ask you. And it could just as well been a ten-pound diamond. But that's not all. To celebrate, he goes on a four-day binge. I just found him. Two of the boys are sitting with him now in the steam room down at the gym. Soon as they cook it out of him. I'm going down and work on him."

I didn't say a word. Eddie's geared for two speeds, full ahead— his own way— and reverse. If Rags was going to put the pressure on him I figured all he'd get would be a backfire.

They must have compromised things after a fashion. Next I heard, Rags was going around trying town to peddle a statue, a gold one this time, for a price like a couple of hundred thousand. I wanted to keep track of things, because I saw a good story coming up when the secrecy was off, so I hunted him up.

Sure enough, the statue was Eddie's second creation. It was gold, but Rag's was ready to chew nails.

"The museums won't touch it," he complained: "say it's ugly, terrible, a sloppy, bulging, fat, nude woman."

"Rent it to a photographer for the 'before' picture for a reducing ad," I suggested: then seeing he was in no joking mood, I asked him how it happened.

"Live and learn," said Rags, sad-like. "Like a dumbbell. I let him have his way. He was dead set to do statuary, so I says, 'O. K. but be sure to make it outta something I can hock in case the art part backfires.' So he says, 'I'll do a Venus,' and I says, 'Shoot, only make her gold.' Well, he's got funny ideas about women. At the start, she was skinny enough to be an exhibit in a T. B. clinic. I kept saying, 'Put some meat on her,' thinking all the time about the weight of it when I went to sell it. He was sore at first, then he got to giggling and did what I said, and how!"

"What the hell," I told Rags, "You're sitting pretty. Go down to Wall Street and look up some of the millionaires that are moaning about the gold standard. The law says they can't hoard, but they can own golden works of art."

He took my advice and found a buyer all right, but getting that quarter of a million too easy was what ruined him. It made him greedy. Rags had made bits before, like I said, but never anything big like that. Now that he had a taste of big money, he was hungry for more and hiked the limit to the sky. He was all for quantity production, and since he had plenty of cash, he began to rig for it.

In planning gold by the ton, commonsense told him they couldn't go on working in Eddie's third-floor studio. That plump Venus damn near caved the joists in. Rags found a place near the foot of Forty-fourth Street, in the block west of Eleventh Avenue. It was an abandoned ice plant, a big barn of a place with a dirt floor. Eddie had to dismantle his machine and take it there, then work for two or three months making parts for the new and bigger machine with it.

The day they were ready to ride with the new equipment, Rags asked me to come down and watch it work. The place looked like a cross between an iron foundry and a movie studio. The floor was laid out in grids, four of them, each with molds for two hundred gold bricks. Pointing down at them was a circle of vacuum lubes mounted on high stands with reflectors back of them. At one side was a sort of throne where Eddie was to sit. Wires ran all over the place. Rags filled up the molds with water, and left a hose dribbling into the header so there'd be plenty of additional water to make up the difference in weight.

Eddie put up a last-minute battle about having to do something as tedious as thinking up hundreds on hundreds of little gold bars, all alike. But Rags couldn't see anything but bullion. He had sweated blood trying to get rid of the fat Venus and he wanted no more of it. At five thousand dollars apiece, the gold bricks were in handy, manageable units, and the sum of them was a fortune. Two million a day in good pay, even if you don't like the work, Rags argued. I have to admit that argument would have sold me. Eddie grumbled some more, but he focused his apparatus on the first bank of molds, put on his metal headpiece, and got on his throne.

As soon as the tubes lit up, the water began to turn pink, then a ruby red. "Colloidal gold," Rags whispered. Eddie must have taught him that word. In about two hours, the first quarter of the job was done. All that time, Eddie had sat there, frowning, concentrating on the idea of twenty-four-carat gold lying in neat rows of bricks. He looked pretty tired and disgusted when he finished, but he only stopped to eat a sandwich, he growled at Rags some more, then tackled the next batch. I stuck around. You don't get to see anything like that every day.

In the afternoon Eddie filled up Grid No. 3. He complained a lot about his head aching, but Rags wasn't listening to him. He was pacing up and down, gloating over the gold, or else sitting in a corner, figuring on the backs of envelopes. Eddie was limp by the time he got to the last set of molds, but Rags kept egging him on, yelling at him like a regular Simon Legree to hurry up, think faster and harder, so it would all be done before night. I felt sorry for Eddie, but all he did was sigh and slip his helmet on and go back to work.

It was about an hour later, that things began to go sour. I heard Rags griping, and went over to where he was. He looked scared. The molds under his feet were full of some gosh-awful, fluffy, pink mess.

"That's horrible!" he said, sniffing the air. Then he ran over and began shaking Eddie.

Eddie had been sitting with his eyes closed, mumbling something to himself, but when Rags pounded hm, he snapped our of it, shut off the juice, and came down to see what the excitement was about.

Eddie was puzzled too, for a minute; then he began laughing.

"Tripe," he said, "that's what it is— tripe!" and then went off into another fit of laughing.

Rags was glaring at him the whole time, wondering what was so funny. "Whadya mean tripe?" he wanted to know, sore as hell.

"Why," says Eddie, as soon as he could get his breath, "I guess I must have gone nuts thinking about nothing but gold. Now I remember, I got thinking what a lot of tripe this whole thing is: kept saying it over and over. 'This is a lot of tripe.' Ha-ha-ha! And that's what we got!"

WELL, they had it round and round. All Rags could see was a million dollars spoiled by sheer inattention, right when his mouth was watering for big money. but after they'd jawed awhile, Eddie agreed to clean up the tripe, make it into gold, but later on, after he'd had some rest. Then I asked Rags what he was going to do with so much gold when he had it.

"Sell it to the bank," he said, cocky as you please.

When I finished telling him about the gold laws, he was worried.

That night he went down to Washington to find out where he stood. What they said to him, I never knew; but after that, gold was out. Rags came back damning the administration like a charter member of the grass-roots conference. But he was already full of new plans. He showed me the schedule— so many tons of platinum, then so much silver, and so on. I warned him he was hunting trouble, driving Eddie like that. I thought it was a miracle that Eddie hadn't torn loose after the tripe episode. He usually did when he was fed up on anything.

"I've taken care of that," said Rags, in an offhand way. "I've got to go abroad. I'm going to Amsterdam to find out how many diamonds the market can take without cracking. While I'm gone, to be sure nothing'll slip, I've fixed it with the O'Hara Agency to keep a guard on the place, so nobody can get in or out. Eddie don't know it yet, but he'll be comfortable enough. I had a bedroom fixed up down there, and a kitchenette, and I hired a Filipino boy to stay and cook for him. He'll have to keep busy, and he can't get in trouble."

"Oh, izzat so?" I told him. "Well, you don't know Eddie. That boy could get in trouble in Alcatraz. When he gets a thirst, he can think up ways and means that'd surprise you."

Rags wouldn't listen to me, and now he's sorry. It was bad enough to lay out all that monotonous work thinking up truckloads of platinum, but to lock up Eddie in that way, without even telling him about it, was just plain damn foolishness. I knew Eddie'd hit the ceiling as soon as he found out: and whenever he did, it was going to be just too bad

And when it happened, it was exactly that way.

I went down there one night, about a week later. It was drizzling, but I felt like a stroll, and I was worried a little about Eddie, locked up in that old plant practically alone. When I got almost to the door of it one of O'Hara's strong-arm men stepped out from behind a signboard and flagged me down. I showed my card and told him I was a friend of Rags and knew all about the layout, but it didn't get me by. Yet I did want to know how Eddie was taking it, so I slipped the fellow a fin, and he talked.

The second night after Rags had gone, Eddie came out of the plant and started uptown. The watchmen headed him off and turned him hack. Eddie didn't understand at first, and cut up quite a bit. They handled him as gently as they could, and finally shoved him through the door without roughing him up too much. It was when he heard what Rags' orders were that he went wild. He went back inside, but a couple of minutes later the door popped open and Eddie kicked the Filipino out and threw his baggage after him.

"Tell Rooney," he yelled to the dicks, "there's more ways of choking a dog than feeding it hot butter." And with that be slammed the door and barred it.

That sounded bad to me, I wanted to know the rest, and the O'Hara man went on. The next night, they heard sounds of a wild party going on inside. That was strange, because they had kept a close watch on the place and knew nobody had gone in. But there it was— singing and laughing, plenty of whoopee. And it had been going on ever since!

I listened, but I couldn't hear a thing. Then we could make out a faint groaning.

"Oh," said the operative, "that's all right. Too much party. You know. They were fighting last right. At least, we could hear the guy bawling the girls out, and they were crying."

"Girls?" I asked. "What girls?"

"See that crack over the door?" he said. "We piled some boxes and barrels up and took a squint inside through there. It was something to see, I can tell you— a perfect harem, like in the movies, only more so, five or six dames, dolled up like nobody's business, all eating off of gold platters and passing jugs of drinks around. The only guy in there is this Twitterley, rigged out like a sultan, with a pair of 'em on his lap, handing the stuff to him, what a life! And they pay me to stand here to keep him in! Where would he want to go? He's got everything, come on; let's hop down to the coffee pot and get on the outside of some hot chow, This joint don't need watching."

IT WAS raining in earnest by then, so I went to the Star office to file some copy. It must have been well past midnight when I came out. The rain seemed to be over, so I started for the subway on foot. In Forty-third Street, near Eighth Avenue, I saw a crowd standing near a window of a cafeteria, peeking in, and some of them were staring up at the swinging sign over the sidewalk. There was a ladder against the building and I could make out a cop near the top of it struggling with something perched on the sign. The cop was wriggling and cussing, and whatever was up there was pecking at him and hissing away at a great rate.

Just then the crowd let out yelps, "There's another one!" Somebody said, and they all ran out to the edge of the curb, looking upward all the time. On the very end of the sign sat a fuzzy little thing, hardly bigger than you fist, but it had a tail about a yard long that hung down and curled up at the end. Its eyes shone like a cat's. Oh, more than that, they flamed— bright violet, not green or orange, the way a cat's do, "he's already got four of 'em down," a fellow told me, meaning the cop.

"They're inside."

I pushed into the cafeteria, and there were others, sure enough, sitting in a row along the counter, they seemed to be harmless enough, after you got over their looks, but what they were was something else again. They may have started out to be marmosets, but something sure went wrong with them. One was a bright-lemon color, another heliotrope, one emerald green, and the other a little of everything. They kept flicking out forked tongues, the way snakes do, and hissing. But those violet eyes were what got you. They gave you the creeps.

The cop outside came in, carrying the latest one he'd caught, a sky-blue one, with purple stripes. Two curbstone naturalists were poking at the little animal and arguing what it could be. In the midst of that, we heard sirens outside and a police patrol car dashed up. A cop got out of the car and came into the restaurant towing a sleepy, bald-headed man, who looked like he hadn't quite finished dressing.

"Do you see what I see?" the cop with the blue monkey asked him, soon as he was inside, throwing me a wink.

"Did you get me out of bed for a gag?" snapped the bald-headed man, huffy as could be. "It's a publicity stunt!" And with that he stalked out.

"Fat lot of help that zoo expert turned out to be," The cop that brought him said. "Stay with it Clancy: the S. P. C. A, wagon'll be here soon."

I'd seen all I'd wanted to see, so I blew. Down the street about a hundred feet I began to feel something dragging my shins at every step. It was dark there and I couldn't see very well, at first, but it felt like I was up to my waist in hairy, palpitating stuff! I could see a lot of little knobs swaying up and down, about the size of baseballs, and each knob had a pair of pearly lights on it. They were dim, dim as glowworms, but there was something scary about it.

I must have yelled, because people came running up behind me, but they stopped some little distance away. As they did, the bobbing balls and the grassy stuff spread out over the street like smoke. The way they heaved up and down and slide sideways at the same time made me sick at the stomach. Then I had a better look. They were spiders! Not the hard-boiled, tough kind of spider, with hair on its chest, but the old-fashioned wiry granddaddy longlegs— except that these must have been all of thirty inches high! I must have been pretty jittery, because the next thing I tried to do was climb a brick wall

I found that was impractical, so I pulled myself together and began to wonder where they came from and what to do about it. They were scattering all over the street then, going away from me, and the other people were backing away from them, yelling.

Presently the emergency track came and the boys tumbled off and started to work on the spiders. They shot a few, but soon quit that. It would have been an all-night business, there were thousands of them. Some of the cops began whanging them with nightsticks, but all a longlegs would do when it was swatted was sag a little, then come up for more. Finally, one of the cops began gathering 'em up by the legs, tying 'em in bundles with wire. The first thing I knew, the whole crowd had joined in and were having a lot of fun out of it. In a little while they had most of them tied up in shocks, like wheat. I never thought I'd live to see the day when they stacked bales of live spiders on the sidewalks of New York, but that's what they did that night.

A couple of dozen of them got away and went jiggling out into Times Square, with a lot of newsies chasing them. The cops let them corner what were left, because another call had come in. Several, in fact. Strange varmints had popped up in two, or three nearby places. I didn't know what was happening, any more than anybody else. Some thought a big pet shop had been burglarized and the door left open, and some others thought this and that, but none of it made sense.

I went with the emergency track next to Forty-forth Street, the other side of Eighth Avenue, where a big serpent was reported to be terrorizing the neighborhood. The moment we got there, we saw the serpent, all right. We couldn't miss it. It was big, and it was luminous! I should say the thing was a hundred or more feet long and a yard thick. It was made of some transparent jelly-like substance, a deep ruby red, but inside we could see its skeleton very plainly and a couple of dogs it had eaten.

The cops tried to shoot it at first, but that was a waste of time. The bullets would go through— you could see the holes for about a minute afterward. Then the holes would close up. Three or four dozen slugs didn't faze the thing. They tried to lasso it, but that didn't work either. In the first place, it was slick and shiny, and could wiggle right on through. Besides, the slime seemed to be corrosive. When a rope did stick for a few seconds, it dropped apart, charred shreds.

Next they chopped at it with axes. They picked a place about midway of the snake, or eel, or whatever you want to call it, and went to it, two men on a side. It was like chopping rubber, but they did get it in two. Then the fun began. The after piece sprouted a head, then sheered out and took the other side of the street. Both the original serpent and the detached copy stretched out to full length, and in a few minutes the cops had two snakes to worry about, instead of one.

"Forget the axes," said the lieutenant "we gotta think of a better one than that."

It was all very exciting to me, but the main effect it had on the cops was to make 'em sore. They had nearly everything in the world on that wagon in the way of equipment, and none of it any good in a case like that. Finally somebody brought an acetylene torch into action, and that was the beginning of the end. That is, the end of that particular pair of monsters. When the flame hit 'em, the parts just hissed, shriveled up, and disappeared. In a little while there was nothing left of them except the skeletons of the two dogs and some charred meat that hadn't been digested.

A police inspector drove up in time to see the finish. "I'm glad you boys found the answer," he said, "because there's plenty more. Everything the other side of Tenth Avenue is blocked with 'em. Let's get going."

"Blocked" wasn't the word; he ought've said "buried." When we got orer there, we found the fire department and about a thousand other cops already there. The avenue had been cleared, but the first four or five streets above Forty-second were packed in squirming, bellowing, hissing monsters. In some places they filled the street almost to the second story window. Everything that crawls, and a lot more, was all mixed up there. After one look, I knew that gelatin eel was hardly worth remembering. In this jam ahead of me were centipedes a half block long, lizards, snakes, animals that didn't look real, storybook animals, dragons, griffins, and the like. The firemen had snared a thing built along the general lines of a crocodile, but it was covered with mirror scales instead of the usual kind. It sparkled beautifully whenever it'd thresh around.

The people in the tenements were awake, and taking it hard. The women and children were on the roofs, or upper levels of the fire escapes. The men stayed lower down, some of them poking at the monsters with curtain poles, bed slats, or anything they had. On the avenue side, firemen had ladders up and were taking the people out as fast as they could. Cars and trucks kept rolling up with more men and equipment. I understood they had sent out a general alarm for all the welding-torch equipment in the city. Soon they had lines of flames working into the cross streets.

I watched them burn and slaughter the creatures for a while, but anything gets tiresome. Daylight came and I was getting hungry. I did think of Eddie several times, and wondered how he was making out, cooped up in that old plant. He was entirely cut off from me, probably surrounded by these monsters, but it never occurred to me to worry about him. I knew he had thick brick walls around him, and only one door, and that barred. I broke away and went back to midtown for some breakfast.

While I ate, I looked over the papers. The extras were not out yet, and there was nothing in them except rather facetious, wisecracking accounts of the marmoset and spider episodes. Then I heard somebody say the militia had been called out, and that the police commissioner had set up temporary headquarters in a shack in Bryant Park. I decided that was the place to go to find out what else'd happened besides what I'd seen myself.

They had already built a stockade or corral there, and in it were a number of the monsters that had been taken alive somehow or other. There was a crowd of scientists hanging around, too, and a funny-looking lot they were. I walked through them, admiring the variety of the layout of their whiskers and listening to their shop talk. Some were taking notes and making sketches and were very serious about the whole business. Others were scoffing openly and saying it couldn't be, there were no such animals. The rest simply stood and looked. I guess they were what you'd call the open-minded ones. One bird had brought his typewriter and was sitting on a camp stool, pecking away to beat the band. I asked him what he was doing and he said he was writing a book. The title was "Phenomenal Metropolitan Fauna." Pretty good, huh? That's what I call being a live wire.

I flashed my card on the guard at the headquarters shack, and went in. A clerk was handing the commissioner a phone.

"What now?" I heard the old boy say in a weary tone. Then he threw the phone down and tore his hair. "Pink elephants," he said, to nobody in particular, and I thought he was going to break down and cry. "Three of them, coming up Forty-second Street."

"That's going too far," said the A. P. man, tearing up his notes. "I'm through. Some Barnum's putting over the biggest hoax yet. I won't be a party to it."

I started to leave. I wanted to see how they handled the elephants, but something new was coming in over the phone, so I waited. That time it was the report about the sea serpent. Uptill then I hadn't given a thought to the marine aspects of the plague, but I hung on, listening to the details.

A sea serpent had slid into the river a little above the Forty-second Street ferry and turned down the river. The battleship Texas happened to be coming up the stream at the time and sighted it. They did some fast work and got a couple of motor sailers over and began chasing it. I will have to check back the files to find out what became of that sea serpent. My recollection of it is that it got away: dived and disappeared somewhere in the upper bay. But the Texas' boats stayed with it to the end, and I heard they had a grand time, bouncing one-pounder shot off the thing's head. It had awful hard scales and they couldn't dent it. But it must have been timid, because it kept going as hard as it could, and never once tried any rough stuff on the launches. One whack of that tail, and it would have been all over for them.

YOU understand by now, I guess, that those monsters were not really ferocious: they just looked bad. They didn't bite, most of them, but they'd jerk you into a psychosis if you were the least weak-minded.

I suppose I seem awful dumb, now that we know what it was all about, not to have guessed earlier what was making the plague of monsters. But there was so much happening, and so fast, my brain didn't work like it ought. I might never have tumbled, if Rags Rooney hadn't come rushing in, wild-eyed. He had landed an hour before from a transatlantic airplane and had been trying to get to the plant.

"Where's Eddie?" he fairly panted, grabbing my arm.

"At the plant," I told turn, "by your arrangement."

"Can't you see?" moaned Rags, agonized. "He's done it again! The plant is the center of this mess, and Eddie's turning these things out with the Sicco… Psy… never mind, you know. He's got the horrors, the D. T.'s. like the doctors said he would, if he didn't lay off. We gotta stop him!"

I dragged Rags over to the commissioner and we finally made him understand. He was not what you'd call a quick thinker, but that day he'd try anything. In a minute we had the Edison substation on the line and were telling them to cut the juice off the plant.

"It's already off," a voice said. "The circuit breakers just kicked out, and won't stay in. They must have had an overload down there, or a short."

That was the worst possible news.

"Gosh." I thought. "Eddie's already put out a coupla thousand cubic yards of assorted animals since midnight, including three elephants at one crack, without blowing any fuses. What can be coming now?"

The commissioner saw something was up, so he went with us, taking us in his car. We tore down Forty-second, blasting the air with our siren. About a block west we met the elephants coming along, docile enough, some national guardsmen leading 'em. I'd heard of pink elephants all my life, but you're got to see one to really know. I think it's the peculiar shade.

We had to park at Eleventh Avenue. There were still plenty of reptiles and minor pests packed around the plant, but flame throwers were slowly cutting their way into them.

The eaves of the plant were still oozing a few small snakes and bats, but the big door was down. The elephants had done that, I suppose. Overhead there were several army and navy planes swooping, machine-gunning the vampires, pterodactyls, and what have you that took to the air. To the side of us, a little way off, were a couple of three-inch field guns that they'd sent down in case something really big and unmanageable should come out.

We heard a big noise down at the plant, and when we looked at it again, we saw the roof begin to rise and the walls to bulge, bricks popping in every direction. Everything fell to pieces, and as soon as the dust cleared away, we were looking at the most gigantic, frightful-appearing thing there ever was, not even barring dinosaurs. It was fat and loathsome and hairy. There was no head, nothing but a gaping red mouth, full of bayonet like teeth, with a ring of octopus tentacles around it. It began groping around with the tentacles and started picking up the small-fry monsters that were within reach. I saw it tuck away a plaid camel with one feeler, while it took a couple turns around a unicorn with another. Then the artillery let loose.

The curator-fellow that was writing the book by the corral had worried his way through the police lines and had been standing close behind us for some time. He pulled me by the sleeve.

"Beg pardon," he chirped, "but did I understand your friend to say that Twitterly was in there operating a machine by which he could telepathically control chemical changes?"

"Something like that," I admitted, not wanting to say too much.

"He was a good physicist and chemist too. I am surprised he permitted ethyl alcohol to enter the reaction. It's a very unreliable catalyst. Tricky, quite."

___________________

8: Brought Down in Flames

F. Britten Austin

1885-1941

Australian Town and Country Journal, NSW, 13 March 1918

Frederick Britten Austin

TWO officers sat at table in the long wooden hut that was the mess of the junior officers of the airship squadron. Both were very young, fair-complexioned, with close-cropped hair, typically North German. Round them were the remains of a copious meal. Used crockery upon the table indicated that other officers had already eaten, but the two young men sat alone.

The furniture of the hut was of the simplest. In addition to the inevitable piquant or humorous designs culled from the illustrated papers, a larger double-page drawing from the Illustrierte Zeitung was prominent on the wall. It depicted, with powerful imagination, a London whose architectural peculiarities were, emphasised in an inferno of blood-red flame, fire-racked shipping in a tangle under a shattered Tower Bridge, while overhead a fleet of Zeppelins floated with insulting calm high above a lattice-work of searchlights starred with bursting-shells. Underneath was the legend in fat Gothic type: "Gott strafe England! Der Shreck in Himmel!" ("The terror in the sky").

The slighter of the two officers gazed thoughtfully at this interesting product of German art.

"Is it really like that, Fritz?" he asked.

His companion laughed shortly at the earnest, tone of the question. It was made manifest that he was a man of experience.

"Not quite, Otto," he admitted. He glanced at the watch upon his wrist.

"Noch zehn Minuten," he said, and the would-be ease of his voice somehow wrecked itself upon a false note of jauntiness. He drew a case of fat cigars from his pocket and proffered it to his companion.

"Take one," he insisted. "It will be long before you get another."

Both lads puffed manfully. Fritz Steinhauer and Otto von Bruchheim had been school-chums together. Both at the earliest possible moment— but Steinhauer, by virtue of a slight seniority in age, three months before his comrades— had answered the call of the Fatherland. More fortunate than so many thousands of gallant lads short-sightedly sacrificed in schoolboy battalions, they had profited by their real abilities and much influence to enter the airship service. Both had passed through the great central school at Leipzig— Fritz always in advance— and now, after several months of separation, they were again re-united.

By a happy and rare chance Otto had been posted from the school to the same squadron as his friend. He had arrived only yesterday.

Otto continued to stare at the picture, although evidently he looked through it down a vista of thought. He leaned suddenly forward across the table to his friend.

"Alter Bursch!" His manner was shamefaced. Clumsily he groped his fingers in a breast pocket while he spoke. "You know people feel— feel sometimes— in advance—" He extracted a little packet from his pocket, "if— if anything happens, I want you to give this to your sister Elsa," he finished, in a swift, nervous run of words. His friend looked at him in pleased surprise.

"You and Elsa! I had no idea— But, dummer kerl, if anything happens to you, it happens to me also! We all go"— he indicated with an earthward gesture of the hand — "together."

A big puff of cigar smoke and a backward jerk of the head marked his contempt for the possibility.

Otto chastised his forehead with his fist.

"Of course!" he laughed. "What a fool I am! Fritz" — he leaned forward again, his face all boyish earnestness— "this is my first trip in real earnest— but — but you know I'm not afraid, don't you? It wasn't that— it— was—" He chopped awkwardly.

"Afraid?" echoed Fritz. "Of course not!  Whoever heard of a German officer who was afraid?" He swaggered in front of a mental mirror, after the manner of his race and caste. "But it's a pity you haven't got a real job. It's much better when there is a responsibility to keep your mind occupied."

Otto was "supernumerary officer under instruction."

He nodded his head absently.

"The captain is a good man, isn't he?"

"Good? I should think so!" answered Fritz, with pride. "It is something to he his second-in-command; and, Herr Gott, doesn't he hate the English! He knows his way over their cursed country better than you do yours over the Leipzig flying-grounds. He used to fly over England at night even before the war. He has often told me about it. It seems some of the stupid Englanders heard the engines in the air, and wrote to the papers about it, and once he and the other officers who used to fly in the old Zeppelin thought that the game was up. But then more mad Englanders wrote to the papers that it was all nonsense, and so everything was all right." He looked at his watch. "Time's up! Get your coat on, alter Bummler!"

He shouted for an orderly. The man appeared, assisted both officers into the thick, padded coats, which went over already cold-proof clothing. On the moment of departure Fritz turned to his friend.

"If you like to give me the packet for Elsa," he said in a voice he made as ordinary as possible, "I will put it with some things of mine that my servant is looking after."

The light had not quite faded out of the sky of a late autumn evening when they left the hut. They emerged into a vast level field. Directly in front of them, at a considerable distance from each other, three enormous Zeppelin sheds were the dominant feature in the landscape. Close to each, dwarfed to Lilliputians by the huge hulk, was a body of infantry, immobile in their ranks. Every tree and hedge that could possibly interfere with a landing had been cut down; but the long straight march of elms lining, a main road had been left as a wind screen. Behind it rose the spires of a Belgian town, just discernible in the twilight.

The two lads walked swiftly across the wide landing-ground towards the nearest of the airship sheds. Of the diffident suggestion of schoolboy intimacy that had escaped them in the privacy of the mess but there remained no trace. Despite their clumsy attire, they hastened with erect, well-drilled carriage, superb in stern self-poise. They were, very consciously, German officers in an idolised service. They belonged to a super-caste of the War Lords, in whom a hint of human weakness was as unthinkable as pity in a barbaric god. On duty, at least— they imbibed the theory with their mother's milk— they were of a divine hierarchy, the world of men at their feet. They saluted smartly, with a stiff, precise gesture— both moved as by one spring— the commanding , officer of the infantry drawn up near the shed.

The great doors were flung open. Within, masking somewhat and yet reflecting the powerful white electric lights, the monster towered above them, incredibly huge. The long parallel lines of the immense polyhedral flanks receded, softly gleaming aluminium, and drew together, far, far back in the illumined depths of the vast shed. Stout steel cables. taut to ringbolts in the concrete floor, as well as an infinite multitude of smaller ropes, pinioned the floating leviathan to immobility. Beneath the colossal bulk of the rigid gas envelope the hanging cars, linked by the long, narrow, rod-slung gang-way, even the enormous propellers, seemed dwarfed to insignificance.

Under the lofty, cathedral-like roof of the shed the voices of men resounded with a hollow echo. The overall-garbed mechanists by the door sprang smartly to a salute as the two officers entered. From the central car a whitewashed rope-ladder hung, nearly touching the floor. Fritz sprang up it with such agility as his padded clothing permitted. His friend followed.

At the top of the ladder an Unter-offizier stood rigid, saluted.

"All ready?" asked Fritz, with clipped curtness.

"Ja, Herr Leutnant."

With the swift precision of a man who thoroughly knows his job, Lieutenant Steinhauer started on a tour of inspection of the entire ship. The senior Unteroffizier and Otto followed him. Everywhere the crew stood ready at their stations. In the central control-car, roofed, upholstered, fitted with panels that could close over, the transparent celluloid windows, the steersman stood in waiting behind the wheels and levers that gave him mastery over the lateral or vertical progress of the ship; the telephonist sat before his instrument. Under a row of dials on the wall-clock, aneroid barometer, speed gauges, etc.— a great chart was spread on a strutted table, field-glasses upon it. In another compartment the wireless operator sat at his apparatus. Between the two, below the gangway, the bombs were ranged in two neat parallel rows, suspended between rails. The couple of men detailed for the duty stood by the levers which at the proper moment should release the missiles. The machine-gunners, fore and aft and centre, were at their posts.

Steinhauer glanced at the spotless cleanliness of the weapons, assured himself that the correct reserve of ammunition was instantly available. The low-roofed engine-cars at bow and stern were inspected, their machinery tested in a roar that re-echoed thunderously under the roof of the shed while the disconnected propellers remained motionless.

Particular attention did the officer devote to a little car slung tight-close under the floor of the gangway between two drums of coiled steel wire. A manhole was opened in the floor, an electric light switched on below; a snug little nest, well-padded, in which a man could lie full-stretched, was revealed. Steinhauer assured himself that field-glasses, telephone, and emergency rations were all at hand. The manhole was closed, the two officers and the N.C.O. continued their tour.

A climb up a narrow ladder through the darkness of the great envelope, between the ballonets, to the machine-gun platform at the top, and the inspection was finished.

Steinhauer glanced at the time, and calmly satisfied, took up his station at the head of the dangling rope-ladder. Lieutenant von Bruchheim stood by his side. Their fair, boyish faces rigid, unemotional, they stood, not less than the mighty engine so terribly beautiful in its finely conceived immensity which dwarfed them, perfect parts of the machine a would-be superhuman Germany had forged for the conquest of the world.

Quick, hard footsteps along the concrete floor resounded in the great shed. In close conversation with a red-striped officer of the General Staff, an officer, whose spare, hawklike face looked strangely thin above the mass of thick clothing, approached the rope-ladder. They stopped, saluted mutually with a click of the heels, and the hawk-faced officer, climbed the ladder.

As he mounted, looking upwards, the piercing intensity of his glance— the eyes of a fanatic— gave Otto von Bruchheim a queer thrill. An impulse of passionate patriotism, glorying in risk and sacrifice, pitiless to the foe, communicated itself to him. Not a muscle moved in him, but he suddenly felt himself capable of any desperate heroism. To die, coldly and unemotionally as a German officer should!— he thrilled in every fibre.

The commander reached the platform. The two young officers saluted with precise automatism. Their superior's eyes softened.

"Guten Abend, meine Herren," he said.

The man's personality was magnetic. Here, on the brink of the far-flung enterprise, Otto, who had felt only awe in presence of this stern man, suddenly loved him. To his vague, lofty ideal an intense loyalty linked itself. The commander turned to Steinhauer.

"Is all ready?"

"Ja, Herr Kapitan— all is ready."

The commander nodded.

"Go, to your station, then." He turned to Otto. "You will remain with me."

Steinhauer saluted and departed aft. The commander, followed by Otto, moved to the forepart of the gangway. He blew a shrill blast on his whistle. The measured tramp of the infantry soldiers as they marched into the vast shed resounded under the lofty roof. On either side of the great airship they stood motionless in long ranks. Other whistles blew. There were a few curt orders, no shouting. In a moment the leviathan, swaying a little, was checked only by the hundreds of men clinging to the ropes.

Another blast on the whistle, and slowly, gently, the great airship began to glide out of her shed, drawn on the steady march of the infantrymen, tiny beneath them. Otto stood by the commander on the open gangway as they floated out of the hard, white brilliance of the electric-lit shed into the grey of the deepening night. Distant across the wide landing-ground the open doorways of the other sheds gaped, illumined like the mouths of caverns. From them also had their giant tenants been led out to the far adventure. One lay poised on the ground, her immense length, bluff at the nose and tapering at the stern, blocking out the horizon. The other hung already in the air, ghostlike In the faint light, rising vertically and silently.

A whistle shrilled from the after-end of the ship. They were clear of the shed. Still they continued to glide across the ground, the tiny soldiers straining with bent backs at the ropes. The commander glanced at the other ships. Both were now rising. He leaned over the rail, blew his whistle. The signal was repeated from below. The great ship stopped, quivering.

"All clear!" was reported from the ground. The commander blew one last loud blast upon his whistle.

"Nun kann's losgehen!" he said to Otto, with a grim smile, parodying the famous phrase that had unleashed, the fiends of war.

The young officer glanced over the rail. The earth, misty and indistinct, was already far below them, was falling away. Without shock or tremor the great ship rose straight up in the windless air.

"Come!" said the commander to Otto, and led the way to the control car, bright with electric light.

Kapitan von Breitmuller commanded not only his own craft, but the two other ships composing the squadron. As he entered the control car he called out an order, prefaced with the code-names of the other ships.

"Course W.N.W. at a thousand metres, rising."

The telephonist repeated it to the wireless operator in the other cabin. Other orders directing the flight formation, distances, engine revolutions, etc., followed. Otto glanced at the rapidly-mounting needle of the aneroid barometer. It touched 1000. At the same moment he heard the bell of tho telegraph indicator to the engine-rooms, and the answering clangs.

With a deafening, rattling roar that swelled still louder in response to another clang on the telegraph, the engines started. The great ship woke from her inertia, pulsed with throbbing life. With a dizzy swing she came round to her course. Again the telegraph clanged, and yet louder rattled and roared the great propellers as they clove and forced back the air in their fiercely swift  revolutions. Everything in the great ship quivered with the force of her rush through the air, and the feverish life-beat of her engines. To touch wood or metal was to come into contact with an almost painful vibration.

The needle of the aneroid barometer still climbed. As she rose into higher regions the ship found herself heading into a slight breeze. She commenced to pitch in long, slow undulations, like a ship in a gentle swell at sea, the cabin floor rising and dropping away almost imperceptibly. Von Breitmuller drew his. junior to the great' chart, marked a point upon it with his finger, shouted to be heard above the roar. "Here," he said, "we meet the other squadron. To-night the verdammte Englander shall know what the hate of Germany means."

The boy glanced up, surprised at the hatred in his superior's voice. The passion be had often facetiously awakened in himself when chorusing the Hymn of Hate was here beside him in a living embodiment, the incarnate spirit of the monster throbbing fiercely through the sky on her errand of destruction.

In obedience to an order from the commander, he went out of the control- car along the gangway. A rush of intensely cold air smote him, penetrated his thick clothing.

He glanced, over the rail. The earth lay hollow beneath him like a dark bowl from whose rim rose, silver-grey, the night sky. Far below,, in the blackness, the lights of a Belgian town glimmered yellow. Aft of the ship, to port and starboard on the same plane as the leader, the single lights of the other two ships glowed like large stars. The radiance from their cars could just be seen.

He passed along the gangway, stepping over the machine-gun crews huddled in thick wraps under the lee of such protection as they could find from the bitter blast. In the rearward engine-car he found Steinhauer in earnest conference with the mechanist Unteroffizier. Despite all their efforts, the starboard engine was refusing to run as sweetly as it should.

Here, in this long, low-roofed cabin filled with machinery, the atmosphere was pleasantly warm. The noise stunned one, bludgeoning the senses in the confined space.

Steinhauer looked up with a preoccupied frown, shouted at the top of his voice an explanation of the trouble. The N.C.O. gesticulated with a spanner, alleged a diagnosis, and promised alleviation. Von Bruchheim returned to report. He found the commander receiving a wireless message from the other squadron. They were in touch.

He looked out of the windows, saw searchlight after searchlight shoot out into the sky, and be instantly extinguished. The other, squadron was signalling its position. Von Breitmuller shouted an order. From their own ship and from those following, similar beams barred the sky for a moment with an intense whiteness, and then were not. The stars, temporarily obliterated, leaped back into a black heaven.

The squadron had effected junction with four more ships, three composing another squadron, the other carrying a very important personage in supreme command of the whole. From now on Von Breitmuller received orders, re-transmitted them to his own squadron.

The first was significant. All lights were doused. The control-car was illumined only by glow-lamps over the steering-compass, the indicator dials, the chart. The speed of the fleet was increased. Slanting upwards, the ship, driven through the air with a force that shook her violently, climbed by her inclined planes to yet higher regions. Already the dial indicated over three thousand metres. Von Breitmuller pointed to a spot on the chart. They were already over the sea.

