A CHAPTER OF PROFIT AND LOSS.
Soovercome was the occupant of the Aunt Sallie at this point of his story, that he requested Hopkins' permission to leave his quarters that he might sit on the floor near the slivers of the shattered whiskey bottle. He needed stimulant. Hopkins readily granted the request, for he felt as if he would not mind having a little stimulant for himself, but as the last drop available for his purposes had been put to the use for which it was intended, he had to deny himself the comfort he would have derived from it. The fact that this horrid event, the harrowing details of which he had just listened to, had occurred right there in his own apartments served to make him doubly depressed, for it certainly indicated that the room, despite its cheerful situation, had been the dwelling-place of a supernatural being, and the present lessee was fearful lest that being should appear on thescene once more to practise some of his infernal tricks upon him.
"You mean to say that when you recovered your senses, you had been deprived of your body?" said Hopkins at last, breaking the silence more for the sake of calming his agitated mind than because he had anything to say.
"Yes," replied the spirit. "I lay there on the sofa an intellectual abstract whose concrete had been amputated and invested by a being who had already lived four-score of years in one body, and who, having worn that out, was now on the look-out for a second. The sensation was dreadful, and when I attempted to do what theretofore I had always done in moments of extreme agitation—to pull fiercely at my moustache—I was simply appalled to realize that the power to raise my hand to do this had passed, along with the moustache itself, into the control of that other being. Then an access of rage surged over me, and I attempted to stamp my foot and shriek. The shriek was a success, but my foot like my arm was beyond my control.
"As the shriek died away I observed my head slowly turning from the paper before it on the table, my right hand relaxed its grasp on the pen, and my own eyes were turned uponme, and I was simply maddened to see the left eye wink mischievously at me, while my mouth broadened into a smile at my own misfortunes.
"'Hello,' I said to myself—that is you know the other being in myself said this to me outside of myself. 'You've come to, at last, eh? I thought you were going to remain in a comatose state for ever.'
"'See here, my friend,' I said, trying to be calm. 'This is a very clever trick you've put upon me, but from my point of view it is most uncomfortable, and I'd just as lief have you evacuate the premises, and permit me once more to assume my normal condition.'
"'Not until I have accomplished what I set out to accomplish,' was the answer that fell from my own lips, which again indulged in an impertinent smile at my expense. 'You don't suppose that I have put in three weeks of time and energy to make you famous with the intention of withdrawing on the eve of success, do you?'
"'I don't know what you mean,' I replied, 'I don't understand the allusion, nor can I see why you permit me to be insulted by my own lips.'
"Here," said the spirit, "my face became clouded and my smile vanished.
"'Ungrateful wretch that you are!' said he who had rifled me of myself. 'Are you notaware that three weeks have elapsed since you and your body parted company? Are you not aware that in that time I have forced the fight between the brothers Baskins to a point that has made that case the talk of London, and you, the hero of the hour in legal circles? Do you not understand that to-morrow you are to appear in court to sum up for your side, and that the LondonTimesitself is to have five stenographers in court to take down every word that is uttered by him they call a second Burke, because of his eloquence, by him they call a second Sheridan, because of his wit, by him they call the newly discovered leader of the English bar, because of the aggressive and powerful manner in which this now celebrated will case has been conducted? And finally, are you not aware that it is you who gain the credit due to me, since it is I who have merged my personality into yours, while you have only to remain quiescent and accord to me the undisturbed occupation of your physical self for a few days more?'
"'I know none of these things,' I answered. 'I know that possibly an hour ago you robbed me of my senses by your infernal machinations, and that when they are restored to me I find myself disembodied, nameless, invisible.'
"'Do you know the date upon which I visited you first?' asked my tormentor.
"'Yes, it was November eighth. You returned on the night of November ninth—that is you returned early this evening.'
"'Perhaps this will convince you of the lapse of time, then,' retorted the occupant of my chair, tossing me a copy of theTimes, 'and these will prove the rest,' he added, throwing several other newspapers at the place where my feet would have been had he not deprived me of them.
"I looked the papers over. TheTimeswas dated November twenty-ninth and contained, as did also the others, a long account of the trial of the case of Baskinsv.Baskins, in which I seemed to have figured prominently, concluding with a biographical sketch of myself coupled with the announcement that my former neighbours at Buxton were thinking of calling upon me to stand for Parliament. The tenour of everything in the papers was complimentary in the highest degree. It seemed that I had fairly routed my client's adversaries by nothing else than the aggressive manner of my fighting; that the case was practically won, though it still remained for me to sum up on the morrow, and that all London was expected to swarm into the court room to listen to my marvellouseloquence. I read and was stunned. My position was more unhappy than ever, for here was a greatness builded up for me, that was utterly beyond my ability once returned to my corse of clay to sustain, and before me was placed the horrible alternative of perpetual exile or stultification."
"Lovely prospect," murmured Hopkins.
"As I read on," continued the spirit, "I felt the burning gaze of my visitor upon me, though he could not see me. In my body or out of it, he still possessed that fearful power of mental concentration which when exerted upon another through the medium of the eye was withering to the soul. So nervous did I become, that noiseless as a sun-mote I moved across to the other side of the room, and yet his gaze followed me as if instinctively aware of my slightest move. For a time not a word was spoken by either of us. I was so overcome at the sudden revelation of my fame, that I knew not what to say. The words of blame that entered into my consciousness—for that was all that was left of me—to say, I could not utter, because however badly I had been treated by this fearful creature in the beginning, it could not be denied that he had exerted his powers entirely for my benefit. On the other hand, I found it impossible to thank him forwhat he had done, since I was unable to dismiss the sense of indignation I felt at the summary and tricky manner in which he had robbed me of my individuality. As for the other, he seemed to be thinking deeply, which contributed to my alarm, for I knew not what it was he was revolving in his mind, and I feared some additional exercise of his supernatural power to my further discomfiture. Finally he spoke.
"'I am very deeply disappointed in you,' he said. 'I at least supposed you to be a person of gratitude. I deemed your nature to be sufficiently refined and sensible to favours to evince some little appreciation of what has been done for you, but I must say that the veriest clod of a peasant would be hardly less stolidinthe face of generous effort in his behalf than you have been toward me. A more unresponsive soul than yours can hardly have lived.'
"'Can you blame me for not being effusively grateful to you for having cut me out of three weeks of existence?' I asked.
"'I can and I do,' he replied. 'You have not been incommoded. Upon your own confession you have not even been conscious during the period that you lacked anatomy. On the other hand, consider what I have gone through! I have suffered more in the pastfortnight than I did in my whole previous life. In making the substitution of my inner self for yours in your body, I failed to remember how much greater than the mortal mind is the mind which has put on omniscience, and I have found the head in which your intellect lived at ease, so contracted, so narrow for the accommodation of mine, that the work I have undertaken in your interest has been one prolonged bit of unremitting agony. If you have ever tried to wear a shoe fifteen sizes too small for you, you will have a faint glimmering of the pain I have suffered in trying to encase a number thirty mind in a seven and a quarter head. It has been almost impossible for me to get some of my great thoughts into this thick cranium of yours in their entirety,—indeed if thoughts were visible, your client might have seen them sticking out of these ears, or hovering above this lovely halo of auburn hair you wear, waiting for admission to an already overcrowded skull.'
