Clarke's church typified the decaying faith of its pastor. Grass was serenely pushing up through the rotting planks of the walk which led from the street to the basement "study" just as the natural goodness and cheer of man returns to dominion through the barriers of custom. The paint was blistering and peeling from the clap-boarding on the sunny side of the main building, and in one of the windows a piece of shingle had been set to repair a broken pane. It had the appearance of neglected age.
"The preacher was right—the creed of his church, as of all others, in a lesser degree perhaps, is too crass, too mechanical, too childish to tally the ideals of a generation which is each day awakening to some new potency of matter, some wider conception of the universe."
On the study door, checked by the sun and worn by the rain, the tourist applied his knuckle, and a voice, formal and sonorous, called out, "Come in!"
Opening the door, which led directly into a dark little den with only one window, Serviss confronted Clarke reading by a green-shaded lamp, in whose light heappeared as pallid, as remote from the sun, as a monk of the Middle Ages.
He rose quickly upon recognizing his visitor. "I'm glad to see you, professor; I beg your pardon for not rising. I thought the knock came from my janitor. Take a seat, please." He gathered a handful of books from a yellow arm-chair and pushed it forward with his foot. "Your visit is most opportune. I was meditating a call at your hotel to-night. I wanted to get your idea concerning two or three scientific discoveries which seem to me to have a most important bearing on the welfare of the race."
Serviss became each moment more keenly aware of being face to face with a task which required all his tact, his self-possession, and his wit, for the man before him was immured in self-conceit, accustomed to carrying his point by a rush of words, and was, withal, a student possessed of unusual intellectual resource. He made a very handsome figure as he took his seat amid his books. His face, freshly shaven, gleamed like blue-white marble, and his abundant dark hair, drawn away from his brow by careless fingers, lay in a tumbled mass above his ear, adding a noticeably sculptural finish to his shapely head. His hands, thin, long, and restless, alone betrayed the excitement which the coming of this Master of the Germ engendered in him. He was eager to question, but he waited for his visitor to begin, which he did with manly directness.
"I have called to talk with you about Miss Lambert. She and her mother having honored me by asking myadvice as to her study in New York, I would like to know whether you, as their pastor, counsel this movement on her part?"
The clergyman's sentient fingers sought, found, and closed tightly upon a ruler. "That I cannot answer directly," he said, slowly. "Miss Lambert's case is not simple. She is a very remarkable musician, that you know, and yet her talent is fitful. She sometimes plays very badly. I am not at all sure she has the temperament which will succeed on the music-stage."
"I made a somewhat similar remark to the mother myself."
"Moreover, her interests are not the only factors in the problem. Mrs. Lambert's life is bound up in her daughter, and without her she would suffer. The well-being of the family as a whole is against her going."
"You have your own interests, too, I dare say."
Clarke's eyes narrowed. "What do you mean?"
"It would be difficult to replace her here in your church-work, would it not?"
The clergyman returned to his candid manner. "It would, indeed. She is the only organist in the village, and is invaluable to me, especially in the Sunday-school."
"I am disposed to consider her interests, and not those of the mother and father, or even the church," pursued Serviss. "I am of those who recognize the rights of the young as of chief importance to the race."
Clarke seized upon this as a gage of battle. "Therace! Oh, you inexorable men of science! What do we care for the race? We would save individuals. The race can take care of itself. The race is only an abstraction—it cannot suffer. Of what avail to the individual to know that the race is to be perfected a thousand years hence?"
"We wander," interposed Serviss, with decision. "The question is really quite simple. Shall we advise the Lamberts to send their daughter to New York to study music, or shall we counsel her to remain here, and in marriage to some good, honest young miner resign herself to the common lot of women. Her talent should determine."
A dull flush rose to the cheek of the preacher, his eyes fell and his voice unconsciously softened. "Marriage is still a long way off for Viola Lambert; she is but a child, and, besides—" He paused.
Serviss smiled. "They marry young in the West, I believe. Besides, she must be twenty, and quite robust."
"She seems but a child to me," repeated Clarke, returning to his clerical manner, and something in the hypocritical tone of his speech angered and disgusted Serviss, and to himself he said: "He is a fraud. He does not intend to let the girl pass out of his control." Then aloud he reopened the discussion: "It all comes back to a question of the girl's talent. If it is sufficient to enable her to earn a living in some larger community, she has a right to go; if not, she should certainly stay here. I believe in the largest possible lifefor every human being, and Miss Lambert's ambition is a perfectly legitimate craving. Furthermore, she seems eager to escape from this life. She hints at some sort of mysterious persecution. She has not defined her troubles in detail, but I inferred that some undesirable suitor made life miserable for her." With these words he bent a keen glance at Clarke.
"You are quite mistaken, sir. Miss Lambert has many admirers but no suitors. I have cautioned her against entanglements of that kind. I have shown how they would interfere with her work."
"You mean her work in your church?"
Clarke's eyes again took on the narrowed glance of suspicion. "Partly that, but more on account of other and higher work which I hope to see her do."