For rather more than an hour their fiercely pulsing progress continued without event. Dimly through the side-windows, frosted with the exhalations of the men inside the cabin, could he discerned the glint of stars in a dark sky. Of their consorts nothing was to be seen. Otto knew only that the other squadron was ahead, their own squadron spread in a wide echelon behind it. But messages were continually exchanged between the ships.

Steinhauer had now entered the cabin, and stood with his friend behind the commander, who sprawled upon a cushion was gazing downward through a transparent panel in the floor. They looked also, bending over his shoulders.

Beneath them was an intense blackness that they knew to be the sea. Once or twice a thin strip of white overlaid it, suddenly produced, and equally suddenly abolished— the searchlights of patrolling ships. Over on the port bow— it seemed almost directly under them, but was in reality many miles distant— two such strips lay long and motionless across the water, were moved suddenly in a quick jerk, but were not extinguished, and three searchlights shot upwards, waved uneasy arms in the dark sky.

"Dover!" said Von Breitmuller.

They raced on undiscovered, leaving the searchlights well away to port— behind them. Half an hour passed. Von Breitmuller raised himself slightly.

"Observation!" he said to Steinhauer; to Otto: "General supervision of the ship to keep in touch with me."

The two young men left the comparative warmth of the control-car, stumbled along the gangway in an icy blackness, feeling more distinctly the gentle heave and pitch of the ship, realising her effort in the numbing vibration of the rod-supports as they clung to them. The vast rattling roar of the propellers would have drowned any attempt at speech. They reached the spot where the observation car was slung under the drums of steel wire.

The cowering, shivering, attendant roused himself. The manhole was uncovered. Fritz switched on the light below for an instant; then, after an intense grip of his comrade's hand in the darkness, slipped in, stretched himself. The manhole was replaced. An electric bell rang. The man pulled a lever, and instantly the drums began to revolve, slowly at first, then ever more. Swiftly, paying out endlessly the thin, strong cables.

Without the experience of his practice-fights, Otto would have realised the frightful, dizzy swing of the little car suspended far below from the jerky, distressful toss it imparted to the entire ship.

Sharp bells rang simultaneously in various parts of the craft, clear above the roar of her machinery.

"Quarters!"

Otto hurried along the gangway. He found the machine gunners standing ready, their thick-gloved hands on the breech. The bomb-droppers were alert, their eyes fixed on the glow-illuminated indicator, the levers ready grasped. The searchlight-operator crouched behind the great barrel lens on the swivel mounting. Yet the leviathan pulsed onward, dark, emitting no sound other than her familiar roar, tossing jerkily with the pendulum-swing of the car swaying many feet below, rushing towards a fateful moment.

Otto hastened from point to point. His deck inspection finished, he glanced over the rail. Below him all was dark, but in that tenebrous depth he discovered a sinuous strip of even more intense blackness, that stretched widening to a point beneath him in sharp curves— the River Thames!

Flushed with excitement, he sprang up the narrow ladder which passed through the gas envelope in a vertical climb to the machine gun platform above. He emerged into an intense cold, and a spectacle of strangely large stars in a numberless multitude, that seemed to crackle as they twinkled in unearthly brilliance on a dark blue background. The heaven was thick-sown with them from zenith to the low horizon. From its depths the beam of the light that had left its origin in the days of Charlemagne, fell now upon this strange product of the twentieth century rushing softly silvern through the radiant night to annihilate a moment or two in the brief lives of pygmies such as those who made her.

But Otto had no thought beyond the immediate. He hastened to the two machine-gun crews, assured himself of their readiness. Then he went to the inward-curving bulwark of bullet-proof steel that enclosed the platform. A rush of bitterly cold wind smote him as though he had run into a wall. He drew back, gasping.

In front of him the broad aluminium carapace of the leviathan stretched featureless, falling away to the sides, and far ahead at the nose, in gentle curves, nowhere dead straight. Beyond it was the star-studded night, through which they drove with sagging, straining rise and fall. Up here, intercepted by the vast bulk of the envelope, the roar of the engine was not so loud, but no other sound came to disputes its pre-eminence.

Suddenly, as he gazed, he saw the swift leap of a reddish reflection. A second later, searchlights, bundles of them, with divergent shafts, shot up into the sky far ahead and to the right and left. They moved ferreting with long white fingers among the stars. In their midst twinkling yellow points of flame   lived for an instant, were constantly reborn.

Simultaneously with a second leaping flash came the rumbling detonation of its predecessor, heard through the roar of the hurrying engines. Thrilled, Otto clutched the rim of the bulwark, crouched to escape the blast of wind, and gazed.

The first squadron was in action. Red flash after red flash leaped skyward over a wide area. From those to the right, of him, far, far down, he could glimpse the brief yellow germ of the explosive. The roll of their heavy detonations was continuous, from spasm to spasm. And ever the questing searchlights moved their long white fingers across the sky, now jerking away independently in a vain hope of the quarry, now clustering together, a waiting menace that suddenly dissolved and swept the heavens anew.

Continuously among them, larger and ever larger as the ship rushed onward, flashed the little yellow stars of the shrapnel bursts. Suddenly a dozen searchlights swung round. Poised on the tip of a converging steeple of white beams, like an eggshell on a cunning water-jet, the long white body of an airship gleamed ghostlike in the sky. The yellow shrapnel stars multiplied themselves furiously around, below, above her.

From the depths beneath her leaped reel flash upon flash in savage retaliation— a rolling, heavy thunder of detonations. She swung round, jumped vertically in her effort to escape the deadly glare. Her long body inclined out of the horizontal— nose upward— whether through injury or because she climbed Otto could not tell. The searchlights held her. A vivid yellow flash, a simultaneous sharp crack, in the air to his right, level with him, snatched him from the vision. Other sharp cracks, whose flashes he could not see, followed. Glancing over the bulwark he perceived a faint white milky radiance veiling the black depths, issuing from immediately below. Through it he saw, far away to starboard, the white eye of another searchlight spring into brilliance, swing its long beam towards them. They were discovered! As he sprang to the hatchway he saw the machine-guns and their crews silhouetted black in the blinding whiteness.

He swung himself down the manhole to the ladder in desperate haste, the necessity of immediate report to the commander urgent within him. He slid rather than climbed down the steep, narrow ladder. Here in the darkness between the unseen ballonets, walled in from all vision, a great fear— not for himself, but for the ship— surged up in him. The pulsing vibrations of the ladder, the noise of the engines— here a ringing roar— reassured him that she still lived. A pitch and roll, and giddy swerve told him that she manoeuvred. The imagined spitting flashes of the shrapnel bursts outside the frail envelope haunted him as he clambered down with frantic haste.

He dropped on to the narrow gangway. All was still, dark, though dimly light by comparison with the blackness from which he had emerged. They had dodged the beam. But the horizon was latticed with, waving, moving searchlights. From the depths below they shot up like a nest of broad white spears. From below also, but ahead of them, the vivid red flashes leaped up without cessation in widespread fans of lurid light. And, grimly significant, far, far below he saw the fierce glow; the rolling smother of buildings in a blaze. Despite the over-powering noise of the ship's engines, the detonations came to him in a continuous dull, shuddering thunder. He thought he heard the sharp cracks of anti-aircraft guns.

As he ran along the gangway to the control car he saw a gleam of something swooping, hawk-like through the night sky, rushing down to meet them, bows on. He shouted a warning to the machine-gunners, forgetful that they could not hear. But they also had seen.

There was a sharp crackle of reports, spitting flames— the aeroplane and they whizzed past a each other.

"Look out!" he shouted to the gunners, useless though it was. The aeroplane had turned and was swooping down upon them again, racing after them. He waited in an agony of suspense for the bomb. It came not. Their enemy had happily exhausted their supply.

The machine drew parallel with them, Otto glimpsed the polished, canoe-like nose of the nacelle, saw the jutting machine-gun switch towards them, spit repeatedly. From aft and centre the two machine-guns of the airship answered in a fierce duel. The aeroplane rushed onwards, outpacing them— nose-dived suddenly.

Otto hurried into the control-car. Von Breitmuller greeted him with a quiet sardonic smile, looking up from the observation panel in the floor. He held a telephone receiver to his ear, was speaking into the transmitter.

"Yes — yes," he said. "I understand — no, wait for the intersection of the streets— the glow will help you—" Otto imagined his friend swinging far below, gazing downward, speaking into the telephone.

"Right!" von  Breitmuller continued. He raised his head, shouted an order to the steersman; "Star-board two points!" Then again into the telephone: "Don't wait too long! Yes— yes."

He stretched out his hand, grasped the handle of the telegraph to the engines, pulled it over with a clang.

There was a sudden silence. The engines had stopped. They were floating forward on their impetus. The noise of their consorts' bombs surged up to them in a thunder of reiterated shocks. Telephone to his ear, von Breitmuller laid his hand upon another telegraph— that to his bomb-droppers— waited. In the dimly-lit control-car was a hush of tense nerves. The stillness of the ship, vibrationless and silent after so long, was impressive. Von Breitmuller spoke again.

"Yes — yes." His fingers settled themselves in a grasp upon the handle of the telegraph— paused. He jerked it suddenly over. Otto glanced down through the observation-panel, fascinated. From the black depth below leaped a spout of livid red flame— another and another. The airship jumped and quivered, rocked in the crashes of the explosions. Von Breitmuller knelt impassive upon the floor, spoke into the telephone, looked up to Otto.

"Target!" he said, with grim delight. He spoke again to the observer. "No— take your line from the river— can you make out the bridges?— right— it's about eight hundred yards from that point." He spoke as though he carried a map of the hated City in his head. "Yes— that's the direction— right."

He clanged the engine-room telegraph once more. Once more the rattling roar awoke, but this time diminished, at half-speed. He shouted an order to the steersman— a blinding white glare shot up through the observation-panel, illuminated the cabin.

For one second the commander bent ever the panel, his sardonic features strongly accentuated in the unearthly glare, looking like an evil magician cowering over a devil's cauldron. Then he sprang to his feet, switched the engine-telegraph on to full speed, shouted order upon order to the steersman.

The ship leaped and shook in a roar of machinery, swung and lurched with  an inclined floor. But still the glare shot up through the observation-panel, dazzling any attempt at downward vision. Another beam smote suddenly upon the side-windows. The features of all in the cabin were grotesquely thrown into relief by the pitiless white blaze.

The commander spoke into the telephone again. "No— no— don't bother— I must lighten her anyway."

He clanged the telegraph to the bomb droppers repeatedly, savagely. From below the blasts of the recklessly-flung missiles rushed up to them, but the flashes were masked by the steady brilliance of the unwavering searchlights. Otto glanced at the aneroid, saw the needle jump. The ship shot up to greater altitudes. Through the frosted windows he saw the gleam of quick yellow flashes, caught sharp detonations in the general roar. There was a louder one— a shudder of the ship. Von Breitmuller was shouting into the telephone.

"Steinhauer! Steinhauer!" he called. He looked up, his face anxious. "Go and see what has happened."

Otto went out.

The long under-body of the envelope gleamed white above him, the rod-slung gangway was startlingly illumined. In the air all round the shrapnel lit and cracked incessantly. He heard a fragment whiz past his head. He hurried to the windlasses of the observation-car. They were gone! A shell had violently burst right between them, hurled them from their mountings. He stood motionless or a second, paralyzed with horror at the fate of his comrade. He saw the sister— Elsa— looking into his eyes. Then, mastering himself with a spasm of will, he glanced upward — saw a great black rent in the white envelope.

A moment later three well-placed shells burst with vicious flashes at different points along the deck. The ship tossed, lay over, lost her level keel. The noise of her engines diminished, altered in character. With experienced ear, he realised that one was running free, that another had ceased to work. The ship sagged all awry, swerved, and pitched. He had to clutch the rail to maintain his footing. He wondered whether she were falling.

Another and another shell struck her, yet still the terrible burst of flame he feared— looked for at each moment— was withheld. The hostile guns below had got her range exactly on a parallax of searchlights. The shells burst all round— again and again upon the deck. He felt the gangway quivering loose under his feet. He was sure that already some shells had burst inside the envelope— by a miracle, had not exploded the ballonets. Trembling, he hastened back to the control-car, clambering over broken stanchions, swinging himself in one instance with frenzied, unconscious courage across a sheer gap.

He found his superior shouting a message to the telephonist for repetition to the wireless operator. It reported their disaster to the flagship. Otto gave him additional details. Cool and sardonic, Von Breitmuller listened, repeated the information in succinct, official language to the telephonist. The message was interrupted by a priority call from the machine-gun platform on top of the envelope. The unteroffizier in charge reported a concerted aeroplane attack, appealed for manoeuvres to assist in beating it off. Von Breitmuller shook his head with a grim smile. He turned to Otto, who stood clutching the downpost in an effort to keep himself upright.

"Go up and take charge. Fight to the last!" His eyes flashed. "We should be proud to die amid the ruins of our foes."

Otto glanced at the blanched faces of the steersman and the telephonist. "Don't grudge your life, boy. We are only the vanguard. Our comrades follow us in swarms to rain down fire hatred for our vengeance. England! England ich passe dich! Our death shall be a fiery curse from heaven!"

The man's face was that of a fanatic at the stake. "Go, boy!" he finished. "Good-bye!"

He pressed his hand.

Outside the shrapnel crashed and crashed. As Otto left the car he heard the commander order the telephonist to release all the bombs. The bombers had been killed, then! Once more he scrambled hurriedly along the gangway, not giving a glance to the scene around below him. But, subconsciously, he was aware that the other ships of the squadron were continuing the attack— were meeting a fierce defence. He swung himself up on to the ladder through the envelope, no longer vertically above him, and stopped, checked by a smell of gas. With quick decision he thrust a handkerchief into his mouth, and climbed. He emerged, with bursting lungs, on to the platform— saw one gun only spitting fire, two men crouched beside it. He ran to assist. As he went something swooped with an angry whirr, low down, close overhead— shot away.

There was a blinding flash, a loud double roar, a sheet of awful flame. The leviathan tilted, hung almost vertical; great tongues of flame, rolling black smoke, licked upward. With a blind instinct he caught at the bulwark to prevent himself slipping, shielded his face from an intense heat. A man yet clinging to the machine gun below him let go his hold. Wrapped in flame, the leviathan drifted slowly, sinking, a fiery terror in the sky.

__________________

9: The Royal Visit

Ethel Lina White

1879-1944

The Glacier County Chief, Montana, 2 and 9 Jun 1939

Roy Glashan's Library, 2023

Ethel Lina White

VIVA RICHARDS had one of her hunches about the Royal Visit to Tudor Green, and, as usual, she managed to infect her policeman-husband with her own foreboding. No one could understand the secret of her influence over him. Besides being an Oxford Boxing Blue, he had a trained mind, while she was small, nervy and as full of superstitions as an old wife.

But for all that, she had her big husband by the short hairs.

It was grilling weather towards the end of August, so that he was glad to get off the baked pavements of High street into the cool of his home. Viva— looking like a high school girl in her tight dark-blue frock, with white collar and cuffs, had tea waiting for him on the daisied lawn at the back of the cottage.

She flew at him, kissed him, rescued the dish of plums from the wasps, poured him out a cup of tea and then looked at him with dark, tragic eyes.

"Bread and butter always tastes of grass out-of-doors." she said mournfully. She added in the same breath, "Hugo, I'm so unhappy about the Royal Visit."

P.C. Richards groaned, for he was sick of the subject. He considered that the residents of Tudor Green had swollen heads and had lost their sense of proportion over the civic honor. Besides, the affair was only small beer—a rushed visit of under half-an-hour. The prince was actually scheduled to fulfill an important engagement at a large industrial city, but with unselfish good nature had consented to break his Journey to lay the foundation stone of the new hospital.

"I'm unhappy, too," Richards informed his wife. "I have to be on duty. But I can't see why you're mourning."

"Because— Hugo. I know there's going to be a terrible tragedy."

He ran his finger uneasily round the inside of his collar, as though it had suddenly grown unbearably tight. Although he always laughed at Viva's presentiments, he had noticed that there was usually a logical origin in a tangible fact behind her tangled fancies and intuitions.

"What makes you think that, infant?" he asked.

"I'm not sure. One can never be certain, for warnings are such shadowy things. But I think it's this burglary at Sir Anthony Kite's."

He laughed indulgently, for it was obvious that, this time, she had strayed too far from any connecting sequence.

"It's queer," she went on. "I feel It must be leading up to something." Then her voice changed to professional interest. "Do you expect to make an arrest?" she asked.

"No, to you. There's not a clue. And the stolen notes are all old ones, so we can't trace their numbers."

BOTH he and his superior— Sergeant Belcher— were annoyed by the affair, for burglaries were practically unknown in Tudor Green, while the special circumstances made it appear an outrage. Sir Anthony Kite, who was a well known London ear specialist, had retired to live in the little old-world town. but, owing to his persistent interest in his profession, he saw local patients at his private residence, besides giving his services to the hospital and clinic.

It was really a gesture of benevolence to the community, so that he was both bewildered and hurt when he came downstairs, on the preceding morning, to find that his study had been entered, through the French window.

Apparently, the burglar had either been disturbed or in a panic, for he had roughly forced a drawer in the desk and grabbed its entire contents, which included private papers and records, besides treasury notes to the value of 52 pounds.

Viva noticed her husband's frown and changed the subject.

"Mrs. Greenwood-Gore has a Union Jack dress for the ceremony. Red, blue and white. It positively shouts loyalty. It sounds pretty grim, but she carries it off. She is so lovely."

She could afford to be generous in view of her husband's antipathy for the local beauty and social leader of Tudor Green.

"Why don't you like her, Hugo? She's always gracious to you." she reminded him.

"She's gracious enough to talk to me, but she rarely takes the trouble to listen to what I have to say. Because I'm a policeman, I suppose... Well. I must toddle back to the station."

Viva walked with him to the front gate, where they lingered to get the effect of the decorations of High street. They were on a lavish scale and presented a regal spectacle of fluttering scarlet and gleaming gold.

Even as they admired them, a cloud passed before the sun, so that the bright colors were suddenly dimmed, while the gilded crowns turned dull, as though tarnished by the poisoned breath of anarchy.

Richards felt Viva's sudden shiver and knew that she was reading an omen of evil in the eclipse.

IN spite of the heat, he hurried back to his work. Notwithstanding his common sense, he felt vaguely apprehensive, as though he, too, had prescience of certain seemingly disconnected events which were already beginning to fit themselves Into a dark and abominable conspiracy.

When he reached the station, he found his superior officer, Sergeant Belcher, listening with the grim expression which betrayed opposition, to Col. Clarence Block ... The sergeant was not only a popular local sportsman, but a native of the place, and he instinctively distrusted a newcomer to the district.

Colonel Block suffered from that handicap, but, against precedent, he had forced his way to the top, through sheer pressure of wealth and a plus-personality. Consequently he had crashed the position of chairman of the reception committee, on the occasion of the Royal Visit, to the annoyance of the mayor, who was a dignified, silver-haired lawyer, of long pedigree.

The sergeant addressed Richards skeptical grin.

"Extra work for you, Richards. The colonel's got the wind up about this Royal Visit."

The support of Viva's presentiment came from such an unexpected quarter, that it stunned Richards to silence. He could only stare as Block began to explain.

"I've made myself personally responsible for the safety of His Highness, so I'm insisting on extra precautions. I've Just carried my meeting, in the teeth of strong opposition. Now I want the co-operation of the police."

"I can't see what there Is to worry about in a loyal little town like ours." objected the sergeant.

"Then you can't see further than your nose. Don't you realize that the prince is going to a big Industrial center, with a strong communist element? Of course, the police will concentrate on making that borough safe for him... But if a mad dog escapes their roundup, if he has any sense, he will come to our little show, where he'll have the chance of a lifetime."

"Hum... What do you propose?"

"I'm going to have all the Territorials on the ground, so as to crowd out the general public. And I'm going to limit strictly the number of those present in the enclosure, for the ceremony."

"All right for your friends, colonel, but rough on the townspeople who've spent their money on decorations."

"They can line the route. And you needn't talk of my friends. They'll soon be my enemies, for I'm going to boil down the list of invitations to the bone. But my back is broad and I'm used to taking hard knocks."

P.C. Richards looked at him. He noticed the strong featured face, the bull-neck, the aggressive lips, the dark blood-shot eyes, the coarse hairs which covered his hands— and decided that his claim to resistance was no idle boast.

The colonel continued to lay down the law.

"There is to be no broadcasting. No photographers and no pressmen, except the local rag. And no planes are to fly over the ground."

"Then you had better speak to your son, colonel."

Block scowled as he walked to the door.

"If that young cub of mine breaks the regulations." he said, "I'll make a point of being on the bench, to give him the maximum sentence."

The sergeant grinned at Richards as the door slammed, for the strained relations between Block and his only son was common knowledge.

"Too gentle for this world," he remarked. "The angels must be calling him. There's the telephone. Take the call, Richards, and if it's Sir Anthony again, I'm not to."

Richards grinned, for the ear specialist had been continually ringing up the station, to inquire if the police were on the track of his burglar. On this occasion, however, and to Richards' astonishment, he had some news for them.

"My casebook has just been returned to me by post," he said in his dry, clearly articulated voice. "Apparently the perverted person who stole it has some muddled idea of making a gesture."

"But it's very satisfactory," remarked Richards heartily. "The loss of confidential documents must be the worst part to a professional man."

"I'm glad I've raised your spirits... But my 52 pounds were not returned."

"I'll be round now to examine the postal wrapper."

"I have already done so. The only deduction from the postmark is that the criminal is spending my money in London."

P.C. Richards rang off, wiping his brow. His only consolation was that, at long last, he must go home to Viva.

WHEN he walked home, in the greenish dusk, he chose the back way beside a small brown river; shaded with masonry, which flowed through part of the town. Even here, his luck was out, for instead of avoiding people, he ran into Mrs. Flora Greenwood-Gore.

A flawless blonde— ageless and childless— she was the wife of an important man. Even the prejudiced Richards had to admit her beauty as he looked at her perfect complexion and violet eyes. He noticed that she was wearing a frock printed with poppies and cornflowers on a white ground, before she drew his attention to it.

"My royal reception dress. My husband says the colors are too daring."

"They've done more than dare. They've hit me in the eye," said Richards.

As she was not married to him, there was no reason for Mrs. Greenwood-Gore to smile at his joke. She went on talking in her habitual monologue.

"Oh. by the way, a man we knew in the Transvaal has just flown over to see me. I had to go out, so I sent him over to your wife, as he met her uncle at the Cape. I'll ring up when I get home and you can send him over..."

She passed on, leaving Richards indignant with her autocratic management.

WHEN he reached the small, cream-washed building which held all he loved most, the French windows of the drawing room were open and the light fell on a patch of vivid green grass. As he lingered, he could tell, by the halting sound of voices, that both Viva and her visitor were finding it difficult to sustain a conversation.

He plunged to the rescue, when Viva gratefully introduced him to the South African. He was a dried-up man with a nasal voice and no entertainment value, so that Richards was justified in not realizing his supreme importance in the development of future events.

There was nothing to tell him that had that especial man not called that evening, the course of history would have been changed.

To make amends for his first stiffness, he produced whisky, which presently unloosed the stranger's tongue. Even then, he was not a success, for he annoyed the Richards family by tactless praise of Mrs. Greenwood-Gore.

"Loveliest woman I've ever met. They were big people in Jo'burg, but she hadn't a scrap of side. Always the same to everyone. And she's not altered a bit. I do admire the way she puts it over."

"She certainly throws her weight about," said Viva coldly.

The stranger glanced at her quickly and then a change came over his expression. For the first time. Richards really understood what is meant by a poker face.

"Are you folks keen on flying?" he asked.

"Not me," replied Richards. "A policeman has to stand on his famous flat feet."

"Only way to get about. The drawback is the engine noise. You see, my job is in the cyanide works at Jo'burg, where the din is chronic. All the workers wear these."

He scooped out of his pocket a couple of curiously-shaped rubber plugs and tossed them down on the mantel shelf.

"Never without them. Always wear them flying... Isn't that the phone?"

"I'll go," cried Viva joyously.

The South African's face lit up when she returned from the hall with her message.

"Mrs. Greenwood-Gore is waiting for you."

He was as eager to go as they to speed his parting. The instant he had gone. Richards dropped heavily down in his shabby varsity chair, which he had brought down from Oxford.

"The end of a perfect day." he sighed. Then he glanced at the mantelshelf and added. "That darned fool has left his gadgets behind. Well, he can fetch them himself. I'm not going to turn out again even to save the whole of the empire."

HIS ill temper and Viva's nerves were partly due to atmospherics, for during the night, they were disturbed by a flickering sky and the mutter of distant thunder. In the morning it was pouring with rain and all day a succession of storms kept rolling up over the hills.

As though the electric weather affected the general temper, the final meeting of the reception committee was an explosive affair. Colonel Block read out his revised list of those persons privileged to attend the ceremony, regardless of angry mutters of protests from those who were disappointed.

He was supported in his tactics by Admiral Stel— one of the oldest residents who was virulently anti-communist.

The vicar arose to make a protest. "I am sure we all appreciate your difficulties and your courage in tackling them." he said to the colonel. "But there is one person who should be present. Surely you could squeeze in Miss Spenser?"

There was a hum of approval, for the little spinster was a devoted parish worker and a zealous member of the Primrose league.

"It would break her heart to be left out," continued the vicar. "She has all the portraits of the royal family in her parlor. The memory of the occasion would remain with her always. Besides, in view of her deafness, she is deprived of so much amusement."

He looked for support towards Flora Greenwood-Gore, whose fair face wore its habitual expression— serene yet remote— as though she dwelt on another plane. When she smiled and bowed her head, the applause grew so vigorous that the colonel had to give way.

"All right, since you insist, she shall have her ticket. And while we're on the subject, I have a special announcement to make. There will be no admission without a ticket. It doesn't matter who the individual or what the circumstances."

"I second the measure," approved the mayor. "It would take time to check a list at the entrance. In view of the rush, everything must go off without a hitch."

Unfortunately, after the concession, the meeting was marred by another incident. The admiral who was so staunch a supporter of home interests that he had not left Tudor Green for years rose on his gouty feet.

"I have been informed." he said, "that the presentation silver trowel and mallet to be used at the ceremony were not supplied locally. In my opinion, it is scandalous to spend one penny of the rate-payers' subscriptions out of the town."

"It was considered necessary," explained the mayor soothingly, "to avoid suspicion of favoritism."

"In any case," interrupted Colonel Block, "the expense will be carried by me, as my contribution. I'm entitled to choose my own firm, aren't I? I don't truckle to local graft."

After that implicit insult, it took all the mayor's diplomacy to prevent the meeting from degenerating into a dog fight. At its conclusion, the colonel made a final arbitrary announcement.

"The invitations will not be sent by post. They must be applied for, personally, at my house. I shall initial them myself and hand them to the rightful persons."

MISS SPENSER lost no time in applying for her precious card. She enjoyed the experience as a little social occasion, for she met others who were at the colonel's imposing mansion on the same errand. While they waited, they were invited into the dining room for refreshments and the spirit of the house was hospitable and friendly.

It was fortunate that she had a taste of pleasure, because within five minutes of leaving she was the victim of a disagreeable incident. She went home by the short cut, a paved passage running between the garden walls of some large houses. At its darkest part, a youth rushed past her, snatched her bag and ran off with it.

She went immediately to the police station, to report her loss.

"Luckily, there was only a little money in it," she told Sergeant Belcher. "A trifle over four shillings. But my card-case and latchkey were inside. I shall get the lock changed instantly, but I do hope my cards will not be used for an improper purpose."

Then she gave a cry of dismay.

"Oh dear, Oh dear. My card of admission was there too. I shan't get another. The colonel warned me not to lose it. He will be so angry with me."

"Did you get a view of the young man?" asked the sergeant.

"The merest glimpse as he rushed under the lamp. Of course I could not be certain, but I thought he looked like young Block. Only that is too ridiculous."

"Well," remarked the sergeant; after the distressed lady had gone, "it seems one of two things. Either the dictator is so annoyed at being crossed over Miss Spenser's ticket that he arranged to have it pinched—or else the son did it on his own. He's been left out of the show and he may be planning some fool revenge on his dad."

P.C. Richards went home in a disturbed frame of mind. He kept asking himself a question. Could there be any connection between the loss of Sir Anthony's 52 pounds and Miss Spenser's 52 pence?

If such were the case, there might indeed be some foundation for Viva's miserable hunch. But although he thought until he was stupid, the two thefts remained poles apart, and he could conjecture no point of fusion.

He did not tell Viva about the incident until the next morning. She made no comment, but he was dismayed to notice her pale face as she poured coffee.

P.C. Richards found the light duty, which was his lot at Tudor Green, an arduous test of endurance. Of course, he told himself that he was worried solely about his wife and he watched the clock— or rather, his wrist— until he was able to get back to the cottage.

He was glad to find his father-in-law, Dr. Buck, having tea with Viva. He was a brisk, sensible man, with a tight pink clean-shaven face, and he would certainly disclaim the responsibility for his temperamental daughter. On this occasion, however, his gossip; had done nothing to relieve her symptoms, for her small face was pinched with anxiety.

"Have you heard about the admiral, Hugo?" she asked.

"No," replied Richards. "What about him?"

"He's fractured his leg. Daddy has just been called in to him. He fell down his front steps."

"Rather early in the day for that."

"No," said the doctor, "he was quite sober. The steps were greased. I nearly slipped on them myself."

"Who could have done it, Hugo?" asked Viva.

Richards tried to hide his uneasiness.

"Some silly practical joke," he declared. "But I'm off duty now and I want my tea..."

Although he refused to discuss the incident, he followed his father-in-law to the front gate.

"You might send over a bromide for Viva," he said. "She's got jim-jams."

"Even I have diagnosed them," remarked the doctor dryly. "I'll let you have a draught."

THE sedative did its work, for Viva had no warning dream to relate on the following morning. The sun was shining from a clear blue sky and she felt cheerfully normal. During the morning she remembered that she had not even tried on the new frock which had been bought for the ceremony. It required to be shortened, and she grew so interested in her appearance that she had not time for apprehension.

She was dressed and seated at luncheon table when Richards entered the room.

"Aren't you cutting it rather fine?" she asked

Then she noticed that he had made no comment on her new finery, although he was usually responsive.

"What's the matter?" she asked.

"Nothing," he replied with forced lightness. "Bad show for Flora Greenwood-Gore. That's all. She's going to miss the fun."

"You mean— she won't be at the ceremony? Why?"

"Got a telegram, early this morning, saying her mother was dying and asking her to come immediately. Her husband is away, so she wired him where she'd gone, before she left. He rang up the old folks to find out exactly what was wrong ... and nothing was."

He stopped speaking, and gazed at his wife in consternation. She sat motionless, her fork poised in the air, while she stared fixedly at him as though her wits had deserted her.

"What's the matter?" he asked sharply. "Say something, but don't look like that."

"Dear Brutus," she murmured.

"My dearest girl, it sounded like you said 'Brutus.' Or am I imagining things?"

"No, I said it. Hugo, don't you remember Barrie's play, where a lot of ill-assorted people were invited to a house, because they had something in common?"

"Yes. But—"

"Don't you see? Someone has prevented Miss Spenser, the admiral and now Mrs. Greenwood-Gore from coming to the ceremony. There's an object behind it— and I'm terribly afraid. What have those three people got in common? What?"

Although he was six feet of stodge, P.C. Richards felt himself beaten by his wife's hunch. He became conscious of something secret and diabolical creeping in the darkness, like a slow train of gunpowder eating its way to the explosion.

He glanced at the clock distractedly.

"If you are right." he said, "we've got to find it out in double quick time. We must be in our places in 15 minutes."

"I know. Think. Hugo."

"It beats me. I could find points of resemblance between the admiral and Miss Spenser. They are both elderly and rheumatic and amateur gardeners and Primrose leaguers and deaf. It's Mrs. Greenwood-Gore that's the complication. She has everything they haven't got."

The telephone bell began to ring, but he shook his head impatiently.

"Shut up," he muttered.

"Answer it," commanded Viva suddenly. "I feel it may be important."

Obediently, he took the receiver off the hook. He was strung up to a pitch of nerves when he wanted to swear at the sound of Mrs. Greenwood-Gore's voice at the end of the line. She was furious over her grievance and insisted on telling him what he already knew, In spite of his efforts to interrupt her.

"I've rung up the police station," she said, "but I can get no responsible person. They say the sergeant has left for the ceremony. So I appeal to you. You must find out who sent that telegram and prosecute the person."

"I'm not sure a practical joke is within our province," he told her.

"Thank you. Now I have your promise, I feel satisfied."

"I'm afraid you didn't hear. I said it's not within our scope—"

"I hope so, too. Goodby."

P.C. Richards rang off and stared at his wife as though he could not be believe his ears.

"Viva," he shouted. "I've got it. I now know what they have in common... They are all deaf."

Viva shook her head.

"Not Mrs. Greenwood-Gore," she protested.

"But she is... That South African chap— Yes, that's the idea."

Dashing across to the mantelshelf Richards began to turn over the ornaments.

"Where are his gadgets?" he panted. She instantly picked up a vase, turned it upside down and shook out the plugs. "Why do you want them?" she asked.

"Because I want to make myself deaf. It seems to me that there's going to be a planned disturbance at the ceremony— probably some noise. That's why they've eliminated all the deaf people. They might not react to the distraction—whatever it is... Well, they'll have me now."

"What will you do?"

"Just act on the spur of the moment. Come along. The car's outside."

Standing in the over-heated enclosure. Viva heard the cheers which were inaudible to her husband. He had motioned a constable to stand by him, but otherwise, he could only wait and watch.

THE great moment was at hand. The cheers grew louder as the prince entered the enclosure. He was accompanied by the mayor and mayoress, who had met the royal train at the station, and he wore the rosebud which had been presented by their grandson.

Colonel Block— as chairman of the reception committee bowed himself forward with a few words of welcome, to superintend the laying of the foundation stone. There was no time for speeches and the short ceremony was soon over. Having done his part, the prince glanced at his watch and then smiled at the company, with his customary charm.

At that moment, there was an unexpected commotion. With a threatening snarl, which grew louder every second, an airplane swooped down out of the clouds and dived lower and lower over the ground, while the roar of its engine increased. Instantly, every head was turned in its direction while every face looked upwards.

There were two exceptions to the general company of sky-gazers. P.C. Richards heard a deadened noise, but the sound reached him a fractional period later than the rest of the crowd. It was in this interval that he, alone, saw what was about to happen.

Colonel Block whipped a knife out of the handle of the silver trowel, as though it were a sword-stick and poised it, ready to stab the prince in the back.

The blow never fell. While the company, including the prince, were still engrossed by the antics of the airman, who was flying in dangerously low circles. P.C. Richards and the other constable had gripped their prisoner and run him out of the enclosure, with the minimum of commotion.

The incident passed with such despatch that afterwards, no one could claim truthfully to be an eye-witness of the outrage ... The prince laughed and hurried back to his car. There was a second outburst of cheers along the return route to the station. Soon afterward he was back in the royal train, only conscious of an amusing break in the boredom of a municipal ceremony.

THAT evening, at the cottage, there was a festive meal, when P.C. Richards returned— full of importance— after the excitement of the proceedings at the police station.

"The Blocks," he explained to his wife, "are paid agents of the Wrecker gang, whose aim it is to upset the peace and security of the world. Father and son worked together, hand in glove. The feud was a dodge to throw dust in our eyes.

"Of course, they were going to be very well paid for bumping off a royalty. The son did all the active part. He stole Sir Anthony's casebook and Miss Spenser's bag and he greased the admiral's doorsteps. As you saw, he did the flying stunt for which his father was going to inflict a heavy penalty, according to plan."

"That was a smart idea," remarked Viva, "If you watch a crowd when a plane files low overhead, I defy you to find anyone who does not look up instinctively."

"Exactly. Block's part was to strike instantly in the confusion and then to slip the knife back, before the murder was spotted. When it was discovered, it would be difficult to associate him with the crime, as they all had an equal chance."

"But wouldn't the knife be traced to him, as he ordered the trowel?"

"He would probably take it away during the uproar. Remember, there were no brainy C.I.D. men present, to take command and order everyone to be searched and all that. I don't see why anyone would suspect the trowel. And if it were found, he would probably be able to prove delivery of an innocuous duplicate and swear to substitution on the part of persons known, in order to frame him."

"But when did you get on to the idea that Mrs. Greenwood-Gore was deaf?" asked Viva.

"When she began to guess at what I was saying on the telephone. I wonder why we never spotted it before that she was deaf. It explains why she goes on talking and never seems to listen. Sheer bluff. My own idea is that she is much older than anyone knows and like many beautiful women she can't stick the thought of age or infirmity. You remember how the South African talked about her putting over 'something.' That chap knew."

