CHAPTER IX.THINGS NOT DREAMED OF IN EVERYDAY PHILOSOPHY.
“Communication between the spirit world and the corporeal world is in the nature of things, and has in it nothing supernatural.”The body, after all, is only a portable, two-legged telephone through which the soul, or part of it, communicates with other souls which for purposes of education and evolution are temporarily imprisoned in these cumbrous and ingenious, but very inconvenient physical machines.—William T. Stead.
“Communication between the spirit world and the corporeal world is in the nature of things, and has in it nothing supernatural.”
The body, after all, is only a portable, two-legged telephone through which the soul, or part of it, communicates with other souls which for purposes of education and evolution are temporarily imprisoned in these cumbrous and ingenious, but very inconvenient physical machines.—William T. Stead.
Chrissalyn had the usual difficulty of the untrained in finding employment. The search was long and disheartening and might never have had a happy ending but for a curious accident, which was no doubt down in the books of destiny.
She was going up a public stairway one day, when a man descending at a break-neck gait ran against her, throwing her down. Distressed at what he feared might have a serious ending, he picked her up, bewailing his awkwardness, and offering to do anything in his power to atone for it.
She opened her eyes to consciousness just as he was saying, “What can I do for her? What can I do for her?”
“Get me a chance to earn my bread,” she gasped, with almost her first breath.
“I’ll do it at once,” he said. “I’ll take you right up the stairs into my office and install you, out of gratitude that I didn’t kill you.” So it could be said in all truth that she “fell into a good situation,” for that it proved to be. Her ignorance of the duties she was to perform was patiently borne with until it was overcome. Never was butterfly more painstaking and industrious than she, and work proved a blessing to her, as it does to everybody whose heart is in it. Occupation gave her a stronger hold on life, for self-dependence is a wonderful invigorator. It gave her added dignity, too, leaving just enough of the butterfly instinct to give her exceeding grace.
Seldom did she speak of her husband, save to Cartice, from whom she concealed nothing, for Mrs. Doring was always tolerant, helpful, receptive, kind and sympathetic, never critical and condemnatory. Others beside the Butterfly understood this, and went to her with what they needed to tell. The mind that is receptive, never meeting any honest communication with hedgehog defiance or fool’s sneer, becomes a magnet which draws knowledge from the very fountain of light and life. Into it flow the secrets of the universe as well as of individuals.
Speaking of her husband one day to Cartice, the Butterfly said, “I never shed any tears becausehe died. It was the only road out of misery for him and for me; but I did weep for the happiness we never had together, yet might have had.”
One Sunday she came, but was silent and reflective, unlike her usual self, for a time. At last she said: “Cartice, dear, I want to tell you something that will certainly seem queer to you. I dare not speak of it to any one else, lest I be locked up as a lunatic. But you are always so kind and so sensible, you may be able to understand it. I don’t. When I think of it I feel afraid that I am a little off my base.”
“You can tell me anything, Chriss, you know that.”
The Butterfly looked nervous and paled a little, but began:
“To-day I have been to the funeral of Jess Hanley, a schoolmate of mine. We were always the best of friends, though for some years we have seen comparatively little of each other, because she has been tied down at home so closely on account of sickness. Her husband died of consumption two years ago. A year later their little boy went. Then Jess became ill, and for months she has been expecting to go any day almost. Last week she sent for me and I went. She told me she knew her time was nearly up. She was quite cheerful over it, as she believed she would be with her husband and child againafter she had ‘passed over,’ as she called it. She was a spiritualist, and thought that dying isn’t dying at all. One thing she made me promise—a mere sick fancy I suppose—and that was that I should not fail to go to her funeral.
“Well, I went of course. It was like most other respectable funerals. People looked solemn, there were flowers, and a preacher made the usual harrowing remarks, which set everybody weeping—everybody but me. I didn’t shed a tear, yet I loved Jess as well as any one there except her mother, I am sure.