"As he spoke these words," said the spirit, with a chuckle, "I would have given ten pounds to have had something to smile with. I never thought one could miss his lips so much as when I tried to grin and found I had not the wherewithal. Despite the insulting comment of my visitor upon the quality of myown mind, it really filled what there was left of me with pleasure to hear that, even though I had departed from it, my body through its limitations had been able to resent the intrusion of this alien spirit so effectually.
"'In addition to the bad fit mentally,' continued the usurper of my anatomy, 'I have had to cope with your dyspepsia, which I did not know you had, and various other physical troubles such as rheumatism and toothache. It appears to me that even if I had not made you famous, the mere fact that I have relieved you of your toothache and rheumatism for three weeks should entitle me to your gratitude. However, I am willing to withdraw in your favour immediately if you insist. Of course you will have to sum up that case to-morrow, and I sincerely hope that you will do it in a manner creditable to your new self, that is to yourself as I have made you.'
"Of course you see, Hopkins," said the spirit, pausing in his story for a moment, "what a dreadful position that left me in. I was absolutely in the dark as to what had been done in the case. I did not know what line of argument had been pursued—I was even unacquainted with the name of the presiding justice at the trial, and as for the testimony elicited during the three weeks of my ownpersonal desuetude, I had not read one word of it. To attempt to sum up the case under the circumstances meant ruin—it meant the final sacrifice of all my hopes; disgrace was imminent.
"'I cannot sum up the case,' I answered in a moment. 'I have not mastered the details, nor is there time for me to do so before the court opens.'
"'I am aware of that fact,' retorted the other. 'But that is nothing to me. I am not at all interested in upholding the undeserved fame of an ingrate. It's nothing to me if disgrace stares you in the face. My name is safe; graven upon a white marble stone in a country cemetery, it is beyond the reach of dishonour, and is endorsed in deep-cut letters with an epitaph extolling the virtues of him who bore it. This is your affair entirely; I wash my hands of it. Come, prepare for your return.'
"Now I submit to you, Hopkins, that, considering the situation, I was justified in changing my tone toward him. Put yourself in my place for a moment," said the spirit.
"I'd rather not," returned Hopkins with a shudder.
"Oh, I don't mean for you to exchange places with me. I just want you to try toimagine what you would have done under the circumstances. You would have besought him even as I did to crown his work with final success, and not leave matters in so unsatisfactory a condition; to spare you the dishonour of a public failure, wouldn't you?"
"Yes, either that or suicide would have been my course," returned Hopkins. "I think I'd have fled to some apothecary's and concealed myself in a chloroform bottle until my consciousness evaporated if I'd been you. You must have known that this thing could not keep up for ever, unless you would consent to remain disembodied all your days."
"That was just the most horrible thing about it," said the spirit. "When I realized what it all meant, I was nearly distracted; but believing suicide to be a crime, and knowing, as I have already told you, that the mind is indestructible, I could not do as you suggested. I might have lulled myself into a state of perpetual unconsciousness, but I did not care to do that, for the reason that, despite the harrowing features of my situation, I was morbidly interested to see how it would all come out. At any rate, I succumbed to my fears, and begged him not to think of departing from my mortal habitation and leaving me in the lurch.
"'Now,' he replied, his face, or rather myface, wreathing with smiles, 'now you are talking sense. I thought you would come to it. It would be the height of folly for you to ruin yourself simply to gratify your love of retaining your form. I promise you that to-morrow night, after the great speech has been made in court—a speech which will ring out through the whole country, that will echo from the hills of Scotland across the Atlantic Ocean to the Rocky Mountains, to re-echo thence to the Himalayas, and so on until your fame has encircled the earth—I promise you that then I will depart hence and trouble you no more, except it be your desire that I return.'"
"That was a fair proposition—he wasn't such a mean fiend after all," said Hopkins.
"At that moment I thought he was rather a square fiend," returned the spirit sadly; "but he developed as time went on."
"And the speech next day? How was that? Did he keep his word?" Hopkins asked.
"Indeed he did," said the spirit with enthusiasm, "and it was simply marvellous. That night, after we had had the conversation I have just told you of, that fellow worked like a slave getting up his points, consulting the records, classifying the testimony and making notes for his great oratorical effort. Hardly a poet in the history of literature was there who did notcontribute some little line or two to make the speech more interesting, or to emphasize some point in a manner certain to appeal to a polished mind or overawe an uncultivated one. Greek and Latin authors were levied upon for tribute. Parallels in ancient and modern history utterly unknown to me were instituted for the elucidation of the arguments advanced—in short, a more polished bit of oratory than that prepared for my tongue to utter never fell from mortal lips before, and as for the peroration—well, it would require the consummate art of the fiend himself adequately to describe it. It was simply dazzling.
"'There is only one drawback, one thing I fear for to-morrow,' said the fiend, as he finished his preparations, 'and that is that these miserable mortal lungs of yours will not be able to do justice to that speech, and some of these quotations rasp on your unpractised tongue, so that I fear their effect may be weakened. However, I'll do the best I can with poor tools; but one thing is certain, you must make a sacrifice to me who have sacrificed time and comfort to you.'
"'What is that?' I asked.
"'I cannot properly accent my words with your teeth in their present condition. For instance these words here:And, gentlemen of thejury, what have we to say of the plaintiff in this action, the brother of the defendant and the firstborn son of the decedent whose desires he now seeks to have over-ridden by the laws of this land, what have we to say of him? What palliation can he offer for his unfraternal conduct in thus dragging his own brother into the courts of this land in a mad effort to recover the paltry sum of thirty thousand pounds? History affords no parallel, gentlemen of the jury, to this cause of son living arrayed against his parent gone before, of brother fighting brother for a miserable pittance, and so on. Don't you see that to be spoken impressively these words demand a certain venomous hiss? I want to electrify the jury by that hiss, but I can't do it unless I have out two of your back teeth and this front one.'
"Here he tapped the left of my two front teeth—pearls they were, Hopkins, pearls beyond price. Of course I objected.
"'I can't let you do that,' I said, 'it'll ruin my personal appearance.'
"'Bah, man!' he said. 'What is personal appearance to pre-eminent success? What are looks compared to immortality? I must again take advantage of your helplessness and rescue you from the effects of your own indecision. I have arranged to have a dentist here to-morrow morning at eight. In five minutes he will havethe teeth out, and by noon your seething voice will have turned twelve good men and true into a mass of goose flesh that will be utterly unable to resist you.'"