"Well, it's all very clever of you, darling." said Viva. "But don't forget Block had to steal Sir Anthony's casebook to find out all the cases of deafness in the district!"

"What of it?" asked her husband.

"Well— wasn't that my hunch?"

_________________

10: Pugh's Poisoned Ring

Richard Marsh

1857-1915

The Harmsworth Magazine, Oct 1900

Richard Bernard Heldmann

I REALLY DON'T KNOW what induced me to do it; it was done on the impulse of the moment— one of those impulses to which collectors, real collectors, collectors in the highest sense, are peculiarly liable; I know I am.

Pugh had left the room for a moment. I just opened his cabinet of rings. I glanced within. One of the rings particularly caught my eye. I just picked it up as he came in. Unconsciously— or almost unconsciously— as Pugh entered, I dropped the ring into my waistcoat pocket. It was the merest coincidence. Five minutes afterwards I went away.

As I was walking homewards it occurred to me that the ring was— where it was. The fact is that I slipped my fingers into my waistcoat pocket, and— found it there. It struck me that, as it was where it was, I might as well examine the thing.

I took it out. It was an engraved cameo, Italian, of about the middle of the sixteenth century; it was set in gold. I don't suppose it was of any value, either intrinsic or fanciful. It was merely a little curio— quite a commonplace affair— the sort of thing one might almost pick up in the street. But the odd part of the affair was that it was just the ring I wanted; that struck me then, and it strikes me now, as being, in its way, peculiar.

I have a few rings of my own— Pugh fancies his collection is better than mine, but then it is notorious that Pugh is simply a conglomerate mass of vanity and ignorance— but, strangely enough, I am particularly weak, as a collector, in Italian work of the middle of the sixteenth century. The coincidence, under the circumstances, of finding that identical ring in my waistcoat pocket, was, of course, surprising. I examined the thing more closely. It was a large cream-coloured ground, with the head of a woman cut in white relief. It was not badly done— not at all. The more closely I looked into the thing, the more clearly I saw that the cameo, for a cameo, was quite a work of art. In my collection it would look uncommonly well. The woman's head was beautiful; the face was perfectly exquisite. I slipped the ring on to my little finger to study the effect.

As I did so I was just turning into the Edgware Road. As I reached the corner I was seized with a sudden spasm of pain; it was like a sudden constriction of the heart, or, better, an acute attack of heartburn. At that moment who should come slouching along, with that habitual graceful slouch of his, but Martin Brasher. I attempted to wave my hand to him; but so severe was the spasm that I had to stagger against the railings to save myself from falling. He pulled up in front of me.

"Are you ill?" he asked.

"Do you think I'm drunk?"

It was such an absurd question to ask a man who he saw was almost fainting! Brasher's eyes began to wander all over me— he was quite capable of thinking, in spite of visual evidence to the contrary, that I was drunk! His gaze began at the soles of my boots, and I knew that, in the course of ages, it would ascend to the crown of my hat. I was aware that nothing would escape his glance; he would be sure to perceive the ring. As the coincidence by which it came into my possession was not one of those coincidences which one is necessarily desirous of publishing to the world, I began fumbling at my little finger to get it off. Brasher immediately fixed me with his eagle eye.

"What are you doing?" he inquired.

"Trying to stand," I said. "Brasher, would it be subjecting you to too great an inconvenience if I were to ask you to turn round and call me a cab?"

He hesitated; then, turning, he hailed a hansom. The instant his back was towards me I replaced the ring in my waistcoat pocket.

The cabman drove me home. Directly I reached Randolph Crescent I stumbled upstairs to my bedroom; I went straight to bed. That scoundrel Bob was out, as usual, so I had to undress myself. A pretty job I found it! That heartburn— I had never been subject to heartburn, but if that was not heartburn I did not know what it was— had never for one instant ceased since it had first begun. Every vein in my body seemed to be throbbing at once. My head seemed to be on the point of splitting. I supposed that I was suffering from an acute attack of indigestion, though what I had eaten or drunk to give me indigestion was more than I could think. I mixed myself a strong sleeping-draught— I felt that if I did not go to sleep at once I should go mad— and, somehow, tumbled into bed.

ii

"TRESS!" Someone seemed to be shaking me. "Tress!" Someone was shaking me. "Tress!" There could be no doubt about it, someone was shaking me to pieces. "Tress!"

I roused myself. I looked up. I found that I was lying in bed. Pugh was standing by my bedside, shaking me as though he were resolved to shake my body into its constituent parts.

"Pugh, is that you?"

"It is. You are a late sleeper, Joseph Tress. Do you know what time it is?"

"No."

"It is nearly noon."

Nearly noon! And I was in bed before nine o'clock the day before. I had been asleep for nearly fifteen hours, and still I felt unrested. It was that sleeping-draught had done it. It must have been too strong.

"I thought that you were never going to wake, upon this side, again— that you were in your long, last sleep. I shouldn't have been surprised."

I sat up in bed with some difficulty. I looked at Pugh. I noticed, for the first time, that his acidulated countenance was irradiated by what he, doubtless, meant to be a smile. It made him look as though he were suffering from an attack of jaundice.

"I had an attack of indigestion yesterday after I left you, and I took a sleeping-draught. I fancy the draught must have been too strong."

"After you left me? An attack of indigestion? I see. Is that all?"

"What else would you have had me have?"

"Ah!"

Pugh's "Ah!" was intended to convey a whole encyclopedia of meaning. What an idiot that man is! He drew a chair to the bedside. He sat down on it. He crossed his hands upon the handle of his stick, and leaned his chin upon his hands. He stared at me, like an owl.

"Tress, do you remember, yesterday, when I was showing you my cabinet of rings, noticing a cameo ring, cream ground, with a woman's head in white relief, of sixteenth century Italian workmanship?"

Now I knew why he had come. Up to that moment I had forgotten all about the ring, and the odd coincidence that I had found it in my waistcoat pocket. For the second I was taken aback. I did not know what to say to him. My head felt fuddled.

"A cameo ring, cream ground, with a woman's head in white relief, of sixteenth century Italian workmanship?"

"That's it, exactly. I see you noticed it."

I shook my head. I did not like to say, in so many words, I hadn't, being as fond of truth as most men.

"Why do you ask?"

"Because, when you went, the ring went too."

"What do you mean?"

"Nothing. Only, when you had gone, I found that the ring had gone. You are sure you didn't notice it?"

"Quite sure."

I was driven to a lie.

"That's odd, because I thought that I saw you pay particular attention to that particular ring— a cameo ring, cream ground, with a woman's head in white relief, of sixteenth century Italian workmanship. You are quite sure you didn't notice it— just think."

"I don't want to think; don't I tell you I am sure?"

What did the imbecile mean by making me pile lie upon lie? Pugh rose.

"That's odd, very odd. Well, it's gone. I thought I'd call and tell you, because"— what he meant for a smile grew more pronounced— "that ring is possessed of peculiar properties."

"Peculiar properties?"

"Some very peculiar properties indeed. A collector, ignorant of those properties, might not find it such an acquisition as he supposed. However, it is of no consequence, since you didn't notice it. Good-day, Tress. I hope your indigestion will be better."

He went. Directly he was gone I scrambled out of bed and locked the door. What an escape I had had! In the confused state of my mind, had he persisted in his questioning, I might have been worried into some fatal admission. I was in a fit state neither of mind nor of body to adequately cope with his impertinent prying.

And what did he mean by his mysterious allusions to the peculiar properties of his wretched ring? All bunkum, probably. Still, he had emphasised his words in a manner which seemed to suggest that he had intended them to mean something. An Italian ring, of the sixteenth century? I remembered, unless chroniclers lied, that certain rings of that period had been credited, in Italy, as being possessed of peculiar properties— as Pugh said, of very peculiar properties indeed.

When Brasher's back had been turned, at the corner of the Edgware Road, I had returned the ring to my waistcoat pocket. Having made sure that the door was locked, I took up my waistcoat and looked for the ring. It was strange. It wasn't there. I remembered, distinctly, putting the ring into the right-hand pocket. But as, then, there was no ring in that pocket I presumed that my memory betrayed me, and I had put it in the pocket on the other side. No, there was no ring in that one either. I couldn't have been such an ass as to have put it into my watch-pocket, and in fact I hadn't.

Then where was it? In the midst of my suffering I had torn my clothes off anyhow. It was possible that, unnoticed by me, it had found its way out of my pocket, and a refuge on the floor. I went down on my hands and knees. I peered under the bed, under the furniture; I minutely examined every square inch of the carpet. There was no ring there. It was possible that I might have lost the ring on my homeward way. I say it was possible, but it did not seem to me that it was probable. I began to be conscious of a feeling of irritation. When a collector so far yields to the enthusiasm of the moment as to borrow a specimen, he does not like to lose that specimen within half an hour of his having borrowed it. He feels that his collection has suffered a loss. Pugh had spoken of the peculiar properties of the ring. Was the act of self-abstraction one of them? Or—

A terrible suspicion flashed across my brain. Pugh, for all I knew, had shown himself into my room. He had found me asleep in bed— helpless! I knew the man. He was a man who, under certain circumstances, would stick at nothing; a man who would shrink from no trick because it chanced to be a dirty one; a man who was absolutely devoid of a sense of honesty. To add to that lot of trumpery which he calls his collection he would rob his friend. I had not the slightest doubt of it. I knew it as a positive fact.

On one occasion .he had actually stolen my Sir Walter Raleigh pipe, a priceless relic, being the identical pipe which that great man himself had smoked. When he was taken, red-handed, in his crime, he had the audacity to pretend that he had slipped the pipe into his pocket by mistake, wrapped, as it was, inside his pocket-handkerchief. Such a man was capable of anything. It was quite within the range of possibility that he had come into my bedroom, found me wrapped in the slumber of unconscious innocence, and overhauled my clothing. And then he had had the consummate hypocrisy to wake me, and to ask me, smiling all the time— I had observed his smile!— if I had noticed, in his cabinet, his wretched ring. And he had spoken of its peculiar properties! If, the next time I called at his house, he were to show me his cabinet of rings— which he would be sure to do!— and I were to see in it that ring, staring me in the face, I should feel demoralised.

The thing was to find out if he had shown himself into my room.

I rang for Bob. I rang once, I rang twice, I rang thrice; the third time I nearly broke the bell. Still no Bob. I went outside the bedroom door and bawled for him. By the time I had bawled myself hoarse, and was meditating descending to the kitchen in my nightshirt, and kicking him out of the house up the area steps, I heard, below, the sound of somebody stumbling up the stairs. Was it possible that, at that hour of the day, before I was dressed, the man was drunk? It sounded as though he was. Bump, bump, up he came; every moment I expected to hear him go bump, bump down again. At last he came blundering through the bedroom door. "What on earth, you scoundrel, do you mean by getting drunk before I'm dressed? Do you know what time it is? It isn't noon!"

"I'm not drunk— I wish I were. I'm a dead 'un."

"You are drunk, sir! I tell you what it is, Bob Haines, I've had enough of your villainy, and I'll send you packing. Who showed Mr. Pugh up into my room?"

"Don't know."

"Of course you don't, you tippling fool!"

"I tell you I'm not drunk, I'm dying. Oh!— Oh!"

Leaning against the wall, he clapped his hand to his side, and groaned. I eyed him. He did not look as though he were drunk, and to do Bob Haines justice, although he has the most capacious and constant thirst of any man I ever knew, I never saw him exhibit any signs of having drunk too much. His is a thirst which nothing shall quench.

"What's the matter with you?"

"I've got a pain— here! It's heartburn! All my veins is bursting! So's my head." Curious. From his words and his looks, he appeared to be suffering from an attack exactly similar to that by which I had been overtaken the evening before. I turned away.

"Bob, have you been in my room this morning?"

"Once. You was asleep."

Oh, I was, was I? Had he overhauled my clothes? What were the peculiar properties attached to that ring of Pugh's? I did not, in spite of the new and lurid suspicions which were darkening my mind, like to charge Bob Haines then and there with stealing from me the ring which I had borrowed from Pugh in the enthusiasm of the moment. Bob was an old and, comparatively, faithful servant, as servants go— they are all thieves. I did not like to blast his career, to charge him with an act of perfidy— that is, unless the evidence against him was undeniable, and— and until my mind was settled. I myself still was feeling queer. So I sent him out of the room.

"Go away; and, if you must die, die decently, without making all that noise!"

In spite of my command I heard him groan-groaning, as he went bump-bumping down the stairs.

Hardly had he gone than someone made a thundering assault on the hall-door knocker. The door was opened. Someone entered— two persons, apparently. I heard them coming up the stairs. Not only did they come upstairs, but, without a with your leave or by your leave, or rapping at my door, or any sort of form or ceremony, they came into my room, just as I was putting on my trousers. It was that idiot Pugh, accompanied by that, if possible, still greater idiot, Martin Brasher.

"Hallo, Pugh, what have you come back for?"

"I have come back in consequence of a communication made to me by my friend Brasher, whom I chanced to encounter within a dozen yards of your doorstep. I should like to have, with your permission, five minutes' conversation with you, in the presence of Brasher. Take a chair, Brasher; sit down." Brasher sat down, on Pugh's invitation.

Pugh sat down on his own.

"Mr. Tress,I should like once more to ask you— and before you answer I beg that you will bring your mind to bear upon the question— if, when yesterday I was showing you my cabinet of rings, you did not notice a cameo ring, cream ground, with a woman's head in white relief, of sixteenth century Italian workmanship?"

What did the fellow mean by pestering me with his ridiculous questions?

"I don't know, Pugh, what you're driving at. I can assure you that I haven't time, or inclination, to notice all your rubbish. I have told you, frankly, more than once, what is my opinion of that cabinet of yours."

Pugh waved his hands in the air.

"Quite so! Just so! We are quite aware that, as you say, you have more than once shown the extent of your connoisseurship. But that is not the point. The point is, that that particular ring is missing— missing, Tress. And a further point is, that that particular ring is possessed of— peculiar properties."

"My dear Pugh, I don't care about its peculiar properties."

"But I think it just as well that you should care, under the special circumstances. To begin with, that ring belonged to no less a person than Lucrezia Borgia."

"Lucrezia Jones!"

"Not Jones, but Borgia. Have you never heard of Lucrezia Borgia, Tress? She was a person of some notoriety, though possibly, and even probably, her name may not have come your way."

Confound his impudence; ignorant ass!

"Lucrezia Borgia, Tress, was a lady who had a partiality for getting rid of her friends, before she robbed them."

Pausing, Pugh looked steadily at me.

"That was an age of poisoners. In southern Europe they simply swarmed. Poison was Lucrezia's favourite method of disposing of her friends. Chroniclers tell us that, of all poisoners, she was the queen. She had as many ways of poisoning a friend as a modern chef has of cooking an egg. And one of her ways— Lucrezia's pretty ways— was by means of poisoned rings."

I could not help it, but I started. I know that Pugh observed the start, because he immediately indulged in his jaundiced libel on a smile.

"That ring, Tress, which was in my cabinet, and which now is missing, was one of Lucrezia's poisoned rings."

I turned away— I was compelled to.

"I don't know, Pugh, what all this has to do with me, though I, no doubt, ought to thank you for imparting such valuable information."

"Not at all, Tress, not at all. Permit me to continue. The way in which that ring works— in a poisonous sense— is by wearing it. Put it on your finger, you are poisoned." I busied myself with the things upon the mantel-shelf, being conscious of a sense of distinct discomfort. I was aware that Pugh was regarding me intently— with unqualified enjoyment— from behind, as, I make no doubt, was that addle-headed Brasher. The plague take Pugh's twopenny-halfpenny ring! I wished I had never seen it.

"The way in which the fair Lucrezia used to work the oracle was doubtless this: She used herself to put the ring upon the victim's finger, in that graceful way she had— the woman's head in white relief is Lucrezia's own likeness— and that same instant the recipient of the lady's generosity fell dead. The gift was probably presented in private. There was no eye there to see it given. It was slipped off the finger almost at the same instant in which the lady had slipped it on. It left no trace of its presence behind. The medical verdict was, no doubt, the contemporary equivalent for valvular disease of the heart. The victim had been slain as by a bolt from on high. That peculiarly active virtue which, if the chronicles are true, the ring once possessed, has been modified by time. Now, it does not kill— at once."

I should like to have thrown Pugh out of the bedroom window; he was simply playing on my nerves.

"Quite recently I have had that ring examined by an eminent toxicologist. The way in which it does its work, in this present year of grace, is this: You place it on your finger— as you, for instance, Tress, might do. That same instant you feel a pain in your side."

Almost without knowing it, I clapped my hand to my side.

"That pain is accompanied by a throbbing of all the veins in your body, and a feeling as though your head was about to split into pieces."

The man was simply brutal. I protest that, as he spoke, the symptoms he described returned to me with all their original force.

"You must own, Tress, that it was a little odd that I should have missed the ring directly I missed you. It appears that, as you were leaving my house, Brasher chanced to meet you. It is in consequence of a communication Brasher has made to me, referring to that chance encounter, that I have ventured upon this further interview. Brasher says— I believe, Brasher, that I am right in saying that when you encountered Mr. Tress he appeared to be suffering from indisposition?"

"He did."

"What appeared to you to be the nature of his indisposition?"

"He appeared to be suffering from a pain in his side. He was almost doubled up, and he had his hands pressed convulsively against the region of his heart."

"Did you notice anything else?"

"I did. I noticed upon the little finger of his left hand a ring."

"A ring? Can you tell us, Brasher, what kind of a ring it was which you noticed upon the little finger of his left hand?"

"I can. My eye was struck by it at once. First, because, although I have known Tress for many years, I never before saw him wear a ring. And, second, because the ring itself was a remarkable ring."

"Not the sort of ring which an ordinary English gentleman would be likely to wear during his walks abroad?"

"Certainly not."

"Describe it, Brasher."

"It was a large oval-shaped cameo. It had a cream ground, with a woman's head in white relief.

It was set in gold, curiously chased. It struck me as being an antique, probably Italian, of the sixteenth century."

What eyes that Brasher has!

"You are quite sure, Tress, that when, yesterday, I was showing you my cabinet of rings you did not notice a cameo ring, cream ground, woman's head in white relief, of sixteenth century Italian workmanship?"

I sank down upon the bed. I was doubled up with pain— it had all come back again.

"Pugh, what's the antidote?"

"The antidote, Tress? To what?"

"To that confounded ring of yours!"

"Tress!" He pretended to be shocked. Rising from his chair, he let his stick fall to the floor with a clatter. "Is it possible that you— you! can have robbed your friend, the oldest friend you have in the world! I thought you capable of most things— of palming off the most trumpery rubbish as a priceless relic— but I never thought you capable of theft, from a friend! Oh, Tress! Tress! that it should have come to this!"

He groaned— the hypocrite!

"What's the antidote?"

"The best antidote I can recommend is, primarily, the return of the stolen property."

"I haven't got it!"

"Tress! Don't add another perjury— you, who are perhaps a dying man."

"I haven't! I slipped it into my waistcoat pocket by mistake."

"You slipped it into your pocket by mistake? I see. That explains how it was you didn't notice it. That also explains how it was you happened to be wearing it when Brasher met you in the street."

"It struck me senseless! I believe I'm dying now! I put it into my waistcoat pocket. When I looked for it this morning, it was gone. I thought— you had come in— when I was sleeping— found it— and taken it again."

"You thought! Tress, consider! Even now your moments may be numbered!"

"Oh-h! Ring the bell, and tell them to send me up some brandy!"

Instead of doing as I requested, and as common humanity directed, he began to preach at me to Brasher.

"Brasher, this man has been my friend for over thirty years. Look at him now, and ponder! I have helped him in his collection. You know my taste, what I may call my genius for the discovery of real antiques. If it had not been for me he would not have possessed the few articles of any value which his collection now contains."

Oh, if I had been sufficiently master of myself to kick him!

"And how does he show his gratitude? I will tell you. He breaks into my house like a highwayman, and ransacks all my most precious stores. He knows that I possess, for an amateur— a mere amateur, Brasher— one of the finest collections in Europe. He is green with envy, racked by covetous desires. He fixes his mind upon one of the finest gems in my collection, a relic for which crowned heads— crowned heads, Brasher!— might sigh in vain, and which nonetheless, so marvellously strong is my natural born instinct as a connoisseur, I picked up at a little town in Italy for less than fifteen shillings."

"More than it was worth."

"You hear him, Brasher, you hear him say that that was more than it was worth? But though he says it, he has sufficient knowledge, even in the midst of his wallowing ignorance, to be aware that it is of priceless value. But his knowledge goes no further. He does not know, what I, the true connoisseur, perceived at once, that in the hands of an ignorant man the ring would deal death and danger. So he steals it— from me, his friend! Within a very few minutes his misdeed finds him out. You saw him struggling with death— we see him struggling now! Brasher, look on him now, and ponder!"

"When you have quite finished, perhaps you'll ring the bell."

"I have not finished, but I will ring the bell. And when I have rung it, I will begin again."

"Oh!"

Brasher rang.

"Ring again."

He did.

"Smash the bell!"

He almost did.

"Bob's drunk."

Pugh turned to Brasher. He put his hands behind his back. He wagged his head.

"Like master, like man!"

"Go downstairs and kick him."

"No, Tress, I will not go downstairs and kick him. You hear Mr. Tress, Brasher, asking me to go downstairs to kick his servant? Unfortunately, that's the kind of man he is."

We waited; I expected I should have to go downstairs myself. Then there was a sound of somebody coming lumbering up the stairs; I knew it was Bob. At last he blundered into the room.

"Oh!" he gasped, and collapsed against the wall.

At that same moment a paroxysm overtook me too. Pugh addressed himself to Bob.

"Well, my man, I'm sorry to see you in this condition."

"Not so sorry as I am— I'm a dead 'un."

Brasher took Pugh by the arm.

"It's a curious coincidence, Mr. Pugh, but this person appears to be suffering in precisely the same manner as Mr. Tress was suffering when I encountered him yesterday evening at the corner of the Edgware Road."

Pugh turned to me; I was literally doubled up with pain.

"And as Mr. Tress is suffering now. I have it!" Pugh snapped his fingers in the air. "Tress, do you really mean that that ring is missing— that you don't know where it is?"

"I do."

"Then you have taken it!" Pugh turned to Bob. "So true it is that as the master so the man. You have stolen from your master the ring which your master stole from me!"

Pugh pointed his finger at Bob as if he— Pugh— were an accusing spirit. In the midst of his agony, Bob seemed to be taken aback.

"What d'ye say?"

"I say, and I say it again, that you— you too, have dipped your hands in crime. Fit associate of such a man!"

"Look here, Pugh, I wish you wouldn't speak of me like that to my own servant."

"But I will, Tress, I will. I will probe, at all hazards, to the bottom of this long-drawn-out crime." He returned to Bob. "Villain, confess your guilt. You have stolen from your master the ring of which he previously had plundered me."

"What are you talking about? I don't know nothing about no ring."

"Brasher, come here; look at this man. You know something of the working of— poisons."

"Poisons!"

Bob staggered back against the friendly wall.

"Look at this man's face— look at it closely. Do you not perceive, in the working of the muscles of his countenance, something strange and ghastly?"

"I do," said Brasher; "I see it most distinctly."

He would have been a fool if he didn't, considering the spectacle which Bob just then presented.

"Do you see a convulsive twitching?"

"I do."

"Do you see an ashen pallor?"

"Most undoubtedly."

"A startled look about the eyes?"

"I see all that."

"Man, the ring which you stole from your master's waistcoat pocket was—"

Bob gave himself away.

"What?"

"A poisoned ring."

Bob sprang at least six inches from the ground.

"If you put that ring on your finger, though only for an instant, you are doomed."

"Oh!" groaned Bob.

"Do you feel a pain in your side?"

Bob groaned again.

"Do you feel as if all your veins were filled with fire?"

Another groan.

"Do you feel as if your head were about to burst into a thousand atoms?"

Another groan, still louder than before.

"Wretched man, time is short. Tell us how long you wore this ill-fated gem, in order that we may, if possible, take measures to save you from the doom you have so justly merited. But first, before anything can be done, you must give me back the ring."

"I haven't got it."

"Where is it then?"

Bob drew himself upright, to the best of his ability, with his back against the wall. He looked round the room with ghastly eyes.

"I never see'd such a house as this in all my days."

"That I can easily believe, my man. And I trust that it may never be your ill-fortune to look on such another."

As he gave vent to this fervent desire of his heart, Pugh's eyes were fixed on me.

"I come up into this room this morning to see if master was awake. Cook had told me that he came in drunk last night."

"She lied!" I roared.

"It was a natural error," commented Brasher. "My own first impression, when I saw you yesterday evening at the corner of the Edgware Road, was that you were suffering from over-indulgence in strong drink."

Thus is a man robbed of his good name! Bob went on—

"He wasn't. He was sound asleep. I never see a man so sound asleep. I says to myself, 'He must have raised his elbow. I know what he can swallow.'"

"You hear, Brasher, what is the servant's opinion of the master?"

Only wait! I would have a settlement with Bob.

"There was his clothes littered all over the place. I sets to put 'em straight. As I picks up the waistcoat, something falls out of one of the pockets. It was a ring."

"A ring," said Pugh. "Just so— a ring!"

"It was a trumpery thing—"

"My man!" said Pugh.

"I picks it up and looks at it; it was a trumpery thing, not worth tuppence-hapenny!"

"Brasher, you hear this man— you hear him? My good fellow, that ring is a relic of the Borgias!"

"I don't know nothing about no boarders. I says to myself when I sees it, and I says to you, that I never see a commoner-looking article."

It sounds incredible, but I chuckled. I resolved to forgive him everything.

"The man's ignorance," cried Pugh, "is as colossal as the master's!"

"It was just a dirty white stone with another stone stuck on top of it, like a woman's head."

"So he describes one of the finest cameos that was ever touched by an Italian graver!"

"The ring itself was brass."

"Brass! It's the finest gold."

"Don't tell me! I know gold when I see it, and I know brass. I've seen heaps and heaps of rings like that, and better, at fairs; pay your penny and you takes your choice."

"Brasher, this man is like the ring— unique!"

"I takes a squint at it, and I sees it was a common-looking article, and I says to myself, 'This ain't worth nothing to nobody.' I was just going to put it back in the pocket, when it comes across me, sudden, 'This is the very ring for cook!'"

Pugh gasped.

"For cook?"

"For cook."

"And why— why for cook?"

"Well, I don't mind saying it, if I've got to say it." Bob looked determined. "I've been engaged to cook— nine years, she says it is, and I've never given her an engagement ring yet. She's always bothering me for one, so when I sees this ring wasn't worth nothing to nobody, I says to myself, 'This is the very thing for an engagement ring for cook.'"

Pugh took out his handkerchief. He wiped his brow. "The very thing for an engagement ring for cook— that relic of the Borgias— the ring which was once the property of the fair Lucrezia herself! Brasher, don't— don't give way. Go on, my man, go on."

"I puts it into my pocket, and as I was going upstairs to my room, who should I see but cook.

"'Cook,' I says, 'have you got half a crown?'  'What for?' she says. 'For me,' I says. 'No,' she says, 'I haven't.'  'Well,' I says, 'I don't quite like telling you, but the fact is, I've been spending a good bit of money on you lately, and it's left me rather short.'" Bob drew the back of his hand across his lips. "I never did like giving something for nothing, no matter to who it is. 'On me! ' she says. 'I'll believe in your spending a brass farthing on anybody but yourself when I sees it.'  'Well,' I says, 'I've been buying you a ring.'  'A ring!' she says. She turned quite yeller."

Bob grinned. Pugh and Brasher didn't know what to make of it at all. I knew the blackguard.

"'Yes,' I says, 'I've been buying you one of the finest rings that ever yet you saw. Look at that now!' I takes it out of my pocket, and I holds it out in front of her. She didn't think nothing of it; I knew she wouldn't. She ain't such a fool as she looks. 'What, that dirty, tawdry, second-hand looking thing,' she says. 'Why, it ain't worth tuppence.' 'Ah, that's where you're wrong,' I says. 'That ring's worth a whole heap of money. If I was to tell you what I gave for that ring you wouldn't believe me. I only come on it accidental like. I calls it a handsome ring.'  'Well, I don't,' she says, 'I calls it hideous— I wouldn't be seen with such a thing on a finger of mine, not me!' 'Ah,' I says, 'wait till you sees it on the human hand.' And I slips it on the little finger of my right hand— just to show it off like. Oh, my crikey!" Bob doubled himself up in the middle. "I was took with such a pain in the side I was obliged to holler. 'What's wrong now?' she says. 'Take the ring,' I says. And I takes it off my finger, I don't know how, and gives it her, and I makes straight for my bedroom, and I chucks myself upon the bed— I was that bad!"

Pugh looked at Bob. Then he looked at Brasher.

"Brasher, is it not strange, is it not more than strange, that in this age of so-called enlightenment there should exist in a civilised country such a master and such a man? Whether to blame more the master or the man it passes my wisdom to pronounce. It is true that the man is an ignorant creature, but then so also is the master. But it certainly, to me, does seem incredible that any creature having any pretensions, even the most shadowy pretensions, to even legal intellect, should present that priceless relic of the Borgias— Lucrezia's own ring— to a cook!"

"But how about the cook?" inquired Brasher. "If she puts—"

The room door was thrown wide open. Mary, the housemaid, came rushing in.

"If you please, sir, I believe that cook's a-dying!"

"A-dying, Mary?"

"She's been up in her bedroom ever so long, and I went up to see what she was doing, because there's nothing done for our dinner— no potatoes, nor nothing; and there she was lying on the bed, groaning awful. If you please, sir, I believe that cook's a-dying."

And Mary, who is a sensitive creature, at least so I should imagine, wept— I don't know why.

"It's the ring!" said Brasher.

We went up to cook in a body. First Mary, then Brasher, then Pugh, then me, then Bob— who apparently did not care to be left behind, though it was all that he could do to stagger. It was the ring, there was no doubt about it. That love-offering of the faithful Bob had all but done for her, if one might judge from the way in which she was behaving. I have seldom heard a woman make more noise; it had not deprived her of the use of her lungs. We heard her squealing as we came along the passage. When we entered the room her squeals redoubled.

"There is the ring!" said Pugh, pointing at her with his outstretched hand.

There was the ring, on cook's engagement finger, the third finger of her left hand— the love-token of a faithful heart, of a nine years' old engagement, the cameo ring, cream ground, with a woman's head in white relief, sixteenth century Italian workmanship, that relic of the Borgias, Lucrezia's pretty plaything. Finding herself in possession of that speaking symbol of Bob's fond love, she had been unable to resist the temptation of seeing how it really did look upon the human hand. She had put it on to see. The immediate result was that she was lying there upon the bed.

"Brasher," said Pugh, "if it is true that the dead are conscious of the acts of the living, how, at this moment, the great Lucrezia must be writhing in her grave!"

iii

WELL, I survived, or I should not be telling this tale; and Bob survived, and cook. And I do not know that either of us is the worse for our experience of the peculiar characteristics of the fair Lucrezia's pretty plaything. Last week cook was married to Bob. A nicely assorted couple they bid fair to make.

Yet we might have been worse— much worse, easily. Pugh allowed me, in one of his rare moments of affability, to submit the ring to a minute examination, and I herewith acquit him of exaggerating its natural wickedness. He has his gifts in that direction; but no man could paint that diabolical illustration of mediaeval fiendishness worse than it deserved, not even Pugh. The ring itself was hollow. When you put it on your finger, directly it came into contact with the flesh, two minute needles were released, one on either side, which had sufficient penetrating force to introduce the poison, which was contained in the reservoir-like circlet, beneath the cuticle. This poison must, originally, have been of an extraordinarily active character, for, after the passage of probably more than three hundred years, it still retained sufficient of its force, so soon as the tiniest drop found its way beneath the scarf-skin, to impregnate the entire system, rushing through the veins with inconceivable rapidity, and instantly affecting the action of the heart.

In its youth it must have slain with lightning-like rapidity, since in its belated old age it could use folks as it had done Bob and cook and me.

The ring is still in Pugh's collection, what is left of it. By the exercise of great skill and care I succeeded in taking it to pieces— wonderfully ingenious mechanism had been contrived by its criminal constructor— but I was not so successful in putting the pieces together again. Pugh says that is my stupidity, which shows his ignorance. However, there are the fragments. Should any person desire to learn what could be planned in the way of wickedness three hundred and fifty years ago, he had better give Pugh a call.

P.S. I presented cook with her engagement ring. Bob and she seemed to have a vague impression that I ought to— so I did.

__________________

11: The Prince Has The Mumps

Richard Connell

1893-1949

The Saturday Evening Post, 8 Sep 1923

Richard Edward Connell

YOUNG Prince Ernest was ill. He had, in fact, the mumps. "Beastly nuisance," he remarked to his valet. He wanted very much indeed to say "damned inconvenience"; and, considering the circumstances, even this would not have been putting the case too strongly; but he did not say "damned inconvenience," because a prince must not set a bad example; and, mumps or no mumps, Ernest Cosmo Adelbert Oscar James never forgot that he was a prince.

"Every inch a prince," said the newspapers of his native land in referring to him, which they did in every edition from the first, or bulldog, to the last, or five-star extra-special sporting final.

That made sixty-six inches of prince, for Ernest was a rather pretty boy of medium stature, with a pink, almost waxen complexion, blond hair impeccably parted, and a brow as unruffled as a pan of skimmed milk. At the moment the symmetry of his features was somewhat marred by the presence of two mature mumps; and, noting this in the gold-rimmed mirror near his bed, Prince Ernest gently groaned.

Physiognomists might have argued from the serenity of his brow that the prince was not a thinker; but they would have been in error, for in his twenty-three years he had, not infrequently, thought. Happily his thoughts had not been disturbing ones. It had taken no soul-struggle to make him entirely content with his princely lot. Having been born a prince, nursed as a prince, breeched as a prince, taught as a prince, at twenty-three and a few days it seemed completely natural to Ernest to be a prince. It was quite impossible for him to imagine himself anything else.

Sometimes he thought: "Of course, I don't say I have a divine right to be a prince; nowadays that isn't considered in good taste. But, since I'm being perfectly frank with myself, I must admit that there is something— well, if not exactly sacred, at least sacerdotal about royalty. Being a prince isn't at all like filling a place in the cabinet or the civil service or the army, where almost any sort of fellow can get ahead if he has enough push. A prince has no use for push; he's a prince, and that's all there is to it."

And at other times he thought: "It's the fashion in these times to pretend that a prince is just like any other man in the country, and not a bit better. That's rot, of course, and no one knows it better than the people. If I am like all the rest of them, why do they stand in the rain for hours to see me whisk by in a limousine? Why do they crowd into some stuffy hall to hear me tell them I am glad to be there, gazing into their open, manly countenances?"

Or, on other occasions, he thought: "To hear some of these radical chaps talk one would think any fellow could be a prince. Really, you know, that's nothing more than twaddle. If they tried it they'd soon find that it takes generations of royal blood behind one to give one that— well, that authority, that— so to speak— presence. I'd just like to see one of those long-haired johnnies try to lay a corner stone— with the proper dignity, I mean. Why, the people would laugh at him! They never laugh at me."

By nature a modest and candid young man, Prince Ernest had but one vanity. He was proud of the appearance he made at public functions. He loved to lay corner stones, to unveil monuments, to visit hospitals, to address meetings. On these occasions he invariably made a neat speech, and he had never, he was glad to say, in any of his speeches given offense to anybody. He accepted, with becoming graciousness, the tributes paid him by the crowds. It pleased him exceedingly to hear his subjects punctuate his speeches with their uncouth but sincere evidences of approbation. Often he read about it afterward in the press, and secretly glowed.

"Prince Ernest"— the front page of the Morning Stiletto is speaking— "was greeted with vociferous enthusiasm when he laid the corner stone of the new polo field being built by the Coal Mine Workers' Union for the use of its members. The prince shook hands with a number of the men and made one of his felicitous and witty speeches. In part His Highness said:

" 'I am always glad to speak to miners. [Cheers.] I was once a minor myself. [Laughter.] Now, all joking aside, and speaking seriously, I am glad to be here and to look into so many open, manly countenances. [Violent cheering and cries of 'Every inch a prince!' and 'Long live Bonny Prince Ernie!'] Yours is a very important industry. [Cries of 'Hear, hear!'] I can't think what I should do in winter if it weren't for coal. [Cheers, and cries of 'God bless Your Highness,' and 'Spoken like a prince!'] I repeat, therefore, I am glad to be with you—' "

Yes, there was no question about it, his subjects loved him.

But now he had the mumps. He was as puffy as if he had attempted to swallow a pair of inflated water wings, and when he drank a glass of water it was like swallowing a string of biggish beads. Moreover, he had a fever, and his royal knees felt decidedly gelatinous, and the doctor had said he must stay in bed. To get mumps at a time like this, he mused, was almost unprincely. His country needed him, and there he lay, ineffectual and mumpish. Indeed, mumps at a time like this was nothing short of a calamity, for on the morrow His Very Serene Highness the Emperor of Zabonia was to pay an official visit to the prince's country. Fifty million people held their breath and tremulously awaited the result. Would there be war? Everybody knew that the answer depended on the emperor's visit.