“I didn’t cry because I was so dazed I couldn’t. That was the queer part of it. I was dazed, because all the time the minister was speaking I saw Jess, her husband and little boy running around the coffin, laughing, kissing each other and throwing flowers in all directions. They took the flowers from the mass on top of the coffin, yet there were never any fewer there, though they threw them around by handfuls.
“Once when the preacher said, ‘We shall see our sister no more until that great and dreadful day of the Lord, when all shall stand at the bar of judgment,’ Jess looked at me, laughed in a knowing way and threw a rose into my lap; but when I tried to pick it up it wasn’t there. Now what do you think of all that?AmI crazy, or what was it?”
“What do you think it was, Chrissalyn?”
“I don’t know, and don’t dare to think too much about it lest I get upset over it.”
“Did others see them, do you think?”
“No; I am sure they did not, and that frightens me. If they were really there why didn’t the others see them? If they were not there why should I see them, unless something has gone wrong in my head? I am sure the others saw nothing, for I thought of that and watched them closely and could detect no astonishment in their faces.”
“How did the dead people whom you saw look, Chrissalyn?”
“Just like living people, clothes and all. Only I knew they were not living and had no business to be there, and couldn’t be there, and yet they were there.”
“Have you ever seen anything of the kind before?”
“Yes, several times; but I always drove the recollection of it out of my mind as soon as possible, because it seemed uncanny and creepy—and I ended by persuading myself that I had imagined it all.”
“Did your friend Jess know you had seen such things?”
“Come to think of it, she did. Once a good while ago she told me about some queer things of that kind she had seen. That’s the reason she was a spiritualist. Then I told her what I hadseen.” (Here the Butterfly’s face lighted up). “Now that may be the reason she made me promise to be sure and go to her funeral. Perhaps she intended to make herself visible to me if she could. At least that view of it makes me feel easier. I prefer to believe I saw ghosts rather than to think my brain is going bad. It has been a long time since I saw anything of the kind. Each time I hope will be the last. But what do you think of it, Cartice? You believe I saw those dead people, don’t you?”
“I think you saw just what you say you did; but I can’t explain it.”
Mrs. Doring had always clung to the belief that the universe held many mysteries beyond her ken; that marvelous things, hidden from common vision, were destined to some day stand revealed, and no man knew the manner in which they might make themselves known. She had had some experience with professional clairvoyants which had been disenchanting. For the most part they had been clammy, illiterate, unscrupulous, pitiful types of humanity, ready to violate truth and the English language without hesitation or remorse. Now she looked at the Butterfly with an interest that almost amounted to awe. Could it be that the gift of seeing the hidden and unknown belonged to this bright, winged being, who loved the world and the things of the world only?
At last she said: “Chrissalyn, you have heard of the faculty of clairvoyance, have you not?”
“Yes, of course.”
“May it not be that you are a clairvoyant, and saw your dead friends clairvoyantly?”
The Butterfly lifted her hands in horror. “O Cartice, how can you suggest such a thing? I a clairvoyant? It would be too dreadful. I wouldn’t have a hint of such a horrid thing get out on me for the world. Why, clairvoyants are hideous creatures, ugly, old, frowsy, untruthful, and advertise to tell you all sorts of things for a dollar.”
“But, my own Butterfly, you are not old and ugly and all the rest of it, neither are all clairvoyants. History contains the names of some very eminent ones. What a wonderful and enviable gift clairvoyance must be. How I wish I had it. And if it be true that you are possessed of it, think what it brings to you—light, light from heaven itself—the most glorious light in the universe—proof that the dead have never died.”
Her friend’s enthusiasm ensnared the Butterfly’s vanity at once, so that she pricked up her ears and gave heed. Whatever Cartice said had weight with her. It gratified her, in spite of her prejudices, to have a faculty unattainable to ordinary persons. All this darted through her head and settled down into acceptance.
“Well, I don’t mind if it is clairvoyance, only don’t tell anybody.”
“It’s not a thing to be talked about with those who don’t understand or respect it. It’s too precious. Would I could see such sights. Then I could sing light-hearted tunes and walk on bravely, be my pack never so heavy. Don’t fail to tell me if you see anything more.”