Hopkins was heartless enough to laugh at this unexpected development.
"I wish I could appreciate the joke, Hopkins," said the spirit indignantly. "What is fun for you was tragedy for me. I had always prided myself on the vigour of my voice. There was nothing weak or affected about it, nor would I, had I been in control of my being, have permitted such vandalism as was perpetrated by that dentist the next morning, just for the sake of making acoupwith the jury. I can't deny, however, that when the speech was delivered the general effect was heightened by the sibilant tone in which the words were spoken. To me the dreadful spirit within my body was apparent from introduction to peroration. The deadly greenness of the fiend shone out through every vein in my body. My eyes, once a beautiful blue, became like the eyes of an adder, and my cheeks took on a pallor that was horrible to look upon, and yet which so fascinated all beholders that they could not take their eyes away from it. The jurors sat petrified, terror depicted on every line of their faces; the judge himself, a florid,phlegmatic person ordinarily, was pale as a sheet and uneasy as an exposed nerve, and when my poor innocent finger, once so prettily pink of hue, was pointed, absolutely livid with the scorn that that creature alone could throw into it, at the terror-stricken plaintiff, he actually fell backward into convulsions, and was carried shrieking profanely from the court-room.
"As for me, I sat cowering directly behind the jury-box fearful for the future, fearful for the effect upon my poor body of the terrible strain that was put upon it, and wondering what I could possibly do upon resuming my normal condition to maintain the reputation which that morning's achievement had brought to me. So absorbed was I in these reflections that the judge's faltering charge at the conclusion of the proceedings fell upon my consciousness unheard, save as the monotonous roar of the vehicles in the street outside was heard; but the verdict of the jury, rendered without leaving the box, in favour of my client did reach my ears, and almost simultaneously came the announcement that there would be no appeal, since the plaintiff in the cause had been frightened into imbecility by the fearful indictment of his character in the summing-up of the counsel for the defendant."
FURTHER DEVELOPMENTS IN THE MAKING OF A NAME.
"Youmust have felt like a vest-pocket Byron, to wake up and find yourself famous that way," said Toppleton; "or, perhaps you found yourselfinfamous, eh? I don't know how it is here in England, but in America a lawyer who'd browbeat a poor innocent litigant into a state bordering upon lunacy, would be requested to move out of town."
"It all depends," returned the spirit. "If my substituted self had limited his brow-beating to the plaintiff, it might have made the reputation which I found awaiting me upon my return to my remains, one of infamy, but that was by no means the case. The judge himself succumbed to nervous prostration a week later, the jurors vanished like a pack of frightened hares immediately they were discharged, and even my client shook like a leaf when he felt my eyes resting upon him. As for my own properself, I was the worst scared man of the lot; so, you see, it was a sort of universal awe that was inspired by the demeanour of my body that day, and one which commanded rather than invited respect."
"Did you find your head a little stretched when you got back into yourself again, or did he break his word and refuse to let you back?" queried Toppleton.
"Oh, he kept his word that time," replied the spirit. "After the trial was over he took a cab and drove rapidly out to Regent's Park and back, returning to my chambers about six o'clock. I was there waiting for him, ready to enter upon my usual anatomical ways once more. My client was also there, though, of course, unaware that I was present in spirit. I was very much amused to see how utterly unnerved poor Baskins was by the strange events of the day. Several times he muttered to himself remarks like, 'I didn't know he had it in him,' and 'If I'd thought he was that kind of a man I'd have kept blessed clear of him. I wonder what he'll charge.' And then every time there was a step or noise of any kind out in the corridor, he would straighten up nervously and stare at the door in a tense sort of fashion which showed that he dreaded meeting me. Once he put his hand in his pocket and pulledout a big duelling pistol which I was alarmed to note was loaded to the muzzle. It was evident that the awe which my new self had inspired in him amounted to positive fear.
"That duelling pistol put an end to my enjoyment of the situation," continued the spirit. "I was afraid he might be goaded into discharging a load of cold lead into my body. Of course, I didn't care to have that happen, and under the agitation of the moment I uttered an ejaculation of consternation. I never saw in all my experience a man so thoroughly frightened as Baskins was when the sound for which he could not account greeted his ear. He went on his knees and shook like a leaf, clasping his hands, as if in prayer, before his face, which turned a blue white. The pistol fell from his hands to the floor, and, as it did so, the door opened, and I saw myself standing on the sill, haggard of face, but not worn of spirit, for the supernatural brilliance of my eye as it caught sight of the pistol and realized at a flash just what the situation was, showed that the soul within was still unwearied by its effort.
"Then," added the spirit, his voice husky with the remembrance of his dishonour, "came an interview that makes me blush, even though I have no cheek on which to display that manifestation of shame. Mybody sprang forward as the pistol met my eye, and, snatching the weapon from the floor, flung it out through the window into the court, where it exploded, the jar of contact with the stone walk being sufficient to discharge it. As the sharp report of the pistol echoed through the court my client threw himself flat on his face, and prostrate there at my feet began to utter a string of incoherent lamentations and despairing requests for mercy at my hands which were painful to hear, and I judged from what meaning I could patch together from his jumble of words, that he deemed me an emissary of Satan,—and I think he was right.
"'What does this mean?' queried the fiend within me. 'Murder or suicide? If you contemplated suicide, I forgive you; if murder—'
"'I was afraid,' gasped my unhappy client. 'Your power was so terrible; the effect of your words so awful, that I—'
"'Ah!' interrupted the fiend. 'I see. It was murder you were prepared to do in case we should not agree, and the power of my eye should chance to be exerted to win you from your determination whatever it may have been.'
"'No—not that—not that!' shrieked my client. 'It was but the natural instinct of self-preservation that led me to—'
"'You weaken your cause by your loquacity, my friend,' said the fiend. 'You suspected me of contemplating some dishonourable or cowardly act, and for that reason you entered the office of him who has saved your good name and your purse alike from them who would have robbed you of both, having so little sense of gratitude that you bring with you an instrument of death. Very well, let it be so. I am satisfied if you are. I might do that to you now which would place you in far worse estate than your poor brother is in. If you had your pistol in your hand, aimed at my heart, you would still be powerless to do me an injury, for with one glance of my eye I could force you to turn the muzzle to your own head, and with another compel you to empty its leaden load into your own brains. Your suspicions are insulting, but an insult from one of your calibre to one of mine is as the sting of a fly to the elephant; I pass it over and charge it on the bill. Ten thousand pounds for trying the case, two thousand five hundred for accepting your insult, two thousand five hundred for condoning it, and in one hour must this money be in my hands with a letter—a letter written and signed by you, expressing your satisfaction with the manner of my conducting the case, and concluding with anallusion to your surprise that my charge is so moderate."
"'And if I refuse to submit to this outrage?' queried my client, lashed into a show of courage which he really did not feel.