"To what do you refer?"
"Pardon me, of that I cannot at present speak; I can only say that it is a work whose preliminary stages can be passed as well here as in New York City—better, in fact."
"You arouse my curiosity—"
Clarke suddenly awoke from his musing and became aggressive. He resolutely changed the subject. "Before you go I want to ask you—do you, as a chemist, deny the immortality of the soul?"
"Chemistry does not concern itself with the soul."
"Do you, as aman, deny the immortality of the soul?"
"I neither deny nor affirm. I have never concerned myself with the question."
Clarke was a little daunted. "You leave the most vital question in all this world uninvestigated!"
"Yes, because I was long ago convinced that the problem of death, like the origin of life, is insoluble, and why waste time on the insoluble? To pore upon the constitution of matter is a species of mediævalism. I am concerned with what bacteria do—not what they are."
"I deny that the question of immortalityisinsoluble!" replied Clarke, his eyes glowing with the fire of his faith. "It is because you scientists ignore the phenomena of spiritism that you remain ignorant of the messages which come from the other side."
"What other side?"
"The realm of those you call 'the dead.'" He caught up a book. "There is the word of a German scientist, a hundred times more eminent than you, and here are the conclusions of two great Englishmen, members of the Royal Academy, who have investigated and have been convinced of the return of the dead."
"I know those men," replied Serviss, coldly. "The common opinion is that they ceased to be scientists when they wrote these volumes. All were past their prime and bereaved, and one was nearly blind. Their true balance of judgment was lost before they set to work on what you call their investigations. The German was considered insane on the 'Fourth Dimension.' But what has this girl to do with your 'realm of the dead' or my study of cancerous tissue? She belongsto the realm of music and flowers. I beg you to remember that. You have no right to throw over her the shadow of your religious perplexities any more than I would have the right to lay before her my knowledge of parasitic growths. Youth, and especially young womanhood, has its rights, and one of them is to be blithe. You admit that you are losing faith; why destroy hers? Your doubts and despairs should not touch her. But they have. She is troubled and sad by reason of your attitude towards life, and especially by your insistence upon the presence of death in the world."
This was not precisely what Serviss had started out to say, but as he went on a sense of being misled, a suspicion that he was playing into the hands of the enemy, kept him from putting into words the strong conviction which had seized him.
The preacher put his interlocked fingers behind his head, and, looking at his visitor beneath lowered, contemptuous lids, replied: "My dear sir, you don't know a thing of what you're talking about."
The note of patronization, the tone of superior wisdom, stung the scientist. He felt in the clergyman's reply not merely opposition, but insult. His very pose was an affront.
"I don't know your motives, that is perfectly true, but I can infer them. It is due me to say that I am not in the habit of mixing in where I am not wanted; but as Mr. and Mrs. Lambert have both asked my advice, I shall give it. The girl is morbid andunhappy here, and I shall tell them to send her away for a time. She has musical talent. I shall advise them to allow her to go East to study."
The preacher's smile deepened into a sneer. "I think I understandyourmotives, and I shall oppose her going. What is there to restrain a man who recognizes neither spirit nor God?"
Serviss was at first astounded, then hot at the grossness of this insinuation, and his strong, brown hands clinched in the instinct to punish—to retaliate—but his anger cooled to the level of words, and he said: "This interview has more than convinced me of the justice of Lambert's distrust of you. I shall see him again and repeat the warning I have already given." And with these words he turned and went out.
It was with a sense of astonishment and relief that he re-entered the daylight, for the sunset glow was not yet out of the sky. A moment before the world had seemed enveloped in midnight darkness, and lo! here now were the splendid peaks, the singing river, all aglow with golden light. The encounter of the moment before receded swiftly, became incredible, but the preacher remained squat in his den like a vampire in his cave.
As he went slowly up the street he acknowledged a feeling of growing weight, of uncertainty. Having given his word in such wise, he had become the defender, the protector of one of whom he knew nothing that was reassuring. His youth seemed to havesuddenly taken on care. His vacation had ended in a cloud of distrust. From the detachment of the scientist he had descended to the level of a moralist and meddler, and, most significant of all, a meddler in the affairs of a young and attractive girl.
Serviss had just written and sealed a letter to his sister, wherein he said, "I shall remain a few days longer here in the mountains—they interest me greatly," when a knock on the door announced the bell-boy bearing a card.
"Dr. Britt!" exclaimed Serviss, with pleasure. "Bring him up, please," and to himself added, "Now we will learn something definite about this amazing group of people."
The manner in which Britt entered the room proclaimed a distinctive character. He edged himself through the door, not stealthily, but carelessly, casually. He, too, was tall, with a wide, dark beard curling over very pink and rather plump cheeks, and in his bright black eyes a sardonic sheen played as he loosely shook his host's hand. His expression was that of a man perpetually amused, as if anticipating a joke or recollecting a mockery. His voice was as languid as his limbs, but his words were precise and to their mark.