Relations between the prince's country and Zabonia were strained— dangerously strained. Why had that bellicose old fire eater, the Duke of Blennergasset, made that intemperate speech in which he referred to the Emperor of Zabonia as a "pompous elderly porpoise with the morals of a tumblebug?" Why had Count Malpizzi, the Zabonian Secretary for War, in heated rejoinder seen fit to declare that as for Prince Ernest's father, the king, he was no lily of the valley himself, and furthermore, Prince Ernest's countrymen were three degrees lower in the scale of existence than the guinea pig? A painful and acute situation had been created between the two countries; one puff of the air of animosity on those smoldering embers and the blood-red flame of war would break forth. This eventuality would be highly inopportune for Prince Ernest's country, for Zabonia had just perfected a cannon whose shell carried a hundred miles and then bounced back to be recharged. War must be averted. The Emperor of Zabonia must be received with every show of cordiality, must be accorded every honor, must be given not the slightest shadow of a pretext for taking umbrage. The emperor must carry away the impression that Prince Ernest's country loved Zabonia with a surpassing love; the emperor must be made to believe that the Duke of Blennergasset's reference to him as a pompous elderly porpoise was one of pure affection and esteem, and that a comparison of the morals of His Very Serene Highness to those of a tumblebug was an idiomatic expression, and highly complimentary, inasmuch as tumblebugs are popularly believed to lead lives of singular probity and chastity.

Prince Ernest's father, the king, had given orders that his entire royal family, down to the most remote ducal cousin, must be on hand to greet the Emperor of Zabonia; and, of course, so the king stated, it was of the highest importance that the heir apparent, Prince Ernest, should be there. But how could he be, for he had the mumps? It was an exceedingly regrettable situation. These Zabonians were a truculent and suspicious lot, and if the crown prince were not present to greet their emperor they'd read some subtle insult into it, you could depend upon it. It was the custom for visiting monarchs to appear on the balcony overlooking the plaza in front of the royal palace to be cheered by the crowd which always collected there on such occasions, and it was also the custom, as the whole world knows, for the king to stand on the right side of the royal visitor and the crown prince to stand on the left. This was the etiquette. From it there could be no deviation. If the crown prince did not stand at the emperor's left hand tomorrow it would be instantly apparent to the crowd that a slight was intended, and then no power could hold back the hungry hounds of war; and war, just now, with Zabonia would be extremely inconvenient.

The prince frowned at the obese pink cupids that adorned the ceiling of the royal bedchamber. He was too weak to do much else.

The doctor had just issued an ultimatum. The prince must not be moved; to do so, the doctor assured him, would be suicide. The king protested, even pleaded. But the doctor, who, like most savants, was stubborn, shook his white beard.

"But he must appear before the crowd," said the king, wringing his own whiskers, which were plentiful and auburn.

"It would kill him," said the doctor with finality.

"If I weren't an only son I'd risk it," said the prince weakly, from his bed.

"You can bet you would," said the king.

His Majesty paced the chamber.

"Mumps!" he ejaculated. "And at such a time! The crowd will never understand it!" He was patently worried.

Then it was that the Count of Duffus, who was Gentleman in Waiting in the Royal Bedchamber, had a tremendous idea. He reduced his brain wave to an excited whisper and poured it into the king's ear. The king beamed and nodded, at intervals saying, "Good!" "Yes, yes, yes!" "Excellent!" "Splendid!" "Ripping!" "By all means!" "Stout fellow!" "Good old Duffus!" "The very thing." "Quite so, quite so!" "Admirable!" "Of course!" "Perfect!" and other expressions of approbation. The Count of Duffus, damp with the gentle dew of success, made off; and the king turned to the prince, a twinkle in his eye.

"Invaluable chap, Duffus," said His Majesty. "Good idea of his. Should have thought of it myself, tho. The old dummy dodge!"

"The dummy dodge, father?" The young prince raised un-understanding eyebrows.

"You'll see," promised the king, "when Duffus gets back."

It wasn't often that the king talked with the prince so familiarly. Usually there was an atmosphere of formality about their relations; it was more as if they were a friendly but not intimate king and prince than a father and son. Sometimes, the prince had noticed, the king was unusually aloof; there had been days when the king had not spoken to the prince at all; on other days His Majesty was more expansive; today the king was positively clubby.

Presently the Count of Duffus did come back, and with him a package so large that it took two able-bodied footmen to carry it. With an air of having accomplished something noteworthy, the Count of Duffus stood the package upright by the prince's bed and began most carefully to peel off the wrapping paper. He tore off the last piece of paper with a flourish, and the prince's eyes opened so wide that his mumps hurt.

It was the waxen figure of a fair-haired, smiling young man in polo costume.

"Why, it's I!" exclaimed the prince, who, mumps or no mumps, surprised or not, always expressed himself correctly.

"They do make those dummies more perfectly all the time," remarked the king, who was admiringly examining the figure. "That nose is exactly like Ernie's, now isn't it?"

The prince lay staring at his effigy.

"I DON'T see—" he began as distinctly as the mumps would let him.

"Oh, you will," said the king. "Duffus, did Madame Hassler make much of a fuss?"

"Oh, naturally," replied the count. "She thought I was balmy in the crumpet, probably. She said it was the prize figure in the waxworks. Big drawing card and all that. I had to pay her a hundred and seventy goobecs before she'd part with it."

"That's a lot of money," said the king, a careful soul; "but it will be worth it tomorrow. I'll make you a duke for this, Duffus."

"Thanks awfully. Oh, look here, Your Majesty! You can move its arms!"

"Better and better!" exclaimed the king. "We can make it salute." The king turned to his son, who was still more than a little bewildered. "Ernie," said the king, "where do you keep your uniform as honorary colonel of the Royal Purple Bombardiers?"

"Whatever for, father?"

"For your understudy here, of course."

The king's expression just then indicated that he did not consider that his son was a lightning calculator.

"Don't you get the idea, Ernie?"

"I think I begin to," said the prince; "and, father, I don't like it."

The king shrugged well-nourished shoulders.

"It's the only way," he said. "We can't risk even the appearance of slighting that touchy old hippopotamus."

"Hippopotamus, father? I was not aware—"

"Oh, I mean that venerable muffin, the Emperor of Zabonia," cut in the king with a trace of impatience.

"But, father," said the prince, and his eyes showed that he was shocked, "he is a king!"

The king was contrite.

"Sorry, son," he said. "I shouldn't speak like that of royalty, I know. But I have so much on my mind these days, with this tiresome visit and your mumps and the shadow of war and heaven knows what."

"But, father," said the prince, following up his advantage, "please don't ask me to permit this monstrous thing. It's not honorable. It's not princely."

The king patted his son's silk pajamaed shoulder.

"Pish-tush, Ernie!" he said playfully. "I wish you wouldn't always be so devilishly idealistic. You're so high-minded one needs to get on a stepladder to talk to you. Wake up, Ernie. You're old enough now not to believe in Santa Claus any longer."

The king's tone grew more serious.

"I've dreaded this day, Ernie," he said, "on your account. You're such a naïve chap, you know. Still, the day was bound to come. It's like a fellow's first cigar— sickens him at first, but it's the only way to learn to smoke."

"Father," said the prince, "I don't know what you're talking about. All I know is that it's not right to try to impersonate a prince in this way. That grinning dummy there isn't I. It can't be I. Nobody will be fooled. And furthermore, I don't want to fool my people."

"Roll over and go to sleep, Ernie," said the king. "There are times when you give me a sharp pain in the region of the waistcoat."

FROM HIS BED the prince could see it all, the whole damnable imposition. First he could see emerge the full outlines of His Serene Highness of Zabonia. The prince could see plainly the celebrated red nose of that monarch; rather like an electric-light bulb in the center of a round cheese, thought the prince, who had a gift for simile. He wondered why the Zabonian emperor insisted on wearing that ridiculous skin-tight pink hussar uniform. Then the prince saw his father step on the balcony, to cheers. His Majesty was in the cream-and-gold uniform of a field marshal of the King's Very Own Royal Indefatigables, and he took his place at the emperor's side, bowing. Then came the stunning blow to the mumps-stricken prince. Another figure had appeared on the balcony, a very erect, dignified figure in the dashing uniform of the Royal Purple Bombardiers. The prince in the bed perceived that the thing on the balcony was himself!

As, horrified, he watched, Prince Ernest saw the thing's hand go up in a precise military salute. The great throng of people went wild. Their cheers made the palace tremble.

"Viva our prince!" he heard distinctly. "Long live Prince Ernest!"

A lean man with a hungry face had eluded the police and eeled his way to the top of a lamp-post in the plaza.

"There he is!" called the man shrilly. "Every inch a prince! Who's every inch a prince?"

Their answer filled the air with sound— "Prince Ernest! Prince Ernest! Prince Ernest!"

Lying there, Prince Ernest saw the dummy back majestically from the balcony.

"Long life to the prince!" screamed the man on the lamp-post. "He never turns his back on his people!"

The crowds took up the cry.

"Long life to Prince Ernest! He never turns his back on his people!"

"And jolly good reason," said the prince, "for they'd see the strings Duffus is pulling to make the thing salute."

The brow of the prince was no longer bland, no longer was it free from lines of disillusionment. He was thinking of what he had seen.

His voice was tragic, as he said, "So this is what it means to be a prince! A dummy serves just as well! A dummy; the sort of thing they have in cheap ready-made clothing stores— Very Nobby! Newest and Niftiest Cut! Take Me Home for Fourteen Goobecs. What a blind ass I've been! But it's not too late. I'm not going to go on with this miserable sham. I'm not going to be a stuffed uniform any longer. If a dummy can be a prince I don't want to be. Let them have a dummy in my place. I'm going to be a man."

He addressed these words to the emptiness of the royal chamber, and his tone was steeped in the vinegar of bitter realization. Prince Ernest was working himself up to quite a pinch of resolution, when the chamber door opened and in came the king. Behind him wabbled the vast bulk and incandescent nose of the Emperor of Zabonia.

"His Zabonian Serenity," explained the king, "insisted on coming to see you. His Serenity understands, of course, why political expediency made it necessary for you to be represented before the people by a— er— substitute. Don't you, Your Zabonian Serenity?"

"Zshur," rumbled the royal visitor; his voice was thick as if his words came through a blanket. "I didn't know," he added, "it wasn't the prince until the king told me."

Emotions were bubbling and sputtering inside the bosom of Prince Ernest.

"I'm ashamed," said the prince, "to deceive my people like that."

His Zabonian Serenity, who had taken a chair, arranged two or three of his chins and part of his expanse of jowl into a grin.

"Ernie," cautioned the king, "no nonsense now!"

The bottled-up feeling rushed from the prince in a torrent of passionate words.

"Father, I'm going to speak out! I'm through with this whole business."

"What business?" The king looked puzzled.

"This prince business," said Prince Ernest. "I saw it all while I was lying here. What am I? Nothing! Nothing, that is, but a— pardon the colloquialism— stuffed uniform. A prince? Bah, a dummy! That's all I am! I step out and bow and smirk and salute while some other chap pulls the strings. The people don't care a gingersnap about me. It's my uniform they cheer. Stuff it with wax or sawdust or me, it's all the same to them. Why, they'd cheer it if it were stuffed with mush! So I'm through, father! I can't go on with this hypocrisy. Give the dummy my place. I'm sorry to shock you, father. You and the emperor probably have never thought about things in this way. But don't you see, a prince is really only a dummy? Forgive me— but it's true."

The young prince was almost hysterical. The king did not appear to be in the least perturbed; he gave the prince a fatherly pat on his shoulder and winked at the Emperor of Zabonia.

"He's only twenty-three and a few days," explained the king, "so naturally he takes it a bit hard. I did myself— thought of entering a monastery— yes, really."

His Zabonian Serenity chuckled deep in his cavern of chest.

"Ernie," said the king, turning to his son, and speaking in his most kindly manner, "you've discovered what all kings discover sooner or later. You've found yourself out. Now your job will be to keep the people from finding you out. Isn't that so, Your Serenity?"

"Zshur," rumbled the visitor, sucking at a long amber-scented cigaret.

"But I don't want to keep them from finding me out!" cried the prince. "I don't want to go on living this ghastly farce. I am going to work."

The king laughed jovially.

"Work?" he inquired. "At what, in heaven's name?"

"Something honest," replied Prince Ernest.

The king laughed and nudged the emperor in his imperial ribs.

"Ah, youth!" said the king. "Ah, youth! By the way, Ernie, how much did you spend last year?"

"Oh, I don't know exactly," replied the prince, mystified. "The Royal Bursar of the Most Privy Purse could no doubt tell you. Probably between three hundred and four hundred thousand goobecs, I fancy."

"And how many motor cars did you have?" questioned the king.

"Eleven, if you don't count roadsters."

"Fair enough," said the king. "We won't count roadsters. Now, Ernie, suppose you were a young lawyer—"

"I wish I were," said the prince.

"At this precise moment," pursued the king, "you'd be in your office hoping some friend would fall down a manhole so you could sue the city for damages. You could consider yourself jolly lucky if you made eight hundred goobecs a year. If you were a young doctor you'd be sitting around with your hands in your empty pockets praying for an epidemic. If you were a young business man you'd be in a terrible stew about your overhead or underfoot or whatever it is business men get into a stew about. Instead of having eleven motor cars, not counting roadsters, you'd be fortunate to have your bus fare. Now I'm a doting father, Ernie, but even I can see that you are no intellectual colossus. And yet you acceptably fill a job that brings you in three or four hundred thousand goobecs a year, and eleven motor cars, not counting roadsters. Despite all that, you talk of going on strike. Really, Ernie, that's preposterous. Isn't it, Your Zabonian Serenity?"

The emperor nodded and puffed at his scented cigaret.

"Pre," he rumbled, "posterous!"

"You've a downy nest, my boy," went on the king benignly. "You'd be a chump to quit it. Come now. Look at this thing through a microscope instead of a pair of smoked glasses. Be a prince of the world, not one of the Red Fairy Book. If the people are dolts enough to let you keep the job, why put unpleasant ideas into their heads?"

"Oh, father"— the young prince was very pale— "forgive me for saying it, but I do believe you are a cynic!"

"Of course I am," answered the king cheerfully. "That's better than being the only other thing a king can be."

"What's that?"

"A blithering fool," answered the king. "How can a king with any sense respect his people? He sees them bawling their beery cheers first about some rather ordinary human being like yourself, for example, Ernie, and then he sees them cheering one of your silly uniforms stuffed with wax. The only way a king who pretends to be civilized can regard his subjects is as dupes."

The young prince lay scowling at the cupids. He was thinking deeply. He said at last:

"I know. You are saying this to try me. You are testing my faith in the inherent strength of royalty. It was weak of me to doubt. That dummy business today did hit me hard; but, after all, it was only a desperate ruse that by chance succeeded. You pretended it is quite the usual thing; but, of course, it isn't. I implore you to tell me that it isn't, father."

The king lit a cheroot and replied in an anecdotal tone:

"When I was your age, Ernie, I had a beautiful set of whiskers and a still more beautiful set of ideals about the sanctity of my position and all that. I still have the whiskers. My dear old father suggested that I grow the whiskers. 'You haven't much of a chin,' he said to me. 'I think you'd better keep your loyal subjects in the dark about that. A king can be human, but not too damn human. Also, there's another reason— whiskery men all look pretty much alike.' I did not understand then what he was talking about; but many years later, after his death, I did. I was scheduled to go to some dismal provincial town and knight some pestilential bounder of a mayor. I'd been performing a lot of royal chores, including the coronation mumbo-jumbo, and I was a bit fed up. The more I thought of going to that town the more bored I grew. But of course I had to go. Was I not a king? I took myself and my duties terribly seriously, even as you do, Ernie."

The king unashed his cheroot in a gold tray and went on:

"Yes, I felt that only a king full of blue blood could possibly knight a fellow properly. However, on the night before the ceremony I drank a magnum of champagne, and then made the strategic error of adding a few glasses of 1812 brandy. Alcohol is no respecter of royalty. In the morning I perceived that if I tried to knight the fellow I'd probably decapitate him. Here was a pretty kettle of whitebait. I was at my wit's end when Lord Crockinghorse, my secretary, bobbed up with an idea. He'd had it on ice for some time, it appeared. He produced a whiskery blighter who opened oysters in a fried-fish shop; the fellow smelled most evilly of shellfish, but he looked exactly like me. In my condition at that time I could hardly tell him from myself. Crockinghorse coolly proposed that the whiskery oysterman should take my place. I was shocked inexpressibly. An oysterman substituting for a king! What a devastating and yet absurd thought! I felt just as you do now, Ernie."

The king blew a smoke ring and continued:

"Well, Crockinghorse won his point, and we dressed up the whiskery blighter in my most garish uniform, told him if he said a syllable more than 'yes' or 'no' we'd murder him, and taught him a speech which went:

" 'My loyal subjects [pause for cheers] I am overcome by this reception. [Pause.] I can only say thank you, thank you, thank you.' We packed him off in my pea-green uniform and next day the papers all said, 'His Majesty performed his part in the ceremony with exceptional grace and dignity.' "

The prince in his bed moaned; the king, with a shrug, continued:

"Oh, I was all cut up for days! Felt deucedly unnecessary. But at last light dawned and the more I thought of the whole affair the more it entertained me. I ended by hiring the whiskery blighter at twenty-five goobecs a week, gave him a room in the palace near the kitchen and a lot of oysters to amuse himself with and whenever I got tired of kinging I trotted to Paris or somewhere incog and left the corner stone laying to my oyster friend. He became rather better at it than I. Oh, I had to do it, Ernie! If I hadn't had a genuine vacation now and then I should have got squirrels in the cupola, absolutely."

The prince had aged perceptibly during this recital. His voice quavered as he asked, "And where is the fellow now?"

"Oh, I still use him," answered the king. "Only last week I sent him down to Wizzelborough to lay the corner stone of the new cathedral. You were there, Ernie. Didn't you notice anything peculiar?"

The prince's reply was faint-voiced.

"I did notice that the cathedral smelled uncommonly oystery," he said. He drew in his breath; his manner was that of a drowning man making a last desperate effort to save himself.

"Father," he said, "I am crushed by what you tell me. I can't believe that what you say is true of all royal persons. Something in here"— the prince laid a manicured hand on the spot on the bosom of his lavender pajamas where he believed his heart to be— "tells me that there are still kings who respect the traditions of royalty, who are themselves and nothing else. I appeal to Your Zabonian Serenity to reassure me about this, to give me back my faith in myself and my position. They wouldn't do a thing like this in Zabonia! Oh, tell me they wouldn't!"

The Emperor of Zabonia tossed away his scented cigaret.

"You gentlemen," he said in his slow, thick voice, "have confided in me. I'm going to return the compliment. I am not the Emperor of Zabonia. I'm just an old actor from the Imperial Stock Company who happens to look like the emperor. He is usually too tight to go to public functions or pay royal visits, so he sends me."

IN THE morning the young prince pulled a velvet bell cord and his valet entered.

"Thursday," said the prince, "I'm supposed to ride through the city and be pelted with flowers. It's an old tradition or some such rot. Will you please take that dummy there in the corner, dress him in my uniform as Honorary Rear Admiral of the Royal Submarine Fleet, seat him in the royal carriage and drive him around in my place?"

The valet bowed. The prince picked up the morning newspaper and turned to the sporting page.

___________________

12: A Twin Identity

Edith Stewart Drewry

1841-1925

The Belgravia Annual, Christmas 1891

"WHAT am I?" you ask, because I say I have had— though I am only thirty— a stranger experience than any with which you five gentlemen have favoured us to beguile the weary time we are snowed up in the train; and as it seems it will be quite an hour before we can get on to London, I will tell you— if you care to hear the story— why I say so, and what I am; only I hope those two ladies will not be shocked to find themselves in my company? No?— thanks— well then, I am an agent-de-police, and have just come over from Paris to spend Christmas with some English friends. Even we poor police-agents get a little holiday sometimes— hein! And the life has its attractions too, as well as its dangers and repulsions. Personally I had little choice, for I was born in the service, brought up in it, for my father was a very clever officer of the Paris Secret Police. I married in the force, widowed in it, and being one of their best women detectives, I was sure of retaining my position. Nature has favoured me, for, as you see, I am a tall but very slight made woman, with a face which lends itself well to masculine disguise. Pardons, madame, what did you say?— Oh! I make a handsome young fellow too— ha, ha! I have often been told so, and that I have a woman's wits and a man's courage. One needs both in my profession too, I can tell you ; and steady nerves, too, as you will see.

Well, about this time five years ago, all Paris was suddenly startled into horror by the discovery of one of those revoltingly brutal crimes in which, I must confess, France is only occasionally rivalled by the wildest deeds of the Far West.

Some few months previously a wealthy banker, named Folcade, had married a very pretty American girl, one of twins, who in all but personal resemblance were so absolutely as one being, and so deeply attached, as to be singular even for twins. Remember that I knew nothing of all this till nearly the termination of my connection with the case. All that the police knew was the bare fact that Madame Folcade had a sister who after the former's marriage had returned to Virginia, U.S., and was there when the tragedy took place, the news of it completely prostrating her health for months. Remember that also, please.

M. Folcade had a villa in large grounds some way out of Paris, in a lonely place, and that fatal evening the banker, having a violent headache, retired about ten o'clock, leaving his wife down in the salon reading, with her pet dog, a Scotch terrier, in the room, and that was the last the poor fellow saw of his wife and her faithful would-be defender alive. M. Folcade awoke at two in the morning, and finding himself still alone, got up, partially dressed, and went downstairs, thinking his wife had dropped asleep over her book. The salon was empty, the window open, and blood was on the floor near the wife's chair!

Monsieur was frantic, called up the household, sent for the nearest police, and every inch of the grounds was searched. As a result Paris soon blazed with the horrible discovery that Madame Folcade had been stabbed to the heart (from behind, the doctor said), probably in the room, then the body carried out to a remote corner of the grounds, and literally cut up piecemeal, for the head, trunk, hands and limbs were found by degrees in different parts of the grounds;— also a long sharp-pointed knife, blood-stained, was found, and the sergent-de-police himself discovered, in a remote spot, under a bush, the body of the poor terrier all bloody from a ghastly stab, but close to its mouth, as if the teeth in the death agony had unclenched and dropped it, was a man's right hand fourth finger with a ring upon it. The faithful animal had evidently flown at the murderer and bitten off that little finger; then, doubtless, mortally wounded itself, fled to the bushes and died before it could reach the house with its prize. Of the assassin there was no trace whatsoever, not even a foot-print, for the ground was dry under a hard black frost.

Well, the finger was, of course, at once preserved in spirits. The signet-ring we found had a monogram on the stone in it, of "L. S." On that finger, and ring, and knife, we had to rely primarily to identify the murderer. Of course, M. Folcade himself was questioned as under possible suspicion; but it was soon clear that he was guiltless. The marriage had been one of love. He was a fond and unjealous husband and one worthy of true trust; but that some savage hate and jealousy was the motive of the crime was tolerably clear. Nothing was stolen nor touched. The devilish deliberation and sequence to the murder betrayed a bloodthirsty revenge— but for what?— by whom done? A lover scorned, perhaps, but when and where? No trace, no sign of any one to suspect, present or missing, whom she had known ; could be found, although M. Folcade made it understood that no expense or time should be bounded, and that the arrest of the murderer would be well recognised. You know that in France we do not allow any reward, officially or openly offered, as you do here for such things. It is done, of course, but— sub-rosa.

The case was in my especial chef's hands, but I was not in it then, for my hands were full, as that week I went off to Vienna on a matter of political crime which took me six months to run my men to earth and have them arrested. I only learned the details of the Folcade tragedy on my return—learned of necessity from my chef, M. Dupre.

"Madame Marie Lacroix," said he grimly, "I must have your aid now in this Folcade mystery."

"Eh bien! M. le Chef," I answered, "tell me all details and I obey the order."

This he did, therefore, and concluded emphatically:

"Now, although I shall not relax my efforts, it is on you, Marie, that your old chef relies to maintain his repute. We want the assassin; the evidence is clear. We have the man who a month before the murder sold the knife to a gentleman who he says he shall know again but cannot describe enough to be of much use— these common people are so stupid, so unobservant— hein! Rather tall, sallow, goodlooking, about thirty or forty!'— bah, see there!— that would do for hundreds. Last Christmas, whilst still unmarried Madame Folcade (then Miss Grey) was in the Riviera with a lady since dead, but we could find no trace of anyone to whom suspicions would attach. Do your best, Marie, money is not to be spared— a great thing."

I was then well supplied, and withdrew.

I will not trouble you with details here, but I threw myself heart and soul into this mysterious case, which had so baffled my confrères. I do not know when I have been so intensely absorbed in a case, so passionately set on success, all my faculties so entirely concentrated on that end. This almost abnormal enfolding of my whole being in the interests of those who had so loved the ill-fated lady, may perhaps account for the strange sequel.

I set to work my own way. I visited the Villa Folcade, saw the place, the picture of Madame Folcade there, and the knife, ring and finger in our possession, and all the people connected with the case. Then I went off to the Riviera, taking a photo of Madame, of course ; went to Nice, Monte Carlo, and, after weeks of patient research I discovered that a certain Polish lady had said that at a rather mixed bal masque last autumn she had noticed a very pretty American who was rather annoyed by the notice of a blue domino. Following up that slender chance I traced out the Pole— a work of time— and she recognised the photo, laughed at the freedom of American girls, said this one appeared to be alone and to have come in bravado, but had got frightened at the attentions or persecutions of the blue domino, had hastily resumed her mask (the Pole added), and vanished.

Here, then, was surely the root of the subsequent tragedy. A reckless "lark"— as you English say— in ignorance of the world; an encounter, probably followed by secret persecution; the girl, afraid to betray her mad escapade to her friends lest a worse construction should be put on it; the man, doubtless in love, in a fashion, jealousy, revenge— voila tout! I returned hopefully to Monte Carlo, and, after some time, obtained the slightest clue to that blue domino, which led me to suspect that (if he were the murderer) he would have made his way to London several months after the crime, as the safest hiding-place, ma parole!— so it is— so vast— so many millions to be lost amongst. Well, I came straight over to London, it being then the October after the murder, and at once went to Scotland Yard to put the authorities there on the qui vive for a man such as I described, lacking a finger and the hand probably marked still by the wound of the dog's teeth. Why did I not advertise, you ask, monsieur?— ceil! because my bird was clearly wary, clever and I wanted him to be lulled into false security and think the police had given up in despair, after nearly a year.

I was unremitting in my cautious inquiries and watchful search, continually changing my disguises (mostly masculine, of necessity), and invariably armed with a loaded revolver for self-defence or to prevent the bird's escape. I am a dead shot and can hit where I will, I may assert. Day and night until quite late I was abroad, here, there and every where— in public resorts, public vehicles, great thoroughfares, east, west, north and south. I haunted the gambling resorts, from the West End proprietary club to the low "hell"— all en garçon, of course. How could I get the entré of some of these, you say, madame ? Ha, ha, that was easily enough managed with money, and I am an accomplished gambler—to be au fait in that line was part of my training.

But day after day, week after week, passed, and I was still baffled. I got not one clue, and at last, just before Christmas, I wrote to my chef—

"Even I am almost in despair that 'L.S.' is either dead, or at the Antipodes. If I learn nothing by December 31st, I fear I must resort to the desperate measure of advertising; I am mad at failing, and more, my whole soul and brain are wrapped up in this case."

That letter reached Paris a few days before Christmas.

On the 24th of December, all day, I had detectives watching the great stations for any man answering to such description as I had, as the assassin might possibly spend the festive season out of town. I myself was about the West End in the evening, dressed much as I am now, in black, with a dark fur toque.

I gave a look over Paddington Terminus, and about ten o'clock I thought I would return to my lodging in Bloomsbury, and there decide on my further action to-night, or whether I should rest— that is, if I could. It was the very anniversary of the tragedy I was to unravel— Christmas Eve. I was beginning to feel the long heavy strain on mental and physical powers, I suppose, and every nerve was strung up to a high nervous tension. I felt in a curious unaccountable manner that would not be shaken off. I stepped into a City-going omnibus, sitting down by the door and instinctively taking notice of the other passengers— only two stout old men at the far end— for it was a bitterly cold night, with a heavy snow-laden sky, dreary enough to make one lonely and miserable under any circumstances. I was both. Yet, withal, as we started eastwards, there began to steal over me, an odd internal excitement, as of a vague expectancy, a restlessness, and intensified desire to gain my end, which became almost agony in its passionate vividness. It seemed to grip me, thrall my very soul, like a visible force. God of Justice ! was there nothing above or below that knew the dread secret I sought? No power— seen or unseen— from whence my inmost being could draw the knowledge of that one man's hiding-place?

What, too, was my chef thinking of his trusted agent, on whose success he had flung his whole credit? What on this dread night were the feelings of her relations, that their beloved dead was still unavenged? In those moments I felt half maddened with longing, and then in and through that longing there grew a strange sensation, as if something— I knew not what— went out from me, taking my life from me, then seeming to draw back with it in returning something that I could not grasp or define—that I never shall be able to define—but made me, with a sort of sudden mental wrench, look up, impelled by a force quite outside myself, to see sitting opposite to me a lady, young and lovely, dressed in handsome mourning.

How and when had she got in? Had the omnibus stopped or even slackened, unnoticed by me, in my strange absorption? No, no, how could it? yet there the stranger sat. And what a singular face it was! What deathly pallor and painful melancholy in every line! What sad, wistful eyes, that seemed full of unshed tears, and kept looking, looking at me, through me, into my soul, with an intense strained gaze that never wavered, and seemed every moment to grow deeper in its dumb agony of appeal as of one struggling for the speech of which God had bereft her tongue. I looked away, aside, out of the doorway, conscious that my blood was creeping dull and heavily, like half-frozen water, through my veins; but a strange,weird fascination compelled me to again meet that gaze. Did she know me? Impossible! I had certainly never seen her before. My heart throbbed up into my throat, my blood began to beat fast and warm again, and as we rolled onwards I was aware of a curious subtle change in my sensations. Every nerve, every fibre was still strung up to a painful tension; but there stole over me, into me, body and spirit, a sense of steel-like strength— a strange settling down of my faculties into cool, steadfast power, and more than that, a sense that grew slowly to impelling conviction that that fellow passenger knew what I did not— whosoever or whatsoever she was, and that my movements must follow hers, blindly. A s that odd feeling deepened and possessed me, my eyes again went to the woman's face—to meet a look of intense restfulness and content that dominated all other expression of anguish or strained eagerness as, if after something unreached. Did she— or— It— read my soul and find there all its tortured, trammelled spirit sought?

It gave me almost a shock to suddenly see the stalwart, prosaic conductor at the doorway asking for "fares to Tottenham Court Road," which I had named when I got in. I noticed at once that he did not even glance at my strange neighbour— seemed not to see her— but I saw her shake her head to me.

"No," I said to the man, "I am going further. I'll stop you when I want to get out."

Under this curious calm that had settled on me, I was not at all surprised at the man's evident obliviousness of that passenger. I should have been surprised if he had evinced any knowledge of her presence, and it seemed to me quite in the order of things when, on reaching Gray's Inn Road, she raised her white hand to me, and glided out on to the pavement unnoticed by the conductor. I paid him and stepped to the stranger's side, thrilled right through with a weird feeling that should ordinarily unnerve one ; yet I had never felt more strong, cool, ready for the most desperate danger or emergency; and as my guide— I following— moved swiftly along northwards I drew off my gloves and felt in my bosom to be sure the revolver was ready to hand. There was grim work, I knew. She led on straight up past the shops, still ablaze at past eleven in that neighbourhood on this eve, and at last turned down a street which I knew to be mostly filled with third-rate, shady lodging-houses, where doors are on the latch all night, and never a question is asked of "whence, whither or w hat?" This class of houses have the commonest latch-locks that are easily fitted, and, of course, I was well provided with such appliances of noiseless entrance.

Before one of these houses my mysterious guide stopped. Save a light in the first floor window all was darkness— either the inmates were asleep or out. To that window my guide eagerly pointed, with a look and gesture that vehemently urged instant action, as if a minute's delay were fatal; so I drew out and fitted a key. She was close, her lips moved, but there was no sound, not a whisper; yet into my mind, as if I had heard it, came a name— Louis Saumarez— and at that moment I opened the door and entered, leaving the door just ajar for her to follow. But she did not. What I meant to do or felt I never could put into words. My mind was concentrated on one great fact—that the murderer was in that lighted room, about to escape, and that I—a woman, alone must stop him and arrest him.

Terror, danger, were not present to me then— I was too strung up— grimly cool. It was I who was dangerous. I stole up quietly, easily, as if I had a right there, opened that door and paused. One glance took in the mise-en-scène. A shabby room, scantily furnished, a fire nearly out, wine and food on the table, a valise packed up, and just drinking a glass of wine, using the left hand, was a rather tall, good-looking, but sallow-faced man. Mon Dieu! I must see that other hand by some ruse.

"Que Diable," said I, with a bitter but abandoned kind of manner, "but you are a cruel enough lover to me, M. Saumarez."

He swung round, so startled that he staggered and caught at a chair with the right hand, to which it was nearest. I saw it full under the lamplight; a dark scar across it; the fourth finger gone! The assassin at last!

"Who the devil are you?" he demanded savagely, recovering himself a little. "I never saw you before, and you are too damned handsome to be forgotten. Leave my room! I have to catch a train, and my name is Mercier."

"Pardons, Monsieur," said I coolly, my right hand on the butt of my weapon, my eyes on his ready for his attack, "you are Louis Saumarez, and you— are— my prisoner for murder."

I stood near the door, he at the far end of the large room. A t the last awful word, he snatched a knife from the table with a fierce "Sacre—r," and sprang towards me; but at that second I fired, and the fellow reeled back with a yell like a wounded wild beast, and fell heavily, partially stunned by the blow to his head, on the floor, the blood coming from his side. I knew where to hit safely. I was turning quickly to get police help before my prisoner regained consciousness, when men's steps came quickly along from below, up the stairs, and two constables came into the room, one exclaiming:

"Hulloa! What's this—murder? Are you hurt too, ma'am?"

Shaken now a little, I had leaned against the wall, as the other man knelt beside Saumarez.

"Non, non" I said. " I fired in self-defence. I am here to arrest that man for the murder of Madame Folcade. I am a French police agent. It is all right."

One was a sergeant, and whilst the other bound up the slight wound, I briefly explained matters and gave my captive in charge. The sergeant sent for the divisional surgeon, who had Saumarez removed to the hospital— in custody, of course— and said in two or three days he would be able to be taken to Bow Street for the necessary formalities of extradition. After we had left him at the hospital, with the constable in charge, I asked the sergeant, as we walked back westward, how they arrived so opportunely—had they heard the shot and cry?

"Yes— just outside," he said; "but they had come from the station near at the summons of a lady in black, who was as white as a ghost, and was dumb, for she could only beckon— beckon like mad, and when we followed led us to that house— just as the shot was fired— and was gone before we could look round. Awful queer, ma'am," he added. "Who was she?"

"I do not know," I answered in a choked voice. "Good-night, I am dead tired now."

I was shaken to the centre now that the terrible, long strain was so far over, and the murderer secured; but next day, Christmas Day, I wired to my chef, and received a reply that he would send over a responsible official with a mandat cCarret to receive the prisoner from the English authorities and bring him over to Paris. Meanwhile, I of course had to obtain at Bow Street a warrant under the Extraditions Act, and two days later Saumarez was pronounced quite able to be removed. As a result— well, within five or six days of his arrest he was safely lodged in the Parisian prison. I had travelled with my French comrades (two of course) and their captive, who had maintained a sulky silence save once— to savagely curse that "diablesse of an agent."

I went the same day of our arrival to report myself to my delighted chef, who asked how I had trapped the bird at last? I felt too shattered then to tell him the actual truth, I shrank in sensitive dread from the possible smile of incredulity, so I said that a person I met by chance had spoken of a Frenchman named Saumarez who had one finger gone, and this person had shown me his lodgings, which he was on the point of leaving when I entered.

"So I had to be summary in my actions," I added, as I rose to go.

"Quite right, Marie, you are invaluable and have well redeemed my confidence in you. You have earned a rest truly, and a reward from M. Folcade. By the way, I have made a promise there for you."

"Comment, Monsieur?"— I was surprised— "my existence is unknown to him and his."

"Individually, yes, but professionally, not so. I went myself to tell M. Folcade of the daring arrest of the assassin by my clever agent— a woman, I added, and he made me promise to send you to his house here in Paris directly you arrived. He and his sister-in-law, the wife's twin-sister, especially wish to see the lady, of whom I spoke."