"'You leave this room a raving maniac, for I have the power to make you so,' I was appalled to hear myself reply."
"And do you mean to tell me," said Hopkins, his bosom heaving with indignation, "that you sat there like a zero on a pedestal, and kept silent with this blackmailing infamy going on under your very eyes?"
"I was speechless with rage," returned the spirit, "or I should have interfered. Before I could recover my composure the letter had been written and the money paid, for my client still had the sixty thousand pounds in their original form, in the one thousand pound banknotes. The struggle he went through was terrible to witness, and as the notes passed from his hands into mine he sighed like one who was heart-broken. The fiend dictated the letter commending my efforts, and expressing surprise that the amount asked for my services was so moderate, and then he opened the door and ushered the unfortunate victim out. As the latter left the room the fiend whispered to him in withering tones to bewareof his vengeance if he ever attempted to reveal what had passed since he entered the room.
"'For,' said he, 'if you are not careful, it matters not in what part of this or any other world you may be, you must forever be within my reach, and forever subject to the consequences of my resentment.'
"Then," said the spirit, "he slammed the door violently and turned and fixed my eyes upon the corner wherein I sat aghast with the mortification of having my name identified in any man's mind with such a diabolical act as that I had just witnessed.
"'Now,' he said, 'you may have this carcass of yours back and welcome. It's lucky for you I have the power I have. If I hadn't, your body would be riddled with bullets within twenty-four hours.'
"'Bah!' I replied. 'That man had no more intention of using that pistol without provocation than I have, and considering the terror with which you have managed to inspire everyone with whom you have come in contact to-day, I don't wonder he came armed.'
"'I never thought of that,' said my substitute, 'though what you say about everybody's terror is true; you might apply it even more broadly than you do, because as I drove down the Strand just now even the omnibus horsesshied, and the driver of my cab had all he could do to keep his ramshackle steed from running away. But hurry up and get ready to relieve me of this mortal incubus of yours, and take your money—it's a nice little sum, eh?'
"'Magnificent,' I returned. 'And when you and I have changed places I am going to return all but five hundred pounds to that poor fellow you have just robbed in such a conscienceless fashion.'
"The moment I said this," said the spirit, "I regretted it, for he grasped the money with my right hand, and holding it over the fire, which was blazing merrily in the grate, he said. 'My friend, I exact from you an oath that you will not return one penny of this sum to Mr. Baskins. If you refuse, I shall cast every one of these bank notes into that fire, nor shall I admit you once more to your form until the very ashes of those notes have disappeared into the air.'
"Now what could I do under the circumstances, Toppleton?" asked the spirit earnestly. "Could I do anything but swear to what he asked?"
"Yes," returned Hopkins, "you could. I don't believe so vile a creature as he could have distinguished between a bible and a city directory. I'd have taken the oath on the city directory."
"Alas!" said the spirit sadly, and with such evident sincerity that it jostled the Aunt Sallie from the chair to the floor. "As I said to you before, I am only an enduring Briton where you have the inventive genius of the Yankee. I never thought of the substitution of the directory for the bible, and the consequent elimination of moral responsibility from the oath. I simply swore as he desired me to, and in an hour I was alone in my office, the occupant of a frame so exhausted that I could scarcely lift my head, and in my pockets were those miserable bank notes, more burning to my conscience than had they been sovereign for sovereign in gold coin hot from the mint."
"Of course," suggested Hopkins, "you devoted them to the cause of charity; subscribed all but your just due to the House for Imbeciles, in which that wronged unfortunate the plaintiff was incarcerated?"
"I intended something of the sort," returned the spirit, extricating himself from the head of Aunt Sallie, and ensconcing himself on the paper-weight on Hopkins' desk. "But I didn't have time. You see, immediately after the trial a perfect avalanche of litigants from other offices slid into mine, and within a week I was so overwhelmed with business that I had to hire the rest of this floor here to find room for my papers.It was painful to me, too, to observe that those who had heard of my fame, but who had never seen me, were manifestly disappointed, when taking their departure at the close of a first interview, at having found me so much less great than they had been led to believe by the public estimate of my abilities. Nevertheless, cases of the most intricate sort were fairly dumped into my hands by the cart-load, and, worst of all, I found that eminence brought with it other responsibilities which I was ill-prepared to meet. I was constantly in receipt of requests to lecture on subjects of a variety that would have appalled the fiend himself, and worse than all I was called into consultation by the Crown in certain litigation of international importance. For a time I tried to go it alone, and by assiduous devotion to study to fit myself for the responsibilities which my fame had brought me, but it was impossible. I broke down in less than a month; but having tasted the joys of prominence I was not strong enough to resist the temptation to prolong it indefinitely, and, without thinking of the means, I committed myself to certain undertakings which were utterly beyond my intellectual strength to accomplish, and then, when brought face to face with failure and disgrace, there was but one thing left for me to do, and that I did.
"I summoned the fiend. The mere expression of a desire to see him was sufficient to bring him into my presence, and time and time again did I subject my poor body for ambition's sake to the dreadful interchange of spirits.
"From without I watched my development from mediocrity to fame with a joyous interest, not unmixed, however, with regret, for, at such moments as were permitted me to enjoy the undivided possession of myself, I could not but feel conscious of a diminution of physical strength which detracted materially from my happiness; and yet when day after day I saw my name in print, and noted that I was regarded as one of the most marvellous intellectual products of the day, I could not bring myself to the point where I could renounce everything I had gained, and withdraw to the contented life of the recluse. Let a man once taste a living immortality, Hopkins, and I care not how strong his character may be, he would part with all that he holds most dear sooner than he would renounce that.
"And so it went on for a full year. I became the leading light of the English bar; I astonished the world as a public orator; so potent were my arguments that in court or on the hustings none were able to resist me. At public dinners I was the speaker who alonecould hold the feasters when the seductions of the wine cup awaited the cessation of my eloquence. Had I been able to extend the hours of my days from twenty-four to ten times twenty-four, I could not have responded to all the calls that were made upon my time. Then as if to show the world that one profession was too small to hold the boundless qualities of my genius, I startled the English reading public with a novel, the depth and power of which stirred the soul of the mostblaséof novel-readers, and the presses of my publisher were taxed to the utmost to supply the demand for my work; then came a volume of poems which caused my name to be mentioned as a possible successor to the laureateship; then a series of essays on scientific and philosophical subjects which were nearly my undoing, since my omniscient self, as I came to call the fiend who was responsible for my greatness, was absent upon one occasion when I was called upon unexpectedly to receive a delegation of Scottish scientists, who had travelled from Edinburgh to London to consult with me in regard to certain propositions advanced in my book. What they thought of me Heaven only knows. You see, Hopkins, as far as my original self was concerned there wasn't an atom of scientific knowledge in my body, andto tell you the truth I hadn't even read my book, concerning which these unwelcome grey beards had come from Edinburgh to speak."