Serviss greeted him heartily. "I am glad to meet you, Dr. Britt; take a seat. I have heard of you through Miss Lambert."
"I saw you on the street," replied Britt, without change of expression, "so I looked over the register to find out who you were. I'm mighty glad to meet up with you. I know you very well by reputation, and Weissmann is an old acquaintance of our family's. What are you doing out here? Visiting the Lamberts?"
For some reason this directness disturbed Serviss a little. "No—oh no! I just drifted in over the divide from the desert, and met Miss Lambert by accident, quite by accident. I dropped into Colorow to rest and rinse the desert dust away, before returning East. Turn about is fair play—what are you doing here?"
Britt struck his left breast with his thumb. "Same old story—busted lung. Whenever you strike a suspicious character out here he's either a 'one-lunger' or a 'remittance man.'"
"That's what makes your country worth while."
"I don't know about that, but you'll find a good many of us waiting. When you fellows develop an anti-toxin for the consumption 'bug,' we're all going back to God's country."
"We're hot on its trail," replied Serviss, jocularly.
"I know you are. I 'read after you,' as they say out here. In fact, I've got a little 'farm,' and take a shy at breeding the beasts myself. I'd like you to come in and give me a hint or two."
"With pleasure," Serviss heartily responded. "So you know Weissmann?"
"I used to. My father was an attaché of the embassy at Berlin at one time, and was a factor in gettingold 'Hair and Goggles' to come over; he was a conceited ass at that time, with more wool than brains, the governor always said; but the governor wanted to do something for the college."
Serviss studied the card. "Do I know your father?—is he still in public life?"
"He is not." Britt's glance veered. "The governor, I'm sorry to say, has a weakness for toddy, and I've retired him. He boards in White Plains with Patsy Cline summers, and relapses winters."
Serviss changed the subject. "By-the-way, I want to ask you about this man Clarke. What kind of a chap is he?"
Britt's answer was languid but adequate. "Three parts fakir and the rest fanatic."
"I was afraid so—and the Lamberts, what of them?"
"Mrs. Lambert is a dear old ninny. Viola is a mighty bright girl suffering from a well-developed case of hysteria and auto-hypnosis."
"What do you mean?" asked Serviss, sharply.
Britt checked himself. "I ought not to speak of it, I suppose, but, as you are a stranger and can keep a professional secret, I will explain. The mother is a spiritualist—has been for years—and, being on the lookout for it, naturally discovered what she calls 'mediumship' in Viola when a child. By carefully nursing the delusion in herself and in her subject, she has been able to develop a rare 'up-rush of the subliminal,' as Myers would say. When I came here totake Dr. Randall's practice, I found among his papers elaborate notes on the girl's development."
"You amaze me!" exclaimed Serviss. "She seems so normal and so charming."
"In reality she's the most extraordinary puzzle I have ever undertaken to solve. It seems, according to Randall, that this power came upon her soon after the death of her little brother—a couple of years younger than herself. I'll let you see these notes if you like. They're very curious; in fact, I brought the book along—I wanted your opinion of them and your advice as to the girl's treatment."
Serviss leaned forward in growing interest. "By all means let me see the notes. You begin to throw light on something that puzzled me."
Britt drew a small brown book from his pocket and said: "Your first thought will be to relate this business to hysteria, and one of Randall's first entries is a reflection along these lines: 'There is much inconclusive literature on the shelves of medical libraries on the subject of hysteria, and many diverse ailments are thrown into that box of explanations.'" Britt looked up. "He's right there, but he goes on to slate the medical profession thus: 'The mind of a child, like any other expanding, growing thing, tends to depart from the norm—loves apparently to surprise its progenitors. Holding in its grasp latent tendencies of all ages, of all the race, it may at any time astound by its sudden expansion in unexpected directions, as well as by its inexplicable failure to follow ordained grooves.'"Here Britt paused again. "You can see the old chap was hard hit. He now gets evolutionary. 'We are all goats, satyrs, and serpents potentially—even from the neurologist's point of view our minds are infinitely complex.'"
Serviss said, "All this is wise, but is it pertinent?"
"He's coming at it. 'Now, what we men of medicine call hysteria seems to be a violent and, in a sense, unaccountable departure from the norm, induced by the removal of some check—by some deep change in the nervous constitution. Thus a girl suddenly refuses to eat, has visions, shouts, and sings uncontrollably, perhaps speaks in an unknown tongue—she is said to be hysterical. A mother, hearing of the death of her child, begins to laugh, passes at length into a cataleptic state, during which a child's voice sounds from her throat; this, too, is hysteria. A man of forty-five becomes melancholy, professes to hear music inaudible to others, develops automatic writing, and trances in which he is able to hear distant voices, and to read sealed letters; this, too, is hysteria. In reality, nothing is explained.'"
"What of it?" interrupted Serviss. "Let's have the application."
"He makes his point in the next paragraph: 'In conformity with this habit, when called in by Mrs. Lambert to study her daughter, who had passed suddenly into deep sleep and was speaking with the voice of her grandfather, I, with owlish gravity, pronounced her attack a case of hysteria. "Take her on a littletrip," said I. "Keep her well nourished and out-of-doors, and she will outgrow it."'"