I started, but said quietly: "The twin-sister, Monsieur, is she then over here?" For though outwardly not a muscle of mine moved, I was startled right through by his words, by the wildly extraordinary fancy that flashed across me as I recalled all that had taken place on Christmas Eve.

"Yes," Dupre replied, "Mademoiselle Clarice Grey came over here to her bereaved brother-in-law just before Christmas; she was too ill to bear the voyage earlier. Will you have a fiacre and go at once, mon agent?"

"Yes, assuredly," I said. I felt that I must go at once and solve this mystery, which was surely on the borderland of the real and unreal, the seen and the wondrous unseen, of which our finite humanity, the soul's prison, knows so little and conjectures so much. I went then to the banker's house, but found that he himself was not yet returned from the bank, though momentarily expected.

"Would I see Mademoiselle Clarice?"

I said yes, gave my name, and was shown into an elegant salon. In three minutes a young lady came in, and in that moment as we faced each other we both stood transfixed, dazed— as if pulsation itself were arrested— each had seen the other, each knew where, but not how—not how;—my strange silent, fellow-passenger and guide of Christmas Eve, no flesh and blood, as this was who now came slowly forward and held my hands tightly— but, the same identity— only that other was in the spirit.

"We know each other," she said, in a hushed, awed way, "not in the flesh but in the soul, and yet a reality, not a dream, though they say I lay like one dead asleep, and when I came back to sentient life knew nothing of where we— she and I— had been."

"We— you and she!" I repeated, feeling my flesh creep and my heart stand still. "There— there were not two but one guide with me."

"We, twain but always one," Clarice said in the same way, her wistful eyes looking into mine— "dead and living, our twinborn souls are one identity for ever, and so the dread secret with which her soul was oppressed, passed with it into mine, but densely trammelled by my mortality till your despair and strength of purpose and desire drew us from our mortal prison to your aid. I felt the mighty spell of your agony enfolding itself with my own maddened thirst for justice, felt a strange oblivion stealing my physical senses, and knew no more, save when I awoke, a deep joy, gratitude, triumph— a restfulness. I knew before your chef spoke that the murderer was arrested by the agent he named, it all came back to me then, and I— we twain knew all."

I stood looking at her as her mystic presence that night had looked at me. What awesome secret of the unknown was indeed half unfolded it seemed, in these twin-born sisters whom even the mystery of death could not part from their entwined co-existence? Had, in truth, the dead sister's soul passed as it were into its twin soul yet encompassed by its mortal body, and so through its own beyond death, knowledge, God-given yet only "through a glass darkly," had a mystic power as the one spirit of the Twin-Identity to guide me, the mortal agent who was the material instrument of God's justice? It might be so. Could I— could any mortal in his bounded finiteness say it could not be? So there must it rest as mystery till all mysteries shall be seen face to face....

You ask me "What was the end of that grim tragedy?"

Well— I traced out Saumarez's antecedents and my suspicions of his motive proved to be true. His guilt was undeniable by the proofs we had— the ring, the finger and knife and many other collateral links of evidence, and Louis Saumarez was condemned and guillotined.

It was months before I could work again, and indeed M. Folcade and Clarice Grey would have had me retire on the competence they insisted on settling on me, but I could not settle to a quiet, useless life whilst I was young and strong. So I am still agent-de police, and I am going to visit Clarice in London, where she is married to an Englishman. Ah, see, the train is going on again and we shall soon reach London. Clarice likes her chere Marie Lacroix "to be with her on Christmas Eve."

_____________

13: Go East, Young Man

Sinclair Lewis

1885-1951

Nashs Pall Mall Magazine  July 1931

Harry Sinclair Lewis

THE grandfather was Zebulun Dibble. He had a moustache like a horse's mane; he wore a boiled shirt with no collar; and he manufactured oatmeal, very wholesome and tasteless. He moved from New Hampshire out to the city of Zenith in 1875, and in 1880 became the proud but irritated father of T. Jefferson Dibble. T. Jefferson turned the dusty oatmeal factory into a lyric, steel-and-glass establishment for the manufacture of Oatees, Barlenated Rice, and Puffy Wuffles, whereby he garnered a million dollars and became cultured, along about 1905. This was the beginning of the American fashion in culture which has expanded now into lectures by poetic Grand Dukes and Symphonies on the radio.

T. Jefferson belonged to the Opera Festival Committee and the Batik Exposition Conference, and he was the chairman of the Lecture Committee of the Phoenix Club. Not that all this enervating culture kept him from burning up the sales manager from 9.30 a.m. to 5 p.m. He felt that he had been betrayed, he felt that his staff, Congress, and the labour unions had bitten the hand that fed them, if the sale of Rye Yeasties (Vitaminised) did not annually increase four per cent.

But away from the office, he announced at every club and committee where he could wriggle into the chairman's seat that America was the best country in the world, by heavens, and Zenith the best city in America, and how were we going to prove it? Not by any vulgar boasting and boosting! No, sir! By showing more culture than any other burg of equal size in the world! Give him ten years! He'd see that Zenith had more square feet of old masters, more fiddles in the symphony orchestra, and more marble statues per square mile than Munich!

T. Jefferson Dibble was a squat, square man with hair like a section of doormat a little bitten at the edges by the old house-dog. He did not look peculiarly cultured. Perhaps that was why he worked at it even harder: than most of the people who go about informing the world that Beauty is Better than Beefsteak— providing you can have both of them.

T. Jefferson's only son, Whitney, appeared in 1906. T. Jefferson winced every time the boys called him mere "Whit." He winced pretty regularly. Whit showed more vocation for swimming, ringing the doorbells of timorous spinsters, and driving a flivver than for the life of culture. But T. Jefferson was determined.

Just as he bellowed "By golly, you'll sell Barley Gems to the wholesalers or get out" in the daytime, so when he arrived at his neat slate-roofed English Manor Style residence in Floral Heights, he bellowed at Whit, "By golly, you'll learn to play the piano or I'll lamm the everlasting daylights out of you! Ain't you ashamed! Wanting to go skating! The idea! It's your mother's shanty blood coming out in you!"

Whitney was taught— at least theoretically he was taught— the several arts of piano-playing, singing, drawing, watercolour painting, fencing, and French. And through it all Whit remained ruddy, grinning, and irretrievably given to money-making. For years, without T. Jefferson's ever discovering it, he conducted a lucrative trade in transporting empty gin bottles in his father's spare sedan from the Zenith Athletic Club to the emporia of the bootleggers.

But he could draw. He sang like a crow, he fenced like a sculptor, but he could draw, and when he was sent to Yale he became the chief caricaturist of the Yale Record.

For the first time, his father was delighted. He had Whit's original drawings framed in heavy gold, and showed all of them to his friends and his committees before they could escape. When Whit sold a small sketch to Life, T. Jefferson sent him an autographed cheque for a hundred dollars, so that Whit, otherwise a decent youth, became a little vain about the world's need of his art.

At Christmas, senior year, T. Jefferson (with the solemn expression of a Father About to Give Good Advice to His Son) lured him into the library, and flowered in language:

"Now, Whitney, the time has come, my boy, when you must take thought and decide what rôle in this world's— what rôle in the world— in fact, to what rôle you feel your talents are urging you, if you get what I mean."

"You mean what job I'll get after graduation?"

"No, no, no! The Dibbleses have had enough of jobs! I have money enough for all of us. I have had to, in fact, toil and moil. But the Dibbleses are essentially an artistic family. Your grandfather loved to paint. It is true that circumstances were such that he was never able to paint anything but the barn, but he had a fine eye for colour— he painted it blue and salmon-pink, instead of red, and he was responsible for designing the old family mansion on Clay Street— I should never have given it up except that the bathrooms were antiquated— not a single coloured tile in them. It was he who had the Moorish turret with the copper roof put on the mansion, when the architect wanted a square tower with a pagoda roof. And I myself, if I may say so, while I have not had the opportunity to develop my creative gifts, was responsible for raising the fund of $267,800 to buy the Rembrandt for the Zenith Art Institute, and the fact that the Rembrandt later proved to be a fake, painted by a scoundrel named John J. Jones, was no fault of mine. So— in fact— if you understand me— how would you like to go to Paris, after graduation, and study arts?

"Paris!"

Whit had never been abroad. He pictured Paris as a series of bars, interspersed with sloe-eyed girls (he wasn't quite sure what sloe eyes were, but he was certain that the eyes of all Parisian cuties were sloe), palms blooming in January, and Bohemian studios where jolly artists and lively models lived on spaghetti, red wine, and a continuous singing of "Aprés de Ma Blonde."

"Paris!" he said; and "That would be elegant, sir!"

"My boy!" T. Jefferson put his puffy palm on Whit's shoulder in a marvellous impersonation of a Father About to Send His Son Forth into the Maelstrom of Life.

"I am proud of you. I hope I shall live to see you one of the world's great pictorial artists, exhibiting in London, Rome, Zenith, and elsewhere, and whose pictures will carry a message of high ideals to all those who are dusty with striving, lifting their souls from the sordid struggle to the farther green places. That's what I often tell my sales-manager, Mr. Mountgins— he ought to get away from mere thoughts of commerce and refresh himself at the Art Institute— and the stubborn jackass, he simply won't increase the sale of Korn Krumbles in Southern Michigan! But as I was saying, I don't want you to approach Paris in any spirit of frivolity, but earnestly, as an opportunity of making a bigger and better— no, no, I mean a bigger and— a bigger — I mean a better world! I give you my blessings."

"Great! Watch me, Dad!"

WHEN, after Christmas, Whit's classmates revelled in the great Senior Year pastime of wondering what they would do after graduation, Whit was offensively smug.

"I got an idea," said his classmate, Stuyvesant Wescott, who also came from Zenith. "Of course it's swell to go into law or bond-selling— good for a hundred thou. a year— and a fellow oughtn't to waste his education and opportunities by going out for lower ideals. Think of that poor fish Ted Page, planning to teach in a prep. school— associate with a lot of dirty kids and never make more'n five thou. a year! But the bond game is pretty well jammed. What do you think of getting in early on television? Millions in it!"

Mr. Whitney Dibble languidly rose, drew a six-inch scarlet cigarette-holder from his pocket, lighted a cigarette and flicked the ash off it with a disdainful forefinger. The cigarette-holder, the languor, the disdain, and the flicking habit were all strictly new in him, and they were extremely disapproved by his kind.

"I am not," he breathed, "at all interested in your lowbrow plans. I am going to Paris to study art. In five years from now I shall be exhibiting in—in all those galleries you exhibit in. I hope you have success with your money-grubbing and your golf. Drop in and see me at my petit chateau at—I think I'll have one at Moret-sur-Loign— when you're abroad. I must dot out now and do a bit of sketching."

WHITNEY DIBBLE, riding a Pullman to greatness, arrived in Paris on a day of pearl and amber. Paris can be hard and grim enough in summer dust, but this October day, in the peace of hazy sunshine, the grey buildings were palaces in a dream. When he had dropped his baggage at his hotel, Whit walked out exultantly. The Place de la Concorde seemed to him a royal courtyard; Gabriel's twin buildings of the Marine Ministry and the Crillon were the residence of emperors themselves. They seemed taller than the most pushing skyscraper of New York, taller and nobler and more wise.

All Paris spoke to him of a life at once more vivid and more demanding, less hospitable to intrusive strangers, than any he had known. He felt young and provincial, yet hotly ambitious.

Some night like this, five years from now, he too would be elegant in a high-ceilinged apartment on the Avenue Montaigne... an artist who had changed all art into a living force... perhaps wearing the red spark of the Legion d'Honneur ribbon and a beard... no, not a beard, because someone from Zenith or Yale might catch him at it!

Quivering with quiet exaltation, he sat on a balcony that evening, watching the lights fret the ancient Seine, and next morning he scampered to the atelier of M. Cyprien Schoelkopf, where he was immediately to be recognised as a genius.

He was not disappointed. M. Schoelkopf (he was of the celebrated Breton family of Schoelkopf, he explained) had a studio right out of fiction; very long, very filthy, with a naked model on the throne. The girls wore smocks very baggy at the throat, and the men wore corduroy jackets.

M. Schoelkopf was delighted to accept Whit, also his ten thousand francs in advance.

Whit longed to be seated at an easel, whanging immortal paint on to a taut canvas. He knew he could beat the red-headed girl who was depicting the model as a slender nymph clad in innocence and cloudy blue vapour, also the red-faced and large-nosed Dutchman who was revealing her as a fat fishwife steaming from her monthly bath, also the tremulous thin youth with spectacles sidewise on his nose who saw her as a series of children's blocks rather badly piled. Whit— oh, he'd catch the model's very soul; make it speak through her eyes, with her mere body just indicated.... Great if his very first picture should be a salon piece!

But before leaping into grandeur, he had to have a Bohemian background, and he went uneasily over the Left Bank (to live on the Right Bank, in comfort, would be Bourgeois, Philistine, American, Rich and all other abominations) looking for a flat.

He rented an apartment way out on the Avenue Félix Faure.

It had belonged to a doctor. Whit suspected that the doctor had died of insanitation. The apartment was packed with brocade furniture, gilt chairs, fringed scarves on a fireplace that didn't, the agent said, match, boule cabinets, and windows not intended to be opened; and it smelled of hair oil, carbolic acid, cabbage and dead air.

But it was quiet and light— and Whit was tired.

That evening he cowered in a corner of his parlour, sniffing at mice, poking with a tentative forefinger at the dust on the formerly gilt frame of a picture— a masterpiece worthy of Paris, the Capital of the Arts— nothing less than an engraving of Landseer's "Stag at Bay."

He fled from the apartment to the famous Café Fanfaron, on the Boulevard Raspail, of which he had heard as the international (i.e. American) headquarters for everything that was newest and most shocking in painting, poetry, and devastating criticism in little magazines.

In front of the café the sidewalk was jammed with tables at which sat hundreds of young people, most of them laughing, most of them noticeable—girls in slinky dresses, very low; young men with jaunty tweed jackets, curly hair and keen eyes; thin-faced Jewish intellectuals with spectacles and an air of disdainful humility; large men (and they seemed the most youthful of all) with huge beards that looked false. A few were sour and worried, but most of them were laughing, while they shouted about colour values and the poetry of Rimbaud.

Whit was waved to a table with a group of Americans. In half an hour he had made a date to go walking in the Bois de Boulogne with a large-eyed young lady named Isadora, he had been reassured that Paris was the one place in the world for a person with Creative Hormones, and he had been invited to a studio-party by a lively man who was twenty-four as far up as the pouches beneath his eyes, and sixty-four above.

It was a good party.

They sat on the floor and drank cognac and shouted. The host, with no very great urging, showed a few score of his paintings, which stood with their faces to the wall. In them, the houses staggered, the hills looked like garbage heaps, the churches had forgotten geometry, and the trees had St. Vitus's Dance, so Whit knew they were the real advanced thing, and he was proud and happy.

From that night on, Whit was in a joyous turmoil of artistic adventure. He was the real thing— except, perhaps, during the hours at M. Schoelkopf's, when he tried to paint.

Like most active young Americans, he discovered the extreme difficulty of going slow. During a fifty-minute class in Yale he had been able to draw twenty caricatures, all amusing, all vivid. That was the trouble with him! It was infinitely harder to spend fifty minutes on a square inch of painting.

Whit was reasonably honest. He snarled at himself that his pictures had about as much depth and significance as a croquis for a dressmaker's magazine. And M. Schoelkopf told him all about it. He stood tickling the back of Whit's neck with his beard, and observed "Huh!" And when Mr. Schoelkopf said "Huh!" Whit wanted to go off and dig sewers.

So Whit fled from that morgue to the Café Fanfaron, and to Isadora, whom he had met his first night in Paris.

Isadora was not a painter. She wrote. She carried a brief-case, of course. Once it snapped open, and in it Whit saw a bottle of Vermouth, some blank paper, lovely pencils all red and blue and green and purple, a rather mussy handkerchief and a pair of silk stockings. Yet he was not shocked when, later in the evening, Isadora announced that she was carrying in that brief-case the manuscript of her novel.

Isadora came from Omaha, Nebraska, and she liked to be kissed.

They picnicked in the Forest of Fontainebleau, Isadora and he. Whit was certain that all of his life he had longed for just this: to lunch on bread and cheese and cherries and Burgundy, then to lie under the fretwork of oak boughs, stripped by October, holding the hand of a girl who knew everything and who would certainly, in a year or two, drive Edith Wharton and Willa Cather off the map; to have with her a relationship as innocent as children, as wise as the disciples of Socrates and, withal, romantic as the steeple-hatted princesses who had once halloed to the hunt in this same Royal forest.

"I think your water-colour sketch of Notre Dame is wonderful!" said Isadora.

"I'm glad you like it," said Whitney.

"So original in concept!"

"Well, I tried to give it a new concept."

"That's the thing! The new! We must get away from the old-fashioned Cubists and: Expressionists. It's so old-fashioned now to be crazy! We must have restraint and the inner check."

"That's so. Austerity. That's the stuff. Gee, doggone it, I wish there was some more of that wine left," said Whit.

"You're a darling!"

She leaned on her elbow to kiss him, she sprang up and fled through the woodland aisle. And he gambolled after her in a rapture which endured even through a bus-ride back to the Fontainebleau station with a mess of tourists who admired all the wrong things, such as the Palace.

The Fanfaron school of wisdom had a magnificent show-window but not much on the shelves. It was a high-class evening's entertainment to listen to Miles O'Sullivan, the celebrated Irish critic from South Brooklyn, on the beauties of Proust. But when, for the fifth time, Whit had heard O'Sullivan gasp in a drowning voice, ''I remember dear old Marcel saying to me, 'Miles, mon petit, you alone understand that exteriority can be expressed only by interiority,' " then Whit was stirred to taxi defiantly over to the Anglo-American Pharmacy and do the most dreadful and American thing a man can do— buy a package of chewing-gum.

Chewing-gum was not the only American vice which was in low repute at the Fanfaron. In fact, the exiles agreed that with the possible exceptions of Poland, Guatemala and mid-Victorian England, the United States was the dumbest country that had ever existed. They were equally strong about the inferiority of American sky-scrapers, pork-and-beans, Chicago, hired girls, jazz, Reno, evening-jacket lapels, Rudy Vallée, the Ohio accent, Bernard McFadden, cowboys, duplex apartments, Tom Thumb golf courses, aviation records, tooth-paste, bungalows, railroad depots, George Washington, doughnuts, Grover Whalen, electric toasters, kitchenettes, dinettes, dish-washettes, eating tobacco, cafeterias, Booth Tarkington, corn-flakes, flivvers, incinerators, Walter Winchell, Sears Roebuck, Kansas, Prohibition, Niagara Falls, Elks, virginity, Eddie Cantor, Bishop Cannon,: Paul Whiteman, corn-on-the-cob, Coney Island, Rotarians, cement roads, trial marriages, Fundamentalism, preachers who talk on the radio, drug-store sandwiches, letters dictated but not read, noisy streets, noiseless typewriters, Mutt and Jeff, eye-shades, mauve and crocus-yellow golf stockings, chili con carne, the Chrysler Building, Jimmy Walker, Hollywood, all the Ruths in Congress, Boy Scouts, Tourists Welcome camps, hot dogs, Admiral Byrd, horn-rimmed spectacles, flag-pole sitters, safety-razors, the Chautauqua, and President Hoover.

The exiles unanimously declared that they were waiting to join the Foreign Legion of whatever country should first wipe out the United States in war.

For three months, Whit was able to agree with all of this indictment, but a week after his picnic with Isadora he went suddenly democratic. Miles O'Sullivan had denounced, with the most beautifully balanced periods and two-dollar words, the puerility of American fried chicken.

Now it was before dinner, and Miles was an excellent reporter. The more Whit listened, the more he longed for the crisp, crunching taste of fried chicken, with corn fritters, and maple syrup, candied sweet potatoes, uncooked celery (for it is a shocking fact, perhaps never before revealed in print, that the French like their celery stewed) and all of the other vulgarities.

Whit sprang up abruptly, muttering, "Urghhg," which Miles took as a tribute to his wit.

It wasn't.

Whit fled down the Boulevard Raspail. He had often noted, with low cultured sneers, a horribly American restaurant called Cabin Mammy's Grill. He plunged into it, now. Ina voice of restrained hysteria he ordered fried chicken, candied sweets, and corn fritters with syrup.

Now, to be fair on all sides— which is an impossibility— the chicken was dry, the corn fritters were soggy, the fried sweets were poisonous, and the syrup had never seen Vermont. Yet Whit
enjoyed that meal more than any of the superior food he had discovered in Paris. The taste of it brought back everything that was native in him... . Return home for Christmas vacation in his Freshman year; the good smell of the mid-western snow; the girls whom he had loved as a brat; the boys with whom he had played. A great dinner down at Momauguin in Senior year, and the kindly tragedy of parting. They had been good days; cool and realistic and decent.

So Whit came out of Cabin Mammy's Grill, and he was buffeted by the first snow of the Paris winter.

Although he was a college graduate, Whitney had learned a little about geography, and he shouldn't have expected Paris to be tropical. Yet he had confusedly felt that this capital of the world could never conceivably be cold and grim. He turned up the collar of his light top-coat and started for—oh, for Nowhere.

After ten blocks, he was exhilarated by the snow and the blasty cold which had first dismayed him. He, the Northerner, needing an authentic winter each year, felt the energy which week by week had dripped from him flowing back now in excited tides. He did no very clear thinking but from time to time he muttered something like a sketch for future thoughts:

"I can't paint! I'd be all right drawing machinery for a catalogue. That's about all! Paris! More beautiful than any town in America. But I'm not part of it. Have nothing to do with it. I've never met a real Frenchman, except my landlady, and that damned hired girl at the flat, and a few waiters, and a few cops, and the French literary gents that hang around the Fanfaron because we give 'em more of a hand than their own people would. Poor old T. Jefferson! He wants me to be a genius! I guess you have to have a little genius to be a Genius. Gosh, I'd like to see Stuyvy Wescott to-night. With him, it would be fun to have a drink!"

Without being quite conscious of it, Whit drifted from the sacred Left Bank to the bourgeois Right. Instead of returning to the Fanfaron and Isadora, he took refuge at the Café de la Paix.

Just inside the door was a round-faced, horned-spectacled American, perhaps fifty years old, looking wistfully about for company. Whit could never have told by what long and involved process of thought he decided to pick up this Babbitt. He flopped down at the stranger's table, and muttered "Mind'f I sit here?"

"No, son, I'm tickled to death! American?"

"You bet."

"Well, say, it certainly is good to be able to talk to a white man again! Living here?"

"I m studying art."

"Well, well, is that a fact?"

"Sometimes I wonder if it is! pretty fairly average bad."

"Well, what the deuce! You'll have a swell time here while you're a kid, and I guess prob'ly you'll learn a lot, and then you can go back to the States and start something. Easterner, ain't you?"

"No, I was born in Zenith."

"Well, well! Is that a fact! Folks live there? "

"Yes. My father is T. Jefferson Dibble of the Small Grain Products Company."

"Well, I'm a son-of-a-gun! Why, say, I know your dad. My name's Titus— Buffalo Grain Forwarding Corp.— why, I've had a lot of dealings with your Dad. Golly! Think of meeting somebody you know in this town!"

They went to the Exhibit of the Two Hemispheres, which Miles O'Sullivan had exaltedly recommended as the dirtiest show in Europe. Whit was shocked— and there is nothing so shocking to a lively young man of twenty-three as to discover that he is shocked. He tried to enjoy it. He told himself that otherwise he would prove himself a farmer, a proverbial, a lowbrow— in fact, an American. But he was increasingly uncomfortable at the antics of the ladies at the Exhibit. He peeped at Mr. Titus, and discovered that he was nervously twirling a glass and clearing his throat.

"I don't care so much for this," muttered Whit.

"Neither do I, son! Let's beat it!"

They drove to the New Orleans bar and had a whisky-soda. They drove to the Kansas City bar and had a highball. They drove to the El Paso bar and had a rock and rye. They lunched lightly at the Naugatuck Bar on scrambled eggs, sausages, buckwheat cakes, and ale. They drove to the Virginia Bar, and by now Mr. Titus was full of friendliness and manly joy.

Leaning against the bar, discoursing to a gentleman from South Dakota so exactly like himself that Whit had difficulty in remembering which was which, Mr. Titus observed:

"I come from Buffalo. Name's Titus."

"I come from Yankton. Smith is my name."

"Well, well, so you're this fellow Smith I've heard so much about!"

"Ha, ha, ha, that's right."

"Know Buffalo?"

"Just passing through on the train."

"Well, now, I want to make you a bet that: Buffalo will increase in pop'lation not less. than twenty-seven per cent this year."

"Have 'nother? "

"Have one on me."

"Well, let's toss for it."

"That's the idea. We'll toss for it.... Hey, Billy, got any galloping dominoes?"

When they had gambled for the drink, with much earnest shaking of the box and warm words of encouragement to the dice, Mr. Titus bellowed, "Say, you haven't met my young friend, Whitney Dibble."

"Glad meet you."

"He's an artist!"

"Zatta fact!"

"Yessir, great artist. Sells pictures everywhere. London and Forth Worth and Cop'nagen and everywhere. Thousands and thousands dollars. His Dad's my closest friend. Buddies. Betcha life. Thousands— just pictures. His Dad's pal of mine. Wish I could see good old Dibble! Wish he were here to-night!"

And Mr. Titus wept, quietly, and Whit took him home.

Next morning, at a time when he should have been in the atelier of M. Schoelkopf, Whit saw Mr. Titus off at the Gare St. Lazare, and he was melancholy. There were so many pretty American girls taking the boat-train; girls with whom he would have liked to play deck tennis.

So it chanced that Whit fell into the lowest vice any American can show in Paris. He constantly picked up beefy and lonesome Americans and took them to precisely those places in Paris, like the Eiffel Tower, which were most taboo to the brave lads of the Fanfaron. He tried frenziedly to produce one good picture at M. Schoelkopf's; tried to rid himself of facility. He produced a decoration in purple and stony: reds which he felt to be far from his neat photography.

And looking upon it, for once Mr. Schoelkopf spoke:

"You will be, some time, a good banker."

THE DAY before Whit sailed for summer in Zenith, he took Isadora to the little glassed-in restaurant that from the shoulder of Montmartre looks over all Paris. She dropped all of her flowery airs. With both hands she held his, across the table, and besought him.

"Whit! Lover! You are going back to your poisonous Midwest. Your people will try to alienate you from Paris and all the freedom, all the impetus to creation, all the strange and lovely things that will exist here long after machines have been scrapped and Henry Ford has been forgotten. Darling, I wish I were a good churchwoman, so I could burn candles for you! Don't let them get you, with their efficiency and their promise of millions!"

"Silly! Of course! I hate business. And next year— this year I've just learned how much I can do— I'll be back here with you! "

He had told the Fanfaron initiates not to see him off at the train. Feeling a little bleak, a little disregarded by this humming and tremendous city of Paris, he went alone to the station, and he looked for no one as he wretchedly followed the porter to a seat in the boat train. Suddenly he was overwhelmed by the shouts of a dozen familiars from the Fanfaron. It wasn't so important —though improbable— that they should have paid fifty centimes each for a billet de quai, but that they should actually have arisen before nine o'clock to see him off was astounding.

Isadora's kind arms were around him, and she was wailing, "You won't forget us— darling, you won't forget me!"

Miles O'Sullivan was wringing his hand and crying, "Whit, lad, don't let the dollars get you!"

All the rest were clamouring that they believed in his talent, and that they would feverishly await his return.

As the train banged out, he leaned over the brass rail of the corridor window, waving to them, and he was conscious that whatever affections and egotism they had shown in their drool at the Fanfaron, all pretentiousness was wiped now from their eager and affectionate faces, and that he loved them.

He would come back to them.

All the way to Cherbourg he fretted over the things he had not seen in Paris— the things he could not conceivably, as an artist, have failed to see. He had been in the Louvre only three times. He had never gone to Moret nor to the battlemented walls of Provins.

WHIT ran into the living-room at Floral Heights, patted T. Jefferson on the shoulder, kissed his mother, and muttered, "Gee, it certainly is grand to be back!"

"Oh, you can speak to us in French, if you want to," said T. Jefferson Dibble. "We've been studying it this winter, so we can return to Paris with you some time. Avez vous un temps charmant cette—uh—year?"

"Oh sure, oui. Say, you've redecorated the breakfast-room. That red and yellow tiling certainly is swell."

"Now ecoutez— ecoute, moh fis. It's not necessary for you, Whitney, now that you have become a man of the world, to spare our feelings. I know, and you know, that that red and yellow tiling is thoroughly vulgar. But to return to pleasanter topics, I long for your impressions of Paris. How many times a week did you go to the Louvre?"

"Oh. Oh, the Louvre! Well, a lot."

"I'm sure of it. By the way, a funny thing happened, Whitney. A vulgarian by the name of Titus, from Buffalo, if I remember, wrote to me that he met you in Paris. A shame that such a man, under pretence of friendship with me, should have disturbed you."

"I thought he was a fine old coot, Dad."

"Mon père! No, my boy, you are again being conciliatory and trying to spare my feelings. This Titus is a man for whom I have neither esteem nor—in fact, we have nothing in common. Besides, the old hellion, he did me out of eleven hundred and seventy dollars on a grain deal, sixteen years ago! But as I say—your impressions of Paris! It must seem all like a dream wreathed with the vapours of golden memory.

"Now, I believe, you intend to stay here for two months. I have been making plans. Even in this wretched Midwestern town, I think that, with my aid, you will be able to avoid the banalities of the young men with whom you were reared. There is a splendid new Little Theatre under process of organisation, and perhaps you will wish to paint the scenery and act and even design the costumes. Then we are planning to raise a fund to get the E. Heez Flemming Finnish Grand Opera Company here for a week. That will help to occupy you. You'll be able to give these hicks your trained European view of Finnish Grand Opera. So, to start with this evening, I thought we might drop in on the lecture by Professor Gilfillan at the Walter Pater Club on 'Traces of Humanist Culture in the Coptic.' "

"That would be splendid, sir, but unfortunately— On the way I received a wire from Stuyv Wescott, asking me to come to the dance at the country club this evening, and I wired back accepting. I thought I'd dine with you and Mother, and then skip out there at about ten for just a little while. Hate like the dickens to hurt their feelings—"

"Of course, of course, my boy. A gentleman, especially when he is also a man of culture, must always think of noblesse oblige. I mean, you understand, of the duties of a gentleman. But don't let these vulgarians like Wescott impose on you. You see, my idea of it is like this—"

AS HE drove his father's smaller six to the country club, Whit was angry. He was thinking of what his friends ex-friends— at the club would do in the way of boisterous "kidding."

He could hear them— Stuyv Wescott, his room-mate in Yale, Gilbert Scott, Tim Clark (Princeton '28) and all the rest— mocking :

"Why it's our little Alphonse Gaugin!"

"Where's the corduroy pants?"

"I don't suppose you'd condescend to take a drink with a poor dumb Babbitt that's been selling hardware while you've been associating with the counts and jukes and highbrows and highbrowesses!"

And, sniggering shamefacedly, " Say, how's the little midinettes and the je ne sais quoi's in Paris?"

And, inevitably, ever so many times, "Ou, la, la!"

He determined to tell them all to go to the deuce, to speak with quiet affection of Isadora and Miles O'Sullivan, and to hustle back to Paris as soon as possible.

HE CAME sulkily into. the lounge of the country club, cleared now for dancing. Stuyvy Wescott, tangoing with a girl who glittered like a Christmas tree, saw him glowering at the door, chucked the girl into the ragbag, dashed over, and grunted, "Whit, you old hound, I'm glad to see you! Gosh, been so long! Let's duck the bunch and sneak down to the locker-room. The trusty gin awaits!"

On the way, Stuyvy nipped Gil Scott and Tim Clark out of the group.

Whit croaked. "Well, let's get the razzing over! I s'pose you babies are ready to pan me good for being a loafer and merely daubing paint, while you've been saving the country by discounting notes!"

The other three looked at him with mild, fond wonder. Stuyvy said meekly, "Why, what a low idea! Listen, Whit, we're tickled to death you've had a chance to do something besides keep the pot boiling. Must have been swell to have a chance at the real Europe and art. We've all done pretty well, but I guess anyone of us would give his left leg to be able to sit down on the Champs Elysées, and take time to figure out what it's all about."

Then Whit knew that these were his own people. He blurted, "Honestly, Stuyv, you mean to say you've envied me? Well, it's a grand town, Paris. And some great eggs there. And even some guys that can paint. But me, I'm no good!"

"Nonsense! Look, Whit, you have no idea what this money-grubbing is. Getting to an office on time. Glad-handing people that you wouldn't use to wipe your feet on! Boy, you're lucky! And don't stay here! Don't let the dollars get you! Don't let all these babies with their promises of millions catch you! Beat it back to Paris as soon as you can. Culture, that's the new note!"

"Urghhg!" observed Whit.

"You bet," said Tim Clark.

TIM CLARK had a sister, and the name of that sister was Betty.

Whit Dibble remembered her as a sub-flapper, always going off to be "finished" somewhere in the East. She was a Young Lady, of twenty-odd, now, and even to Whit's professionally artistic eye, it seemed that her hair, sleek as a new polished range, was interesting. As they danced together, as they said the polite contemporary things about Amos 'n' Andy, Max Schmelling, sixteen-cylinder cars, Floyd Gibbons' broadcasting, gunmen, Bishop Cannon, and all the other topics that were so popular in those naive, old-fashioned, gentle days way back in the summer of 1930, Whit and Betty Clark looked at each other and wriggled at each other with a considerable fury of traditional dislike.

Midmost of that disastrous dance, Whit observed, "Betty! Darlingest!"

"Yeah?"

"Let's go out and sit on the lawn."

"Why?"

"I want to find out why you hate me so much."

"Hm. The lawn. I imagine it takes a training in Yale athletics and Paris artisticing to be so frank."

But Betty had swayed with him to the long, high-pillared veranda, where they crouched together on a chintz-covered glider.

Whit tried to throw himself into what he conceived, largely from novels, to be Betty's youthful era. He murmured:

"Kiddo, where have you been all my life?"

From Betty's end of the glider, a coolness like the long wet stretches of the golf course; a silence; then a very little voice:

"Whit, my child, you have been away too long! It's a year now, at least, since anyone— I mean anyone you could know— has said 'Where have you been all my life?' Listen, dear! The worst thing about anybody's going artistic, like you, is that they're always so ashamed of it. Dear, let's us be 185. Cultured or hoboes, or both. G'night!"

She had fled, swift as a searchlight beam, before he could spring up and be wise in the manner of Isadora and Miles O'Sullivan, or the more portentous manner of T. Jefferson Dibble.

Yet, irritably longing all the while for Betty Clark, he had a tremendous time that night at the country club, on the land where his grandfather had once grown corn.

HE DANCED that night with many girls.

He saw Betty Clark only now and then, and from afar. And the less he saw of her, the more important it seemed to him that she should take him seriously.

There had been a time when Whit had each morning heard the good, noisy, indignant call of T. Jefferson demanding "Are you going to get up or ain't you going to get up? Heh! Whit! Ja hear what I said! If you don't wanna come down for breakfast, you ain't gonna have any breakfast! "

Indeed, it slightly disturbed him, when he awoke at eleven of the morning, to find there had been no such splendid, infuriating, decent uproar from T. Jefferson.

He crawled out of bed. He descended the stairs with a charm and punctilio which extended as far up as his temples, and he forgot the quite unpoetic ache above them. In the lower hall he found his mother, fussing about vacuum cleaners and looking timid.

(It is unfortunate that in this earnest report of the turning of males in the United States of America towards culture, it is not possible to give any very great attention to Mrs. T. Jefferson Dibble. Aside from the fact that she was a woman, very kindly and rather beautiful, she has no existence here except as the wife of T. Jefferson and the mother of Whitney.)

"Oh, Whit! Dear! I do hope your father won't be angry! He waited such a long while for you. But I am so glad, dearie, that he understands, at last."

For a moment, Whit's mother seemed almost boisterously angry.

"I'm so glad he understands at last that possibly you may have just as much to do with all this Painting and Art and so on as he has!... But I meant to say, your father is expecting you to join him at three this afternoon for the meeting of the Finnish Opera Furtherance Association. Oh, I guess it will be awfully interesting and so on— it will be at the Thornleigh. Oh, Whit, dear, it's lovely to have you back! But don't let me, for a moment, interfere with your father's plans!"

The meeting of the Finnish Opera Furtherance Association at the Hotel Thornleigh was very interesting.

It was more than interesting.

Mrs. Montgomery Zeiss said that the Finns put it all over the Germans and Italians at giving a real modernistic version of opera.