"I should like to have been on hand to hear you," said Hopkins with a laugh. "You must have felt like Damocles!"
"I was worse off than Damocles. He was face to face with nothing but death. I was having atête-à-têtewith dishonour. Damocles had a sword suspended over his head, held in place by a hair, I had a Krupp cannon over mine, held in place by Heaven knows what."
"How did you get out of it?" queried Hopkins. "Summon the fiend?"
"What, summon that deadly green thing before those men, and change places with him in the presence of witnesses? I fancy not. I have been a complete hall-marked fool in many respects, Hopkins, but my idiocy never went as far as that. The only thing left for me to do was to acquiesce in nine things that those fellows said, and look doubtful at the tenth and say I didn't know about that; my inherent love of compromise and my ingenuity in that direction stood me in good stead upon that occasion. It was a narrow squeak, but I got through all right. Thesavantswent back to Edinburgh somewhat disappointed, I presume, with the new sun on the scientific horizon.And you ought to have seen how the fiend laughed when I told him about it the next time I saw him! He fixed it all right, however, by sitting down and writing a letter to my late visitors and answering every one of their questions, and asking them a few additional ones, to answer which I fancy put them to their trumps.
"After making me famous as scientist, novelist and lawyer, the fiend induced a political bee to enter my cap, and one day after an absence of a week from my body, during which period of time I was utterly in the dark as to its whereabouts, I was appalled to see it reel in at the door in a maudlin state that revolted me.
"'Well,' I said as soon as I was able to speak,' what new disgrace is this you have put upon me? Am I to make my mark now as an inebriate, or is this simply a little practical joke you are putting upon my sensibilities? If it is the latter, it is a mighty poor joke.'
"'No,' returned the fiend, who I am pleased to say showed some sense of shame at the plight he had got me into this time. 'No, this is not a practical joke, nor do I wish to ruin your reputation for sobriety. I regret this apparent liquidation of your system quite as much as you do, not because I care what others say,though. It is because I find it much harder to manage your body under these present circumstances. When one leg wants to go dancing down Pall Mall, and the other evinces a strange desire to walk gravely off in the direction of Scotland Yard, it is a most difficult thing for a mind not thoroughly in sympathy with either of them to drive them down the Strand in that modest, unassuming fashion which alone enables one to avoid police supervision. I've had the devil's own time with this weak corse of yours, and if I had known how abominably light-headed and airy-legged a little strong drink made you, I never should have had you stand for Parliament—'
"'Stand for Parliament?' I cried, aghast at the new honour which was being thrust upon me. 'Have I been standing for Parliament?'
"'Well, not exactly' laughed the fiend. 'You've been sort of held up for Parliament; you haven't been able to stand up without wobbling for five days; in fact, not since you tried to do your duty by your constituency, and take a little something at your own expense with a few rounds of doubtful voters. You were nearly defeated, my boy, because of your disgusting inability to cope with the flowing bowl, but I managed to pull you through. The temperance people voted to a man against you,but the other interests stood by you pretty well, and you now represent your old neighbours in—'
"'My old neighbours,' I moaned. 'Have I been made to appear to my old neighbours in the light of a dissipated politician when all my life long I had been known to them as a sober—'
"'Don't dwell on that point, my good fellow,' interrupted the fiend. 'Forget it. In forgetfulness of what you have been, and in consideration of what you have become, lies happiness. By the way—have you a mother living?'
"'Yes,' I answered, numb with anxiety for fear of what was coming. 'You haven't disgraced me in her eyes, have you?'
"'Oh, no,' returned the fiend. 'But a lady claiming to be your mother visited me during the campaign, and was very indignant because I failed to recognize her—that cost you some votes, but not enough to change the result. She didn't look a bit like you, and I was afraid the opposition was putting up some game on us, so I just laughed her off.'
"'You—you laughed her off—you mean to tell me,' I stammered, 'that when my mother came to my political headquarters to see her son, he refused to recognize her, and laughed her off?'
"'Oh, come,' said the fiend indignantly, 'don't get angry. Remember one thing, please. You are now a member of Parliament, a great Lawyer, a famous Scientist, a Novelist and an Orator. It is I who have made you so. If you don't like what I've done, we'll call the arrangement off, and you can make a spectacle of yourself in the eyes of the world. I hate an ingrate. You couldn't expect me to know a lady whom I never even saw before, and when I have a big scheme on foot I do not intend to have it spoiled for want of caution. If I made you seem an undutiful son, I am sorry for it, and will strive to make amends next time I meet your mother. I'll write a formal apology if you desire, but I don't wish to hear any more of your sentimental nonsense. Much has to be sacrificed in achieving greatness, and you have got therewith just about as little personal inconvenience as any man in history. Stop your snivelling, or I'll desert your cause, and what that means even you can grasp.'
"With these words," concluded the spirit, "he departed, and left me to sleep off the effects of a seven days' campaign in which my moral welfare had been sacrificed to the thirst of at least four hundred doubtful voters. Credited with a seat in Parliament, I found my name debited with the crime of intemperance, lackof self-respect, and a gross affront to my own mother; a fine record for one week in which in my own consciousness I was unable to recollect doing anything that could not have been done with propriety by a candidate for canonization."
"Humph!" ejaculated Toppleton, deeply moved by the horror of the weary spirit's story. "It strikes me that canonization in the form in which it was used on the Sepoys in '57 would be mild punishment for that Nile-green brute that got you into this. To tell you the truth, Sallie, the fearful justice of your cause is almost enough to make me withdraw entirely. I should hate to be called upon to prosecute a defendant of the nature of your verdant visitor."
THE CROWNING ACT OF INFAMY.
"Hearme to the end, Hopkins, I beseech you," said the exile earnestly. "Of course the fiend strikes you as a being to be avoided, but I do not believe that he is now as powerful and as terrible as he was in the days gone by. Long confinement to a purely mortal sphere must necessarily have weakened his supernatural powers, and it strikes me that properly managed by a young and aggressive lawyer, our case against him would be won in an instant. At all events, do not compel me to leave my story unfinished. I am sure that when you hear of the crowning act of infamy of which my evil genius was guilty, you will not hesitate a moment in making up your mind that duty summons you to aid me."
"Very well," rejoined Hopkins. "Go on with the tale, only do not be too sanguine as to its results in convincing me that I am the man to extricate you from this horrid plight."
"After I had attended one or two meetings of the House of Commons," said the exile, resuming the thread of his story, "I enjoyed the experience so much that I almost forgave the fiend for having so nearly ruined me with all my old friends; and having written, in accordance with his promise, a truly beautiful letter to my mother, explaining away the harsh treatment she had suffered at the hands of her now illustrious son on the ground of his not being quite himself on that occasion—a state of mind due to too close attention to work and study—I quite forgave him for that unpleasant episode in my campaign. My mother too overlooked the affront, and wrote me a most affectionate epistle, stating that I might trample upon her most cherished ideals with her entire acquiescence if my taking that course would ensure to her the receipt of so loving and touching a letter as the one I had sent her. The fiend and I both had to smile, on receiving my mother's note, to observe that the dear old lady attributed my ability to express myself in such beautiful terms to the poetic traits I had inherited from her.