"Very good advice."
"So it was, but mark the sequel: 'She did not outgrow it.' He puts this in italics. 'The power within her gained in mastery, and, what is most singular and baffling to me, she continues to be a hearty, healthy child in all other ways, and yet at times she seems the calm centre of a whirlwind of invisible forces. Chairs, books, thimbles, even the piano, move to and fro without visible pushing. Electric snapping is heard in the carpet under her little feet, and loud knocking comes upon the walls—'"
"Ah!" exclaimed Serviss, and recalled the knocking at his first visit, while the girl was at the piano.
"Here he drops into italics again. 'One by one all the familiar manifestations of the spiritualistic medium are being reproduced by this pretty maiden here in this mountain home.'"
"Good Lord, what a pity!" exclaimed Serviss.
Britt read on: "'The mother, aggrieved and alarmed by the rude way in which the girl is buffeted, has been put to her paces to conceal the topsy-turvy doings of her household. Stones are hurled through the windows, cabinets are opened by invisible and silent locksmiths,and I have seen these things and can offer no explanation.'" Britt closed the book. "Right here the old doctor lost his nerve, up to this time he was a fairly acute observer. His next entry is evidently some weeks or, possibly, months later. He says:'Slowly we have learned to understand the phenomena, but we cannot control them, and the child is still cruelly embarrassed by intrusive tappings and cracklings as she visits her friends or as she sits in her seat in school. She has become afraid to sleep alone, and calls piteously for a light whenever the noises begin.'"
"The poor child—"
"You may well say that," replied Britt. "She has told me that her time of greatest trial comes just after the family have had their evening meal, and while she is seated at her book; but Randall grows eloquent in his description of what took place: 'Almost every night at seven o'clock the obscure powers begin their uncanny and invisible riot, ending by seizing upon the child as if to destroy her, compelling her in the end to sleep. Then her voice, her limbs, seem at the disposal of some invisible intelligence.' You see, the old man is weakening. He says no more of hysteria, and nothing about taking the girl away."
"Do you mean to tell me he joined in fostering this delusion?"
"Mark his change of tone. He goes on: 'The mother, convinced by her reading, as well as by messages in writing, believes that the spirits of her dead are trying to communicate with her, and so sits night after night terrified yet hoping, waiting for further instructions from the imponderable ones.'" Britt turned a few pages rapidly. "Listen to this. Here is the key to the old man's change of heart: 'To-night the child began to speak to me in the voice of a man.Hoarse words rose from deep in her throat, a voice and words impossible to her in her normal condition. The voice purported to be my father's. It is all very singular. I do not understand how she could know the things this voice uttered to me.' You see," said Britt, "he has ceased to be the medical adviser." He turned a number of pages slowly. "Well, the girl passed rapidly through these various phases, according to Randall. She wrote messages with her left hand, wherein her grandfather McLeod detailed the method of treating her, and Randall was so far gone that he acquiesced. From her eleventh to her fifteenth year she lived under this 'control.' The manifestations increased in power and definiteness. The 'controls' at last were three—her grandfather, her brother, and her own father. At sixteen the most violent of the manifestations ceased, and the girl went away to school. At this point Joe Lambert enters—he married the mother."
"How did he take these doings?"
"He seems to have been a silent and reluctant witness; the doctor only mentions him incidentally. There are one or two pitiful letters from the girl written while at school, detailing several embarrassing returns of the 'spirits,' but, on the whole, she was happy. According to the record, her vacations must have been a torment, for 'Waltie,' that's noPolter-geist, seemed determined to make up for lost time. He came every night, making life a hell for his sister. She could go nowhere, and it was with the greatest difficulty that the mother kept her dreadful secret."
Serviss, with darkened brow, writhed uneasily in his chair. "I have heard of these things before now, but this is a new view of a medium's development. I don't understand the mother's attitude."
"Randall notes that the mother was resigned and content as soon as she was convinced of the return of her dead father and husband and son, and at present will not think of giving up her fancied communion, especially as the 'guides' constantly assure her that 'they' will protect the girl. But observe the senility of this note in Randall's diary: 'Martha comes regularly to me now, and I am happy in a renewed sense of her companionship. Indeed, I fancy at times that I can see her. She showed me her hands last night; I could see them plainly against the window. I had quite a controversy with Lambert after the sitting. "It's all bad business," he said. "I am scared when I think of what's going to become of Viola. Here she is growing to be a big girl, and a pretty girl, and she ought to be out in company—she ought to be singing and dancing like other girls. She ought to marry like other girls and be happy, and she can't be so long as these things are going on. It isn't right."'"
"No more was it," said Serviss. "It was villainous."