Mr. T. Jefferson Dibble said that as his son, Whitney, had been so fortunate as to obtain a rather authoritative knowledge of European music, he (Whitney) would now explain everything to them, and in all humility he (T. Jefferson) was self-sacrificingly glad to donate to Finnish opera his son, in fact, as one might say, his own flesh-and-blood.

After a lot of explanation about how artistic opera was, and how unquestionably artistic Zenith was, Whit muttered that he had to beat it.

And in a rather inartistic manner, while T. Jefferson stared at him with a sorrowful face as blanched as his own product, Ritzy Rice, Whit fled the room.

AT five o'clock Whit was sitting on the dock of Stuyv Wescott's bungalow on Lake Kenepoose, muttering, " Look, Stuyv, have you got a real job?"

"Yeah, I guess you'd call it a job."

"D'you mind telling me what you are making a year now?"

"About three thou. I guess I'll make six in a coupla years. Some day, maybe, fifty."

"Hm! I'd like to make some money. By the way, my most noble fellow— it just occurs to me, and I hope that I am not being too rude in asking—what are you doing? Are you a surgeon, an aviator, a bond salesman, an auto mechanic, a Communist Leader or..."

"I am an insurance agent," remarked Stuyvy with a melancholy dignity. "What do you think I got a college education for?"

"And you're already making $3,000 a year?"

"Yeah, something like that."

"I think I ought to be making some money. It's funny. In Europe it's the smart thing to live on money that somebody else made for you. I don't know whether it's good or bad, but fact is, somehow, most Americans feel lazy, feel useless, if they don't make their own money. Prob'ly the Europeans are right. Prob'ly it's because we're too restless. Listen, Stuyv! D'yuh think I'd make a good insurance man?"

"Terrible!"

"You're helpful. Everybody is helpful. Say! What's this new idea that it's disgraceful to make your own living?"

"Don't be a fool, Whit. Nobody thinks it's disgraceful, but you don't get this new current of thought in the Middlewest, that we gotta have art."

"Get it! Good heavens, I've got nothing else! I will say this for Paris — you can' get away from people who believe in art by just going to the next café. Maybe I'll have to go back and live there in order to be allowed to be an insurance agent or something ! "

Stuyv Wescott was called to the telephone, and for three minutes Whit sat alone on the dock, looking across that clear, that candid, that sun-iced lake, round which hung silver birches and delicate willows and solid spruce. Probably the lake could have been duplicated in a hundred corners of the world; in Sweden, in Germany, in Siberia. But to Whit, at the moment, it seemed solely American. As Paris gave him the sense of marching Romans and medieval poets, so this lake murmured of aboriginal America. He saw the Indians in birch-bark canoes, the pioneers in fringed buckskin; he saw the gallantry that had been killed and the hope that still endures.

A hell-diver, forever at his old game of pretending to be a duck, bobbed out of the mirror of the lake, and Whitney Dibble at last knew that he was at home.

And 'not so unlike the hell-diver in her quickness and imperturbable complexity, Betty Clark ran down from the road behind the Wescott bungalow and profoundly remarked, "Oh! Hello! "

"I'm going to be an insurance man," remarked Whit.

"You're going to be an artist!"

"Sure JI am. As an insurance man!"

"You make me sick."

"Betty, my child, you have been away too long! It's a year now, at least, since anyone— I mean anyone you could know— has said 'You make me sick?!"

"Oh— oh— You make me sick!"

T. Jefferson was extremely angry when Whit appeared for dinner. He said that Whit had no idea how he had offended the Opera Committee that afternoon. Consequently, Whit had to go through the gruesome ordeals of accompanying his father to an artistic reception in the evening, and of discussing Cezanne, Matisse, Gauguin and other artists of whom he knew somewhat less than nothing with earnest ladies who knew even less. It was not until eleven that he could escape for a poker game in an obscure suite of the Hotel Thornleigh.

There were present here not only such raw collegians as Stuyv Wescott, Gil Scott and Tim Clark, but also a couple of older and more hardened vulgarians, whereof one was a Mr. Seidel, who had made a million dollars by developing the new University Heights district of Zenith.

When they had played for two hours they stopped for hot-dogs; and Room Service was again drastically ordered to "hustle up with the White Rock and ice."

Mr. Seidel, glass in hand, grumbled:

"So you're an artist, are you, Dibble? In Paris?"

"Yeah."

"And to think that a young fella that could bluff me out of seven dollars on a pair of deuces should live over there, when he'd be an A-tr real-estate salesman."

"Are you offering me a job?"

"Well, I hadn't thought about it.... Sure I am!"

"How much?"

"Twenty-five a week and commissions."

"It's done."

And the revolution was effected, save for the voice of Stuyv Wescott, rather like that of a hound-dog who has found the corn mash at the bottom of the silo, wailing, "Don't do it, Whit! Don't let any of these babies get you with their promise of millions!"

Whit had never altogether lost his awe of the T. Jefferson who had once been able to deny him breakfast, to impound his bicycle, to forbid him playing with the enchantingly grubby children of the coachman.

He dared not tackle that Zeus of breakfast food and of culture till eleven of the morning, when he called upon him at his office.

"Well, well, my boy, it's nice to see you!" said T. Jefferson. "I'm sorry that there is nothing really interesting for us to do to-day. But to-morrow noon we are going to a luncheon of the Bibliophile and First Edition Club."

"That's what I came to see you about, Dad. I'm awfully sorry, but I shan't be able to go to any kind of a lunch to-morrow noon. I'll be working."

"Working?"

"Yes, sir. I've taken a job with the Seidel Development Company."

"Well, that may be interesting for you for this summer, and when you return to Paris..."

"I'm not going back to Paris. I can't paint. I'm going to sell real estate."

The sound that T. Jefferson now made was rather like thunder, very much like a carload of steers arriving at the Chicago stockyards, and particularly like one hundred and forty-six cars tooting their horns on a side street in the desire to enter a boulevard.

"I might have known! I might have known it! I've always suspected that you were your mother's boy as much as mine, however much I've tried to conceal it from myself. How sharper than a serpent's tooth! Serpent in a fella's own bosom! Here I've toiled and moiled and, in fact, I've toiled all these years to give you a chance and then, just out of sheer, utter ingratitude, you don't take it—I mean you don't take the chance. Here I've given up my life to manufacturing Puffy Wuffles, when all the time my longing was to be artistic, and now when I give you the chance—Serpent's tooth! The old bard said it perfectly! Whit, my boy, I hope it isn't that you feel I can't afford it! In just a few days now, I'm going to start my schemes for extending the plant—going to get options on the five acres to the eastward. The production of Ritzy Rice will be doubled in the next year. And so, my boy:

"You'll either stick to your art or I'll disown you, sir! I mean, cut you off with a shilling! Ill by thunder make you artistic, if it's the last thing I do!"

On the same afternoon when he had, and very properly, been thrown out into the snow-storm with a shawl over his head, Whit borrowed five thousand from Stuyv Wescott's father, with it obtained options on the five acres upon which his father planned to build, with them reported to Mr. Seidel, from that low realtor received the five thousand dollars to repay Mr. Wescott, plus a five thousand dollar commission for himself and his weekly cheque of $25, spent the $25 in flowers, and with them appeared at the house of Betty Clark at 6.15.

He was met at the door by the English butler— well, he wasn't exactly English, but he had served for several years, as footman, under an English butler born in Dublin.

It is to be regretted, in this polite story of the highest American society, that the butler greeted Whit with, "Hello, kid! You're almost grown-up now! I hear you been in Paris. I'll holler up to Tim."

He hollered. Tim Clark appeared.

"Say, will you get out of here, Tim?" remarked Whit. "I want to see Betty."

" Betty?"

"Yeah, Betty."

"Oh, I see,' said Tim. "You mean you want to see Betty?"

"That's the idea," said Whit.

Tim went to the foot of the stairs and yelled "Betty!" He went halfway up the stairs and yelled '" Betty!" He went nearly to the top of the stairs and yelled " Berry!"

"Yeah," she said.

"Hey, kid, your suitor is here."

"My what?"

"Your suitor. Your boy-friend."

"Who's that, darling? Lindbergh is already married."

"Listen, you poor fool, it's

"I  know. 'Taint Lindbergh. just Whit Dibble. All right. coming down, God help me!"

It's Tm

Betty came down, so lovely, so cool, so refreshing in skirts that clipped her ankles; and so coolly and refreshingly she said:

"Hey, Whit, my dear! Salutations oh thou in the vocative. What can I do for you?"

"I don't think you can do anything besides help me spend the five thousand and twenty-five dollars I've made today— Hey, I forgot! I spent the twenty-five for these flowers. They're very nice, aren't they?"

"They certainly are."

"But do you think they're worth twenty-five dollars?"

"Sure, they are. Listen, darling! I'm so sorry that you wasted your time making five thousand dollars when you might have been painting. But of course an artist has to be an adventurer. I'm glad that you've tried it and that it's all over. By the way, did you get the five thousand by bootlegging, or by bumping somebody off? But that doesn't matter, of course. We'll go back to Paris, as soon as we're married, and have a jolly li'l Bohemian flat there, and I'll try so hard to make all of your artistic friends welcome."

"Betty! Is your brother still here?"

"How should I know?"

"Would you mind finding out?"

"Why, no. But why?"

"Dear Betty, you will so well understand what a scoundrel I am, in a few minutes. Funny! I never meant to be a scoundrel. I never even meant to be a bad son... Will you yell for Timmy, please?"

"Yeah, sure, of course I will."

She yelled, very competently.

Tim came downstairs, beaming.

"I hope it's all over."

"That's the point," said Whit, "I am trying to persuade Betty— to persuade you— to persuade T. Jefferson— that I don't want to be an artist. I'm trying— God knows what I'm trying!"

With which childish statement Whit fled from the house.

He found a taxi and gave the driver the address of his boss, Mr. Seidel, at the Zenith Athletic Club. Mr. Seidel was politely eating an Athletic Club dinner.

"Hello, boy, what's the trouble?" said Mr. Seidel.

"Will you let me pay for a telephone call if I make it here?"

"Sure I will. I'll even charge you 10 per cent., if that will make you feel any better."

Whit remarked to the Athletic Club telephone girl, "I'd like to speak to Isadora at the Café Fanfaron, Paris."

The voice of that unknown beauty answered, "Which state, pleeze?"

"France."

"France?"

"Yes, France."

"France, Europe?"

"Yes."

"And what was the name, please? "

"Isadora."

"And what is the lady's last name, please? "'

"I don't know... Hey, get me Miles O'Sullivan, same address."

"Just a moment, please. I will get the supervisor."

A very cool voice said, "To whom do you wish to speak, please? "

"I wish to speak, if I may, to Miles O'Sullivan. At the Café— I said Café—  C for coffee, A for Abraham, E for— you get it, don't you, Café— Café Fanfaron. In Paris. Right. Thank you very much."

When the telephone rang, it was the voice of the head waiter of the Fanfaron, a Russian who disapproved of Americans.

He said, "'Allo— allo."

"May I speak to Miles O'Sullivan?" demanded Whit.

"To who?"

"To Miles O'Sullivan."

"Te ne comprend pas."

"C'est Monsieur Dibble qui parle—

"D' Amerique?"

"Oui, et je desire to talk to Monsieur Miles O'Sullivan right away, tout de suite."

"Mais oui, je comprend. Vous desirez parler avec M. Miles O'Sullivang?"

"That's the idea. Make it snappy, will you?"

"Oui, right away."

Then Miles O'Sullivan's voice on the 'phone.

While Mr. Seidel smiled and watched the second-hand of his watch, Whit bellowed into the telephone, " Miles! Listen! I want to speak to Isadora."

That voice, coming across four thousand miles of rolling waves and labouring ships and darkness, mumbled, "Isadora who? Jones or Pater or Elgantine?"

"For heaven's sake, Miles, this is Whitney Dibble, speaking from America! I want to speak to Isadora. My Isadora."

"Oh, you want to speak to Isadora?"

"Yes, I want to speak to my Isadora."

"Well, I think she's out in front. Listen, laddie, I'll try to find her."

"Miles, this has already cost me more than a hundred dollars.

"And you have been caught by the people who think about dollars?"

"You're darned right, I have! Will you please get Isadora quick?"

"You mean quickly, don't you?"

"Yeah, quick or quickly, but please get Isadora— I mean get her quick— I mean quickly."

"Right you are, my lad."

It was after only $16.75 more worth of conversation that Isadora was saying to him, "Hello, Whit, darling, what is it?"

"Would you marry a real-estate man in Zenith, in the Middlewest? Zenith, I mean. You know! Swell town! Would you stand for my making ten thousand dollars a year?"

From four thousand miles away, Isadora crowed, "Sure I will!"

"You may have to interrupt your creative work—"

"Oh, my darling, my darling, I'll be so glad to quit four-flushing! "

MR. WHITNEY Dibble looked at his chief and observed, "After I find out how much this long-distance call has cost, do you mind if I make a local call?"

Mr. Seidel observed, "Go as far as you like, but please give me a pension when you fire me out of the firm."

"Sure!"

Whit telephoned to the mansion of T. Jefferson Dibble.

T. Jefferson answered the telephone with a roar:

"Yes, yes, yes, what do you want, what do you want?"

"Dad, this is Whit."

"So you have called me, you have called me— what do you want, what do you want?".

"Dad, what I tried to tell you this morning is that I am not engaged to one of these flappers in Zenith, but to a lovely intellectual author lady in Paris— Isadora."'

"Isadora what?"

"Do you mean to tell me you don't know who Isadora is, and what her last name is?"

"Oh, Isadora! The writer? Congratulations, my boy. I'm sorry I misunderstood you before."

"Yes. Just talked to her, long-distance to Paris, and she's promised to join me here."

"That's fine, boy! We'll certainly have an artistic centre here in Zenith."

"Yeah, we certainly will."

Mr. Seidel remarked, '" That local call will cost you just five cents besides the $87.50."

"Fine, boss," said Whitney Dibble. "Say, can I interest you in a bungalow on Lake Kennepoose? It has two baths, a lovely living-room, and— Why do you waste your life in this stuffy club-room, when you might have a real home?"

_______________

14: The Ghost of Grave Gully

Anonymous

As by "M. M. C."

Australian Town and Country Journal (NSW), 21 July 1888

'I WISH YOU'D come up for a few weeks. Easter is close at hand now; and we expect a good many visitors. So if you come I can promise you a jolly time.'

This was a portion of a letter which Tom Carlton, proprietor of Terborg Station, received from his friend, Charles Cotton, one evening in February. Early next morning he started on his journey. At noon on the third day he stopped at the comfortable homestead of Narenta Station. The proprietor, Mr. Wingfield, asked him to rest until the following day.

'You are very kind,' answered Tom, 'but I must get on. I want to catch the coach at Tarissa.

'The coach!' echoed Mr. Wingfield. 'Why, the weekly coach leaves Tarissa at 5 o'clock to-morrow morning, and Tarissa is fifty miles from here.'

When seated at the luncheon table Tom asked, 'Is there not a shorter route to Tarissa than the main road? A man whom I met yesterday told me that there was a shorter track if I cared to follow it.'

Here Tom was interrupted by Mrs. Wingfield saying in an agitated voice, 'Oh, don't go the short track.'

Tom looked surprised. 'Why,' he asked; 'is it dangerous?'

'Tell him all about it, James,' said Mrs. Wingfield, turning to her husband, 'and don't let him go that track.'

'Don't get so excited, Annie,' said Mr. Wingfield. 'After all it may— we may—'

'No optical delusion,' said Mrs. Wingfield. We both saw it too plainly.'

'Well, I will tell Mr. Carlton the whole circum-stance directly,' said Mr. Wingfield, soothingly; and then he turned the conversation into other channels.

When they rose from the table Mr. Wingfield led the way to the verandah. 'Now,' said he, 'I will tell you all about the short track. It will cut off four miles; and it passes through Grave Gully, and Grave Gully is haunted.'

Tom looked at his host's face in surprise. It wore a serious troubled expression.

'Haunted,' Tom said. 'I don't believe in ghosts, and I won't go four miles extra to avoid one.'

'I am unwilling to believe in ghosts,' said Mr. Wingfield, 'yet now— listen Mr. Carlton; and then judge. But first I must tell you how Grave Gully came to be haunted. About twelve years ago Tarissa Station was owned by a Mr. Simmonds. He was a very proud man, and looked upon his servants— whom he treated well enough in the matter of wages and living— somewhat in the same light as horses and cattle. He had one daughter; and I believe he would as soon have suspected her of falling in love with the horse she rode as with the groom whose duty it was to attend her. However, Miss Simmonds and Will Barclay fell in love with each other, and decided to elope. They chose a day when Mr, Simmonds was in Tarissa township. Miss Simmonds told the servants that she was going to the township, and would not be back that night. At about 2 o'clock in the afternoon she rode away, followed by the groom, Will Barclay. You may be sure that they did not go near the town. They rode for about thirty miles in the opposite direction. It was a very hot night; and there was no water within miles. The next morning the horses had gone. They were a pair which Barclay had bought from a travelling mob a short time previously. So they did not make back. The grass was short and dry, and it was difficult to track them. It was very late when he found them; and though he hastened back to the camp it was quite dark when he reached it. He said afterward, poor fellow, that he felt a presentiment that something was wrong when he came to the camp and found everything so quiet.

'He called Miss Simmonds, and, getting no answer, went to where the saddles and things were, and discovered that the quart pot was missing. So he concluded that she had gone for some water. He kindled a fire, and then started for the waterhole. By this time the moon had risen; and the night was bright as day. But Barclay could not see any sign of Miss Simmonds. The mud round the waterhole's edge was soft, and Barclay readily found the tracks left by himself on the previous night, when he had gone for water. But in no other place could he discern the impress of a human foot. It was quite evident that the girl had never found the waterhole. When had she started; and was she looking for it? Barclay spent the night in cooee-ing and lighting fires.

'When the morning dawned he tried to find the missing girl's tracks. But only a blackfellow would have been capable of tracking her small feet over the dry, hard grass. After searching unsuccessfully for two or three hours, Barclay rode to the nearest station, and reported the loss. Every man on the place turned out to assist in the search, except one, who went to give word to Mr. Simmonds. Of course Mr. Simmonds started to join in the search, which he made sure would be successful.

'On the third night after her loss he reached the station whence the search party had gone, and there he found some of the men, who had returned for fresh horses. The blacks had found the girl's tracks, habit skirt, jacket, and afterward her hat. The black tracker said "White Mary mad— she run about all ways. My word! that fellow cranky along a lubra!"

'Where is that —— Barclay?' asked Simmonds. 'I'll put a bullet through him the minute I see him.'

'You may put him in the lunatic asylum,' one of the men said, 'for he's mad enough. He's never tasted food; and he's always going day and night. He will be the first to find Miss Simmonds.'

'The man was right, for the next day three of the search party met just near what is now known as Grave Gully. The girl had been making toward Tarissa all the time; but she was out of her mind long before she got near enough to recognise any of the places which ought to have been familiar to her. Well, as I was saying, the three men met and rode on together. Presently one said, "Look down in the gully there. What is that long thing dangling from that tree?" "By Jove," said another, "it's a man!" And the third added, "It's Barclay!"

'They galloped down; and a sickening sight it was. Beneath the tree lay the body of the missing girl; and, suspended from one of its branches by a brace, was the body of Barclay. He had been dead for some hours. They were buried beneath the tree where they died, and—'

'And,' interrupted Tom, 'the gully was called Grave Gully; and ghosts are seen there.'

'Quite right,' said Mr. Wingfield; 'only that it is but one ghost which is seen there.'

'You believe that?' asked Tom.

And his host answered gravely, 'I do. It is only of late years— only the last two— that the ghost has made its appearance,' added Mr. Wingfield.

'And can you account for that?' asked Tom. 'If he, or she, whichever sex the ghost is, stayed quietly in its grave for so many years, why does it not stay there now?'

'Because,' answered Mr. Wingfield, 'something over two years since Mr. Simmonds died, and left orders in his will that he was to be buried in the cemetery at Tarissa township, and his daughter's body removed from Grave Gully, and interred beside him. It is supposed that Miss Simmonds's spirit objected to this; for since her body was removed from Grave Gully her ghost haunts it.

'You observed how nervous and delicate my wife is. Well, three weeks ago she waa no more nervous than you, and was in excellent health. We had planned to go to Tarissa Station. We took the short track through Grave Gully. It was nearly midnight; but the moon was shining brightly when we got near the graves. Suddenly the horses stopped short; and I felt ray wife çatch my arm. I looked round; and there, on what had been Miss Simmonds's grave, I saw her ghost. A tall, slight figure all in white, with long, fair hair falling over its shoulders, and a patch of crimson on the left arm. I only saw it for a second. Mrs. Wingfield had fallen from the seat to the floor of the buggy in a swoon. I stooped to raise her; and when I looked at the graves again the ghost had disappeared. I can tell you I was glad when we got to the house.'

WHEN Tom Carlton resumed his journey a vague presentiment of looming evil stole over him, and grew stronger as day declined. The round full moon rose, and it was high and bright in the heavens when he entered Grave Gully. While looking round, wondering beneath which of the drooping trees were the graves of the ill-starred lovers, his horse suddenly bounded, knocked against the projecting limb of a tree, and fell over a log, breaking its own neck and its rider's leg in doing so. It was all over in five minutes. Tom lay helpless; his dead horse lying partially on him, and preventing him from rising. Looking round, he saw what had frightened his horse. It was the ghost! Noiselessly, slowly, it advanced toward him— a tall white-robed figure with a mass of fair hair falling on its shoulders, and a splash of crimson on the left arm. Real terror deprived Tom of his senses, and he fainted.

'YOU DOUBT whether there is a ghost, Dr. Morris! What else could have frightened Mr. Carlton's horse?'

The speaker was Miss Jessie Meredith. Tom had been found the morning after his adventure in Grave Gully, and brought to Tarissa homestead.

'Horses will shy at anything,' said the doctor— 'a shadow or a fallen bough. You ought to know that, Miss Meredith; and, please, remember that it was after he got the fall that Mr. Carlton saw the ghost.'

Jessie was silenced, but not convinced.

A week afterward Mrs. Meredith, her two daughters, and Dr. Morris were in Tom's room; and the conversation turned on pre-existence.

'I think,' said Tom,'I must have met Miss Meredith in a former state. Her face is familiar to me.'

'If so, Alice ought to remember you,' said Jessie.

'I know now whom you remind me of, Miss Meredith,' said Tom. 'You are like the ghost.'

'The ghost!' said Alice. 'Oh ! I hope not.'

'Don't be frightened, child,' said her mother. 'You remind Mr. Carlton of the ghost because you are pale, and dressed in white, and your hair is loose. Isn't that it, Mr. Carlton?'

'Perhaps so,' Tom answered.

ELEVEN p.m., and silence reigns in Larissa homestead. It is a hot night; and all the doors are open. Miss Meredith's door opens on to the side verandah. Her father and the doctor, who are watching it, see her appear at it. She is habited only in her nightdress. A small scarlet shawl which she always carries when going for a walk is thrown over her left arm. Her fair hair falls loosely on her shoulders; and her blue eyes are wide open. She walks in the direction of Grave Gully, followed by her father and Dr. Morris. When she has reached the graves the doctor whispers,

'Wake her now, Mr. Meredith. Be gentle and careful.'

_________________

15: Dick Thornton's Mistake

A Christmas Story

Rolf Boldrewood

1826-1915

Australian Town and Country Journal (NSW), 1 Jan 1881

Thomas Alexander Bowne

IT WAS the blessed Christmas-tide. An old-fashioned season, too, people said. The snow lay deep on the ground. It turned the hedges into whited walls; the covered-up cottages into Esquimaux wigwams. The highways were choked; the pathways hidden; the trees laden; the brooks frozen; King Frost, constituting himself an impresario, with unlimited powers, had arranged a dazzling variety of transformations, as though he had been studying effect, for the usual Christmas pantomime, on a very large scale indeed!

At tho railway terminus of Northby Junction, matters were in a state of bustle and excitement almost unparalleled, bordering, indeed, on disorganisation. The Northby Express going out, the Southby goods due, the Westby mail coming in, hordes of schoolboys home for the holidays, demoralised with unwonted freedom, shoals of persons of every kind and sort whose business could not be predicated from outward tokens, travelling doubtless for good reasons, for bad reasons, for hardly any reasons at all.

Of this last was Mr. Richard Thornton, formerly of Australia, and now, like a celebrated historical personage, of No Hall, Nowhere. He had been a dweller in continental cities while it suited him, and now, it must be confessed, was a dawdler and purposeless wayfarer in the land of his forefathers, where the near approach of Christmas had found him as destitute of plan for sharing the season's time-honoured festivities as a laggard butterfly in a late autumn.

He had come early to the terminus, and was sitting in a first-class waiting-room, surrounded by his impedimenta, luxuriating in the warmth shed by a grate filled with lumps of coal, half as big as quartern loaves. He gazed around lazily, but not the less critically, watching the various family groups, who, debouching late from cab and "growler" betrayed anxiety in every tone and gesture.

"They do it a'purpose clean out o' aggerawation," an over-worked, soured head-porter had just remarked, dashing after a truckload of late luggage coming up from the other end of the platform. "As if they couldn't ha' started last week, when the trains wasn't more than quarter full; but it's just like 'em, passengers is that thoughtless and—  Hi, where are you a crowdin' to?" he suddenly shouted out, "that compartment's full-up with Parson Aveland and family. This way, sir, I'll find you a place young man— a smart porter you are, surely."

This sentence, partially obscure it must be confessed, terminated in sarcastic apostrophe of his erring fellow-servant who, nothing daunted, held up his hand to the guard in the brake van. The whistle sounded, the train sped smoothly and swiftly along the frozen rails, just as a young man laden with a hand bag, books, papers, and a furred overcoat, half slipped, half tumbled into a well-filled first-class compartment, the door of which was slammed and locked after him by the offending porter.

There was apparently some ground for the vexation of the head porter, which was unequivocally expressed during the leisure afforded while watching for the Eastby down, which wasn't due for full three minutes.

"Here's Parson Aveland, a fine free-handed gent, though he is a parson, travels regular on the line, got all his family with him, Miss Gladys and all— and you must go and crowd a strange gent, bang a top of him, just at the last minute!  I'm ashamed on you, as a porter of good standin' at Northby Junction. I'm ashamed on you, John Stokes."

"The gentleman was a settin' in the first-class waitin'-room, a-thinkin' o' summit else," said Stokes, "and precious nigh lost his seat as it was. I was that pushed that I opened the door of the parson's a'partm't in mistake for the Temperance gent's, as it wouldn't have mattered. As luck would have it, there was one spare scat, though it was that full of walkin' sticks and umbrellas and children's toys, blest if they hadn't to shift 'em. Well, the stranger, he slangs me, and the parson, too, that is, leastways, he looks as much as for to say, 'I know where you're goin' to, my good follow.' Howsomever, Miss Gladys says, 'It doesn't matter, the distance is short,' quite gentle-like, when the whistle sounds. I slams to the door and off they goes, I didn't like to let him lose his ticket."

"Why not?" demanded tho head porter, grumpily, " times is bad; shares is not over brisk. These sort of chaps as moons about till its too late, and then worrits the officers of the company, allers has money and to spare. Hanything's bettor than affrontin' our reg'lar travellers."

" Well," returned John Stokes, with respectful gravity, "I'll think o' that another time, Mr. Fusby. But mistakes will happen now and then. Here comes the down train."

The scream of the fast-flying steam demon that now came speeding towards them with great burning eyes, through the fast-gathering darkness, which rattled and crunched savagely as it tore past within a couple of feet of them, prevented further conversation. But the countenance of John Stokes had a severe and satisfied expression, as of beer looming in the not distant future, when he retired from the dialogue.

AFTER the train had fairly started, and the stranger's profuse apologies had come to an end, accepted as they were with the good breeding which so rarely deserts an English gentleman, however temporarily disturbed, matters commenced to improve.

The store of magazines and newspapers, with which he had provided himself, stood him in good stead with divers members of the family which he had compulsorily entered. The boys had not seen the last Punch, published that morning, and were, as schoolboys of the world, interested by the presentment of a saucy Etonian, as also by some "happy thoughts" peculiarly accented to their taste. As a consequence, they became absorbed in literature, and were obviously less trouble to their relatives than on former occasions.

Paterfamilias, apparently a reading man, could not resist the offer of an uncut Gentleman's Magazine; after which Mr. Thornton prudently devoted himself to The Times, and made no further offers of literary aid. He looked up, indeed, once from his paper, without any warning, and, perhaps, to his surprise found a pair of large bright yet kindly hazel eyes fixed rather searchingly upon his countenance They were instantly withdrawn, but with so becoming a blush that he did not repeat the slight awkwardness of the situation.

One of the younger children came to the rescue with a question about a bearskin rug which was included in his wraps, and thus effected a most successful diversion. The inquisitive one required to know the nature of the beast, and so on, which had so soft a skin, and both the boys cast down their Punches, and became deeply interested in the fact that their travelling companion was a hunter on occasion, and had in a far land over the sea slain many such on the Rocky Mountain slopes, where Red Indians still roamed, and still took white scalps. This led to hunting generally, and even to a kangaroo chase, a fascinating topic which had by no means come to an end, when the whistle and a perceptible "slowing" of the train told that they were nearing a station.

"You will permit me, sir, to apologise once more for my intrusion," said Dick to the paterfamilias, with an air of deepest respect, "and to betake myself to another carriage as soon as the train stops."

"Why, he's going to Creyke," cried out one of the school boys, who had been examining Dick's luggage seriatim. "There it is, as plain as a pikestaff on that label— C-r-e-y-k-e."

"My dear sir," said the old gentleman, now in the serene enjoyment of a stiffish aesthetic article, "I trust you will not think of changing, unless you find our company uncongenial. (Here Dick glanced at the young lady, who looked down with much demureness.) By a singular coincidence, you appear to be travelling to tho same destination as ourselves."

"Thanks, very much," said Dick, "If I don't incommode you. I am going to Creyke."

"Indeed!" said the rector, "indeed! We have not many passengers to our secluded town. Have you any friends residing in the neighhourhood?"

"Not that I am aware of," said Dick, coolly. "The fact is, that I have been travelling the last three or four years, and I seldom stay very long in one place. I heard by chance of your church at Creyke, as being an uncommonly fine specimen of early Saxon."

"You were most correctly informed, my dear sir," replied the rector, dropping his magazine in his eagerness, and fixing his eyes upon Dick with an expression which told how close the question was to his dearest occupation in life. "May I ask whether you take much interest in church architecture?"

"It has always been a favourite, I may say, an hereditary study of mine," replied Dick, effusively. "I sketch a little— en amateur, only— and I sometimes think my portfolio will be fuller of churches and cathedrals when I return to my own land than of any other subjects."

"I shall have much pleasure, the greatest pleasure," said the old gentleman, who had thrown overboard the magazine for good and all, and put his spectacles in his pocket, "in showing you St. Gundulf's, regarded, not without reason, as one of tho most ancient Abbey churches, and undoubted specimens of Early Saxon ecclesiastical architecture, not only in our country, rich in antiquities as it is, but in all Britain."

"My dear sir, you amaze me," said Dick. "I know Durham and Rochester Cathedrals, but I frankly confess I never expected to have found traces of the picturesque mingling of Danish ravages and Norman restoration of the 13th century, in your quiet county."

"No antiquarian of any standing has ventured," said the rector, "to deny our claim to be considered the finest."

"You forget, papa," said the young lady, upon whose face a quiet smile had been gradually developing, "that Mr. Pryce Jones said—"

"Pryce Jones," cried out her father, almost jumping up from his seat, with excitement, "and who is he? did he not aver that there was no historical proof that Bishop Godmond, in the end of the 11th century, specially rebuilt the Baptistry, whereas, Giraldus Cambrensis—"

"Oh, never mind the old church," said one of the schoolboys, who had regarded with disfavour the topic thus, to his mind, unluckily introduced. "You and papa can go and moon about it till all's blue, when we're at home. He always does when new people come. Tell us about the kangaroos— can they fight, and what kind of dogs do you hunt them with—"

"Bertie, I am ashamed of you," said Miss Gladys, bending her brows in a severe and intimidating manner, which only scorned an incongruously ingenious mode of heightening her personal attractions Dick thought. "What will—"

"Mr. Thornton think of you?" interposed Dick, bowing as if he had been formally introduced; "he really is not much shocked— he understands a good deal about boys, who are much alike in all lands. Well, Bertie, you had better come to Australia, and see. And if we meet there, I will lend you a horse that you may gallop all day, and no groom will scold you, however fast you ride him."

"Oh, will you?" said the boy. "I should like it of all things— only it is such a terrible long way off. But I say, where are you going to stop at in Creyke. You go to Bowstead's at The Rooks Nest. It's a jolly place if you like— nearly as old as the church, and there's big fire places, and tiles and oak-wainscoting, and the beat ale in the country."

"I shall be sure to take your advice, Bertie, if I stay at Creyke long enough to need a comfortable home. And you must come and see me, and show me the lions."

"I can quite endorse my son's recommendation," said the rector, who, reflecting that the church architecture question might be arranged at leisure, whereas the magazine, which he did not happen to take in, was a fleeting and transitory possession, had settled down to his article again. "And I trust we shall have many opportunities of meeting during your stay in our neighbourhood."

The winter day was darkening fast as the train rolled up to the unpretending station of Creyke, where a neat, well-appointed carriage, with an exceedingly rubicund coachman met the rectory party, who, in the process of transference, were greeted by every one with a great warmth and cordiality. Evidently popular in their own country, thought Mr. Thornton, who now had ample leisure to collect the possessions which had so confused him at the commencement of his journey. The half-melancholy feeling of the stranger when, far from home and kin, he witnesses, the joyous greeting accorded to others, commenced to assail him.

He was partly consoled by the rector's attention in handing him his card, whereon was engraved "The Rev. Piers Aveland," and enjoining a highly respectable parishioner to see the gentleman safe to the Rooks' Nest. This concluded their acquaintance for the present, apparently; as, after a warm shake of the hand on the rector's part, a smile and a bow from tho young lady, and a loudly emphasised promise from the boys to show him such a pony, the coachman whirled them somewhat impatiently away.

If one ever truly and literally "takes one's ease in one's inn," and some people have found considerable rest and solace at intervals, during their travels o'er the highways of life, in such retreats, the Rooks' Nest, at Creyke, must have been the very place referred to by the poet. Yet, it is not customary in England for people possessing the shadow of a home, or the most apparitional presentments of friends, to abide in any hostelry during the time-honoured Christmas festival.

In a sense, therefore, it was well for Richard Thornton that such custom held sway, inasmuch as he had an assortment of suites of apartments from which to select. After some comparison he chose a sitting-room and bed-room facing the south, the former opening out upon a small walled-in garden, which had in the old, old days of the Abbey of Creyke been devoted to the horticultural experiments of a certain holy prior, long celebrated for his skill in the planting of apple trees and the then-rare apricot. Over the wall was visible a long stretch of down with a range of hills, beyond which was a winter sea. The wide bare expanse gratified Dick's Australian heart. The decoration of the rooms, oak-panelled and furnished in a way which showed that no article had been added since the Restoration, was soothing to his feelings. A fire of billet wood glowed and sparkled in each of the great open fireplaces, with their quaint andirons and Dutch-tiled mantelpieces. A snowy cloth speedily covered the old oaken-polished table, whereon a dinner made its appearance after the traveller had completed his toilette, which showed that the traditions of the refectory still lingered in the erstwhile sacred pile. A jug of the famous Creyke home-brewed ale, brown, clear, creamy-frothing and potent, judiciously mulled according to a receipt handed down by the landlord's great-grandfather, stood by the hearth.

And when, to complete the picture, old Roger Bowstead himself appeared in the doorway bearing the first dish in his hands, looking for all tho world like a wood-cut of Chaucer's jolly host, but slightly randomised, Dick Thornton felt inclined to bless the fortunate mistake which had led his wayward steps hither.

Mr. Thornton was considering next morning; considering at great ease and with fullest after-breakfast leisure, before the vast old-fashioned fireplace, whore every tile gleamed ruddily with reflected glow, the question of walking forth exploringly, when the rector was announced.

"I have come to ask whether you would like to go over the church with me?" said he, cordially. "I am quite at your service as cicerone, until lunch time, when, perhaps, you will join us at the rectory. Mrs. Aveland looks forward to your returning with me."

Dick was most happy.  The pair then sallied forth down the somewhat narrow cobble-stone paved street of the village, lined with old-fashioned gabled houses with overhung roofs, past the corn exchange, the chief butchers' and bakers' shops, finally crossing to the further side of a bridged trout stream, where stood noble old St. Gundulf's, the Abbey Church of Creyke. Built of dark red sandstone, it contrasted finely with the pale winter tones glorifying the peaceful valley, and recalling memories dim with the rime of Eld.