"'She's very proud of her dear boy,' sneered the fiend.
"'In spite of his brutality at the committee-room,' I retorted; and then we both grinned,for each truly believed that he had got the better of the other."
"It was a pretty close contest," said Hopkins. "But on the whole the laugh seems to be on you."
"It certainly was the first time I tried to speak in Parliament," returned the spirit. "Such a failure was never seen. I was to take part in a very important debate, and when the hour came for me to get on my feet and talk, I was my weak-kneed self and utterly unacquainted even with the side I was expected to take. The fiend had promised to do all the talking, and on this occasion failed to materialize. I spoke for ten minutes in an incoherent fashion, mouthing my words so that no one could understand a syllable that I uttered. It was a fearful disappointment to my friends in the House and in the galleries; the latter being packed when it was understood that I was to speak. Of course, when the fiend appeared later on, he straightened it all out, and the printed speech which he dictated and which I wrote was really a fine effort and did our party much good. But these little embarrassments were tragedies to me, and at every new success I quailed before the possibilities of disastrous failure at the next effort. In but one respect was I entirely free from the fiendish influence, and that was in the matterof my love. From that phase of my life the fiend kept himself apart, and it was the only joyous oasis to be found in the boundless desert of my misery. To the fiend, Sunday was literally a day of rest, for upon that day he never approached me, and I devoted it to calling upon the woman I loved.
"She was a beautiful woman, the only daughter of a retired city merchant, and fond of the admiration of successful men. That she loved me before I attained to eminence in the various professions in which the fiend had compelled me to dabble, I had much reason to believe; but I had never ventured to make love to her in dead earnest, because I feared for the result. She had often said to me that while she should never marry for riches and position, she did not intend to fall in love with any man just because he had neither, and that no man need ever propose marriage to her who was not reasonably sure of a successful career. It was not selfishness that led her to think and speak in this manner, but a realizing sense of the unhappy fact that mediocrity married is as hopeless as a broken-winded race-horse in harness. There is plenty of ambition but no future, and as she often said, 'Where hopelessness comes, happiness dwelleth not!'"
"A daughter of Solomon, I wot," interrupted Toppleton.
"Yes," said the spirit, with a sigh for her he had lost, "and rather superior to the old gentleman in a great many ways. Of course I understood, and, lacking achievement in my profession, discreetly held my tongue on the subject of matrimony, taking good care, however, when I called never to let any other fellow outstay me, unless perchance he was some poor drivelling idiot from whose immediate present the laurel was further removed than from my own. She understood me, I think, though I never put that point to a practical test by a proposal of marriage. This was the state of affairs at the time of my first meeting with the fiend, and for a year subsequent to that ill-starred night upon which he first crossed my path I let matters take their own course, waiting a favourable opportunity to ask the great question, upon the answer to which hung all my future happiness. I could see that with my increasing fame, her interest in me waxed; but as every passing day brought new and undreamed-of distinctions she grew more and more reserved toward me—a most feminine trait that, Hopkins. When a woman begins to love a man in dead earnest, in nine cases out of ten she will make him feel that he is utterlyabhorrent to her, and it's a good thing she does, because it makes him look carefully into his own character in an endeavour to discover and to root out all the undesirable features thereof. It is this that enables love to redeem men whom the world considers irredeemable, so, of course, I had no feeling of discouragement at her growing coldness, for, understanding women, I knew exactly what it meant. I think I was more or less of an enigma to her."
"I should think it likely," said Toppleton. "If she really knew you, she must have been mightily surprised at your sudden strides towards universal genius. It's a wonder to me that she did not suspect the enigma, and give it up."
"Yes," returned the spirit. "It was very embarrassing to me when she expressed her surprise at my progress, and asked me how I did it, and other questions equally hard to answer. And then her father, who was always more or less insufferable, now became absolutely insulting—that is, his new found appreciation of my virtues led him into making assertions which galled me, he little knew how much—assertions to the effect that to look at me no one would suspect that I had more than ordinary intelligence; that to hear me talk one would never suppose I could make a speech of any kind,much less set the world on fire by my eloquence; and finally, that no man after this could tell him that it was possible to judge of the future by the past, or the past by the present, for he had always thought me foredoomed to failure, and I had achieved success, and, having achieved success, gave no present evidence that I deserved it."
"He had the making of the accepted mother-in-law in him," said Hopkins. "What could have induced you to fall in love with the daughter of a man like that?"
"She was a superb woman, that's what," rejoined the spirit with enthusiasm, "and when I think of the happiness that the Nile-green shade first placed within my reach and then snatched from me, I regret that the soul is immortal, and that I am not all-powerful, for it would please me to grind his soul into absolute nothingness.
"It was at least a year and two months subsequent to my first meeting with him," continued the spirit as soon as his overwrought feelings would permit, "that he first broached the subject of matrimony. He had attended a grand ball at the house of the Earl of Piccadilly and was the lion of the occasion owing to his stand in certain recent Parliamentary crises. His readiness in debate had gained him a highposition, and his natural grace of manner—that is,mynatural grace of manner—had helped him to a hold on the affections of those with whom he was associated, for, as he grew more accustomed to my figure and got his angles comfortably rounded off to fit my curves, he managed to subdue that horrible aspect he had assumed with such fearful effect in the trial of Baskinsv.Baskins, and when geniality was the attribute most likely to help him on he was geniality personified. The ball was ostensibly one of the Earl of Piccadilly's usual series of annual functions, but in reality it was given for the purpose of introducing me into society. From all accounts, it was a grand affair, and I seemed to have made as fine an impression as a social debutant as I had in the law courts, in the field of literature, and in the House of Commons. If the fiend spoke truly that night, when he returned and handed my fatigued body over to me for a rest, I made a marked success; all the ladies were raving about me; I was a divine dancer, though before that night my feet had never tripped to the strains of a waltz, polka, or any other terpsichorean exercise. I pleased the dowagers as well as the maids, and had, in short, become an eligible—that is I had become as desirable a matrimonialpartias an untitled person could hope to be, and the fiend remarkedwith a sly wink that it was not beyond the range of possibilities that the Premier would bestow upon me one of the peerages at his disposal when the proper time came.
"'Bachelorhood is pardonable in a young man,' said my evil genius upon this occasion, 'but we must marry if we are to reach the pinnacle of success. There is a solidity about the married man's estate that bachelorhood lacks, and I rather think I can make a match that will push us ahead.'