"Randall was too far gone to even agree. 'But it hasn't hurt her,' I replied; 'and, indeed, this marvellous fact resigns me to the practice. I can't endure now the thought of being cut off from Martha and Paul, our precious boy. It would be like shutting the door in their faces. Besides, they are in control; we couldnot stop their use of the girl if we were to try. As for me, it is now my life. I am old. My friends, my dear ones, are all on that side. I have only a few more days to live, and then—' Right here the old man stopped. He lived a month or two after that, but he made no more notes, and when I came on the scene Clarke was in control of the situation. I had no acquaintance with the family and no personal knowledge of the case till Lambert called one day and told me of the sittings going on in the little cottage. He had a notion that I might be able to cure the girl."
Serviss had listened to Britt with growing pain and indignation—pain at thought of Viola's undoing, indignation that the mother and her physician could so complacently join in the dark proceedings. "Of course, you took hold of the case."
"I tried to, but Mrs. Lambert and Clarke would not admit that the girl was in need of my care. They invited me to join the circle as a spectator, which I did. I am still the onlooker—merely."
"You don't mean to say they are still experimenting with her?"
"You may call it that. They sit regularly two or three nights each week. Clarke is preparing to renounce his pulpit and startle the world by a book on 'spiritism,' as he calls his faith. The girl is his source of thunder."
Serviss sank back into his chair and darkly pondered. "That explains a number of very strange words and actions on the girl's part. What is herattitude? She seemed to me extremely discontented and unhappy."
"Sheisunhappy. She understands her situation and has moments of rebellion. She knows that she is cut off from her rightful share in the world of young people, and feels accursed."
"I can understand that, and several things she said to me corroborate your analysis of her feeling. But tell me—you have attended these sittings—what takes place—what does the girl profess to do?"
"I don't know. I can't determine Clarke's share in the hocus-pocus. It all takes place in the dark."
"It always does. It belongs there."
"Many of the good old 'stunts' of the professional medium are reproduced. Lights dance about, guitars are played, chairs nose about your knees, hands are laid on your cheek, and so on."
"You don't think she is wilfully tricking?" Serviss asked this with manifest anxiety.
"There's every inducement—darkness, deeply anxious friends. It would not be strange if she did 'help on' now and then."
"What a deplorable thing!"
"And yet I'm not so sure that she wilfully deceives, though I have detected her in fraud. Probably the whole thing began in some childish disorder which threw her system out of balance. There are hundreds of such cases in medical literature. She was 'possessed,' as of old, with a sort of devilish 'secondary personality.' She probably wrote treatises left-handed andupside-down. They often begin that way. The mother, lately bereaved, was convinced of her daughter's occult powers. She nursed the delusion, formed a circle, sat in the darkness, petting the girl when things happened, mourning when the walls were silent—and there you are! 'Sludge the Medium' all over again, in a small way. Probably the girl didn't intend to deceive anybody at first, but she was tolled along from one fakery to another, till at last she found herself powerless in the grasp of her self-induced coma. She is anxious to escape her slavery; she revolts, and is most unhappy, but sees no way out. That's my present understanding of the case. Now, what is your advice? What can I do? I am deeply interested in the girl, but I have no authority to act."
"You shock and disgust me," said Serviss, profoundly moved. "The girl seems too fine for such chicanery. Who is this man Clarke?"
"He was a sensational preacher in Brooklyn a few years ago, but a hemorrhage in the pulpit cut short his career in the East. He came out here and got better, but his wife, who had a weak heart, couldn't stand the altitude. She died—a sacrifice to her husband. He's the kind of a man who demands sacrifice. After his wife's death, he fairly lived at the Lambert cottage, and is now in full control. The girl's will is so weakened that she is but a puppet in the grasp of his powerful personality."
Serviss was now absorbed in reconstructing his conception of Viola. Her situation appealed to him withthe greatest poignancy, but his ability to help her seemed gone. Fair as she looked, she was to be avoided, as one tainted with leprosy. His impression that first afternoon had been true—she was beleaguered, if not lost.
Britt was saying: "If the girl were under age I'd appeal to the health authorities of the state—I really would, much as I like Mrs. Lambert—but she is of age, and, what is more to the point, Clarke has won her love and confidence, and what can you do? He fills her horizon, and the mother favors him. He talks to her of her daughter's 'mission to the world,' and such-like vapor, and has the girl herself half convinced that her cataleptic states are of divine origin. I confess I haven't felt free to make any real tests—you can't treat her like a professional, you know—but she seems to have induced by long practice a genuine coma, and until some clamp is applied I can't say whether she or Clarke is the chief offender. Now what would you do?"
Serviss burned with the heat of his anger. "Don't reveal to me any more of this wretched business. I can't advise. If you, her physician, and Lambert, her step-father, can't put a stop to it, what can I, a passing stranger, do? I don't want to know anything more about it. Why, man, it's diabolical! To warp and imprison a girl like that! To think of that bewitching creature as a common trickster—appalls me. And to think that good people, millions of them, believe in such mummery! It is incredible!"
"You'd be surprised at the number of somewhatsimilar cases we find among our patients. Since coming here I've gone in for a little library of books on the subject. Every physician during his practice comes upon one or more of these abnormal cases which, as Randall says, we label, for convenience, 'hysteria,' and I'm free to say that I don't think we're at the bottom of the matter. Let's be just to this girl. There are points in her favor."