"There," said the rector, poising himself on one foot, and looking at the ancient pile, with an air of reverent yet critical admiration, as if he had never set eyes on it before. "There, my dear sir, I may, perhaps, be held slightly partial, but I do sincerely believe, and venture to assert, that you have not in your travels come across a more perfect specimen of the genuine early Saxon Abbey Church, now so rare."

Dick's instructed taste informed him that he could praise with a clear conscience, and he did so. But he laid on his colouring with an artist's delicacy of touch, showing a discriminating knowledge of his subject. The rector was charmed; he pointed out lovingly, and seriatim, each interior detail so dear to his heart.

Dick Thornton cordially admitted to himself that the worthy rector had not praised St. Gundulf's without reason. Not alone an ecclesiastical edifice it stood there palpably venerable as a shrine, a memorial of past ages, a monument of the undoubting faith of its long-dead founders. Any man of ordinary taste and sentiment, not to say a clergyman, might be proud to have that ancient pile within daily ken.

An Abbey church, only short of cathedral rank, it had been founded in the seventh century and ravaged by Danes in the eighth. The choir and transept were early English; the crypt, a duplicate subterranean church of only inferior size and beauty, was, with the nave, distinctly Norman. Bishop Gundulf had rebuilt it in the following century, and had added the Priory, which, long disused and dismantled in the civil wars, had finally merged into The Rooks' Nest.

What could be more rich and beautiful than the Chapter House, of octagonal form, with the cloisters still enclosed by the dormitory and refectory, now the lodgement of the sexton— himself a grave and dignified antiquarian. St. Gundulf's was unique in itself and its surroundings; so said all persons of taste, Richard Thornton included.

So absorbed were both men in this highly congenial pursuit, that it was only when he had consulted his watch with something like a start, that Mr. Aveland remarked that it was five minutes past 1 o'clock, and that they must abandon archaeology for the present.

If the church was a study of ancient art, the rectory was a triumph of modern comfort. Never had Dick seen a house which was so obviously the abode of all the domestic virtues as this most charming dwelling. Here Mrs. Aveland, a pleasant-voiced, well-preserved, and rather stately matron, received him with reassuring cordiality, while conveying to her husband, in a tenderly reproachful manner, the fact that the luncheon hour was even now o'er past. As for Miss Gladys, when that young lady appeared, with an air of friendly welcome, and yet with a slightly conscious expression, he could hardly forbear an inward feeling of self-congratulation.

"And yet I don't know why I should be overpleased," he said to himself. He was a very calm judging and philosophical personage, this Richard Thornton, and the aim of his life was to render himself even more rigidly the slave of logic that an imperturbable temperament had made him.

"She can't help being an awfully good housekeeper— don't know that I ever saw a better managed house, no fussiness apparent, either. But she didn't get that mild sympathetic air from the feminine parent. She's rather in the Florentine and command line, or I mistake.

"Well, we shall probably live in different hemispheres, if I become nearly related to her. But that's in the dimmest future"

How perfect in style and manner, for the most part, are those family repasts, where the favoured guest is present. How beautifully under command is everybody's temper! Paterfamilias does not grumble, or be grumbled at, as the case may be. The maternal countenance beams, forbearing and affectionate. The daughters are divine, the sons chivalrously respectful. (The boys in this instance, were away on a short visit.)

Dick Thornton had informed his mind, both by books and travel. He talked well and easily when with people who comprehended subjects which interested him. On the present occasion, if he contributed some scarcely common fact, or followed up some line of argument which the rector had started, he found the hazel eyes fixed upon him with a glance of shy approval, which stirred his pulses, after a fashion to which they had been long unaccustomed.

After lunch an adjournment was proposed to the library, where rare prints and archaic editions of note furnished an hour's pleasant occupation. When at length Mr. Thornton rose to go he received a pressing invitation to become a guest at the rectory until the Christmas holidays had passed.

"You will be so lonely at The Rooks' Nest," said Mrs. Aveland. "Bowstead is a most civil and attentive old person, still, it is always strange to be at an inn, at least, I should think so."

But to this proposal Thornton could not consent. He very properly preferred to be independent as to his lodgings. His thanks were sincere and cordial, and he promised to visit them daily if they would have him, and to join the Christmas festivities. Still he would, if they permitted him, remain in his quarters at The Rooks' Nest.

From this position he would not be moved, electing to support the role of the comparatively unknown. He had learned from experience that a lack of interest attaches itself to the perfectly well-comprehended acquaintance, like the well-worn book, the leaves of which are read, re-read, and turned down at the corners.

The next day he took a long solitary walk and did not visit the rectory.

When Christmas Day came the house was, of course, filled with guests. Friends and relatives came from a distance, to all of whom he was presented as an Australian gentleman, a species of foreigner, or, if not one, a man from a far country, and, as such, to be wondered at exceedingly.

Some of the guests, on that account only, as if distance of habitation was an important and dangerous factor in a man's character, otherwise unimpeachable, regarded him with a species of curiosity, which almost savoured of distrust.

But Dick had by this time staunch and outspoken friends in the household; not Miss Gladys, of course, though she went the length of affirming to her good friends that he was "nice" and also "original"— more than which an English young lady, bien elevee, can't be expected to say. But the boys, Bertie and Gaveston, they had no hesitation in sounding the praises of their new friend.

"He was a first-rate fellow, and no mistake. He had hundreds of horses, and thousands of cattle and sheep in Australia— not like these pokey little farmers. And there were wild blacks on some of his places, and they threw spears at him once. And he could ride and shoot and fish, and drive four-in-hand, and do everything. And he sketched churches and water-falls, and things, like one o'clock. And he had kangaroo dogs in Australia, and papa said he was best up in church-building of any man he knew."

Here the audience generally smiled.

Christmas, to the wanderer, lacks its essential festival flavour when he performs its functions away from home and kindred. Yet Dick Thornton found the rectory a more than tolerable substitute. He liked the old-fashioned games and merry-making; the more so, that the unrestrained and festive intercourse proper to the season, brought out many traits of character conventionally concealed at other times.

For, let who will suffer in such an ordeal, it only served to bring out Gladys Aveland's sunny disposition into brighter, clearer relief. She was everybody's good angel— the children, the servants, the guests, the relatives, the parishioners, all were devoted in their affectionate loyalty to the daughter of the house:

"That's a kind of thing that can't be put on," said this cautious colonist; Mr. Thornton, when musing over tho events of the day. "Household and village reputations are not to be constructed in a day; they must be the growth of years of sympathy, of unselfish kindness, and capable administration. Really I feel like a better kind of burglar, as having entered this house to carry off such a treasure. Fortunately, I can promise to come back in a year or two. Thanks to my worthy uncle, I am not tied down to the personal management of my property,"

Though Mr. Thornton was not persuaded to take up his abode at the rectory, it must be confessed that he spent a very largo portion of his time there. He had discovered that he and Miss Aveland had literary tastes and artistic pursuits in common; the more frequent opportunities he had of talking to her, the more he was convinced that along with cultivated tastes she possessed a well balanced mind; a large infusion of common sense; more than all, that priceless gift of natural sweetness of temper, which he was wont to aver, was worth all other feminine good qualities put together.

"High principles you may find, joined with a deeply religious tone of mind. They are far from uncommon. All manner of accomplishments and attainments, with grace and refinement, may be imparted by education," he reiterated like a Philistine, as he was, "but if a woman isn't born with a good temper, nothing will over impart it. And unless I am in a position to fool utterly certain of my future wife's possession of it, I shall never marry at all."

This had been his oft-repeated statement in the days of careless bachelor companionship, when he lived in chambers, and with "Friends of Bohemia" and others full often discussed these and other stupendous social questions.

"But have you an exceptionally good temper?" it was asked of him, during one of these "tabaks parlemente."

"Perhaps not— perhaps, explosive at a moderately high temperature; but that is not the question. A man's safety-valves, natural and acquired, are so numerous and available, that a little more or less a! earn is easily carried off. He can smoke, he can drink, he can hold his tongue, he can take hard exercise, he can wrestle intellectually, politically or commercially, with his fellow-men. All those dull the irritated nerve, and tend towards recovery. Now a woman, even more or less exceptional, can do none of these things. Hence the dire result is, that if she be cursed with a temper, which means uncertain seizure of sullenness, discontent, or ferocity, she cannot help actively demonstrating it in speech or manner. Her household is then necessarily desolated with all the horrors of war, neither age nor sex being spared."

"A darkish picture," partly said, partly smoked his friend. "But how, may I ask, did your sage and worshipful highness become possessed of this accurate knowledge of the secrets of the prison-house, all unwedded as you are said to be?"

"How does one know anything?" laughed Dick Thornton; "partly from observation, doubtless, tradition, rumour, accidental stumblings upon the treasure-trove of Truth. But I do know so much, and shall act accordingly."

The more Dick Thornton saw of Miss Aveland the more he became convinced that she was all she appeared to be— a pure-minded, domesticated, well-educated girl, such a one as might be expected from her surroundings. She had not seen very much of the world. Paris was not familiar to her, and she could not talk about the Continent like a courier. She had not been very often to London, either. All this Dick Thornton thought was decidedly in her favour.

He could show his wife everything after marriage that it was desirable she should see. It would be very pleasant acting as a cicerone, and watching the combination of fresh youthful enthusiasm acting upon a mind at once inexperienced and highly cultured. He detested young women who know everything, and he had seen so many families, whose continental and fashionable experience had rubbed off the bloom of innocence very decidedly, without replacing it by any knowledge worth acquiring.

As to her personal appearance, it had attracted him at first, only to confirm his fullest approval afterwards. He was not young enough to be fascinated by mere beauty, knowing how poor a toy, how dear a bauble, it may prove to be, purchased at the cost of a life's sacrifice. But, he fully appreciated such true mouldings of form and face, as when co-existing in the divine day of youth, appeal irresistibly to the uncorrupted heart of man.

Tall himself, blue eyed, fair haired, brown boarded, calm and impassive of manner, he showed therein his true descent from the restless Norsemen, who having made their forays from the near vicinity of the North Pole, were now, in Dick's person, and those of his kindred, building up au empire at the other side of the world, as near as could be arranged to the south Pole. He, therefore, saw his ideal of loveliness in a slight, yet rounded, figure, not noticeably above the medium height, with dark hair, and large, softly bright hazel eyes, illumining a face which expressed with girlish lucidity each varying tone which waked the air-harp echoes of a sensitive organisation.

So IAO abandoned himself to the tide which was gliding so pleasantly and flowingly in the right direction, congratulating himself  now on the fortunate mistake which had given him the entree to so pleasant a household, had brought him into propinquity with the rare feminine type he had been these long years persistently, if not always enthusiastically, essaying to discover.

Mr. Thornton had spoken vaguely of his spending a week or two at Creyke, in the pursuit of architectural and other aesthetic ideals; but it appeared as if he were disposed to linger on, or else that St. Gundulf's possessed those spiritual powers of attraction which were stonily claimed for it in medieval times.

When, after all reasonable limit had been reached, he stated his intention of departing from the neighbourhood, he was gratified at the disapprobation with which his communication was received on all sides; that is, by Mr. and Mrs. Aveland and the boys. As for Miss Gladys, she assented formally, but the fair cheek grow perceptibly paler; at least an interested spectator thought so.

This may have incited Mr. Thornton to declare that he would run up to London and see if he could arrange to remain a fortnight longer. The hint of reprieve led to so palpable a rise in the social thermometer, that he had hardly the heart to depart by the evening train, for the purpose of attending to nothing in particular, except the purchase of one or two carefully selected articles of bijouterie, which he thought might come in useful in the remote future.

Mr. Thornton duly returned, having successfully arranged his business, and during the further period which he permitted himself for his researches into the over interesting and recondite subject of ecclesiastical architecture, certain mutual explanations, distantly connected with a religious ceremony in St. Gundulf's, came about in an apparently accidental manner.

Contrary to what occasionally happens in this uncertain life of ours here below, the highly important, indispensable, irrevocable ceremony did come off in the venerable and famous church, St. Gundulf, at the day and hour appointed. The ancient pile was crowded with the rank and fashion of the country, as well as with the villagers, who pressed to see the last of the kind face they had all loved— which had been so constant in visits of mercy, in seasons of sorrow, in time of need.

As for Dick Thornton, he had very carefully considered the subject, so that, having deliberately formed his opinion, he was free from all shadow of misgiving or doubt upon the matter. He more than ever applauded the lucky chance which had landed him within the shadow of St. Gundulf, and was fain to believe that the Saint had secured to him by a modern miracle, a pearl of womanhood. That particular description of gem which he had ever dreamed of as shining perennially with undimmed lustre in the setting of matrimony. Not dependent upon anyone— thanks to the capricious testamentary preference exhibited by an old bachelor uncle he had no relatives to consult about matter which interested him, and him only, so closely and vitally, of living men. He was able to produce such sterling credentials in the shape of bankers' and other serviceable autographs as satisfied the reverend Piers that he might safely delegate the charge and sustenance of his daughter to him, without fear of default in that respect. All the friends and relatives of the bride approved of him, and his best man, another Australian of prepossessing appearance and inoffensive manners— but in the modified and guarded manner in which English people approve of anyone they have not known all their lives.

And indeed, as we have said, there was no reason why anyone should disapprove of Richard Thornton. He was manly, yet cultured: travelled; experienced beyond his years, yet not "fast;" peaceful of mien and manner, yet by no means a man to be annoyed or oppressed with impunity. His cosmopolitan habits had saved him from provincialism of any kind, and unless he himself had volunteered the information, no one could by any peculiarity of air, speech or manner have discovered that he was not an ordinary well-bred Englishman of the leisure class.

HE did not purpose to take his bride at once to Australia, though they might probably visit that great south land at some future day. For the present, they had sketched out a kind of provisional introductory tour, which was to commence with a leisurely ramble through Egypt and Palestine, thus evading the remainder of the English winter, returning through Italy and Germany, and regaining England somewhere about the leafy month of June.

In furtherance of this wise and hopeful project they had been in Paris for a fortnight, had gone to Marseilles, and now, on board the lively P. and O. steamer Panther, were threading the straits of Bonifacio, with a fair wind and an uninterrupted view of the snow-capped mountain peak of Sicily, bathed in the gold and purple of a Mediterranean sunset.

Gladys Thornton, nee Aveland, had been for some moments intently gazing o'er the wondrous panorama— at sea and sky, the storied land, the very waves which boasted a Past, so rich in the imagery of romance.

The "Crescent and the Cross" slid down and lay unheeded among the wraps at her feet. Her husband abated for a while his pacing up and down the deck, and looking with a calm air at the evening glories, as of one who had seen them before, turned towards his wife, when his eye glowed with a brighter light and his face assumed an expression of ineffable tenderness. She stole her hand within his, as he stood beside her, and looked fondly up into his face.

"Oh! Richard, what a world of beauty!" she murmured, "is daily unfolded to us; all that my wildest hopes ever pictured. And the east, the glorious east, before us yet. How we shall enjoy it together. My life is too full of happiness. I feel as if it was almost wrong for a mortal to be so happy, and to think that it might never have come to us, if— if— you had not been put into our carriage at Northby Junction by mistake!"

"It was no mistake," he said, " 'fait expris,' as the waiter explained when he spilled the soup over the obnoxious guest.

"No mistake!" cried the fair bride, "why, how could it have been otherwise?"

"Very simply, my darling," answered Mr. Richard Thornton, with perfect sang froid. "I caught sight of a young lady at a strange railway station who realised all my long-cherished aspirations. I was determined to see more of her. I have some weaknesses and many faults— nino de mi alma— as they say at Gibraltar, which we shall soon see, but want of decision was never reckoned among them. I formed my resolution promptly."

"And what did you do then?"

"Gave the porter, John Stokes— good fellow, Stokes— a sovereign, after asking him a few leading questions. He informed me of your good father's name, residence, and passion for ecclesiastical architecture, got me a ticket for Creyke, which I had never before heard of, and finally, in furtherance of my iniquitous design, tumbled me in among your family group, mistaking yours for the next carriage, at the last moment, when the train was just starting. You know the rest."

"Oh, you base, deliberate, unprincipled, cold-blooded schemer!" exclaimed the captive, half in alarm, half in admiration. "How can I ever believe you again? Flattering poor dear papa, too, with your church architecture and mock- antiquarian research. That ever I should have been so shamefully taken in."

"My last deception, darling Gladys, as far as you are concerned, rest assured of that," said Dick, sitting down beside her, and permitting her head to nestle upon his shoulder. "What was I to do, really now ? After all, it was a pardonable ruse. 'All's fair in war' and the other thine, you know. Suppose I had been undecided— as most men would have been— and let the train bear you away for ever out of my sight ! Think of that awful contingency. Was I so very wrong, do you think?"

Her lips answered him, as did her eyes; no speech was needed, and as he drew her towards him and folded her in his arms in open defiance of the man at the wheel, the officers of the watch, and such passengers as were not below slightly indisposed, for the Panther was a very lively boat, each felt in their inmost heart that no more blissful result in this world of matrimonial lotteries had ever followed a chance meeting than the life drama which had for its first act that harmless piece of strategy— "Dick Thornton's Mistake."

__________________

16: The Gold Brick Twins

Irvin S. Cobb

1876-1944

The Red Book Magazine, Dec 1915

"SAY, those old boys that used to write the fables— ain't it curious how they nearly always had their dope straight?"

It was my highly improper friend Scandalous Doolan who put the question, thereby starting the conversation off on an entirely new tack. Until this, nothing whatever had been said about fables or the authors of fables. As I recall, the talk at the moment dealt with the habits of whales— he-whales and she-whales.

We had been speaking of whales in the first place, and whales had suggested ships, and ships suggested icebergs, and icebergs suggested soda fountains, and soda fountains suggested frothy things, and frothy things suggested mad dogs, and mad dogs suggested hot weather, and hot weather suggested light underwear, and light underwear suggested heavy underwear, and heavy underwear suggested polar explorers, and polar explorers suggested walruses, and walruses suggested whales. So here we were back again on whales, breezing along beautifully, when Scandalous' mind suddenly jibed and went about.

Had it been anyone else who interrupted, I am quite sure I should have felt a momentary sense of pique. A whale is one of the best things to talk about that I know of. In regard to whales and their peculiarities you can make almost any assertion without fear of successful contradiction. Nobody knows any more about the subject than you do. You are not hampered by facts. If some one mentions the blubber of the whale, and you chirp up and say it can be noticed for miles on a still day when the large but emotional creature has been moved to tears by some great sorrow coming into its life, everybody else is bound to accept the statement. For after all, how few among us really know whether a distressed whale sobs aloud or does so under its breath? And who, with any certainty, can tell whether a mother whale hatches her egg like a hen or leaves it on the sheltered bosom of a fjord to be incubated by the gentle warmth of the midnight sun? The possibilities of the proposition for purposes of informal discussion, pro and con, are apparent at a glance.

Personally I would give it first rank. The weather helps out amazingly when you are meeting people for the first time, because there is nearly always more or less weather going on somewhere, and practically everybody has ideas about it. Breakfast also is a wonderfully first-aid topic to bring up in a mixed company. Try it yourself the next time the conversation seems to lull. Just speak up in an off-hand kind of way and say you never care much about breakfast, that a slice of toast and a cup of weak tea start you off properly for doing a hard day's work, You will be surprised to see  how the conversation livens up and how eagerly а present join in. The lady on your left feels you should know she always takes two lumps of sugar and nearly half cream, because she simply cannot abide hot milk, no matter what the doctors say. The gentleman on your right will be moved to confess he likes his eggs boiled exactly three minutes, no more and no less. Buckwheat cakes find a champion, and oatmeal rarely lacks a warm defender. Weather for strangers, but among friends, breakfast and whales— bear these in mind and you will never be at a loss for pleasant ways of spending the long winter evenings which are now upon us. But the greater of these is whales. We had hardly skimmed the subject of whales when Mr. Doolan leaped headlong into fables.

Nevertheless I gave him leeway by waiting in silence for what was to follow. Through long acquaintance I have come to learn his idiosyncrasies, which are many and unique. For a brief space, after his interrupting remark, there was silence. I held my tongue and he peered contemplatively down the slant of his cigar to its glowing tip and with the bottom of his glass made little patterns of rings upon the marble top of the table. Anon he resumed:

"NOW, f'rinstance, speakin' of fables, you take that one about the grasshopper and the ant. It's been a favorite of mine ever since I first heard it. From what I've been able to gather, that particular fable was first pulled by an old guy named E. Sopp. I wonder did he spell his last name with one p or two? Anyway, it's no matter. By all accounts he was a foreigner and most foreigners have funny monakers, anyway. Even if he was a wop, he must've been considerable of a deep thinker— that old boy. The party that first brings this fable to my attention tells me E. Sopp lived three or four thousand years ago. Naturally, I couldn't stand for that. I says to this party, 'Quit your kiddin',' I says to him; 'this is only 1915 that we're livin' in now. You can't go behind them returns,' I says. And of course he didn't have any come-back because I had the figures on him. Just the same, I judge the old bird dated clear back to before the year of fhe Big Wind in Ireland, and that's plenty far enough back for me.

"But speakin' of this fable, the grasshopper went pikin' about all summer wearin' snappy clothes for 'varsity hoppers and havin' the time of his life. Easy come and easy go— that was his motto. Every time he got a dollar he spent. a dollar and fifteen cents of it right away. He couldn't break a five without developin' some new friends. But all this time the ant is workin' like a bird-dog, hivin' it up and saltin' it down. Pretty soon the heated term is over and fall has came and went, and now the crool winter is upon us and the grasshopper finds hisself as busted as a ha'nt. Bein' out of money, it's a cinch he is out of friends too. When your riches start to fly away, there's quite a few that ketch the sound of them restless rustlin' wings almost as soon as you do— I've noticed that myself, and I'm no member of the Sopp family either. I guess it's because they've been cuddlin' up so close to you that they can hear the warnin' with such a cute acuteness.

"Well, anyway, the grasshopper starts down the big road. He's limpin' on both feet, fallen arches havin' come on him just as soon as he deprived his insteps of the constant support of the bar-rail. His hair is stickin' out through the top of his straw hat, and the chill wind of December is rattlin' his white duck pants. He comes by the ant's house, and sees the smoke pourin' out of the chimney. The ant is settin' at the front window smokin' the best cigar that any amount of money up to ten cents will buy, and readin' funny pieces out of the comic section. The grasshopper remembers him and the ant used to belong to the same college fraternity back in the old care-free days. He goes up to the front door and knocks. The ant takes a peek through the window and sees who it is, and, bein' a tender hearted little cuss, the sight of his old chum standin' out there shiverin' in the bitter cold affects him so he can't bear to look at it any longer. So he pulls down the shades and goes and calls the dog. And the next mornin' the grasshopper is discovered frozen to death in a snowdrift and the ant has liver and onions for 'breakfast. The moral, as I figure it out, bein' that it's tough to be an ant but a blame sight tougher to be a grasshopper.

"I'M reminded of that fable every time I think of the fix in which me and the Sweet Caps Kid finds ourselves one winter about two winters ago. The summer precedin' was the finest summer for grasshoppers that I ever encountered. And me and the Sweet Caps certainly was one gallus little pair of hoppergrasses. We spent the heated term and all we made at one of them hot-bath resorts in the Middlin' West. It was a great place for losin' symptoms, bankrolls, waist-lines and reputations. An old boy would blow in there ridin' in an invalid chair and sayin', 'Ouch!' every time the wheels went over a crack in the planks. He'd be kinked up into a nice tight hard knot, with his joints so full of rheumatism that when he took a step he creaked like a new pair of corduroy pants. The sanitarium folks would take him in hand and begin givin' him the treatments. Inside of two weeks he'd be hirin' a fluffy blonde to teach him the fox-trot and his wife back home would be consultin' an alimony specialist. I never saw so many human pretzels converted into animal crackers in my whole life before.

"ТО persons in our line of endeavor, it was certainly a lovely spot to be at. The place was as wide open as oysters on the half shell. Everywhere you looked you could see wise guys from the city in the act of bein' trimmed by suckers from the high grass. Not since the old days when I worked the shells with a wagon-circus that carried its own troupe of porch-climbers and let out the safeblowing privilege to the highest bidder have I seen the plums hangin' so low and the pippins so easy to pick. For three months me and the Sweet Caps Kid took in coin with both hands; the trouble was that we let it go with both hands too. We couldn't figure how the crop would ever run short, for the harvest was most plentiful, and the reapers, they was few.

"But you can't always tell. All of a sudden something happens.

"There's a change of city administrations, and no sooner does the new crowd get into office than they start house cleanin' something frightful. The word goes out to close the dampers and bank the fires. One or two hardy adventurers disregards the gipsys warning, whereupon a grand jury leaps upon them, with shrill cries and inside of four weeks they're bein' measured for nobby outfits of striped suitin's at an institution for the promotion of indoor occupations run by the State. So me and Sweet Caps Kid takes advantage of this period of enforced inactivity to hold a consultation.

" 'Sweety,' I says to him, 'something seems to inform me it's our next move. Personally I have no desire,' I says, 'to have a large, coarse creature called a deputy warden standin' over me teachin' me how to make chair bottoms. Any time I need a hair-cut I want to be able to pick my own barber. Let us,' I says, 'proceed to show these zealous reformers that us two are the boys that put the syrup into surreptitious. Let us go hence with all the silent yet sincere alacrity of hot sorghum runnin' out of a leaky jimmy john.'

"Sweet Caps, he sees the wisdom of my remarks and he allows we can't be startin' too soon to suit him. But the main drawback to our mappin' out an extensive travelin' debauch is that we're down so close to the cloth. We've been fritterin' our substance away on frivolities when we should have been buryin' it in a perserve-jar back of the smokehouse. So we compromises on a short, quick trip to the city of Hot Springs, in the State of Arkansas, pronounced by the home-folks Arkansaw, the sas being silent as in juniper, and the saw bein' prominent as іп planin'-mill. We departs therefore in a speedy and unostentatious manner.

'WELL sir it certainly looks like misfortune is doggin' our steps, because we arrives just twenty-four hours behind another reform wave. For persons in our perfession there is positively absolutely nothin' doin'. The only doormat in town with a 'Welcome' sign on it is the one in front of the county jail.

"Sweet Caps undertakes to horn his way into one of the leadin' card clubs with a view to replenishin' our exchequer by a little judicial play at faro and kindred sports. They: throws him out twice and he goes back for the third time— and the door-keeper climbs astraddle of his neck and rides him all the way down the front steps, clear across the sidewalk, out into the street, and leaves his mussed and prostrate form on the car tracks. And then it seems to dawn on Sweet Caps that they really don't want him there. So he takes the gentle hint and comes away. In a quiet by-way openin' off one of the main thoroughfares we rigs up a simple little green baize table and produces the educated pasteboards, our intent bein' to teach the trustin' souls of them pastoral wilds the Three Card Montessori system for the education of our little ones. The understandin' is that I'm to do the rifflin' and Sweet Caps is to make change. But before I've had time to make more'n one pass, up comes a bull disguised as a plain-clothes native, reinforced by a whole passel of the infuriated peasantry, and they chases us four or five blocks.

AFTER that, conditions continue to get no better rapidly. Pretty soon we're down to a small stack of thin white chip. Jitney by jitney our little hoard vanishes from us. All summer I've been burnin' up those large dark-brown imported Havana back-logs at forty cents each. The best I can do for myself now is to blow a nickel about once in so often for a Peter Panatela, the cigar that never grew up. Domestic goods they are, too, and I'm no domestic. I belong to one of the learned callin's.

"We ain't eatin' with our accustomed regularity, neither. I don't scarcely remember a time when toothpicks plays such a small part in my daily life. We feels that we are indulgin' in a spell of unbridled extravagance any time we spend a dime apiece for a crock of Chilly Con Carney, which is a Mexican dish named for an Irishman. And the Chilly part is stuck on for a joke, because the stuff is so hot you can't notice the taste. I never knew before red pepper could be a blessin' in disguise.

"We used to go up against the Greaser uprisin' for dinner. At breakfast time and lunch time we'd bestow our patronage upon the free-lunch emporiums. That is to say, we did so at first. We'd drop into a saloon, all organized to accept anything that might be passed out, except the bar-check. But it wasn't long before the lookout got to know us, and no sooner had we breezed through the swingin' doors than he'd throw his protectin' form between us and the cracker jar-and start whistlin' for the bouncer. Whereupon we would withdraw in an abrupt but dignified manner and go for a long walk on an empty stomach, meanwhile broodin' upon them happy, happy days when we et only the white meat, with a little of the dressin', and throwed the second joint and drumstick away.

"We has ample time for all such bitter reflections. There we are, us two, both of us, me and him, marooned on a desert island in the midst of plenty—two poor little famishin' grasshoppers from the effete East entirely surrounded by thrifty but highly inhospitable ants. I hadn't heard about the fable up to this time, but as I look back on it now, I know old Mr. Sopp certainly calls the turn on us. Nearly everybody else in our line of trade has hurriedly shut up shop and gone away to give the moral spasm time to quit spassin', and them that hasn't gone is stayin' on for the same reason that we stays— they didn't have the price.

"Well, to make a long story just as long, things continues in this heart-breakin' way for several days— only they seems like weeks to us— and then we meets the General..... Don't get tired and go 'way before I tell you about the General, because he's really the star of the piece. How does he get to be a general? How should I know? Maybe his paw kept a general store or his grandmother suffered from general debility. Out in that far country some folks is born with a title and some inherits one. I guess, though, the General borrowed his when nobody was lookin'. He didn't fight for it— I'll swear to that. He wasn't old enough to have been in our late Civil War, and besides, no Civil War that thought anything of itself would 'a' let him be in it. With the General infestin' the vicinity it couldn't have stayed civil more'n a week at the very longest.

"ONE day me and the Sweet Caps Kid are settin' in our lonely lodgin's, for which we are now two weeks behind with the rent and no prospect of ketchin' up, neither. Not havin' any thing else to do, we are engaged in wonderin' how long a growed-up man with all his facilities intact can continue to go on livin' after he's become a strict non-eater and a total anti-imbiber, when there comes a knock on the 'door.

"We figures it's the, landlord again. He's been up to see us twice already durin' the day, makin' pointed inquiries touchin' upon a subject which we would greatly prefer not to have discussed in our hearin'. Still, if he wants to keep on payin' duty calls upon us, we can't object without hurtin' his feelin's.

" 'І s'pose it's our estimable host once more,' says Sweet Caps. 'He told me the last time he was up that when he came again, he hoped to see a little money. What an optimist that guy is! Seems almost a pity to disappoint him, don't it? S'pose we match to see which one of us goes to the door and tells him we aint neither one of us іп?'

" 'No,' I says, 'let us remember,' I says, 'we are guests to-day beneath his roof and to-night are liable to camp on his sidewalk. Come right in, Little One,' I says, raisin' my voice.

"With that the door opens. But it aint our hopeful friend, the proprietor, that stands beamin' upon the threshold. It's a large, influentially dressed person in a high hat. He has a wide, warm smile, one of those long, cream-separator mushtashes, a bad eye, a high hat, and a malt, spirituous and vinous breath. It's the General. Of course we don't know at the moment he's the General, but we know just by the way he looks he's something. I seem to ketch the hauntin' aromas of wines, ales, liquors and cigars the instant I lays eyes on him; also hot vittles.

"We bids him welcome and he comes in and introduces himself and says our names have been suggested to him by a mutual friend in the city. We didn't know until then we has any friends in the city, mutual or unmutual, but we begs him to proceed. Then he wants to know if we are open to a proposition to make a little piece of change.

" 'Well,' I says, 'murder is out of our line and we aint never done any grave-robbin' or kidnapin'. 'But,' I says, 'we're willin' to try. Let the Gold Brick Twins do your work, I says. 'Pray proceed,' I says; 'your openin' remarks interests us strangely.'

"So then he sets down amongst us and outlines his scheme, and if he'd been singin' it and accompanyin' himself on the zither, his words couldn't 'a' sounded more dulcit than what they sounds in the ears of me and the Sweet Caps Kid. Long before he gets through, each of us is holdin' him by the hand.

"Well, the net result is that he advances us certain sums of money with which to get the rest of our wardrobe out of retirement, and he stakes us to a regular human meal. And the descendin' shades of night finds us all three spraddled out in luxurious ease in the smokin' compartment of a sleepin' car goin' away from there at forty miles an hour. It's just like a dream. There we are with cigars in our faces and soothin' mixtures in our mitts and one of the brightest graduates that Booker T. Washington ever turned out of his seminary to wait upon our slightest needs. The General is puttin' up for the travelin' expenses and payin' all bills incurred on root; yet still I can't seem to care for him as I maybe should. I'm willin' to do business with him, but I aint prepared to love him.

"It's plain though that he don't feel that way with regards to himself, personally. Any time the General gets on the subject of the General he's prepared to speak for hours and hours without becomin' wearied. He's a very consistent absorber, too. I figure out he's part Scotch and the rest seltzer. If he aint got a highball at his elbow, he feels something is missin' from the landscape. But subsequently, as time passes on, I notices that when it comes to a struggle to see who's goin' to pay for the last round, he's very easy to control. The more I see of the General, the more prone I am to unlike him excessively. But as I said just now, he don't share none in them sentiments. He's passionately addicted to himself.

"Shortly before midnight, when me and Sweet Caps has a moment of privacy together in the wash-room prior to retirin', I find my little playmate entertains practically the same feelin's that I do.

" 'It strikes me with great forcibility,' says Sweet Caps, 'that this new-found benefactor of ours is considerable of a Camembert. Sizin' him, up casual, I would say off-hand that he's mostly deep yellow, with a fleck of green mold interspersed in him, here and there,' he says.

" 'Sh-h!' I says; 'naughty, naughty,' I says, just like that. 'Let's not be uncharitable, I says. 'Probably he was born that way. As the Latin puts it, Semper Edam, meanin', I says, 'once a cheese always a cheese.'

" 'I don't like them milk strainers he wears on his upper lip, neither,' continues Sweet Caps, in a petulental tone. 'Burnishers has gone out of style for wear upon the human face, he says. 'When we get'to know him a little better, let's club in and buy him a nice clean shave.'

" 'Sweet Caps,' I says, 'never look a gift horse in the mushtash. There are several things about the General that I don't deeply care for, he himself being chiefly one of them. But let us bear with him,' I says, 'until he ceases to bear. At the present he's our staff of life. Never, I says, 'never, never punch.a meal ticket until you have to.'

"And with that I leaves my shoes in the aisle, and puts my feet in the hammock and goes to bed on the bottom shelf of Mr. Pullman's perambulatin' pantry.

"THE next morning we arrives where we're goin' to. It's the capital city of one of the flattest and most enterprisin' commonwealths in this entire sisterhood, bein' located in the heart of that favored district which people in New York regards as the Far West and people in San Francisco regards as the Far East. I prefer not to name it by name. It is true that the General is now no more, and he never was very much ; he passed away last spring, as F read in the papers at the time; but the State itself is there yet, and the Statute of Limitations continues to hang on, and I'm afraid some of the folks out there is still a little mite fretfully inclined whenever they happens to think of me and the Sweet Caps Kid. So I will not burden you with too many details. Howsomever, any time you should chance to be out in that neighborhood you shouldn't have any trouble findin' the place. Just take the first turn to the right after you cross the Mississippi Valley, keepin' the Rocky Mountains and the Pacific Coast on your left, and after a while you'll come to it. It's got a Carnegie Library and a new fire station; some of the streets run one way and the others run the other way, and the Eagles met there once, and the Elks are expected to drop in almost any time. You'll be able to recognize it easy. Oh, yes— here's another hint to help you: The people livin' there always speak of it as the garden spot of the world. It may be a garden spot, but it needs cultivation.

"Ву a strange coincidence, we arrives on the very day that the State legislature convenes. We takes rooms at the leadin' hotel, occupyin' what the Kid, who's a mighty literal pronouncer, insists on calling а suet, meanin' by that a sweet. The General takes one parlor and fits it up regardless with bottled goods and corkscrews and other necessities of life, and in the adjoinin' parlor me and the Sweet Caps Kid rigs our cosy little deadfall; and then we sets back and waits for business to open up.

"We don't have long to wait, neither. You see, it's like this: The General is a lobbyist by profession. He's one of the hottest little lobbyists that ever come out of a loblolly. Naturally, though, he don't call himself by such an obnoxious title. He speaks of himself as a promotor of helpful, legislation. He's been retained by the principal railroad traversing that part of our common country to do its plain and fancy corruptin'. All the railroad desires at this time is for the legislature to give it about the half the State in the shape of franchises. And all the General has got to do is to see that the legislature comes through. He turns in an expense account every week that would make a Rivers and Harbors bill look puny, and from what I can gather he's drawin' a pretty fancy salary, besides which he's entitled to keep what he can make by chiselin' down a member from his regular price for bein' corrupted. Any time a corn-fed statesman who's set forth in the past-performancesbook at the figger of five hundred, can be induced to sell out for, say, three hundred and fifty, the General goes south with the difference. It's his legitimate commission on the deal. And at that he aint satisfied. He hankers to get the three-fifty back without losin' said statesman's vote. That's where me and the Sweet Caps Kid come in.