Chrissalyn did see something more of the same character very soon, and made haste to describe it to her friend.
She had gone to a bank to attend to some business which required more explanation than was convenient to make through the cashier’s window, so she was invited to take a seat in the office of the president, with whom she had some acquaintance.
While she sat there his son entered, bearing strong evidence of having tarried too long at the wine. His reputation as altogether too jolly a dog was well known. His father sent him off as speedily as possible, and then said to Chrissalyn in a burst of distracted confidence, such as we all give to somebody at times when the load grows too heavy, “My boy is going to ruin in spite of all I can do. I have borne with him till I am out of patience, yet my forbearance is wasted. I am tempted to cast him off entirely, to throw him on his own resources and see how that will work. Maybe it will bring him to reason, sinceno amount of kind treatment does him any good.”
On the instant Mrs. Layton saw a woman stand behind the banker. Whence she came or how she knew not, but there she was, and she spoke—spoke in an earnest, anxious voice, with an entreating gesture: “Tell him not to do that. Beg him not to do it. Say thatIimplore him not to do it.”
Under the impulse of the request, before she had time to think what she was doing, the Butterfly told the banker what she had just seen and heard.
He was a big, commonplace, worldly man, whose head was never heated with super-mundane problems, yet he whitened as he heard this strange story.
“What was the woman like?” he asked.
“She was young and plainly dressed in a calico gown of an old-time mode, and she looked astonishingly like your son.”
The face of the banker whitened more and more and his eyes became glassy and fear-struck.
“That describes my first wife, Rob’s mother,” he said, “yet you did not know—no one here does—that he is not the child of my present wife. I was poor while she lived, so poor that she never had anything better than calico to wear.”
By that time Chrissalyn began to have a sheepishfeeling about what she had done, and wished she were well out of it. A force that was resistless had impelled her to speak, but now that the tale was told, the impulsion gone and she became master of herself again, her first thought was that she had let out the secret of her ability to see things not within the range of common vision. So she attempted to make light of it, lest the banker go about telling it as a queer thing, and then the detested name of clairvoyant would be fastened on her in spite of everything.
“I dare say it’s all nonsense, and I hope you won’t think of it again,” which was as near as she could delicately come to saying, “I hope you will not speak of it.”
The stout banker mopped a cold perspiration from his face, with a good deal of nervousness. He was tolerably shaken up, and was making a wild effort to regain his equilibrium. Though not a man to go very deep into anything outside of finances, he was neither dogmatic nor unteachable. He knew what he didn’t know, which is a rare bit of wisdom, and in that territory were all things beyond the commonplace.
“Anyhow, whatever it was, Mrs. Layton, I’m obliged to you for telling me—more obliged than I can express,” he said, with unaffected earnestness—“and I will do as she wants me to. I will not turn Rob out.”
“I’m glad of that,” said his visitor, whose instinctswere always kind. “It could hardly do him any good.”
The springs of the banker’s emotions had been touched, and for a moment he looked like a big boy about to cry like a little boy. That’s what he saw he must do, or pour himself out in uninvited and prodigal confidence, and that’s what he did.
Thus it was that the banker’s skeletons held high carnival that afternoon in their owner’s business office. The reminder of the wife of his youth, the companion of his poverty, pressed the closet door unceremoniously open. The unhappy owner of the unique outfit took a full breath and unreservedly told how miserable he was, and that the only happiness he ever had was during the life of his first wife,
“When there was scarce bread to eatAnd the wolf was at the door.”
Now, he had money, and with it a wife who wore purple and fine linen, and loved nobody but herself. He spoke of his loneliness, and told what a poor, mean, paltry sham his life was, and how at times he had wondered if his dead wife could see and understand. He kept on till the closet of skeletons had been pretty well swept and aired, and they had stretched their legs in a fine dance after long suppression—kept on until the Butterfly held him and his wretchedness, so to speak, inthe hollow of her hand. When she went forth it was with a sure conviction that he would say nothing about her clairvoyant experiences. He would have enough repenting to do about the break-out of the skeletons to keep him busy.