Serviss protested. "Not another word. It's too painful."
Britt persisted. "I was merely going to say that I think there is some basis for all this humbuggery. These mediums don't start from nothing. They nearly all begin with some abnormality. Some submerged power rises to the surface of their minds like a sea-serpent, and that distinguishes them as seers. Curious friends crowd around, then the lying begins. It's going to be worth while to take the subject up, by-and-by. I'd do it myself if I could live in New York City." He rose. "Well, I don't blame you for not going into this case—I wish I were clear of it myself—but I was hoping you'd had some experience that would help me." Thereupon the conversation shifted to other grounds.
After Britt went out Serviss sat in brooding uneasiness over his visitor's sad revelations. He had known Viola Lambert but three days, and yet these revelations concerning her affected him most painfully, quite vitally. His pleasure in her and in the mother and their pretty home was utterly gone, and thebreaking-off of this acquaintance left an ache in his heart.
Of course he put all this on very general grounds. "I hate to lose faith in any one. It is a shock to know that I can be so wholly deceived by appearance. Clarke is really the one to blame in the deception. I can't believe the girl wilfully deceives, and yet Britt was explicit, and he seems to be a keen, dispassionate observer."
Thereupon he began to pack in order to take the early morning train for the East. He decided not to see her again, and posted a polite note saying he had been obliged to return to New York, and that he regretted his inability to call.
As he stood on the rear platform of his train next day, looking back up the cañon towards the shining crest of Colorow, he had a craven sense of having deserted a helpless young girl in the hour of her greatest trial.
Mr. Britt was right. Mrs. Lambert was very fond of Clarke—had, indeed, quite taken him into her heart. He was at once son and spiritual adviser, and his wishes had the force of commands. His bereavement could not have anguished her much more keenly had Adele been her own daughter, and this affliction still lay like a mist between them, preventing even a foreboding of his impending confession of desire. Her remembrance of the beauty and high character of his wife made Viola seem doubly the child; and so when, from time to time, some busybody hinted at the minister's marked intimacy with her daughter, she put the covert insinuation away with a frank word—"You mustn't even think such a thing."
Viola, too, from the very beginning of their acquaintance, had admired the young minister quite as deeply as Serviss imagined, and had humbled herself before Adele as to a very wonderful lady of the mysterious outer world, whose deportment, dress, and speech had been sources of enlightenment; and when she passed away, the land of the shadow became just that much richer, more complete in its dominion over her.Almost at once Adele spoke through the vale, saying, "I am here to help and guide."
Thus all powers of earth and heaven had combined to make Clarke the ruler of Viola Lambert's little world. He stood between her and young Clinton Ward and all other suitors—he absorbed her thought. She admired his gifts, and trembled beneath the power of his dark eyes, his magnetic hands, and especially responded to the music of his deep voice, which was very enthralling when it took on the pleading melody of the lover. At times he filled her with such passion of vague unrest that life became a torment, for she was of the age when the world is for the lover's conquest, and the cadence of love's song means most and is least understood; and yet at times she felt a fear of him which chilled her. She was struggling, too, with growing ambitions, and with an expanding knowledge of the world which was beginning to make her critical—the wonder of the child was giving place to the insight of the woman. The wish to shake off her invisible tormentors and be like other girls was in reality a demand for the right to be loved and valued for her own natural self, entirely free from the touch of spectral hands.
She was disappointed that Clarke did not understand and sympathize with this wish, but that he desired her in marriage had never once entered her mind. He was a minister, and she reverenced his office, and, besides, she considered herself but a girl, too ignorant and too trivial to be the wife of one so high in holy service.
With the coming of the young professor a new force seemed entered upon the saner side of her life. She recognized in him a master of the great outer world—the Eastern world, the world of the unafraid—and her determination to at least subordinate her "controls" had expanded swiftly to a most dangerous height during the few hours of her companionship with him. She felt that he would sympathize with her—that he would help her. The clear positiveness of his speech, his health, his humor, grew upon her each moment, and she resolved to confide in him when next they met.
Part of this upspringing revolt, this antagonism, Clarke divined, and the determination to arrest her purpose, the desire to possess her entirely and at once, excluded every other wish or plan, and to feel was to act with Anthony Clarke, for he was born to emotional experience as the sparks fly upward. He had ever been a creature of unreason, morbidly conscious of self—and naturally, for in him struggled the blood of three races. His father was Scotch, and his mother—Spanish on the spindle side and Irish by way of a most mercurial father—remained an unsolved problem all her days, even to her husband. Her laughter was as illogical as her tears. Her household could never tell what the next hour would bring forth, so ready were her sympathies, so instant her despairs. She lived all her life at the heights or the depths, with never a day of serene, womanly, reasonable action, and when she died her passing was of the same emotional stress.She clung to earth like one whose body was about to drop into soundless deeps.