"That's why he took that trip all the way to Hot Springs to dig up a couple of specialists. Thats why we're now on the job in Parlor B of Sweet A.

"It's so easy it's right simple. The General sets his eye on a promisin' rube-member from the tall and uncut. He honeys up to him, wearin' the greasy smile of a fish-duck that's just located a fat minnow, and soon the hellish deed is done. In the dusk of the evenin' the General takes his young friend by the hand and leads him into his room and pays him the price of his shame. Maybe he gets him for two hundred, and maybe he has to pay him as much as two hundred and fifty— you'd be surprised to know how cheap you can buy shame in some sections of this favored land.

"Well, they closes the deal and then right away the member gets impatient to go. If he's an old timer at the game, he's worried for fear he sold out too cheap, and if this is his first offence, he's. low in his mind to think of what. his constituents will say if they ever find it out on him. That's the General's cue to slip a drink or two into him. Then the General goes to the door and opens it about an inch and a quarter and takes a quick peek outside. He slams the door then and comes back and tells the member there's a suspicious-lookin' party snoopin' round in the hall. He suggests they slip into the next room to wait until the coast is clear.

"So they slips into the next room and, lo and behold, me and the Sweet Caps Kid is settin' there playin' show-down for pennies. The General introduces us to the corrupted guy as a couple of friends of his, and then me and the Sweet Caps Kid invites 'em both to set down and play a little nickel-ante with us, jacks or better to open, ten-cent limit. The General says they've got a little time to kill and maybe they might as well draw a few hands.

"I guess I don't need to tell you the rest of it— you must know how the Big Mitt is worked. No? Well then, p'raps I had better explain, briefly. The deck goes round a few times and nothin' happens. Then it comes my deal, and the Sweet Caps Kid takes a flash at the cards I've slipped him, and he says sort of wistful-like that he certainly wishes we was playin' for something substantial, because he's got a hand that he'd like to adventure a little real money on. Them words sound like a message from Heaven to the General's young friend, and he seconds the motion. So just to humor him and Sweet Caps, me and the General agrees to remove the roof temporarily, and them two starts in bettin'. In order to show that he's perfectly calm and collected, the sucker knocks his stack of chips over and turns pale as a sheet and keeps swallowin' his Adam's apple and trembles all over. And the Sweet Caps Kid keeps on a-h'istin' him and a-h'istin' him.

"After a while the legislator's money is all up, and then Sweet Caps calls him; and he spreads out his little throbbin' king-full on palpitatin' queens. But Sweet Caps, he merely smiles a sad, pensive smile and reaches for the coin, at the same time layin' down four rattles and a button.

"What's four rattles and a button? Why, that's my pet name for a complete set of tens with an ace on the side for a confidence card. So the sucker, talkin' strange words to himself, departs in a kind of a stricken state, reflectin' upon the melancholy circumstance that he's sold his birthright for a mess of jackpottage, and then lost that too. When the sound of his draggin' footsteps has died away in the distance down the deserted hallway, me and Sweet Caps and the General splits the winnin's three ways, and then we all retires to our downy couches, filled with the comfortin' thought that to-morrow will be a new day.

"IT'S a payin' business, with sure profits and no risk, but at that I don't care deeply for it. I reckon I'm too honest— that's always been my principal drawback. But the General, he thrives on it. While we're cuttin' up the proceeds, he sets there combin' his droopers with his fingers and takin' on flesh so fast it's visible to the naked eye. Every night that passed I seems to care for him less and less, until after a while I could: be arrested for thinkin' the thoughts which I thinks about the General. I want.to kick him so bad it makes my foot hurt. But I restrains myself. As I says to the Sweet Caps Kid, 'Business before pleasure, I says.

"Well, things jog along very comfortable and cosy for a while; leastwise, they would be comfortable and cosy: if I could only quit dislikin" the General long enough to take some interest in my surroundin's. Sometimes a statesman that's been trimmed in our little game refuses to stay bought, but generally he does.

"And then one day, in comes the General and tells us he's garnered enough ordinary members to make a mess, but just to insure a dead cinch he needs the chairman of the House Committee on Railroads. It seems chairmen come higher than the run of ordinary perch, because the General says this particular fish can't see his way clear to compromisin' his priceless honor for less'n two thousand bones, cash down, paid in advance. So he feels that we mustn't take no chances on lettin' any part of that large and succulent mass of dough get away from us. The gent in question is plum' addicted to flirtin' with the playin' cards, so the General tells us, and you can't bet 'em too high to suit him when he's got his sportin' temperature up, but he's a toler'ble wise. bird, and there mustn't be any slip-up. He thinks the deal will go through on the comin' Friday night, after the legislature has adjourned for the week. This is a Tuesday when he unloads all this "valuable and timely information upon us.

"Immediate, I has an idea of my own. I says to him, 'General,' I says, 'it occurs to me that for this special and extraordinary occasion there maybe oughter be a new face round our happy fireside. The fact that me or Sweet Caps has won every time we had one of our little sessions is liable 'to have caused talk amongst the classic shades of that there state-house. It is possible,' I says, 'that sinister rumors, founded upon unjust suspicion, has already come to the ears of this wise young friend of yours. Don't you think,' I says, 'that we'd better have a fourth player present at our next little gatherin'— somebody who's a perfect stranger to Mister Chairman. And then, if the stranger holds the winnin' hand and all the rest of us goes through the form of droppin' our bank-rolls too, why there'll be no reason for the principal loser to beef or renige. Do you,' I says, 'get my drift? Or don't you?'

" 'I get you,' says the General, or words to that effect, 'but that means there'll be four instead of just us three to divide up the surplusage. I'm constitutionally opposed,' he says, 'to cuttin' a melon into so many pieces, where it can be avoided. Besides,' he says, *whereabouts are you goin' to find your added starter? Remember, he says, 'this is a close corporation and regular dwellers in this sweet community is barred.'

" 'Well,' I says, 'I don't know myself yet where we'll find him. But at least we can be lookin' round between now and Friday. I'm liable to run upon a promisin' non-resident almost any time,' I says. 'I've been suspectin' for some time,' I says, 'that there was sharpers loose in this fair metrolapus. I'll keep my eyes skinned,' I says.

"The General, he grumbles some more, but he's bound to see the force of my reasonin', and so finally he consents. The next day and the day after I goes snoopin' round, spyin' out the land, and late on the afternoon of the second day, which is Thursday, just after the train from Saint Louis gets in, I goes and looks up the General and am able to report progress. I tells him a welldressed party who looks like he might have ulterior motives on other people's bank-rolls has just blowed in on the 4 :03 from Germantown-by-the-Eads-Bridge and that if he's the person I think he is, we've located what we've been lookin' for. i

" 'Нow'll you find out if he is, or if he aint?' says the General.

" 'That,' I says, 'is one of the easiest things I do. Come with me,' I says.

"So I takes the General with me and we goes up to the suspect, who is leanin' against the cigar case in the lobby, pickin' himself out a suitable smoke.

" 'Howdy do, Izzy,' I says. 'How did you leave things at Joliet?'

" 'Excuse me,' he says in a hauteurful manner; 'I'm afraid you have the wrong party. My name is Montague— P. Alex. Montague.'

" 'Probably so,' I says, 'probably so, for this day and date. But what's a name more or less between brothers in the same lodge? And besides,' I says, 'I've seen your picture in the paper too often to be mistook. Come with us, I says; 'for,' I says, 'we wouldst have speech with you in private. I'd hate it something awful,' I says, 'if some gossipin' busybody was to overhear us and go runnin' round tellin' people that Mr. P. Alex. Montague is no other than First Aid Izzy Wexenbaum, the well-known and popular card-wizard.'

"Не looks worried at that. 'Is this a pinch?' he says. 'Because if it is,' he says, 'I'll have to tell you now that nobody's got anything on me.'

" 'Our sole desire,' I says, reassurin'-like, 'is to introduce you to some easy money. General,' I says, 'allow me to make you acquainted with Mr. P. Alex. Montague Et Cetera Wexenbaum.'

"So with that we all repairs to our snug retreat, where Sweet Caps is waitin' for us. The moment Sweet Caps lays eyes on the gentle stranger he says to him, 'Friend, aint I seen you somewheres before?' 'Well,' says First Aid, 'I wouldn't be surprised, because as far back as I can remember I've nearly always been somewheres or somewheres else.' After that it don't take no time at all to come to an understandin'.

"Now, if you don't mind, we'll just skip along to Friday night. Everything works like it's been greased. The chairman of the Railroads Committee receives his bonus of two thousand and tucks it away in his wallet. He starts to go, but the General suspects there's somebody snoopin' round in the hall outside— so they ooze into Parlor B for a few minutes. Much to their surprise, they finds me and Sweet Caps and the gentleman known as P. Alex, settin' there together, fussin' with the pasteboards in a bored and nonchalant way. From this point you know the route. It is sufficiency to say. that on the fourth deal the limit is removed by general consent and everybody starts bettin' his head off. Pretty soon the pace gets too warm for me and I throws my pat flush into the discard. Then the Sweet Caps Kid decides his little seven-full on trays is also outclassed and he retires graceful. But the General and the Chairman and First Aid keep right on slingin' their frogskins into the center until when the show-down finally comes off, the General, to all appearances, is out two thousand om four nines and the Chairman hàs gambled his two thousand away on four lovely kings, and First Aid is in the rocker with a little straight flush of hearts.

"So First Aid gathers up the dough and shoves it into various pockets. He then arises and says it's gettin on towards his bedtime and he thanks everybody for a pleasant évening and says good-night and bows himself out, all of which is part of the play as agreed upon. The Chairman likewise departs, but without thankin' anybody, and if it's been a  pleasant evening for him he forgets to mention that, too. That leaves me and the General and Sweet Caps, and we sets awhile waitin' for First Aid to come slippin' back and return to us our ostensible losses and cut up the Chairman's two thousand with the rest of us. But he don't come, and Sweet Caps goes out to see what's detainin' him.

"In a minute Sweet Caps comes tearin' back in to say our new little playmate is missin. He aint in his room, and the night clerk reports that a person answerin' to the general plans and specifications of P. Alex. just now paid his bill and departed in a hired hack.

"At this I jumps up with an agonized cry, rememberin' that there perfidious Izzy has just about got time to get the 11:15 if he hurries. Simultaneous, the same horrible thought comes to the General, and he jumps up too. But I reminds him, while we were grabbin' for our coats and hats, that it wont never do for him to be seen engaged in a personal altercation with a common crook. 'You stay here, General, I yells to him as me and the Sweet Caps Kid makes for the door, 'and we'll go ketch up with him. Stay right here,' I says, 'until you get word from us.'

"When it comes to lettin' somebody else do the rough work and take all the risks, the General is certainly old Colonel Buck Passer's favorite nephew. He falls back into his chair, beggin' us to lose no time, and as we tears down the hall we hears him utterin' moanin' sounds.

"Take it from me, we loses no time. We jumps into a taxicab that happens to be waitin' outside the front door and tears for the station. We arrives there just as the little 11:15 choo-choo is on the point of departin' for Chicago and all points east. We runs through the gate and piles aboard her and goes rampagin' into the sleeper and shoves open the door of the stateroom. And sure enough, Mr. First Aid Izzy is hidden away there. He's settin' with his back to the door, and he's engaged in pullin' money out of all his pockets and pilin' it up. on the seat in front of him preparatory to sortin' and countin'.

"He looks up, but before he's had time to say a word we've got the stateroom door fastened on the inside. Just as we falls upon him with joyful cries, the train pulls out, bearin' me and him and the Sweet Caps Kid far, far away into the stilly night. So when the first excitement has died down, I takes charge of the dough and divides it up proper. And as for Izzy, he appears to be perfectly satisfied with what he gets."

I BROKE in here.

"Surely," I asked, "you didn't give him anything after he'd tried to run away with the entire pot?"

"Why shouldn't we give him any of it?" countered Mr. Dolan. "Look at all the trouble he had been put to— leavin' his regular engagements and jumpin' all the way out from Saint Louie on the strength of the telegram he got from me Wednesday morning. And anyway, ain't he the Sweet Cap Kid's own half-brother? No sir, he gets all that's comin' to him— he's done earned it.

"But I knowed the dear old General would be settin' up waitin' for the word I'd agreed to send him, and I always believe in keepin' my promises. So from the next station I sends him a wire readin' as follows:

Dear General—

You was dead right. It's better to cut a melon three ways than four. Which we have just done so.

(Signed)

Scandalous,

Sweet Caps,

Brother Izzy.

"But," concluded Mr. Doolan, "I don't sent it C. O. D.— I sends it prepaid, right out of my own pocket. I judged the General might not have the cash with him to pay for it if it comes 'Collect.' "

________________

17: Don't Dream on Midsummer's Eve

Ethel Lina White

1879-1944

The Hardin Tribune-Herald, Montana, 30 July and 6 August 1937

Roy Glashan's Library (epub): 2023

"WHAT would happen to Puck if I had been killed?" This was the first thought which flashed across Merle's brain after her crash. It was the agonized question of the bread- winner, for her small nephew— Puck— was entirely dependent on herself.

The accident was not the fault of the motorist, since she had crossed the road against the lights. She had been mooning back to work, down the scented gloom of the lime avenue. It was June 23rd, Midsummer eve, and some one had told her that a dream dreamed on that special night, always came true...

Even as she smiled at the fancy, she was conscious of a shattering shock, followed by a black-out; and then she opened her eyes, to find herself lying on the pavement, while an elderly man with a kindly face, bent anxiously over her.

"Oh, I'm sorry," she cried. "Have I hurt the car?"

"The question is— has the car hurt you?" he asked.

To his relief, although bruised and shaken, she was miraculously intact. She rose unsteadily to her feet, and was beginning to fumble for her powder-puff, when he spoke to her.

"You had better let me drive you home."

As she was on her way to work, it seemed wiser to give the address of the doctor for whom she acted as secretary-dispenser. To her dismay, there was an appreciable pause before she could remember it. In the end, however, her brain began to function again, and not long afterwards, the car stopped before the right door.

Dr. Perry lived in a large old-fashioned house, at the end of the ancient city, which was dominated by gray cathedral towers. Nearly every street was lined with limes, or chestnuts, which formed cool tunnels during the summer heat. A slow green river flowed slowly through the town, which had been half asleep for the last hundred years.

Merle loved every stone of it, but this evening, it seemed doubly precious, because she had so nearly lost it. When the motorist had driven away, she entered the house, by the private way of the dispensary, and threw herself down into a deep leather chair.

The sun had been beating down on the glass roof all afternoon, so that the place was warm as a conservatory. It was very quiet, for Mrs. Stock— the housekeeper— was in the kitchen and the doctor was out, at a case in the country. He was only beginning to build up a practice, and there were no appointments for the evening.

As she sat in the twilight, smelling the familiar druggy odor, blended with the scent of the jessamine screen over the windows, Merle grew cold to realize the risk to which she had exposed Puck by her criminal carelessness. Although the gentleman had an imposing string of names, his nickname was apt, since he was rather like a mischievous elf.

He was the kind of child to whose appeal women are vulnerable—delicate, affectionate, clever, and a champion trouble-maker. Merle was especially sentimental and apprehensive over him, because he was her sole salvage from an unhappy past.

She had endured a little hell of proxy suffering during her twin-sister, Marvis' disastrous marriage to Lewis Gore. Unfortunately, her brother-in-law's conduct offered no loop-hole for legal redress. His mean bullying nature was not manifested in acts of violence, just as— although he soaked continually— no one had ever seen him drunk... But he contrived to drain his young wife of her joy and vitality, so that, at the first illness, she flickered out of life, leaving her baby boy in Merle's care.

At first, Merle was too stunned with grief, and too worried about the future, to appreciate her legacy. It took nearly all that remained or her small capital, to finance Lewis and clear him out of the country. Since he had gone, however, she could hardly believe in her present happiness and peace.

She often herself that she had everything—Puck, her work, her home, and loyal service, for Puck's nurse looked after the bungalow. Lately, too, a new element had come into her life, for she was conscious of the doctor's growing interest in herself. He was a kindly practical man, and she was growing very fond of him.

As usual, she considered Puck's interests first, and she came to the conclusion that, besides the benefit of a resident physician, the young domestic tyrant needed masculine authority.

She had drifted off into a light sleep— for the warm gloom acted as a soporific— through which she could hear faintly the cooing of the pigeons and the ticking of the grandfather's clock. Presently she opened her eyes and forced herself to rise. The movement made her feel so queer and dizzy, that she knew that further work was out of the question.

"I'll mix myself a draught, to quiet my nerves," she decided. "And then I'll rest a bit, before I go home."

To her dismay, she found that she lurched against the furniture when she crossed over to the shelves. Her head was spinning like a weather-cock in a high wind, while the floor heaved like the deck of a steamer, during a channel crossing. Half-blinded by a mist which drifted before her eyes, she managed to measure and mix a sedative.

As she raised it to her lips, she felt suddenly too sick to drink it. Laying it down again, she groped her way from the dispensary into the cool cavern of the big dining room, where she flopped down in an easy chair.

Closing her eyes, she listened to the distant sounds of Mrs. Stock moving about in the kitchen, until she was aroused by the creaking of the door.

JUMPING up in a panic, she stared, in incredulous horror, at her brother-in-law, Lewis Gore.

He was tall and enormously stout, with a head too small for his bulk. His light cold eyes— set in deep pouches— glittered like white glass, as he nodded in casual greeting.

"Hullo, Merle."

She forced herself to speak.

"When did you come back, Lewis?"

"I landed yesterday. I've come back to collect my boy. I am taking him back to Borneo."

"Borneo?" she echoed, scarcely able to believe her ears. "But Lewis, he is so wee and delicate. He could never stand the heat."

"He'll get used to it. The kids there don't play. They just sit around and sweat. Very healthy, on the whole."

"No, Lewis, I can't let him go. You don't understand. I've had all the trouble in the world just to rear him... If you want money—"

"Money?" He laughed thickly. "My dear girl, I've not come back to hold out my hat. I've married a rich widow, with a rubber plantation, out there. You can send your bill for his keep. It can't be much for bread and gravy."

The mean speech, which flattened out two years of sacrifice into a thin spread of pap, was typical of his mentality, but Merle barely heard it. Her head was throbbing like a dynamo as she thought of Puck. He had to be tempted to eat, even in an English imitation heat wave, while he grew languid and limp as a wax candle.

It was torture to picture him— bewildered, unhappy, ill-torn from his devoted slaves and handed over to callous strangers. She knew he could never survive the change from his own little kingdom to a damp tropical exile.

"You can't do it," she cried with sudden fierceness, which was foreign to her nature. "I won't let you. It would be murder. Murder."

As her voice rose, the door slipped open a few inches, and the long horse-face of the housekeeper appeared in the aperture. "Was any one hollering 'murder'?" she asked.

Merle was too agitated to do more than shake her head, but her brother-in-law growled an order of dismissal.

"Clear out."

After another long suspicious gaze at the girl's quivering face, Mrs. Stock went away, banging the door to register protest.

As though the noise caused her jammed brain to vibrate, a wild plan suddenly flashed through Merle's head. When her brother-in-law dropped into the empty chair, and spoke in the amicable tone which paved the way for a customary request, she agreed with him in token of defeat.

"That's settled then," remarked Lewis. "Ill collect him some time this evening."

"I'll have him ready," she told him.

"Well, then, what about a quick one?"

"A drink? I'm sure the doctor would offer you one. I'll get it at once."

AS she walked slowly toward the door her decision was made. She intended to take Puck away immediately and hide him in some quiet place until Lewis had gone abroad again.

Only, since every minute's start was of importance to her getaway, it was necessary first to take steps to prevent his father from coming to the bungalow that evening. He must be doped, so that he would sleep for a few hours in the safe haven of the doctor's dining room. It was evident that no meal was going to be laid there that night, for the doctor would return too late for dinner.

Lewis' back was turned toward her as she crept to the sideboard and snatched up the whisky decanter, so he did not see her go into the dispensary.

Her head bumped furiously when she crossed over to the slab where she had left the sedative which she had mixed for herself. The specks of light which kept flashing across her eyes, blinded her vision; but as the powder was already dissolved in the glass, she only had to fill it up with whisky.

"Lucky I had it already," she thought, as she carried it back to the dining room.

Her brother-in-law remained seated and appeared to be already at home, as though in anticipation of his enforced visit.

"It's neat," she told him tremulously.

"That's right." He nodded approvingly. "Never tasted good water."

She gave him the tumbler, and saw him drain it as she reached the door. He sank back and the chair hid him from view; but she heard a satisfied grunt and a creaking of springs, as though he were settling himself more comfortably.

"I must wait a few minutes, just to see if it is going to take effect," she told herself.

Her heart was hammering with impatience, for she was in a fever to get back to Puck. In spite of recurrent fits of giddiness she paced the room, unable to keep still. As she paused by the dispensing-slab, she took up the bottle she had left standing there.

Suddenly her vision cleared, so that she read the label clearly. Unable to credit what she saw, she stood, staring at it in frozen horror.

Instead of a sedative, she had just given her brother-in-law a fatal dose of virulent poison.

She clutched her throat, to strangle her screams, as she realized her position. She felt sure she would be under suspicion of committing a crime, since the principal factors— motive and opportunity— could be proved. Everyone knew about her devotion to her small nephew and also her hatred of his father.

Further, there would be the evidence of the housekeeper, who disliked her intensely, and who had overheard a dispute, which included the incriminating word, "Murder." Who would believe her story that she had killed him with poison which she had mixed, in error, for herself?

"I must do something," she said desperately.

Then she shook her head hopelessly. Calling for help would be useless. The doctor was away, and the hostile housekeeper would only complicate her trouble. Besides, she knew that it was too late to try to administer antidotes.

Her brother-in-law must have died almost immediately— and in agony. As she remembered the creaking springs of the chair, which heralded the first spasm, she crashed completely and dropped down into darkness...

IT seemed to her that she had been falling for years, yet still went on sinking. Deeper and deeper, while the blackness thickened around her... All at once, she became conscious of faint sounds in the void, which reminded her of homely things— the cooing of pigeons and the ticking of a clock. She smelt a familiar odor compounded of jessamine and drugs, as she opened her eyes.

She was sitting in the same chair in the dispensary, as when she had felt herself growing drowsy. Her hat and bag lay beside her, just where she had thrown them after she had first entered. In front of her was a calendar, which displayed the date.

It was Midsummer eve. And she had been asleep.

The compensation of an evil dream is the relief of waking up. Although she was still feeling the effects of her crash, Merle laughed joyously.

"Lewis went to Australia," she said. "And he couldn't fascinate anyone—let alone rich widows. Except my poor Marvis, and she was spellbound. But I know where the Borneo part came from. I was staring at that."

A journal, dealing with tropical disease, lay on the table, displaying the word "Borneo," in heavy type, above an article.

In spite of her happiness, some of the horror of her dream remained. She felt apprehensive and feverishly anxious to see Puck and know that all was well with him. Ramming on her hat, she hurried from the dispensary. She ran most of the way home, so that when she reached the bungalow, she was in a state of utter exhaustion.

Mrs. Megan Thomas broke off her song— for like most Welsh people, she was a tireless vocalist— when she opened the door.

"Oh, my Heavenly Father," she gasped. "What's happened to you?"

"I was knocked down by a car," gasped Merle. "How's Puck?"

"Lively as a flee."

"Thank heaven... Anyone called about him?"

"Of course not... Now you drink this, and off to bed with you, my lady."

As she was unaccustomed to stimulants, Merle was practically drunk when Mrs. Thomas undressed her and tucked her up. She lay through the night in a heavy dreamless sleep, and awoke carefree and refreshed.

AS she lay and listened to the cheerful sounds of an awakening world, she watched the curtains blowing into her room, and the green flicker of a beech-tree shaking against a windy blue sky. It was a day when it was good to be alive. She heard the milk-cart on the road and the welcome rattle of china from the kitchen, while she waited for the reassurance of a child's voice, to tell her that the angels had not called for Puck during the night.

It came almost Instantly— the protesting squeal of a young autocrat disturbed in mischief. The next minute, the door was burst open and Puck rushed into the room and hurled himself on her bed.

To an unenlightened eye, he might appear an ordinary small boy in a thin vest and panties; but when he hooked his arms around her neck, Merle knew that she held the world's wonder.

He was followed by Mrs. Thomas, with the tea tray.

"What did you have for breakfast?" Merle asked him, knowing his passion for important words.

"Partridges," he replied promptly.

"Porridge," explained Mrs. Thomas. "You don't eat partridges in summer, Puck."

"But it's winter, today," he assured them, glancing out of the corners of his almond-shaped blue eyes. "I made it 'fair and frosty'."

"He's been playing with the barometer again," groaned Merle, feeling that she need not have worried about angel visitations. "Have you broken it again, Puck?"

"Not much," he replied virtuously. "Not nearly so much as I did last time."

Mrs. Thomas and Merle smiled at each other when their young lord and master had scampered from the room to find the puppy whom he really adored.

"Fancy sending him out to Borneo," said Merle. "I had a ghastly dream about his father yesterday."

Mrs. Thomas listened to Merle's dream with a creditable show of interest; but at its end, she sniffed with disgust.

"Pity you only dreamed it... Why, what's the matter now?"

To her consternation Merle had grown suddenly pale, while her eyes were dark with horror.

"Oh, Megan," she cried. "I've just thought of something terrible. Suppose it wasn't a dream? Suppose I really did poison him?"

"Oh, don't be daft," snapped Mrs. Thomas. "Did you give him rat poison?"

"Of course not."

"Then he's still crawling round in your dream. Only vermin-killer would make his sort curl up properly."

But Merle refused to be comforted. Her hands shook so violently that Mrs. Thomas had to take her cup from her, as she went on speaking.

"You see, when I woke up in the dispensary, I was so confused that I took it for granted I'd been asleep. I never looked around... But I remember now, that I must have fainted when I found out what I'd done. Suppose I was just coming to, after a faint, instead of waking up?"

Mrs. Thomas tried to scold, or laugh her out of her morbid fancy, without success; in the end, she decided to humor her.

"If you bumped off Puck's pa," she reasoned, "you must have left the corpse lying about. We know that housekeeper is a slummock, but even she wouldn't overlook a nasty trifle like that... I'm going to ring her up and ask her if she found anything out of its place."

Merle held her breath with suspense, while she listened to Mrs. Thomas' voice in the hall, where the telephone was installed. Her heart pounded when the woman returned to the bedroom.

"The housekeeper says you left your bag behind you."

"Oh, the blessed relief," cried Merle, laughing to keep back her tears. "What a fool I've been."

SHE left the bungalow in a gay mood that matched the sunshine. As she walked down the avenues, every garden was fragrant with roses. The river sparkled in the light as she leaned over the parapet of the old bridge, and looked down at the slow current.

She was swinging away with it, when a voice brought her back to earth.

"Morning, Merle. Day-dreaming?"

She looked up into the ruddy cheerful face of Captain Cliff. He was the club gossip, and, as usual, he had plenty of amusing tales for her entertainment. Presently, however, his expression grew graver and he lowered his voice.

"By the way," he said. "I heard that precious scoundrel— your brother-in-law, Gore— was back in town. I hope, for your sake, it's not true."

As Merle listened, she felt in the grip of a nightmare.

"No," she protested vehemently. "It's not true."

"Good. Some chap fancied he recognized him. I'm glad. It's not secret that you hate him like rat-poison, is it?"

The Captain strolled away, chuckling, while Merle gazed at his receding back, as though she beheld the Angel of Doom.

"It's no secret that you hate him," The words echoed in her brain as she began to run toward the doctor's house. It was like the Voice of the Town, condemning her with corroborative evidence. Only— she had not murdered him. It was a dream, from which she was not yet fully awakened.

When she reached the familiar door, it took an effort to ring the bell. While she waited for the housekeeper to come, she reminded herself of the reassuring telephone call. All the same, she moistened her lips nervously when at last, the door was opened.

No policeman stood in the entrance— only the slatternly figure of Mrs. Stock.

"The doctor's gone away for the morning," she said in a surly voice. "He says put off all appointments till the afternoon. And he wasn't back until nearly midnight. But I suppose he knows his business best."

"He certainly does, Mrs. Stock."

Merle's voice was firm, to hide the fact that she was vaguely worried by the unexpected absence. As she crossed the hall, instead of entering the dispensary, she nerved herself to open the door of the dining-room.

Her first glance showed her that the big chair was empty. No huge, distorted body lay stiffened there in its death agony. There was nothing worse than dead flowers in the vases and the usual signs of the housekeeper's neglect.

She started at the sound of Mrs. Stock's voice.

"Your bag's in the dispensary, if that's what you are looking for."

Convicted of trespass, Merle returned to her own domain of the dispensary, where indignation drove out every other emotion. It was only too obvious that Mrs. Stock had taken advantage of the doctor's absence to slack shamefully.

"She's not so much as shown it a duster," thought Merle furiously. "Her number's up, as far as I'm concerned. And she knows it. That is why she looks so venomous."

Although a note in the doctor's handwriting was lying on a table, she did not open it at once. After telephoning to the few patients who had appointments, she decided that she must restore some order before she could work. The wastepaper basket was stuffed to overflowing and had evidently been used as a communal dump for the rubbish from the living rooms.

As she picked it up, with the intention of carrying it out to the kitchen, she noticed some fragments of glass lying amid the dead flowers from the dining room.

Her heart dropped a beat, as she scooped them up to examine them. They were parts of a broken tumbler, to which a smear of sediment still adhered.

Her dream was true. She had actually given poison to her brother-in-law.

Feeling as though she had been sandbagged, she looked around her dully. By now, Lewis Gore's death was known, for someone had discovered the body and removed it. The most likely person was the doctor, who would do his utmost to protect her. It was even possible that his absence was connected with her interests.

The thought of his championship was her one ray of light. There was a wan smile on her lips as she opened his note, but it stiffened to a grimace of horror as she read it.

"I've just seen your brother-in-law. He spun me a lie about taking Puck out to Borneo, but I soon got wise to it. He wanted to be bought off again, and it was merely a threat to raise his price... Now, you'll be furious with me, but I knew he would only go on bleeding you, so I wrote him a final check, (I'll tell you how you can repay me, when I come back.) In return, I have his stamped agreement, appointing you Puck's guardian and renouncing all claim. I am taking it up to Somerset House, to get it stamped."

The letter made the tragedy doubly grim, by reason of its irony. It was torment for Merle to reflect that Lewis had already signed away his claim to the boy when he called yesterday. He was telling lies to try and get something extra out of her.

For some time, she sat, stunned by the blow. The telephone bell rang, but she did not stir from her chair. Presently she roused herself to speculate on her future.

She could not see any ray of hope for herself. Her fate would be hanging, or imprisonment for life. What jury would believe her story of a mistake, in view of the fact that the bottle was plainly labeled, and that she was accustomed to dispense drugs?

But her own fate was nothing compared with Puck's future. By the deed, now in process of being stamped at Somerset House, she was appointed his legal guardian. And she had failed him utterly. It appalled her to imagine what would become of him— penniless and left to strangers.

Even if the doctor took charge of him, for her sake— and she only assumed his affection for herself— it was natural that he would marry some other woman, later on.

In that dark hour Merle had to admit that she and Mrs. Thomas had spoiled Puck, even although, in their opinion, he redeemed their fondness by a hundred ways, just by being himself— the most adorable small boy in the universe.

But this practical hypothetical woman— the doctor's future wife would probably resent him as a usurper and pack him off to boarding school. On the other hand, if no one accepted his responsibility he would be sent to some institution, which would be worse.

And she could do nothing to help him— for she was going to be hanged.

THE idea was so fantastic and monstrous that her mind slipped away on another journey. Although her brain was too blurred for clear thought, it was apparent even to her, that, since the doctor knew nothing of the tragedy, there remained only Mrs. Stock to make the discovery. Remembering her dilatory habits, it was likely that she found the distorted body in the chair only a little time before Merle had appeared on the scene.

In her employer's absence she would notify the police, who had evidently removed the body to the mortuary. There could be no other explanation of the empty chair. Yet, as Merle thought of the housekeeper's grim silence, when she opened the door, and her denial of any unusual incident, over the telephone, she had the helpless feeling of being ambushed.

If she were already connected with the tragedy why had no official appeared to take her evidence? And why were the fragments of glass placed in the wastepaper basket? She always understood that— in a case of sudden death— nothing on the scene was allowed to be removed.

For a moment she wondered whether Mrs. Stock had smashed the tumbler herself, only to reject the idea immediately. Lewis must have swept it off the table in his death agony. But the mere fact that the pieces had been piled on top of the dispensary rubbish basket, where she could not fail to see them, seemed to indicate an attempt to trap her.

She knew that if she yielded to her impulse, she was bound to incriminate herself. For Puck's sake, she wanted desperately to hide the bite... Yet the first thing the police would look for would be the medium by which the poison was administered and they must have seen the broken glass already.

Perhaps they were in a conspiracy with Mrs. Stock to watch her own reaction. Although the dispensary was empty, she felt the unseen presence of a company of spies. Eyes were everywhere— looking at her through holes in the ceiling and chinks in the wall.

As time passed and nothing happened, she felt that she was being subjected deliberately to the torture of suspense—waiting for the inevitable knock on the door and the footstep in the hall. They wanted to break down her resistance, in advance. Yet she could do nothing else but wait...

Wait. Listening to the ticking of the clock— to the buzz of a fly on the window pane— to the throbbing of her own heart ...

"It must be a dream," she told herself.

If she hung on to this certainty, she might wake up and find herself in the warm gloom of the twilight dispensary, where she doped last night.

Only— this was reality. She was wide awake and the sun was shining on the trees outside. This was today— and she was powerless to recall the past.

SUDDENLY her heart gave a mighty leap. Her fingers gripped the arm of her chair, as she heard footsteps outside the room. The door was opened, but she did not turn round. She had reached the limit of sensation, when nothing mattered any more.

"Merle."

It was the doctor's voice, tense with anxiety. "Are you all right?" he asked. "Mrs. Thomas has just been telling me about your accident."

"Perfectly," she told him.

"Did you get my note?"

"Yes."

"Isn't it fine news about Puck? Aren't you thrilled?"

"Yes. It's marvelous."

The doctor was in a state of jubilant excitement, when he accepted Merle's lack of enthusiasm as the result of her smash. He went on talking eagerly and rapidly, while she watched his face, without grasping the meaning of his words.

"Lewis confessed he tried to touch you first. But he said you gave him a drink and then walked out on him. So then he came to me."

"When did you last see him?" asked Merle.

"Oh, lateish. I had to get the lawyer to draw up the document, after hours. Oh, by the way, I ran Lewis up to London, with me, this morning, to clear him out of your way. I... What's the matter?"

In her relief, Merle broke down completely.

"Then he's alive. I didn't poison him," she cried.

As she sobbed out her story, the doctor's face, too, worked with emotion.

"You might have drunk that poison yourself. That's the part I can't get over," he said. "It was just touch and go that you are alive today."

Suddenly a chance sentence galvanized her to life.

"But he drank it— and he's alive too," said Merle. "I can't understand it all. I always thought you told me that potassium cyanide is a deadly poison."

"So it is. For heaven's sake don't try to find out for yourself... But the poisonous effect of the cyanide is due to a great extent to the fact that it reacts with the acid normally secreted in the process of digestion by the stomach to form a highly poisonous partial compound which is instantly absorbed... Now your brother-in-law suffers from chronic alcoholic gastritis— a form of dyspepsia in which the stomach fails to secrete acid. So like Rasputin— whom they tried to kill, in vain, by the same poison— he was immune."

END

Table of Contents

- 1: The Partner / Joseph Conrad
- 2: Mr. Lobel's Apoplexy / Irvin S. Cobb
- 3: The Real Thing / Arthur Savage

- 4: The Thing in the Upper Room / Arthur Morrison

- 5: Hermann the Irascible / "Saki"
- 6: The Miracle of Zobéide / Pierre Mille
- 7: Catalyst Poison / Malcolm Jameson

- 8: Brought Down in Flames / F. Britten Austin

- 9: The Royal Visit / Ethel Lina White

- 10: Pugh's Poisoned Ring / Richard Marsh

- 11: The Prince Has The Mumps / Richard Connell

- 12: A Twin Identity / Edith Stewart Drewry
- 13: Go East, Young Man / Sinclair Lewis
- 14: The Ghost of Grave Gully / Anonymous

- 15: Dick Thornton's Mistake / Rolf Boldrewood

- Unnamed

- 17: Don't Dream on Midsummer's Eve / Ethel Lina White