"'I don't think I need your assistance,' I replied. 'In fact I prefer that some of the things which pertain to myself shall be left entirely in my own hands. In matters of the affections I can take care of myself.'
"'Very well,' was the fiend's response. 'Have your own way about it, only take my advice and get married. We need a wife.'
"'We?' I cried. 'We! I just want you to understand, my dear sir, that the pronoun doesn't fit the case.Imay need a wife andyoumay need a wife, but if you think I'm going into any co-operative scheme with you in that matter you are less omniscient than usual. Remember that please and let us have nothing more to say on the subject.'"
"That was a very proper stand for you to take," said Hopkins, gravely. "Though I thinkthat, under the circumstances, you should have given up all ideas of marriage. No woman would have you, knowing that you were not yourself at times; and then having as little control over your other self as you seem to have had, you would often have found yourself in hot water for flirting with other women, when, in reality, your own self was as innocent as a mountain daisy."
"I know I did wrong in thinking of marriage, Hopkins," returned the spirit, "but if you had ever met the woman I loved, you would have loved her too—yes, even if you were a confirmed celibate. I don't believe a Cardinal, sir, would have hesitated between his hat and her. My sole justification was her loveliness, and then the fiend's ready acquiescence in my statement that in that matter he must hold aloof gave me confidence that I might safely take the step I had so long and so ardently desired to take.
"Weeks passed by, and in everything save the courtship of Miss Hicksworthy-Johnstone I gave myself unreservedly over to the fiend, who began suddenly to take an interest in my personal appearance which he had never before manifested. He laid in a fine supply of clothes—dress suits, walking suits, lounging suits—suits in fact of every description and of the finest texture. Shirts and collars, and tiesof the choicest sort were imported by him from Paris, and on my hands I now observed he was beginning to wear kid gloves of fashionable type. His hats and shoes were distinctly in the mode, and his jewelry, as far as it went, was of unexceptionable taste and quiet elegance. In fact, Toppleton, I began to be something of a dandy. This I attributed to the natural vanity of my other self. I, too, was proud of that graceful form, but I never thought enough about it to go about arraying it in a fashion which neither Solomon nor the lily of the field could ever have approached. I cared nothing for gloves save as a means to a warm finger's end, and it made no difference to me whether my hat was of the style of '48, or plucked fresh from the French Emperor's own block. As long as my head was covered I was satisfied. Patent leather shoes I could never bring myself to buy, because they had always seemed to me to go hand in hand either with poverty or laziness. To a man who cannot afford shoe blacking or who is too lazy to black his own boots, patent leathers, I thought, were a boon; but I never classed myself under either head, and wore the regular foot gear of the plain but honest son of toil.
"But now all was changed. My other self was vain, and unexpectedly gave himself overto dandyism. At first he rather disturbed my equanimity by wearing somewhat loud patterns, but he soon got over that, and between us, after a very little while, two or three months perhaps, my body had the best clothes there were to be had in all London. I had not realized all this time that I was fast becoming a millionaire, and when my tailor's bill for fifteen hundred pounds came home one night I was in a great stew, but the fiend came in and relieved my conscience very much by showing me my balance in the bank. It amounted, Toppleton, to one hundred and seventy-five thousand pounds, with an income still running evenly along from my law practice of ten thousand pounds per annum, not to mention the revenues from my books, which in six months had amounted to two thousand pounds. I was a rich man, and when I observed that this was my condition, I made up my mind to ask Miss Hicksworthy-Johnstone's hand in marriage the very next time I saw her. I hoped this would be soon, but, alas for human expectations, it was not. The Christmas holidays were about to begin, and I bethought me that at the season of goodwill toward men I might ask the possessor of my heart to accept it as a permanent gift, a decision which I unfortunately kept to myself, for from one end of theholidays to the other I never laid eyes upon my mortal habitation. The fiend was off with it for one whole month, Hopkins."
"Didn't you know where?" asked Toppleton.
"I did not," returned the spirit. "He went off with it as usual one night late in November to attend a meeting of the leaders of our party, telling me not to worry if he did not return for twenty-four hours, since there was important business on hand. What the business was he did not inform me, nor did I seek to know it, since under our arrangement it was not necessary that I should familiarize myself with parliamentary matters, which were usually as dry as they were weighty anyhow, and hence distasteful to me.
"Well, I waited twenty-four hours and no fiend appeared. Another day passed with no sign of him. A third day moved into the calendar of the past; a week elapsed, then a second, a third, a fourth, and finally a month had gone. I was growing sick with apprehension. What if something dreadful had happened and my lovely, only body was lying dead somewhere, too shattered for the fiend to remain longer within it, and gone for ever from me? What if the present occupant of my corse had again yielded to the seductiveinfluence of the cup, and was off somewhere upon a prolonged spree? I floated uneasily in and about my quarters here, sleepless, worried to distraction. I searched my papers, as best I could without hands, to see if there was not some clue as to my whereabouts among them, and found none. I went through the contents of the waste basket even, and found nothing to relieve my dreadful anxiety, and then I went to the wardrobe to search the pockets of my clothes for possible evidence to calm my agitated soul.
"Toppleton, there was not one vestige of a garment in that clothes press from top to bottom. Not a shoe, not a coat, absolutely nothing. It was bare even as Mother Hubbard's cupboard was bare. This was an additional shock, and I became giddy with fear. I floated madly across to the bureau and peered into the drawers thereof. Beyond the ties I had formerly worn and the collars, frayed at the edges, of my negligée days, nothing remained, and then for the first time I noticed that my trunk was gone from the room.
"'What can it mean?' I asked myself, though I might as well have spared the question, for it was one I could not answer. Days came and went, leaving me still pondering. Christmas Eve came and found me here mopingin a cheerless apartment, friendless, forlorn, clothesless and bodiless—a fine way to pass what should have been the happiest night of the year."
"Elegant!" said Toppleton. "It might have been worse though. If you had had your body and still been clothesless you would have found it rather cold, I fancy."
"I had almost given up all hope of ever seeing myself again," continued the exile, ignoring Hopkins' interruption, "when on the evening of January second I heard a step coming along the hall which I at once recognized as my own, my latch-key was inserted in the lock and the door was opened, and at last I stood before myself again, the picture of health and happiness.
"'Are you there?' my lips said with a broad smile, as my body entered the room.
"'I am,' I replied shortly; 'and I've been here, Heaven knows how long, worried sick to know what had become of you. I don't think you are the most considerate fiend in the world to take me off for weeks without letting me know anything of my whereabouts.'
