MS

 

"As a reward for his daring he was flung from the roof of the palace and dashed to death on the stones of the courtyard. Now you can understand why it was that the spinning nose dive wakened old memories--he had plunged to his death before; you can also see why he felt `as if his tummy had dropped out' when he saw the pictures of Egypt, for it was in an Egyptian existence that all this took place. There are a great many people alive at the present time who have had an Egyptian past; we seem to be running into a cycle of them.

 

"You can also see the reason of Black's love of speed; it waked dim memories of his last contact with the soul he was seeking. If he could retrace his steps to the point where he swooped into space he would be able to pick up the trail of the woman of his desire. He was prompted to reproduce as nearly as possible the conditions in which he had last known her.

 

"As I have already told you, the memories woke, and Black set forth on his quest for the woman he had been mated with life after life, and having seen in the occult records their repeated union, I knew it was only a matter of time till they came together, and I sincerely hoped that she, too, would remember the past and be free to marry him. If she had not, we should have had, as I warned you, a very nasty mess. These spiritual ties are the devil.

 

"Now, I expect you wonder what chance it was that brought Elaine Tyndall to me. I knew, as I told you, that sooner or later their paths would meet. Well, I placed myself mentally at the point of their meeting; consequently as time drew near, they converged upon me, and it was my privilege to steer them to harbour."

 

"But what about Miss Tyndall and her delusions?" I inquired.

 

"It looked to you like a commonplace case of old maid's insanity, didn't it?" said Taverner. "But the girl's self-possession and absence of fear led me to suspect something more; she was so very definite and impersonal in her attitude towards her delusions. So I arranged for her to come down to Hindhead and let me try whether or not I could see what she saw.

 

"What we saw you yourself know; it was Black shaken out of his body by the shock of the accident and drawn to her by the intensity of his longing, not at all an uncommon phenomenon; I have often seen it."

 

"How did you manage to get Black to re-enter his body, provided he had ever been out of it?"

 

"When Elaine touched his body, the soul of Black realized that it could meet her in the flesh, and so sought to re-enter its own body, but the vitality was so low it could not manage it. If the girl had not held him in her arms as she did, he would have died, but he lived on her vitality till he was able to build up his own."

 

"I can see the psychological end of it," I said, "but how do you account for the chances that brought them together? Why should Miss Tyndall have become restless and made for the Portsmouth road, timing her arrival to fit in with Black's passing?"

 

Taverner looked up at the stars that were just beginning to show in the darkening sky.

 

"Ask Them," he said. "The ancients knew what they were about when they cast horoscopes."

 

**********************************

 

The Soul that would Not be Born

 

 

 

Contrary to his usual custom, Taverner did not insist on seeing his patient alone, for the sufficient reason that no information could be extracted from her. It was to the mother, a Mrs. Cailey, we turned for the case history, and she, poor anxious woman, gave us such scanty details as an onlooker might observe; but of the viewpoint and feelings of the patient we learnt nothing, for there was nothing to learn.

 

She sat before us in the big leather armchair; her body was a tenement for the soul of a princess, but it was, alas, untenanted. The fine dark eyes, utterly expressionless, looked into space while we discussed her as if she had been an inanimate object, which practically she was.

 

"She was never like ordinary children," said the mother. "When they put her in my arms after she was born she looked up at me with the most extraordinary expression in her eyes; they were not a baby's eyes at all, Doctor, they were the eyes of a woman, and an experienced woman too. She didn't cry, she never made a sound, but she looked as if she had all the troubles of the world upon her shoulders. That baby's face was a tragedy; perhaps she knew what was coming."

 

"Perhaps she did," said Taverner.

 

"In a few hours, however," continued the mother, "she looked quite like an ordinary baby, but from that time to this she has never changed, except in her body."

 

We looked at the girl in the chair, and she gazed back at us with the unblinking stolidity of a very young infant.

 

"We have taken her to everybody we could hear of, but

 

they all say the same--that it is a hopeless case of mental deficiency; but when we heard of you, we thought you might say something different. We knew that your methods were not like those of most doctors. It does seem strange that it should be impossible to do anything for her. We passed some children playing in the street as we came here in the car--bonny, bright little things, but in such rags and dirt. Why is it that those, whose mothers can do so little for them, should be so splendid, and Mona, for whom we would do anything, should be--as she is?"

 

The poor woman's eyes filled with tears, and neither Taverner nor I could reply.

 

"I will take her down to my nursing home and keep her under observation for a time, if you wish," said Taverner. "If the brain is at fault, I can do nothing, but if it is the mind itself that has failed to develop I might attempt the cure. These deficiency cases are so inaccessible--it is like ringing up on the telephone when the subscriber will not answer. If one could attract her attention, something might be done; the crux of the matter lies in the establishment of communications."

 

When they had gone, I turned to Taverner and said:

 

"What hope have you in dealing with a case like that?"

 

"I cannot tell you just yet," he replied; "I shall have to find out what her previous incarnations have been. I invariably find that congenital troubles originate in a former life. Then I shall have to work out her horoscope and see whether the conditions are ripe for the paying off of whatever debt she may have incurred in a previous life. Do you still think I am a queer sort of charlatan, or are you beginning to get used to my ways?"

 

"I have long ceased to be astonished at anything," I replied. "I should accept the devil, horns, hoofs and tail, if you undertook to prescribe for him."

 

Taverner chuckled.

 

"With regard to our present case, I am of the opinion that we shall find the law of reincarnation is the one we

 

shall have to look to. Now tell me this Rhodes--supposing reincarnation is not a fact, supposing this life is the beginning and end of our existence and at its conclusion we proceed to flames or harps according to the use we have made of it, how do you account for Mona Cailey's condition? What did she do in the few hours between her birth and the onset of her disease to bring down such a judgement on herself? And at the end of her life, can she justly be said to have deserved hell or earned Heaven?"

 

"I don't know," said I.

 

"But supposing my theory is right; then, if we can recover the record of her past, we shall be able to find the cause of her present condition, and having found the cause we may be able to remedy it. At any rate, let us try.

 

"Would you like to see how I recover the records? I use various methods; sometimes I get them by hypnotizing the patients or by crystal-gazing, and sometimes I read them from the subconscious mind of Nature. You know, we believe that every thought and impulse in the world is recorded in the Akashic Records. It is like consulting a reference library. I am going to use the latter method in the present case."

 

In a few moments, by methods known to himself, Taverner had shut out all outward impressions from his mind, and was concentrated upon the inner vision.

 

Confused mental pictures evidently danced before his eyes; then he got the focus and began to describe what he saw while I took down notes.

 

Egyptian and Grecian lives were dismissed with a few words; these were not what he sought; he was merely working his way down through the ages, but I gathered that we were dealing with a soul of ancient lineage and great opportunities. Life after life we heard the tale of royal birth or initiation into the priesthood, and yet, in its present life, the girl's soul was cut off from all communication with its physical vehicle. I wondered what abuse of opportunity had led to such a sentence of solitary confinement in the cell of its body.

 

Then we came to the level we sought, Italy in the fifteenth century, as it turned out. "Daughter of the reigning duke--." I could not catch the name of his principality. "Her younger sister was beloved by Giovanni Sigmundi; she contrived to win the affections of her sister's lover, and then, a richer suitor offering for her own hand, she betrayed Sigmundi to his enemies in order to be free of his importunities."

 

"A true daughter of the Renaissance," said Taverner when he had returned to normal consciousness and read my notes, for he seldom retained any memory of what transpired during his subconscious states. "Now I think we can guess the cause of the trouble. I wonder whether you are aware of the mental processes that precede birth? Just before birth the soul sees a cinematograph film (as it were) of its future life; not all the details, but the broad outlines which are determined by its fate; these things it cannot alter, but according to its reaction to them, so will its future lives be planned. Thus it is that although we cannot alter our fate in this life, our future lies entirely in our own hands.

 

"Now we know the record, we can guess what manner of fate lies upon this girl. She owes a life debt to a man and a woman; the suffering she caused recoils upon her. There is no need for a specialized hell; each soul builds its own."

 

"But she is not suffering," I said; "she is merely in a passive condition. The only one who suffers is the mother."

 

"Ah," said Taverner, "therein lies the crux of the whole matter. When she had that brief glimpse of what lay before her, she rebelled against her fate and tried to repudiate her debt; her soul refused to take up the heavy burden. It was this momentary flash of knowledge which gave her eyes their strange, unchildlike look which so startled her mother."

 

"Do people always have this foreknowledge?" I asked.

 

"They always have that glimpse, but its memory usually

 

lies dormant. Some people have vague premonitions, however, and occult training tends to recover these lost memories, together with others belonging to previous lives."

 

"Having found out the cause of Miss Cailey's trouble, what can you do to cure her?"

 

"Very little," said Taverner. "I can only wait and watch her. When the time is ripe for the settlement of the balance, the other actors in the old tragedy will come along and unconsciously claim the payment of their debt. She will be given the opportunity of making restitution and going on her way fate-free. If she is unable to fulfil it, then she will be taken out of life and rapidly forced back into it again for another attempt, but I think (since she has been brought to me) her soul is to be given another chance of entering its body. We will see."

 

I often used to watch Mona Cailey after she was installed at the Hindhead nursing home. In spite of its masklike expressionlessness, her face had character. The clearly cut features, firm mouth, and fine eyes were fitting abode for a soul of no ordinary calibre--only that soul was not present.