Her son had inherited all her fervency, her inconstancy of purpose, as well as her tendency to collapse under pressure. Physically he had always been of slender figure, with weak lungs, and these weaknesses he had used to free himself from work, from responsibility.
He was not a hypocrite—in that Britt was mistaken. He was by nature deeply religious. His soul aspired, at times, to high things. He was sympathetic to actual pain, and had always been morbidly in awe of death. The sight of any poor, lost, and suffering man threw him into instant, profound, and melancholy pity. A dead beetle in the road, a fly caught in a spider's web, a young robin water-soaked and bedraggled, appalled him, even as a boy, and he pondered them with sad and questioning eyes long after his young companions had forgotten them. Where had the light of their eyes fled? he asked himself. He found no sport in killing any creature, and more than once he used all his slender force to defend a cat from stoning; and yet he was known to have joined the worst youths of his native town in secret drinking-bouts, thereby acquiring the reputation of a liar and sneak, as well as that of licentiate. At seventeen, just when the appetite for liquor seemed beyond his control, a great "revivalist" won his soul, as the saying went, and at twenty-three he assumed his first pastorate.
Success as a pulpit orator was assured by the charm of his voice, the magnetism of his manner. His head was singularly handsome, and often when he spoke his face was irradiated like that of a seraph, and the women of all his congregations adored him from the first glance, embarrassing him with their ardent praises. That he had remained faithful to his wife in spite of this adoration was evidence of her great beauty of character. She was, indeed, his safeguard and his hourly monitor while she lived.
For him she had sacrificed all her friends in the East. She came to the mountains without a murmur, she bore with him, cheered him, upheld him in a hundred ways—and when she died his world went black as midnight. It was as if in the midst of a monster, interminable cavern his one starlike light had gone out in his hand. For days he beat his head against the wall, crying defiant curses against his God; but in the end he sank into voiceless despair. Then it was, as he lay prone and passive, that he began to hear mysterious whisperings and tappings on the walls of his cavern of despond. He rose and listened. He groped his way towards the dim light. He returned to the world of men. His faith in the Scriptures was weakened; but he soon discovered a wondrous change of heart towards those who claimed to be intermediaries between the worlds of matter and of spirit. He turned his attention to the study of the physical evidences of life after death.
Up to that moment he had given but little credence to Mrs. Lambert's half-hearted confidences concerningher own change of faith, and, as Viola had been away at school much of the time, he had forgotten that she was concerned in the mother's confession.
The disclosure of her powers, as he told Dr. Britt—after they were both involved in the curious case—came violently, without warning, a few days after Adele's death. "I was sitting with Mrs. Lambert in sad conversation, seeking her aid and comfort. Viola occupied a low chair beside the shaded lamp, a book upon her knee. She was listening to me. I had just finished saying, in deeply passionate tones, 'I would give all my hope of life for one whisper from the lips of my Adele,' when the room began to darken. At first I thought the effect lay in my own brain, but a moment later I perceived that the light had actually begun to fail. We all watched it in silence for a moment, then Mrs. Lambert remarked, 'Viola, Mary forgot to fill the lamp.'
"Even as she spoke a cool wind blew over my head and lay along my hands. The flame leaped into the air, the room went black, save where a pale glow coming from the street lay upon the floor. A faint rustling arose, a hand touched my cheek, soft lips brushed my ear, and a whisper that stopped the beating of my heart began. A vague, inarticulate murmur, at first; but at last I plainly heard my spirit-wife speaking in gentle reproof—'Tony, Tony, I am always with you.'
"The whisper ceased. The hand was taken away. A deep sigh came to my ear. My Adele was gone! The moment of ecstasy was over. I sat stunned, inert,my brain whirling with the far-reaching import of this experience. Before I could drag myself to my feet Mrs. Lambert, practical and undisturbed, threw open the door and let the light of the street in. Only then, as I looked on Viola, lying in trance with white, set face, did I first connect her in any way with my sweet communion with Adele.
"Then, like a flash of joyous light irradiating my soul, came the conviction that she was the medium through whom my Adele had spoken—that she had opened the gates of silence for me.
"I was no longer body—I was a brain suspended in some invisible sea of force. Here was the reality of religion. Here was the answer to the anguished cry of humanity—an answer to my prayers which the Hebrew Scriptures could not give. Therewasa life beyond the grave. The spiritdidpersist after the decay of the body. And here in this little room, when my despair was deepest, the proof had come, blinding me with its beauty.
"Then I said: 'Viola, you have given me the most wonderful moment of all my life. You brought my Adele and put her hand in mine. Through you I heard her voice again. God has chosen you for a great work; I feel it. You should not repel these powers; your gift may mean the most exquisite comfort to thousands—nay, millions—of bereaved souls.'
"I was amazed at the vehement unreason of her reply. 'I don't want it!' she cried. 'I hate it! I won't sit again!' Then I tried to persuade her of her greatmission, to no result. The following night I came, and we pleaded with her to act again with us, but she still passionately refused. 'Why don't they come to you or to mother,' she complained, 'instead of to me?' To this I said: 'There is no answer. They have made you their instrument, and it is your duty to do their will.'