"'I am very sorry,' said the fiend, throwing himself down on the lounge. 'I meant to have told you, but you were not here when I returned. Lord Smitherton invited me out to his houseat Snorley Farms for the Christmas holidays along with the Earl of Pupley, General Carlingberry-Jimpson, and a half-dozen members of the Birmingham Society of Fine Arts. It was an invitation I could not well refuse, and, besides, our carcass here was beginning to feel the need of an outing, so I accepted. I came back here to tell you about it, but you must have been floating about somewhere else. At all events, you are much better for the outing, and your purely mortal self has had a good time. And, by the way, I want to warn you about one point. When you are the occupant of this corse, I think you would better not walk down Rotten Row, or go anywhere in fact where I am accustomed to going, because you don't know my friends any more than I know yours, and that is apt to lead to misunderstanding. Lady Romaine Cushing, who was visiting Lady Smitherton, told me that I had cut her dead in the Row one afternoon, although she had stopped her carriage particularly to speak to me. It was you who cut her, but, of course, you were not to blame, because you never saw Lady Romaine Cushing; but it is hard to explain away little matters of that sort, and I had the deuce of a time getting her to believe that her eye must have deceived her. We can't afford to offend our friends of the fairsex, you know; they can make or mar a man these days.'
"'And I am to be kept away from the haunts of polite society,' I said, with some natural indignation, 'just because it embarrassesyouto explain why I don't bow to people I don't know.'
"'But it's all for your good,' he replied. 'You seem to forget that I am actuated entirely by the best of motives.'
"'No doubt,' I said, 'but I think it's rather hard on me to be excluded from the most attractive quarter of London.'
"'You are not excluded. You can walk there if you choose at night or very early in the morning, or when Society is out of town, or, better still, you can float there in your invisible state at anytime. In fact,' added the fiend, 'it would be very enjoyable for you, I should think, to do that last. You can poise yourself over a tree for instance, and watch yourself hobnobbing with the illustrious. You can sit in your invisibility in any one of the carriages that roll to and fro, and, as long as you do not obtrude yourself on the occupants, there is not an equipage in London, high or low, in which you cannot ride. You are better off than I am in that respect. While I have no particular shape I am visible like a bit of sea-fog, but you beinginvisible can go anywhere without making trouble. The theatres are open to you free of charge. The best seats are at your disposal. If you choose to do it you could even sit on the throne of England, and nobody would be the wiser.'
"'That's all very well,' I said; 'but I don't care to travel about in that impersonal fashion. I prefer the incarnate manner of doing things, and if you will kindly permit me to assume bodily form once more, I'll be very much obliged.'
"'Certainly!' he replied, and with that we changed places.
"The sensation of getting back to my accustomed figure once more was delightful, and there was no denying the fact that I was better off for the outing I had so unceremoniously taken. My step was elastic, my head felt clear as a bell, and, altogether, I had never before enjoyed the consciousness of so great a physical strength as now was mine.
"This feeling gave me courage to do many things which I had hitherto put off, and among them was the making of a proposal of marriage to the admired Miss Hicksworthy-Johnstone. It was seven o'clock when the fiend had left me to the personal enjoyment of my complete self, and at eight o'clock I was in a hansom cabspeeding out to the dwelling-place of the woman I loved. At eight thirty I was on my knees before her, and by eleven o'clock I was her accepted suitor. Such happiness as was mine, Hopkins, no man ever knew. The only trouble known to my soul at the moment was the consciousness that Arabella, as I was now permitted to call Miss Hicksworthy-Johnstone, was in the dark as to the methods by which my greatness had been achieved. I could not confess my dreadful secret to her, for that would have put an end entirely to our relations, and I loved her so that I could not bring myself to give her up. She asked me numberless questions of a most embarrassing sort, as if she suspected there was something wrong, but I managed in some way, I know not how, to give a plausible answer to every one of them."
"Possibly the fiend left a little of his brain in your head when he got out," suggested Toppleton.
"Perhaps so," returned the exile. "However it was, I managed to make out a satisfactory case for myself, and at the close of a cross-examination such as no man ever went through before, lasting two and a half hours, Arabella threw herself into my arms and called me by my first name. She was mine, and all the world seemed bright.
"I walked home," continued the spirit, "and in a condition of ecstasy that almost compensates for all I have suffered since. My feet seemed hardly to touch the ground, and I whistled from the time I left Arabella until I entered my room here,—a reprehensible habit, perhaps, but one which had always been my method of expressing satisfaction with the world. As I entered this room I was brought down from my ecstatic heights to an appreciation of my actual state, for the first thing to greet my eyes was the fiend, greener than ever, sitting by the fire ruminating apparently, for it was at least five minutes before he took note of my presence, although I addressed him politely as soon as I saw him.
"'Hallo,' he said finally. 'Where have you been?'
"The question was as unexpected as it was natural, and I was unprepared for it, so I made no reply, covering my silence by taking off my shoes and preparing for bed.
"'Where have you been?' he asked again, this time in a tone so peremptory that I decided in an instant not to tell him.
"'Out,' I answered. 'Where have you?'
"At this he laughed.
"'Don't be impudent,' he said. 'I do not wish to pry into your affairs. I only wanted toknow where you had been because I am interested in you, and I want to help you to avoid pitfalls.'
"'That's all right,' I responded graciously. 'I appreciate your kindness, but you need not be interested in where I have been to-night, because I have been engaged in a little matter that concerns you not at all.'
"'Very well,' he replied, turning once more to the fire. 'I'll take your word for it; only you and I must be perfectly candid with each other, or complications may arise, that's all. By the way, I'll have to borrow you again to-morrow morning. There are a half-dozen members of Parliament coming here to discuss certain matters of state, and you would be somewhat embarrassed if you undertook to meet them.'
"'That suits me,' I said, happy enough to acquiesce in anything. 'Only I'll want to get back here to-morrow evening. I have an engagement.'
"The fiend eyed me narrowly for a moment, and I winced beneath his gaze.
"'All right,' he said, 'you can get back, but this Parliamentary business is very important, and Imusthave the semblance of a mortal being every morning this week.'
"'That can be arranged,' I replied. Arabellacould have my evenings, and he could have my mornings. That was fair enough, I thought, and so it happened. Every night for a week I spent in the company of myfiancée,—whose name, by the way, I never mentioned in the fiend's presence—and every morning for the same period he was in charge, conducting negotiations which only served to make me more famous.
"Finally the dreadful morning came. It was Saturday, and the fiend and I were sitting together in my quarters. We had just changed places. I was in my present disembodied state, and the fiend had taken possession for the day, when there was heard in the corridor a quick nervous step which stopped as he who directed it came to my door, and a voice, which to my consternation I recognized at once as that of Arabella's father following close upon a resounding knock, cried out,—
"'This is the place. This is the kennel in which the hound lives. Open the door!'
"There was not time for the fiend and me to change places. Indeed, I had hardly recognized the old gentleman's voice, when the fiend in answer to his demand opened the door.
"A madder man than my prospective father-in-law appeared to be I never saw, Hopkins," said the spirit, his voice tremblingwith emotion. "He was livid, and when the door opened, and he saw the man he supposed to be me standing before him showing absolutely no signs of recognition, he fairly foamed at the mouth.