 

It was Taverner's expectation that the other actors in the drama would appear upon the scene before very long, brought to the girl's vicinity by those strange currents that are for ever on the move beneath the surface of life. As each new patient arrived at the nursing home, I used to watch Mona Cailey narrowly, wondering whether the newcomer would demand of her the payment of the ancient debt that held her bound.

 

Spring passed into summer and nothing happened. Other cases distracted my attention, and I had almost forgotten the girl and her problems when Taverner reminded me of them.

 

"It is time we began to watch Miss Cailey," he said. "I have been working out her horoscope, and a conjunction of planets is taking place towards the end of the month which would provide an opportunity for the working out

 

of her fate--if we can get her to take it."

 

"Supposing she does not take it?"

 

"Then she will not be long in going out, for she will have failed to achieve the purpose of this incarnation."

 

"And supposing she takes it?"

 

"Then she will suffer, but she will be free, and she will soon rise again to the heights she had previously gained."

 

"She is hardly likely to belong to a royal house in this life," I said.

 

"She was more than royal; she was an Initiate," replied Taverner, and from the way he said the word I knew he spoke of a royalty that is not of this earth.

 

Our words were suddenly interrupted by a cry from one of the upper rooms. It was a shriek of utter terror such as a soul might give that had looked into chaos and seen forbidden horrors; it was the cry of a child in nightmare, only--and this added to its ghastliness--it came from the throat of a man.

 

We rushed upstairs; we had no need to ask whence that cry came; there was only one case that could have uttered it--a poor fellow suffering from shell-shock whom we were keeping in bed for a rest.

 

We found him standing in the middle of the floor, shaking from head to foot. At sight of us he rushed across and flung himself into Taverner's arms. It was the pathetic action of a frightened child, but carried out by the tall figure in striped pyjamas, it was extraordinarily distressing to witness.

 

Taverner soothed him as gently as a mother, and got him back to bed, sitting by him until he quieted down.

 

"I do not think we will keep him in bed any longer," said my colleague after we had left the room. "The inactivity is making him brood, and he is living over again the scenes of the trenches."

 

Accordingly, Howson appeared among the patients next day for the first time since his arrival, and seemed to benefit by the change.

 

ours, until my colleague put his hand on my shoulder one evening as the two were crossing the lawn towards the house.

 

"Who is that with Mona Cailey?" he asked.

 

"Howson, of course," I replied, surprised at the obviousness of such a question.

 

"So we call him now," said Taverner, watching the pair closely, "but I think there was a time when he answered to the name of Giovanni Sigmundi."

 

"You mean--?" I exclaimed.

 

"Exactly," said Taverner. "The wheel has come round the full circle. When he was dying by torture in the hands of those to whom she betrayed him, he called for her in his agony. Needless to say, she did not come. Now that he is in agony again, some strange law of mental habit carried the call for help along the old channels, and she has answered it. She has begun to repay her debt. If all goes well, we may see that soul come right back into its body, and it will not be a small soul that comes into the flesh if that happens."

 

I had thought that we were going to witness a romance of reunited lovers, but I was soon made aware that it was more likely to be a tragedy for one at least of them.

 

Next day Howson's fiancee arrived to visit him. I took her out to the secluded part of the garden where he spent his time, and there saw enacted a most pathetic little tragicomedy. As usual, Howson was at Mona Cailey's side, smoking his interminable cigarettes. At sight of his fiancee he sprang to his feet; Mona Cailey also rose. In the eyes of the newcomer there were fear and distrust, perhaps occasioned by her unfamiliarity with mental cases, which are always distressing at first sight, but in the eyes of our defective there was a look which I can only describe as contempt. There was one flash of the astute ruthlessness of the fifteenth century Italian, and I guessed who the newcomer was.

 

Howson, forgetful of the other girl's presence, advanced

 

eagerly to meet his fiancee and kissed her, and I thought for a moment we were going to be treated to one of those nasty outbursts of spitefulness of which defectives are capable, when a sudden change came over Mona Cailey, and I saw that marvellous thing, a soul enter and take possession of its body.

 

Intelligence slowly dawned in the misty eyes as she watched the scene being enacted before her. For a moment the issue hung in the balance; would she rush forward and tear them apart, or would she stand aside? Behind the oblivious lovers I poised myself for a spring, ready to catch her if necessary. For ages we waited thus while the unpracticed brain moved reluctantly in its unaccustomed effort.

 

Then the girl turned away slowly. Over the grass she moved, silently, unnoticed by the other two, seeking the shelter of the shrubberies as a wounded animal seeks cover, but her movements were no longer those of unguided limbs; she moved as a woman moves who has walked before kings, but as a woman stricken to the heart.

 

I followed her as she passed under the trees and put my hand on her arm, instinctively speaking words of comfort, although I expected no response. She turned on me dark eyes full of unshed tears and luminous with a terrible knowledge.

 

"It has to be," she said distinctly, perfectly, the first words she had ever uttered. Then she withdrew her arm from my hand and went on alone.

 

During the days that followed we watched the soul swing in and out of the body. Sometimes we had the mindless imbecile, and sometimes we had one of those women who have made history. Save that her means of communication developed slowly, she was often in full possession of her faculties. And what faculties they were! I had read of the wonderful women of the Renaissance--now I saw one.

 

Then, sometimes, when the pain of her position became too great to be borne, the soul would slip out for a while and rest in some strange Elysian fields we know not of,

 

leaving to us again the care of the mindless body. But each time it came back refreshed. Whom it had talked with, what help had been given, we never knew; but each time it faced the agony of reincarnation and took up its burden with renewed courage and knowledge.

 

The dim, newly-awakened mind understood Howson through and through; each twist and turn of him, conscious and subconscious, she could follow, and of course she was the most perfect nurse he could have had. The panic-stricken mind was never allowed to thrash about in outer darkness and the horror of death. Instinctively she sensed the approach of nightmare forms, and putting out her hand, pulled the wandering soul back into safety.

 

Thus protected from the wear and tear of his terrible storms, Howson's mind began to heal. Day by day the time drew nearer when he would be fit to leave the nursing home and marry the woman he was engaged to, and day by day, by her instinctive skill and watchful care, Mona Cailey quickened the approach of that time.

 

I have said that he would leave and marry the woman he was engaged to--not the woman he loved--for at that time had Mona Cailey chosen to lift one finger she could have brought the old memories into consciousness and drawn Howson to herself; and that she was fully aware of this, I who watched her, am convinced. An ignorant woman could not have steered round the pitfalls as skilfully as she did.

 

The night before he was to leave she had a bad relapse into her old condition. Hour after hour Taverner and I sat beside her while she scarcely seemed to breathe, so completely was the soul withdrawn from the body.

 

"She is shut up in her own subconsciousness, moving among the memories of the past," Taverner whispered to me, as slight twitchings ran through the motionless form on the bed.

 

Then a change took place.

 

"Ah," said Taverner, "she is out now!"

 

Slowly the long white hand was raised--the hand that I had watched change from a limp thing of disgust to firmness and strength, and a sequence of knocks was given upon the wall at the bedside that would have skinned the knuckles of an ordinary hand.

 

"She is claiming entrance to her Lodge," whispered Taverner. "She will give the Word as soon as the knocks are acknowledged."

 

From somewhere up near the ceiling the sequence of knocks was repeated, and then Taverner placed his hand across the girl's mouth. Through the guarding fingers came some muffled sound I could not make out.

 

"She will get what she has gone to seek," said Taverner. "It is a high Degree to which she is claiming admission."

 

What transpired during the workings of that strange Lodge which meets out of the body I had no means of knowing. I could see that Taverner, however, with his telepathic faculties, was able to follow the ritual, for he joined in the responses and salutes.

 

As the uncanny ceremony drew to its close we saw the soul that was known to us as Mona Cailey withdraw from the company of its brethren and, plane by plane, return to normal consciousness. On her face was that look of peace which I had never before seen in the living, and only on the faces of such of the dead as went straight out into the Light.

 

"She has gathered strength for her ordeal," said Taverner, "and it will indeed be an ordeal, for Howson's fiancee is fetching him in her car."

 

"Will it be wise to let Miss Cailey be present?" I asked. "She must go through with it," said Taverner. "It is better to break than to miss an opportunity."

 

He was a man who never spared his patients when there was a question of fate to be worked out. He thought less of death than most people think of emigration; in fact, he seemed to regard it in exactly that light.

 

"Once you have had some memory glimpse, however dim, of your own past, you are certain of your future; therefore you cease to fear life. Supposing I make a mess of an experiment today, I clear up the mess, go to bed, sleep, and then, in the morning when I am rested, I start again. You do the same with your lives when once you are sure of reincarnation. It is only the man who does not realize as a personal fact the immortality of the soul who talks of a ruined life and opportunities gone never to return."

 

Mona Cailey, Taverner, and myself were on the doorstep to bid goodbye to Howson when his fiancee called to take him away. He thanked us both with evident feeling for what we had done for him, but Taverner waved a disclaiming hand towards the girl at his elbow.

 

"You have had nothing from me but board and lodging," he said. "There is your psychologist."

 

Howson took Mona's hand in both his. She stood absolutely passive, but not with her usual limp inertia; it was the motionlessness of extreme tension.