"That night the little parlor became a battle-field. Mrs. Lambert had invoked the aid of Donald McLeod, her father, the girl's 'control.' Viola resisted almost to the death. It seemed as if a strong hand clutched her throat, commanding obedience. I feared she would be torn to pieces, and at last I protested. 'She is suffering too much; let us give over the sitting.' But Mrs. Lambert said, quietly: 'It is her own fault. She is being punished for her obstinacy. Father is disciplining her—he will not harm her.' In the end the power conquered, and the girl lay back in slumber so deep, so dead, that her breath seemed stilled forever—her hands icily inert, her face as white as marble."
"Why didn't you interfere?" asked Britt, sternly.
"How could I, when the mother and the girl's 'controls' were minded otherwise? Besides, I began to believe in the girl's mission—I began to understand the enormous value of her work. My God, Dr. Britt, had I that girl's gift I would engross the world. I would write such words across the tomb that death would seem as sweet as baby slumber. I would make the grave a gateway to the light. I would eliminate sorrow from the earth. The Bible no longer satisfiesme. I want something more than cold, black letters on a printed page. I want to know! I want to thrill the world with a new message; and here, now, at my hand, is a medium. I can never have this power—perhaps it is only given to babes and to sucklings, but I can spread the light. You, Dr. Britt, shall help me. Let us study this wonderful gift. Let us concentrate our energies upon this supreme problem. I will note all that comes to us, and I will write a burning book—a revelation that shall go round the globe, guiding and gladdening every human soul. Think of it! There is no mightier mission on earth. This girl can be, and must be, made a savior, a hope-bringer, to thousands of despairing souls!"
To this fervid appeal Britt remained impassive and coldly critical—till, chilled and repelled, Clarke had withdrawn his confidence. The two still met occasionally in Mrs. Lambert's home, but their antagonism had deepened to actual hatred. Britt, impotent to help, had long since ceased to protest, even to the girl herself; for he had learned that every revolt on her part brought keener pain and deeper humiliation in its train. He entered upon a study of the subject, and thus far had found little to encourage the hope of the girl's redemption from her maladies.
Clarke, too, had surrounded himself with every available book which bore upon these baffling phases of human experiences, and had put himself in touch with every society organized for the investigation of occult phenomena—and in his dark little denbrooded day and night over the dimly apprehended laws of the unseen universe. He left his studies only to be with Viola, who had become as necessary to him as his daily food—as indispensable as air. She was at once his hope and his very present help. How to keep her, how to mould her to his will, how to use her to his great purpose of ridding the world of the fear of death—these became his hourly care, his only interest.
To these ends he strove to enthrall her by his singing, by his oratory, and by his love of poetry, knowing well that to drum constantly upon the harsh string of her "mission" would revolt her; and she, thus beset, thus beleaguered, gave over her rebellion, resigning herself to her guides till this ruddy and powerful young man of science came into her world to fill her with new determination to escape from her mental slavery.
Clarke loved this girl, not as he had loved Adele, of course, but quite as humanly. Her mediumship, so vital to the world, so sacred in his eyes, had but added to her allurement. "All that I am, and all I hope to be, is bound up in the possession of that sweet, wonderful child," he said, in acknowledgment of his discovery. In a very subtle way he now apprehended a change in the girl, and, realizing how utterly his aims, his daily happiness, his future depended upon her, he rose from his seat resolved not merely to advise against her going away, but to claim her as his own—his wife.
"My wife!" At this deeply significant word Adele's pleading face rose vividly before him. Writhing with shame before her reproachful glance, he cried out:"But I cannot live alone! And then consider—I shall be able to meet you each day, perhaps each hour, and as I myself develop in grace of soul I may come to you without any medium. I am not disloyal to you, Adele. I love this girl, I confess that; but not as I loved you. You were my true wife, the only spouse I can ever have—you filled my soul. My love for this girl is that of a father—a teacher. I need her for—Oh, my Adele, I will confess, before you came back to me through this child I was weary of the earth, ready to violently end my anguish. Viola put your hand again in mine—she gave me to hear your voice. I cannot bear to lose those priceless moments, and yet I must do so if she goes from me. Am I not justified in desiring her presence? Come to me; tell me, to-night, what you would have me do. Be merciful, my angel spouse. Remember my empty, desolate heart. Remember the greatness of the work I have set myself to do. Oh, my sweet spirit, if you could only put an arm about my necknow, without any other interposing soul! Come to me, whisper to me—now! Let me know your presence here as I sit alone and despairing—"
He ceased to pray, and bowed his head upon his desk and waited in an agony of hope—waited while the darkness deepened and the splendid eternal song of the river proclaimed the futility and folly of man. A cricket sang with heart-piercing cheer, as if to say, "I die to-morrow, but I never despair." But no silken rustle, no whispering voice came to still the agony welling in bitter sighs from the lips of the tempted man.