 

"Poor little Mona!" he said. "You are a lot better than you used to be. Go on getting better, and one of these days you may be a real girl and have a good time," and he kissed her lightly as one would kiss a child.

 

What memories that kiss awakened I cannot say, but I saw him change colour and look at her sharply. Had one glimmer of response lightened those dark eyes, the old love would have returned, but there was no change in the masklike countenance of the woman who was paying her debt. He shivered. Perhaps some cold breath from the torturers' dungeon touched him. He got into the car beside the woman he was to marry, and she drove away.

 

"How will that marriage turn out?" I asked as the sounds of the car died in the distance.

 

"Like a good many others where only the emotions are mated. They will be in love for a year, then will come disillusionment, and after they have bumped through the crisis, held together by the pressure of social opinion, they will settle down to the mutual toleration which passes for

 

a successful marriage. But when he comes to die, he will remember this Mona Cailey and call for her, and as he crosses the threshold she will claim him, for they have made restitution, and the way is clear."

 

***************************

 

The Scented Poppies

 

I

 

"Mr. Gregory Polson," said Taverner, reading the card that had been brought to him. "Evidently a junior member of the firm. Lincoln's Inn is where they have their abode, so they are probably solicitors. Let us have a look at him."

 

A man's work generally puts its mark on him, and our visitor, although a comparatively young man, already showed the stamp of the legal profession.

 

"I want to consult you," he began, "about a very curious matter--I cannot call it a case. It seems to me, however, that you are the only man who can deal with it and therefore--although it may not be strictly in your line--I should be exceedingly grateful to you if you would look into it."

 

Taverner nodded his acquiescence, and our visitor took up the burden of his story.

 

"I daresay you have heard of old Benjamin Burmister, who made such an enormous fortune during the War? We--that is, my father's firm--are his solicitors and are also personal friends of the family, or, to be exact, his brothers' families, for old Mr. Burmister is unmarried. My sister and I have grown up with the two sets of Burmister cousins as if we were all one big household; in fact, my sister is at present engaged to one of David Burmister's boys--an awfully nice chap, my particular friend, in fact. We are very pleased about the engagement, for the Burmisters are nice people, although the other two brothers were not wealthy. Well, to make a long story short, after Edith and Tim had been engaged about six months, my people were a lot more pleased about the engagement (but I can't say that I am, however), for old Benjamin Burmister made a new will leaving his money to Tim."

 

"Why should you regard this as a disadvantage?"

 

"Because the people he has left his money to have an unfortunate knack of committing suicide."

 

"Indeed?"

 

"Yes," said our visitor, "it has happened upon no fewer than three occasions. The will I have just completed in favour of Tim is his fourth. Murray, Tim's eldest brother, who was the last one Mr. Burmister had chosen to be his heir, jumped off a cliff near Brighton about a month ago."

 

"You say that each time Mr. Burmister makes a will, the principal beneficiary commits suicide?" said Taverner. "Can you tell me the conditions of the will?"

 

"They are rather unfair in my opinion," said Gregory Polson. "Instead of dividing the money among his nephews and nieces, who are none too well off, he insists upon leaving the bulk of it to one nephew. His idea seems to be that he will found a kind of dynasty--he has already purchased the country seat--and that he will make one Burmister an influential man, instead of making about a dozen of them comfortable."

 

"1 see," said Taverner, "and as soon as the will is made the principal beneficiary commits suicide."

 

"That is it," said Polson; "they have had three suicides in two years."

 

"Tut, tut," said Taverner, "as many as that? It certainly does not look like chance. Now who has benefited by these deaths?"

 

"Only the next heir, who speedily commits suicide himself."

 

"What determines your client in his choice of an heir?"

 

"He picks the nephew whom he thinks is most likely to do him credit."

 

"He does not follow any rule of birth?"

 

"None whatever. He chooses according to his estimate of their character, picking the more forceful natures first. Tim is a much quieter, more retiring kind of fellow than his cousins--I was rather surprised to see old Burmister's selection fall on him--but there is not much choice now; there are only three boys left after these ghastly tragedies."

 

"Then it is one of these three men who will ultimately benefit if another suicide takes place?"

 

"That is so. But one can hardly conceive a criminal cold blooded enough to kill off an entire family on the off-chance that the final choice might fall upon himself!"

 

`What manner of men are these three remaining cousins?"

 

"Henry is an engineer, doing quite well and engaged to be married. He will never set the Thames on fire, but he is a decent chap. He is Tim's younger brother. Bob, Tim's cousin, is a bit of a ne'er-do-well. We have had to extricate him from a breach of promise and one or two other unpleasantness, but I should say he was a good-hearted, irresponsible lad, his own worst enemy. The last of the family is Irving, Bob's brother, a harmless enough chap, but not fond of honest work. Joseph Burmister's boys never did as well as David's; they inclined to the artistic rather than the practical, and that type never makes money.

 

"Joseph's wife, however, had a fair amount, and each of her children has about a hundred and fifty a year of his own; not affluence, but it keeps them out of the workhouse. Bob does odds and ends to supplement his means; he is secretary of a Golf Club at present, but Irving is the family genius and has set out to be an artist, though I don't think he has ever produced anything. His sole occupation, so far as I know, is to write a monthly art criticism for a paper that thinks publicity is sufficient payment."

 

"He will not get very fat at that rate," said Taverner. "How does he manage to exist on his hundred and fifty?"

 

"He lives in a single room studio and eats out of a frying pan. It is not so unattractive as it sounds, however; he has extraordinarily good taste, and has got his little place quite charming."

 

"So these are the people who might possibly benefit under the will--a steady-going engineer, a good-natured scatterbrain, and an artistic Bohemian."

 

"There were originally seven possible beneficiaries, providing old Benjamin adhered to his policy. Three are dead by their own hand, one is at present under sentence of death--"

 

`What do you mean by that?" interrupted Taverner quickly.

 

"Ah!" said Polson, "that is the thing that gave me a nasty turn, and made me come to you. The three men who are dead all committed suicide in the same way by flinging themselves from a height. Tim was in my office yesterday; our chambers are at the top of the building, a considerable height up. He leant out of the window for quite a while, and when I asked him what he was looking at he said: `I wonder what it would feel like to take a header on to the pavement.' I told him to come in and not play the fool but it gave me a nasty shock, coming on top of the other suicides, so I came to you."

 

"Why to me?" asked Taverner.

 

"I have read something of occultism and something of psychology and heard how you work the two systems in combination," said Polson, "and it seemed to me that this was a case for you"

 

"There is more in this than you have told me," said Taverner. "What is it that you suspect?"

 

"I have no evidence whatever; in fact, it is the lack of evidence that has made me seek an explanation outside the normal. Why should these men, perfectly healthy average individuals, take their own lives for no reason whatsoever? One cannot account for it on any of the accepted theories, but if one admits the feasibility of thought transference, and pretty nearly everybody does nowadays, then it seems to me that it would be possible to give mental suggestion to these men to commit suicide."

 

"It is not only possible," said Taverner, "but in less extreme forms this exercise of secret pressure is exceedingly common. I could tell you some curious stories in connection with the Great War in this line. Not all the men who were `got at' were reached through their pockets; many were approached by the channel of their subconscious minds. But continue. There is someone whom you are watching, subconsciously, if not consciously?"

 

"I have given you all the facts that could possibly be admitted as evidence. I haven't got a clue that would hang a cat, but I suspect Irving."

 

"On what grounds?"

 

"On none whatever; chiefly on the principle of `I do not like you, Dr. Fell.'"

 

"Give me your unbowdlerized impressions of him."

 

"He is not straight, sir. I have never once caught him out, but I should never trust him. Then he is in with a set I don't like the look of: they play about with hashish and cocaine and each other's wives. They are not wholesome. I prefer Bob's wildcat company promoters to Irving's longhaired soul-mates.

 

"Thirdly, Irving is the last one old Benjamin would be likely to leave his money to. I think he would leave it to Irving before he left it outside the family, for he is terribly proud of the Burmister name, but he is not at all fond of the fellow. They never got on together; Benjamin is a rough, downright old chap, and Irving is a bit of an old maid. Fourthly, if you knew Bob and Henry, you would know that it was out of the question that they should do such a thing, but Irving might--when a man fools with drugs he may do anything. Besides, he has read along the same lines as I have; in fact it was he who first put me on to them."

 

"Have you any reason to believe that Irving is a trained occultist?"

 

"He is interested in occultism, but I should not imagine that he would ever train in anything; he is nothing but a dabbler."

 

"Then he is not very likely to be able to perform a mental assassination. Thought transference requires more effort than swinging a sledge hammer. If you are ever offered your choice between being an occultist and a blacksmith, choose the lighter job and enter the forge rather than the Lodge.

 

"Well, you suspect Irving? As you say, there is no evidence to hang a cat, but we will put him through the sieve and see what he yields Did he become very intimate with old Mr. Burmister's heirs after the wills became known?"

 

"No more so than usual, they are a united family and always saw a lot of each other The only thing that Irving ever did that was out of the ordinary was to decorate their rooms for them--he has a wonderful taste in colouring-- but then he did that for a good many of us, and designed the girl's dresses, too. He is an extraordinary chap, who makes a hobby of that sort of thing; he knows all the out-of-the-way shops where you can get queer brands of coffee and cigarettes, and restaurants where you can get weird food. It has always seemed to me the sort of thing for a woman rather than a man to be interested in."

 

"Ah!" said Taverner, "he designed their rooms Now that is a peculiarly intimate thing to do--the man who designs the place you live in can exercise a great influence over your life if he knows how to make use of his opportunities. But before we go any further afield, try and think if there was anything of any sort that the dead men had in common and the living ones have not got, any mode of life, possession, peculiarity--anything in fact, that differentiated them."

 

Polson racked his brains for several minutes

 

"The only thing I can possibly think of," he said at length, "is a particular kind of scent that Irving manages to get hold of and gives to his particular friends He makes a great mystery of it, but then he loves making mysteries about nothing in particular; it makes him feel important."

 

"Come now," said Taverner, "we have struck a warm trail at last. The psychological effect of scents is very great; what has our friend been playing at with his mysterious smells?"

 

"I don't know," said Polson; "he probably gets it at the Stores. He had some wonderful tea once that was supposed to come direct from Lhassa, and we found a Lyons' label round it. He is that sort of chap."

 

"But what about this scent? Did he give it to each of the dead men and to none other?"

 

"He used to give it to his particular pals as a special favour. His great wheeze was to get those big poppy heads the chemists sell for making poultices, paint them all sorts of Futurist colours, stuff them with potpourri and fix them on the end of strips of pliable cane. They really look very well in a vase, like great gaudy flowers. He gave me a bunch once, but I wasn't honoured with the sacred perfume that he has in his own quarters; but Percy (one of the boys who was dead) had some, and he has given Tim a bunch. I am not sure whether they are scented or not."

 

"Then the best thing you can do is to go round to your cousin, get hold of those poppy heads, and bring them to me to have a look at."

 

Polson sallied forth on his mission, and as the door closed behind him, Taverner turned to me.

 

"You see," he said, "the advantage of intuition. Poison had nothing whatever to go on, but he instinctively distrusted Irving; when he begins to suspect foul play, he proceeds to countercheck his intuitions by observation, which is a peculiarly effective method of work, for you will see how the use of the intuition is able to point out a profitable line of observation and, by means of the subtlest and most elusive of subjective clues, lead us to what promises to be solid ground. We must see what evidence the poppy heads yield, however, before we begin to theorize. There is nothing so misleading as a preconceived opinion; one is very apt to twist the facts to fit it."

 

We went on to other cases, and had got to the end of our appointments when the butler informed us that Mr. Polson had returned and would like to see us again. He was ushered in, bearing a long parcel in his hand, his eyes bright with excitement.

 

"Tim has been given the special scent," he cried as soon as he was inside the door.

 

"How did you manage to obtain possession of the poppy heads? Did you tell him why you wanted them?"

 

"I told him I wanted to show them to a friend. It was no use worrying him until we have something definite to go on, or he might commit suicide by sheer autosuggestion."

 

"Wise man!" said Taverner. "You have read to some purpose."

 

Poison unrolled his parcel, and laid half-a-dozen gorgeously-colored poppy heads on the desk. They looked like wonderful tropical fruit, and certainly formed an acceptable present. Taverner examined them one by one. Five of them yielded nothing to his probing save a shower of fine black seeds, but the sixth exhaled a curious heavy perfume, and rattled when shaken.

 

This poppy head," said Taverner, "is going to meet with an accident," and he crashed a paper weight down on it. Out on the blotter rolled three or four objects that looked like dried raisins, and most curious of all--a fair sized moonstone.

 

At the sight of this we exclaimed as one man. Why should anyone place a gem worth several pounds in the inside of a poppyhead where it was never likely to be seen? Taverner turned over the black objects with his pencil.

 

"Scented seeds of some sort," he remarked and handed them to me. "Smell them, Rhodes."

 

I took them in my hand and sniffed them gingerly. "Not bad," I said, "but they are slightly irritating to the mucous membrane; they make me feel as if I were going to sneeze, only instead of the sneeze coming to anything, the irritation seems to run up into my head and cause a peculiar sensation as if a draught of cold air was blowing on my forehead."

 

"So they stir up the pineal gland, do they?" said Taverner. "I think I can see some method in the gentleman's madness. Now take the moonstone in your other hand, go on sniffing the seeds, look at the moonstone, and tell me the thoughts that come into your head, just as if you were being psychoanalysed."

 

I did as I was instructed.

 

"I think of soapy water," I began. "I think my hands would be improved by a wash. I think of a necklace of my mother's. I think this stone would be very hard to find if I dropped it out of the window. I wonder what it would be like to be thrown out of the window. I wonder what it would feel like to be thrown from a height? Does one--?"

 

"That will do," said Taverner, and took the moonstone away from me. I looked up in surprise, and saw that Polson had buried his face in his hands.

 

"My God!" he said. "And I used to play with that boy!" I looked from one to the other of my companions in surprise.

 

"What does it all mean?" I asked.

 

"It means this," said Taverner. "Someone has hit upon a singularly ingenious way of bottling psychism. A man who is incapable, by reason of his lack of development, of doing mental work on his own account, has found a way of buying occultism by the ounce. There must be a factory where they are turning out this precious product, and where an unscrupulous scoundrel like Irving can go and buy two-penn'orth and bring it away in a paper bag."

 

I had always understood that occult work could only be done by men of unusual natural gifts who had devoted long years to their development, and this idea of taking your turn at the counter and buying the hidden powers like acid drops tickled my fancy. It was only the expression on Polson's face that prevented me from bursting out laughing. But I saw what deadly possibilities were latent in the plan that Taverner had outlined so grotesquely.

 

"There is nothing original in this scheme," said Taverner. "It is simply the commercial application of certain natural laws that are known to occultists. I have always told you that there is nothing supernatural about occult science; it is merely a branch of knowledge that has not been generally taken up, and which has this peculiarity, that its professors do not hasten to publish their results. This exceedingly clever trick of the moonstone and the scented seeds is simply an application of certain occult knowledge for the purpose of crime."

 

"Do you mean," said Poison, "that there is some sort of mental poison inside that poppy head? I can understand that the smell of those seeds might affect the brain, but what part does the moonstone play?"

 

"The moonstone is tuned to a keynote, and that keynote is suicide," said Taverner. "Someone--not Irving, he hasn't got the brains--has made a very clear mental picture of committing suicide by flinging oneself from a height, and has impressed that picture (I won't tell you how) on that moonstone, so that anyone who is in close contact with it finds the same image rise into his mind, just as a depressed person can infect others with depression without speaking one single word to them."

 

"But how can an inanimate object be capable of feeling emotion?" I inquired.

 

"It couldn't," said Taverner, "but is there such a thing as an inanimate object? Occult science teaches that there is not. It is one of our maxims that mind is entranced in the mineral, sleeps in the plant, dreams in the animal and wakes in the man. You have only to watch a sweet-pea tendril reach out for a support to realize that the movements of plants are anything but purposeless, and the work connected with the fatigue of metals is well known Ask your barber if his razors ever get tired, and he will tell you that he rests them regularly, because fatigued steel will not take a fine edge."

 

"Granted," I said. "But do you mean to tell me that there is sufficient consciousness in that bit of stone to be capable of taking in an idea and transmitting it to someone's subconscious mind?"

 

"I do," said Taverner. "A crystal is the highest development of the mineral kingdom, and there is quite enough mind in that stone on the table to take on a certain amount of character if a sufficiently strong influence be brought to bear upon it. Remember the history of the Hope diamond and various other well-known gems whose records are known to collectors. It is this mental development of crystals which is taken advantage of in the making of talismans and amulets for which the precious stones, and next to them the precious metals, have been used from time immemorial. This moonstone is simply an amulet of evil."

 

"Taverner," I said, "you don't mean to tell me that you believe in charms?"

 

"Certainly! Don't you?"

 

"Good Heavens, no, not in this enlightened age!"

 

"My dear boy, if you find a belief universally held throughout all ages by races that have had no communication with each other, then you may be sure that there is something in it."

 

"Then to put it crudely," said Polson, who had hitherto stared at Taverner in silence, "you believe that someone has taught this moonstone how to give hypnotic suggestion?"

 

"Crudely, yes," replied Taverner, "just as middle C struck on a piano will cause the C string of another piano to vibrate in sympathy."

 

"How does the moonstone manage the hypnosis?" I inquired, not without malice, I am afraid.

 

"Ah, it has to have help with that," said Taverner. "That is where those scented seeds come in, and a more diabolically ingenious device it would be hard to find.

 

"Everybody is not psychic, so some means had to be devised of inducing at least temporary sensitiveness in the stolid, matter-of-fact Burmisters against whom this device was directed. As even you will admit, Rhodes, there are certain drugs that are capable of changing the condition and state of consciousness--alcohol for one, chloroform for another.

 

"In the East, where they know a great deal more about these things than we do, a careful study has been made of the drugs that will induce the change, and they are acquainted with many substances which the British Pharmacopoedia knows nothing about. There is a considerable number of drugs which are capable of producing, at least temporarily, a state of clairvoyance, and those black seeds are among the number. I don't know what they are--they are unfamiliar to me--but I shall try and find out, as they cannot be common, and we may then be able to trace their origin and get this devil's workshop shut down."

 

"Then," said Polson, "you think someone has imprinted an idea on the soul of that moonstone so that anyone who was sensitive would be influenced by it, and then added the seeds to his fiendish potpourri so as to drug an ordinary person into abnormal sensitiveness and make him susceptible to the influences of the moonstone?"

 

"Exactly!"

 

"And some devil manufactures these things and then sells them to dangerous fools like Irving?"

 

"That is my opinion."

 

"Then he ought to be hanged!"

 

"I disagree with you."

 

"You would let such a cold-blooded brute go unpunished?"

 

"No, I would not, but I would make the punishment fit the crime. Occult offences are always dealt with by occult means. There are more ways of killing a cat than drowning it in cream."

 

"It has not taken you long to dispose of that case," I remarked to Taverner as Polson withdrew, profuse in his thanks.

 

"If you think that is the end," said my colleague, "you are very much mistaken; Irving will certainly have another try, and equally certainly, I shall not let the matter rest."

 

"You will only get abused if you go to the police station" I told him. "If you think that twelve British grocers in a jury box would hang Irving you are very much mistaken; they would probably ask the court missionary to visit you and see if he couldn't get your family to do something for you."

 

"I know all that," said Taverner. "It is quite useless to go to law in a case of occult attack, but there is such a thing as the psychic police, you know. The members of all regularly organized Lodges are bound by their oath either to take up themselves or report to their fraternity any case of mental malpractice that comes within their knowledge, and we have our own way of doing justice."

 

"Do you intend to give Irving a dose of counter-suggestion"

 

"No, I won't do that. We are not absolutely certain that he is guilty, though it looks suspiciously like it. I shall deal with him by another method, which, if he is innocent, will leave him scatheless, and if he is guilty will be singularly appropriate to his crime. The first thing, however, is to get in touch with our man without arousing his suspicions. How would you go to work, Rhodes?"

 

"Get Poison to introduce me," I said.

 

"Poison and Irving are not on any too good terms; moreover, I have the misfortune to have a certain amount of fame, and Irving will smell a rat the minute I appear in the case. Try again."

 

I hazarded several suggestions, from giving him a com- mission to paint poppyheads to falling in a fit at his feet as he issued from his studio. All of these Taverner vetoed as leaving too much to chance and likely to rouse his suspicions and prevent the possibility of a second attempt to corner him if the first failed.

 

"You must work along the line of his interests, and then he will fall into your hand like a ripe pear. What is the use of reading psychology if you never use it? I will bet you that before a week is out I shall have Irving begging me, as an enormous favour, to execute justice on him."

 

"How do you propose to go to work?" I asked.

 

Taverner rolled the seeds over thoughtfully with a pencil. "These things cannot be too common; I will find out first what they are and where he got them. Come along with me to Bond Street; there is a man in a perfumer's there who will probably be able to tell me what I want to know."

 

We were not long in arriving at our destination, and then I saw that curious little by-play that I had often witnessed when Taverner was in need of assistance. A man in a dirty white laboratory coat, who obviously did not know Taverner from Adam, was summoned from the back of the shop, my companion made a sign with his left hand that would have passed unobserved if one had not known what to look for, and immediately the attitude of our new acquaintance changed. We were led behind the counter into a room that was half laboratory, half store room, and there, amid a litter of chemical appliances, gaudy wrappers, hampers of herbs smelling up to high heaven, and the remains of a meal, the mysterious seeds were spread out for investigation.

 

"It is one of the Dipteryx," said the man in the white coat, "the same family as the Tonquin Bean; Dipteryx Irritans is its name. It is sometimes used for adulterating the true Tonquin bean when imported in powder form. Of course a small amount cannot be detected by any chemical tests, but you would not care to have a sachet of it among your handkerchiefs; it would give you a form of hay fever, and affect your eyesight."

 

"Is it imported into this country much?"

 

"Never, save as an adulterant, and then only in powder form. It has no commercial value--you could not buy it here if you tried, in fact you could not buy it in Madagascar (where it comes from), because no scent merchant would own to having any on his premises. You would have to collect it yourself from the wild vines."

 

`What trade paper do you scent-makers affect?"

 

"We have not got one of our own, but you could get at the scent trade through the druggists' journals."

 

Taverner thanked him for his information, and we returned to Harley Street, where Taverner busied himself in drawing up an advertisement to the effect that a Mr. Trotter had a parcel of Dipteryx Irritans to dispose of and solicited offers.

 

About a week later we received, via the journal's office, a letter to say that a Mr. Minski, of Chelsea, was prepared to do business with us if we would furnish him with a sample and state our lowest price. Taverner chuckled when he received this epistle.

 

"The fish bites, Rhodes," he said. "We will proceed to call upon Mr. Minski forthwith."

 

I nodded my acquiescence and reached for my hat.

 

"Not in these clothes, Rhodes," said my colleague. "Mr. Minski would put up the shutters if he saw a top hat ap- proaching. Let me see what I can find in my vanity bag."

 

His "vanity bag" was the name by which Taverner designated an old suit case that held certain disreputable garments that served him as disguise when he did not wish to obtrude his Harley Street personality upon an unappreciative world. In a few minutes I was denuded of my usual panoply, and was invested in a seedy brown suit of pseudo-smart cut; black boots that had once been brown, and a Trilby hat completed my discomfort, and Taverner, resplendent in a greenish frock coat and moth-eaten top hat, informed me that if it were not for my ruby tie-pin (which came out of a cracker) he would not altogether care to be seen out with me!

 

We took a bus to Victoria Station, and thence, via the King's Road, to our destination in an obscure side street. Mr. Minski's shop proved to be something of a surprise-- we had thought to interview a man of the "old do" dealer type, but we found that the shop we sought had some pretensions. A collection of Ruskin pottery and Futurist draperies graced the window, studio-made jewelry of the semiprecious persuasion hung in a case by the door, and Mr. Minski, in a brown velvet coat and tie like a miniature sash, made Taverner look as if he had called for the washing!

 

My colleague placed a forefinger, carefully begrimed at the consulting room grate, upon the velveteen coat of the owner of the shop. "You are the gentleman who wants to buy the Tonquin beans?" he inquired.

 

"I don't want any Tonquin beans, my good man," said that worthy impatiently. "I understood your advertisement to say that you had a parcel of Dipteryx Irritans to dispose of. The Tonquin bean belongs to a different genus, Dipteryx Odorata. I can get that anywhere, but if you are able to obtain the Irritans bean for me, we may be able to do business."

 

Taverner closed one eye in a revolting wink. "You know what you are talking about, young fellow," he informed the velveteen individual. "Now, are you buyin' these beans for yourself, or on commish?"

 

"What has that got to do with you?" demanded Mr. Minski haughtily.

 

"Oh, nothing," said Taverner, looking more rag-and-bony than ever, "only I prefer to do business with principals, and I always give ten per cent for introduction."

 

Minski opened his eyes at this, and I saw that what Taverner had guessed was probably true--Minski was buying on behalf of someone else, who might or might not be Irving. I also saw that he would not be above accepting a commission from both parties to the transaction. He had evidently been bidden to conceal the identity of his client, however, and was wondering how far he dared exceed his instructions. Finally he said: "Since you refuse to deal with me, I will communicate with my customer and see whether he is prepared to buy from you direct. Come back on Wednesday at the same time, and I will let you know."

 

We returned to civilization and put off the garments of our humiliation until the appointed time came round, when, dressed once more in the uniform of the shabby genteel, we returned to the shop of Mr. Minski. As we entered, we saw a man seated on a kind of divan in the corner, smoking a scented cigarette. He was, I should say, thirty-one or two years of age, sallow and unwholesome of complexion, with the pupils of his eyes unnaturally dilated; the way in which he lay back among the cushions showed that his vitality was low, and the slight tremor of the nicotine-stained fingers pointed to the cause.

 

Taverner, even in his shabby garments, was an imposing figure, and the man on the divan stared at him in astonishment. "You wish to purchase the Irritans variety of the Tonquin bean?" said my companion.

 

The man nodded, without removing the cigarette from his lips, continuing to stare at Taverner, who was adopting quite a different tone towards him from that which he had used towards Minski.

 

"The Irritans bean is not generally used in commerce," Taverner went on. "May I inquire for what purpose you require it?"

 

"That is no concern of yours," replied the man with the cigarette.

 

"I ask your pardon," said Taverner, "but this bean possesses certain properties not generally known outside the East, where it is raised at its true value, and I wondered whether you wished to avail yourself of these properties, for some of the beans which I hold were prepared with that end in view."

 

"I should very much like to!" The unnaturally bright eyes became even brighter with the speaker's eagerness.

 

"Are you by any chance one of us?" Taverner dropped his voice to a conspirator's whisper.

 

The bright eyes glowed like lamps. "I am exceedingly interested in these matters."

 

"They are subjects worthy of interest," said Taverner; "but this is a child's way of development." And he carelessly opened his hand, showing the black seeds which had come from the poppy, which served him as his pretended sample.

 

The cigarette came out of the languid mouth now. "Do you mean that you know something about Kundalini?"

 

"The Sacred Serpent Fire?" said Taverner. "Of course I am acquainted with its properties, but I do not make use of it personally. I regard its action as too drastic; it is apt to unhinge the mind that is not prepared for it. I always use the ritual method myself."

 

"Do you--er--undertake the training of students?" cried our new acquaintance, nearly beside himself with eagerness.

 

"I do occasionally, if I find a suitable type," said Taverner, absent-mindedly playing catch with the black seeds.

 

"I am exceedingly interested in this matter," said the man on the divan. `Would you consider me a suitable type? I am certain that I am psychic. I often see the most peculiar things."

 

Taverner considered him for a long moment, while he hung upon the verdict.

 

"It would be a small matter to put you in possession of astral vision."

 

Our new acquaintance sprang to his feet. "Come round to my studio." he cried; "we can talk things over quietly there. You have, I presume, a fee? I am not a rich man, but the labourer is worthy of his hire, and I would be quite willing to remunerate you for your trouble."

 

"My fee is five guineas," said Taverner, with an expression worthy of Uriah Heep.

 

The man with the scented cigarette gave a little gasp of relief; I am sure that if Taverner had added on a nought he would have paid it. We adjourned to his studio--a large, well-lit room decorated with a most bizarre mixture of colours. A couch, which probably served as a bed by night, stood at an angle in front of the fireplace; from the far corner of the room issued that indescribable odour which cannot be avoided where food is stored--a blend of bacon rind and coffee floated towards us, and the drip of some hidden tap proclaimed our host's washing accommodation.

 

Taverner bade him lie down on the couch, and producing a packet of dark powder from his pocket, shook some grains into a brass incense burner which stood on the mantelpiece. The heavy fumes drifted across the studio, overwhelming the domestic odours from the corner, and made me think of joss-houses and the strange rituals that propitiated hideous gods.

 

Except for the incense, Taverner was proceeding as in ordinary hypnotic treatment, a process with which my medical experience had rendered me familiar, and I watched the man on the couch pass rapidly into a state of deep hypnosis, and thence into a relaxed condition with almost complete cessation of the vital functions, a level to which very few hypnotists either can or dare reduce a subject. Then Taverner set to work upon one of the great centres of the body where a network of nerves converge. What his method was I could not clearly see, for his back was towards me, but it did not take many minutes, and then, with a series of swift hypnotic passes, he drew his victim back to normal consciousness.

 

Half dazed, the man sat up on the couch, blinking stupidly at the light; the whole process had occupied some twenty minutes, and he showed pretty plainly that he did not consider he had had his money's worth, counting out the notes to Taverner without any too good a grace.

 

Taverner, however, showed no disposition to go, lingering in talk, and as I noticed, watching his man closely. The latter seemed fidgety and, as we made no move, he finally said: "Excuse me, I believe there is someone at the door," and crossing the studio, quickly opened it and looked outside. Nothing but an empty passage rewarded his gaze. He returned and renewed his conversation with Taverner, but with a divided attention, from time to time glancing over his shoulder uneasily.

 

Then suddenly interrupting my colleague in the middle of a sentence, he said: "I am certain there is someone in the room; I have a most peculiar feeling, as if I were being watched," and he whipped aside a heavy curtain that hung across an alcove--but there was nothing but brooms and brushes behind it. Across he went to the other corner and opened a cupboard, then looked under the bed and proceeded to a systematic search of the whole studio, looking into hiding places that could barely have concealed a child. Finally, he returned to us, whose presence he seemed to have forgotten, so absorbed was he in his search.

 

"It is most peculiar," he said. "But I cannot get away from the feeling that I am being watched, as if some evil presence were lurking in the room waiting for my back to be turned."

 

Suddenly he looked upward. "What are those extraordinary balls of light moving about the ceiling?" he exclaimed.

 

Taverner plucked me by the sleeve. "Come along," he said, "it is time for us to be going. Irving's little friends won't be pleasant company."

 

We left him stock still in the centre of the room, following with his eyes the invisible object that was slowly working its way down the wall. What would happen when it reached the floor I did not inquire.

 

Out in the street I heaved a sigh of relief. There was something about that studio which was distinctly unpleasant. "What in the world have you done to the man?" I asked my companion.

 

"What I agreed to do--give him clairvoyance," replied Taverner.

 

"How is that going to punish him for the atrocities he has committed?"

 

"We don't know that he has committed any atrocities," said Taverner blandly.

 

"Then what are you driving at?"

 

"Just this. When a man gets the Sight, one of the first things he sees is his naked soul, and if that man was the one we think he is, it will probably be the last, for the soul that perpetrated those cold-blooded murders will not bear looking at. If, on the other hand, he is just an ordinary individual, neither strikingly good nor bad, then he will be the richer for an interesting experience."

 

Suddenly, from somewhere over our heads, a bloodcurdling yell rang out into the gathering dusk. It had that quality of terror which infects with panic all those who hear it, for other passers-by as well as ourselves stopped dead at the sound. A door slammed somewhere in the great echoing building we had just vacated, and then running footsteps passed rapidly down the road in the direction of the river.

 

"Good Lord!" I said, "he will go over the Embankment," and was startled into pursuit when Taverner laid a restraining hand on my arm.

 

"That is his affair, not ours," he said. "And any way, I doubt if he will face death when it comes to the point; death can be singularly nasty, you know."

 

He was right, for the running footsteps returned down the street, and the man we had just left passed us, flying blindly towards the flaring lights and human herd of the roaring Fulham Road.

 

"What is it he saw?" I demanded of Taverner, cold shivers chasing each other down my spine. I am not easily scared by anything I can see, but I frankly admit I fear the thing I cannot.

 

"He has met the Guardian of the Threshold," said Taverner, and his mouth snapped shut. But I had no wish to press the inquiry further; I had seen Irving's face as he passed us, and it told me all I needed to know of the nature of that strange Dweller in outer darkness.

 

Taverner paused to push the wad of notes in his hand into the collecting box of the Cancer Hospital.

 

"Rhodes," he said, "would you prefer to die and be done with, or to spend all your life in fear of death?"

 

"I would sooner die ten times over," I replied.

 

"So would I," said Taverner. "A life sentence is worse than a death sentence."

 

**********************

 

The Death Hound

 

"Well?" said my patient when I had finished stethoscoping him, "have I got to go softly all the days of my life?"

 

"Your heart is not all it might be," I replied, "but with care it ought to last as long as you want it. You must avoid all undue exertion, however."

 

The man made a curious grimace. "Supposing exertion seeks me out?" he asked.

 

"You must so regulate your life as to reduce the possibility to a minimum."

 

Taverner's voice came from the other side of the room. "If you have finished with his body, Rhodes, I will make a start on his mind."

 

"I have a notion," said our patient, "that the two are rather intimately connected. You say I must keep my body quiet,"--he looked at me--"but what am I to do if my mind deliberately gives it shocks?" and he turned to my colleague.

 

"That is where I come in," said Taverner. "My friend has told you what to do; now I will show you how to do it. Come and tell me your symptoms."

 

"Delusions," said the stranger as he buttoned his shirt. "A black dog of ferocious aspect who pops out of dark corners and chivvies me, or tries to. I haven't done him the honour to run away from him yet; I daren't, my heart's too dickey, but one of these days I am afraid I may, and then I shall probably drop dead."

 

Taverner raised his eyes to me in a silent question. I nodded; it was quite a likely thing to happen if the man ran far or fast.

 

"What sort of a beast is your dog?" enquired my colleague.

 

"No particular breed at all. Just plain dog, with four legs and a tail, about the size of a mastiff, but not of the mastiff build."

 

"How does he make his appearance?"

 

"Difficult to say; he does not seem to follow any fixed rule, but usually after dusk. If I am out after sundown, I may look over my shoulder and see him padding along behind me, or if I am sitting in my room between daylight fading and lamp lighting, I may see him crouching behind the furniture watching his opportunity."

 

"His opportunity for what?"

 

"To spring at my throat."

 

"Why does he not take you unawares?"

 

"This is what I cannot make out. He seems to miss so many chances, for he always waits to attack until I am aware of his presence."

 

"What does he do then?"

 

"As soon as I turn and face him, he begins to close in on me! If I am out walking, he quickens his pace so as to overtake me, and if I am indoors he sets to work to stalk me round the furniture. I tell you, he may only be a product of my imagination, but he is an uncanny sight to watch."

 

The speaker paused and wiped away the sweat that had gathered on his forehead during this recital.

 

Such a haunting is not a pleasant form of obsession for any man to be afflicted with, but for one with a heart like our patient's it was peculiarly dangerous.

 

"What defence do you offer to this creature?" asked Taverner.

 

"I keep on saying to it "You're not real, you know, you are only a beastly nightmare, and I'm not going to let myself be taken in by you.'"

 

"As good a defence as any," said Taverner. "But I notice you talk to it as if it were real."

 

"By Jove, so I do!" said our visitor thoughtfully; "that is something new. I never used to do that. I took it for granted that the beast wasn't real, was only a phantom of my own brain, but recently a doubt has begun to creep in. Supposing the thing is real after all? Supposing it really has power to attack me? I have an underlying suspicion that my hound may not be altogether harmless after all."

 

"He will certainly be exceedingly dangerous to you if you lose your nerve and run away from him. So long as you keep your head, I do not think he will do you any harm."

 

"Precisely. But there is a point beyond which one may not keep one's head. Supposing, night after night, just as you were going off to sleep, you wake up knowing the creature is in the room, you see his snout coming round the corner of the curtain, and you pull yourself together and get rid of him and settle down again. Then just as you are getting drowsy, you take a last look round to make sure that all is safe, and you see something dark moving between you and the dying glow of the fire. You daren't go to sleep, and you can't keep awake. You may know perfectly well that it is all imagination, but that sort of thing wears you down if it is kept up night after night."

 

"You get it regularly every night?"

 

"Pretty nearly. Its habits are not absolutely regular, however, except that, now you come to mention it, it always gives me Friday night off; if it weren't for that, I should have gone under long ago. When Friday comes I say to it: `Now, you brute, this is your beastly Sabbath,' and go to bed at eight and sleep the clock round."

 

"If you care to come down to my nursing home at Hindhead, we can probably keep the creature out of your room and ensure you a decent night's sleep," said Taverner. "But what we really want to know is--," he paused almost imperceptibly, "why your imagination should haunt you with dogs, and not, shall we say, with scarlet snakes in the time-honoured fashion."

 

"I wish it would," said our patient. "If it was snakes I could `put more water with it' and drown them, but this slinking black beast--" He shrugged his shoulders and followed the butler out of the room.

 

"Well, Rhodes, what do you make of it?" asked my colleague after the door closed.

 

"On the face of it," I said, "it looks like an ordinary example of delusions, but I have seen enough of your queer cases not to limit myself to the internal mechanism of the mind alone. Do you consider it possible that we have another case of thought transference?"

 

"You are coming along," said Taverner, nodding his head at me approvingly. "When you first enjoined me, you would unhesitatingly have recommended bromide for all the ills the mind is heir to; now you recognize that there are more things in heaven and earth than were taught you in the medical schools.

 

"So you think we have a case of thought transference? I am inclined to think so too. When a patient tells you his delusions, he stands up for them, and often explains to you that they are psychic phenomena, but when a patient recounts psychic phenomena, he generally apologizes for them, and explains that they are delusions. But why doesn't the creature attack and be done with it, and why does it take its regular half-holiday as if it were under the Shop Hours Act?"

 

He suddenly slapped his hand down on the desk.

 

"Friday is the day the Black Lodges meet. We must be on their trail again; they will get to know me before we have finished. Someone who got his occult training in a Black Lodge is responsible for that ghost hound. The reason that Martin gets to sleep in peace on Friday night is that his would-be murderer sits in Lodge that evening and cannot attend to his private affairs."

 

"His would-be-murderer?" I questioned.

 

"Precisely. Anyone who sends a haunting like that to a man with a heart like Martin's knows that it means his death sooner or later. Supposing Martin got into a panic and took to his heels when he found the dog behind him in a lonely place?"

 

"He might last for half-a-mile," I said, "but I doubt if he would get any further."

 

"This is a clear case of mental assassination. Someone who is a trained occultist has created a thought-form of a black hound, and he is sufficiently in touch with Martin to be able to convey it to his mind by means of thought transference, and Martin sees, or thinks he sees, the image that the other man is visualizing.

 

"The actual thought-form itself is harmless except for the fear it inspires, but should Martin lose his head and resort to vigorous physical means of defence, the effort would precipitate a heart attack, and he would drop dead without the slightest evidence to show who caused his death. One of these days we will raid those Black Lodges, Rhodes; they know too much. Ring up Martin at the Hotel Cecil and tell him we will drive him back with us tonight."

 

"How do you propose to handle the case?" I asked.

 

"The house is covered by a psychic bell jar, so the thing cannot get at him while he is under its protection. We will then find out who is the sender, and see if we can deal with him and stop it once and for all. It is no good disintegrating the creature, its master would only manufacture another; it is the man behind the dog that we must get at.

 

"We shall have to be careful, however, not to let Martin think we suspect he is in any danger, or he will lose his one defence against the creature, a belief in its unreality. That adds to our difficulties, because we daren't question him much, less we rouse his suspicions. We shall have to get at the facts of the case obliquely."

 

On the drive down to Hindhead, Taverner did a thing I had never heard him do before, talk to a patient about his occult theories. Sometimes, at the conclusion of a case, he would explain the laws underlying the phenomena in order to rid the unknown of its terrors and enable his patient to cope with them, but at the outset, never.

 

I listened in astonishment, and then I saw what Taverner was fishing for. He wanted to find out whether Martin had any knowledge of occultism himself, and used his own interest to waken the other's--if he had one.

 

My colleague's diplomacy bore instant fruit. Martin was also interested in these subjects, though his actual knowledge was nil--even I could see that.

 

"I wish you and Mortimer could meet," he said. "He is an awfully interesting chap. We used to sit up half the night talking of these things at one time."

 

"I should be delighted to meet your friend," said Taverner. `Do you think he could be persuaded to run down one Sunday and see us? I am always on the lookout for anyone I can learn something from."

 

"I--I am afraid I could not get hold of him now," said our companion, and lapsed into a preoccupied silence from which all Taverner's conversational efforts failed to rouse him. We had evidently struck some painful subject, and I saw my colleague make a mental note of the fact.

 

As soon as we got in, Taverner went straight to his study, opened the safe, and took out a card index file.

 

"Maffeo, Montague, Mortimer," he muttered, as he turned the cards over. "Anthony William Mortimer. Initiated into the Order of the Cowled Brethren, October, 1912; took office as Armed Guard, May, 1915. Arrested on suspicion of espionage, March, 1916. Prosecuted for exerting undue influence in the making of his mother's will. (Everybody seems to go for him, and no one seems to be able to catch him.) Became Grand Master of the Lodge of Set the Destroyer. Knocks, two, three, two, password, `Jackal.'

 

"So much for Mr. Mortimer. A good man to steer clear of, I should imagine. Now I wonder what Martin has done to upset him."

 

As we dared not question Martin, we observed him, and I very soon noticed that he watched the incoming posts with the greatest anxiety. He was always hanging about the hail when they arrived, and seized his scanty mail with eagerness, only to lapse immediately into despondency. Whatever letter it was that he was looking for never came. He did not express any surprise at this, however, and I concluded that he was rather hoping against hope than expecting something that might happen.

 

Then one day he could stand it no longer, and as for the twentieth time I unlocked the mailbag and informed him that there was nothing for him, he blurted out: "Do you believe that `absence makes the heart grow fonder,' Dr. Rhodes?"

 

"It depends on the nature," I said. "But I have usually observed if you have fallen out with someone, you are more ready to overlook his shortcomings when you have been away from him for a time."

 

"But if you are fond of someone?" he continued, half-anxiously, half-shamefacedly.

 

"It is my belief that love cools if it is not fed," I said. "The human mind has great powers of adaptation, and one gets used, sooner or later, to being without one's nearest and dearest."

 

"I think so, too," said Martin, and I saw him go off to seek consolation from his pipe in a lonely corner.

 

"So there is a woman in the case," said Taverner when I reported the incident. "I should rather like to have a look at her. I think I shall set up as a rival to Mortimer; if he sends black thought forms, let me see what I can do with a white one."

 

I guessed that Taverner meant to make use of the method of silent suggestion, of which he was a past-master.

 

Apparently Taverner's magic was not long in working, for a couple of days later I handed Martin a letter which caused his face to light up with pleasure, and sent him off to his room to read it in private. Half an hour later he came to me in the office and said:

 

"Dr. Rhodes, would it be convenient if I had a couple of guests to lunch tomorrow?"

 

I assured him that this would be the case, and noted the change wrought in his appearance by the arrival of the long wished-for letter. He would have faced a pack of black dogs at that moment.

 

Next day I caught sight of Martin showing two ladies round the grounds, and when they came into the dining-room he introduced them as Mrs. and Miss Hallam. There seemed to be something wrong with the girl, I thought; she was so curiously distrait and absent-minded. Martin, however, was in the seventh heaven; the man's transparent pleasure was almost amusing to witness. I was watching the little comedy with a covert smile, when suddenly it changed to tragedy.

 

As the girl stripped her gloves off she revealed a ring upon the third finger of her left hand. It was undoubtedly an engagement ring. I raised my eyes to Martin's face, and saw that his were fixed upon it. In the space of a few seconds the man crumpled; the happy little luncheon party was over. He strove to play his part as host, but the effort was pitiful to watch, and I was thankful when the close of the meal permitted me to withdraw.

 

I was not allowed to escape however. Taverner caught my arm as I was leaving the room and drew me out on the terrace.

 

"Come along," he said. "I want to make friends with the Hallam family; they may be able to throw some light on our problem."

 

We found that Martin had paired off with the mother, so we had no difficulty in strolling round the garden with the girl between us. She seemed to welcome the arrangement, and we had not been together many minutes before the reason was made evident.

 

"Dr. Taverner," she said, "may I talk to you about myself?"

 

"I shall be delighted, Miss Hallam," he replied. "What is it you want to ask me about?"

 

"I am so very puzzled about something. Is it possible to be in love with a person you don't like?"

 

"Quite possible," said Taverner, "but not likely to be very satisfactory,"

 

"I am engaged to a man," she said, sliding her engagement ring on and off her finger, "whom I am madly, desperately in love with when he is not there, and as soon as he is present I feel a sense of horror and repulsion for him. When I am away, I long to be with him, and when I am with him, I feel as if everything were wrong and horrible. I cannot make myself clear, but do you grasp what I mean?"

 

"How did you come to get engaged to him?" asked Taverner.

 

"In the ordinary way. I have known him nearly as long as I have Billy," indicating Martin, who was just ahead of us, walking with the mother.

 

"No undue influence was used?" said Taverner.

 

"No, I don't think so. He just asked me to marry him, and I said I would."

 

"How long before that had you known that you would accept him if he proposed to you?"

 

"I don't know. I hadn't thought of it; in fact the engagement was as much a surprise to me as to everyone else. I had never thought of him in that way till about three weeks ago, and then I suddenly realized that he was the man I wanted to marry. It was a sudden impulse, but so strong and clear that I knew it was the thing for me to do."

 

"And you do not regret it?"

 

"I did not until today, but as I was sitting in the dining room I suddenly felt how thankful I should be if I had not got to go back to Tony."

 

Taverner looked at me. "The psychic isolation of this house has its uses," he said. Then he turned to the girl again. "You don't suppose that it was Mr. Mortimer's forceful personality that influenced your decision?"

 

I was secretly amused at Taverner's shot in the dark, and the way the girl walked blissfully into his trap.

 

"Oh, no," she said, "I often get those impulses; it was on just such a one that I came down here."

 

"Then," said Taverner, "it may well be on just such another that you got engaged to Mortimer, so I may as well tell you that it was I who was responsible for that impulse."

 

The girl stared at him in amazement.

 

"As soon as I knew of your existence I wanted to see you. There is a soul over there that is in my care at present, and I think you play a part in his welfare."

 

"I know I do," said the girl, gazing at the broad shoulders of the unconscious Martin with so much wistfulness and yearning that she clearly betrayed where her real feelings lay.

 

"Some people send telegrams when they wish to com- municate, but I don't; I send thoughts, because I am certain they will be obeyed. A person may disregard a telegram, but he will act on a thought, because he believes it to be his own; though, of course, it is necessary that he should not suspect he is receiving suggestion, or he would probably turn round and do the exact opposite."

 

Miss Hallam stared at him in astonishment. "Is such a thing possible?" she exclaimed. "I can hardly believe it."

 

"You see that vase of scarlet geraniums to the left of the path? I will make your mother turn aside and pick one. Now watch."

 

We both gazed at the unconscious woman as Taverner concentrated his attention upon her, and sure enough, as they drew abreast of the vase, she turned aside and picked a scarlet blossom.

 

"What are you doing to our geraniums?" Taverner called to her.

 

"I am so sorry," she called back, "I am afraid I yielded to a sudden impulse."

 

"All thoughts are not generated within the mind that thinks them," said Taverner. "We are constantly giving each other unconscious suggestions, and influencing minds without knowing it, and if a man who understands the power of thought deliberately trains his mind in its use, there are few things he cannot do."

 

We had regained the terrace in the course of our walk, and Taverner took his farewell and retired to the office. I followed him, and found him with the safe open and his card index upon the table.

 

"Well, Rhodes, what do you make of it all?" he greeted me.

 

"Martin and Mortimer after the same girl," said I. "And Mortimer uses for his private ends the same methods you use on your patients."

 

"Precisely, "said Taverner. "An excellent object lesson in the ways of black and white occultism. We both study the human mind--we both study the hidden forces of nature; I use my knowledge for healing and Mortimer uses his for destruction."

 

"Taverner," I said, facing him, "what is to prevent you also from using your great knowledge for personal ends?"

 

"Several things, my friend," he replied. "In the first place, those who are taught as I am taught are (though I say it who shouldn't) picked men, carefully tested. Secondly, I am a member of an organization which would assuredly exact retribution for the abuse of its training; and, thirdly, knowing what I do, I dare not abuse the powers that have been entrusted to me. There is no such thing as a straight line in the universe; everything works in curves; therefore it is only a matter of time before that which you send out from your mind returns to it. Sooner or later Martin's dog will come home to its master."

 

Martin was absent from the evening meal, and Taverner immediately enquired his whereabouts.

 

"He walked over with his friends to the crossroads to put them on the bus for Hazlemere," someone volunteered, and Taverner, who did not seem too well satisfied looked at his watch.

 

"It will be light for a couple of hours yet," he said. "If he is not in by dusk, Rhodes, let me know."

 

It was a grey evening, threatening storm, and darkness set in early. Soon after eight I sought Taverner in his study and said: "Martin isn't in yet, doctor."

 

"Then we had better go and look for him," said my colleague.

 

We went out by the window to avoid observation on the part of our other patients, and, making our way through the shrubberies, were soon out upon the moor.

 

"I wish we knew which way he would come," said Taverner. "There is a profusion of paths to choose from. We had better get on to high ground and watch for him with the field-glasses."

 

We made our way to a bluff topped with wind-torn Scotch firs, and Taverner swept the heather paths with his binoculars. A mile away he picked out a figure moving in our direction, but it was too far off for identification.

 

"Probably Martin," said my companion, "but we can't be sure yet. We had better stop up here and await events; if we drop down into the hollow we shall lose sight of him. You take the glasses; your eyes are better than mine. How infernally early it is getting dark tonight. We ought to have had another half-hour of daylight."

 

A cold wind had sprung up, making us shiver in our thin clothes, for we were both in evening dress and hatless. Heavy grey clouds were banking up in the west, and the trees moaned uneasily. The man out on the moor was moving at a good pace, looking neither to right nor left. Except for his solitary figure the great grey waste was empty.

 

All of a sudden the swinging stride was interrupted; he looked over his shoulder, paused, and then quickened his pace. Then he looked over his shoulder again and broke into a half trot. After a few yards of this he dropped to a walk again, and held steadily on his way, refusing to turn his head.

 

I handed the glasses to Taverner.

 

"It's Martin right enough," he said; "and he has seen the dog."

 

We could make out now the path he was following, and, descending from the hill, set out at a rapid pace to meet him. We had gone about a quarter of a mile when a sound arose in the darkness ahead of us; the piercing, inarticulate shriek of a creature being hunted to death.

 

Taverner let out such a halloo as I did not think human lungs were capable of. We tore along the path to the crest of a rise, and as we raced down the opposite slope, we made out a figure struggling across the heather. Our white shirt fronts showed up plainly in the gathering dusk, and he headed towards us. It was Martin running for his life from the death hound.

 

I rapidly outdistanced Taverner, and caught the hunted man in my arms as we literally cannoned into each other in the narrow path. I could feel the played-out heart knocking like a badly-running engine against his side. I laid him flat on the ground, and Taverner coming up with his pocket medicine case, we did what we could.

 

We were only just in time. A few more yards and the man would have dropped. As I straightened my back and looked round into the darkness, I thanked God that I had not that horrible power of vision which would have enabled me to see what it was that had slunk off over the heather at our approach. That something went I had no doubt, for half a dozen sheep, grazing a few hundred yards away, scattered to give it passage.

 

We got Martin back to the house and sat up with him. It was touch-and-go with that ill-used heart, and we had to drug the racked nerves into oblivion.

 

Shortly after midnight Taverner went to the window and looked out.

 

"Come here, Rhodes," he said. "Do you see anything?"

 

I declared that I did not.

 

"It would be a very good thing for you if you did," declared Taverner. "You are much too fond of treating the thought-forms that a sick mind breeds as if, because they have no objective existence, they were innocuous. Now come along and see things from the viewpoint of the patient."

 

He commenced to beat a tattoo upon my forehead, using a peculiar syncopated rhythm. In a few moments I became conscious of a feeling as if a suppressed sneeze were working its way from my nose up into my skull. Then I noticed a faint luminosity appear in the darkness without, and I saw that a greyish-white film extended outside the window. Beyond that I saw the Death Hound!

 

A shadowy form gathered itself out of the darkness, took a run towards the window, and leapt up, only to drive its head against the grey film and fall back. Again it gathered itself together, and again it leapt, only to fall back baffled. A soundless baying seemed to come from the open jaws, and in the eyes gleamed a light that was not of this world. It was not the green luminosity of an animal, but a purplish grey reflected from some cold planet beyond the range of our senses.

 

"That is what Martin sees nightly," said Taverner, "only in his case the thing is actually in the room. Shall I open a way through the psychic bell jar it is hitting its nose against, and let it in?"

 

I shook my head and turned away from that nightmare vision. Taverner passed his hand rapidly across my forehead with a peculiar snatching movement.

 

"You are spared a good deal," he said, "but never forget that the delusions of a lunatic are just as real to him as that hound was to you."

 

We were working in the office next afternoon when I was summoned to interview a lady who was waiting in the hall. It was Miss Hallam, and I wondered what had brought her back so quickly.

 

"The butler tells me that Mr. Martin is ill and I cannot see him, but I wonder if Dr. Taverner could spare me a few minutes?"

 

I took her into the office, where my colleague expressed no surprise at her appearance.

 

"So you have sent back the ring?" he observed.

 

"Yes," she said. "How do you know? What magic are you working this time?"

 

"No magic, my dear Miss Hallam, only common sense. Something has frightened you. People are not often frightened to any great extent in ordinary civilized society, so I conclude that something extraordinary must have happened. I know you to be connected with a dangerous man, so I look in his direction. What are you likely to have done that could have roused his enmity? You have just been down here, away from his influence, and in the company of the man you used to care for; possibly you have undergone a revulsion of feeling. I want to find out, so I express my guess as a statement; you, thinking I know everything, make no attempt at denial, and therefore furnish me with the information I want."

 

"But, Dr. Taverner," said the bewildered girl, "why do you trouble to do all this when I would have answered your question if you had asked me?"

 

"Because I want you to see for yourself the way in which it is possible to handle an unsuspecting person," said he. "Now tell me what brought you here."

 

"When I got back last night, I knew I could not marry Tony Mortimer," she said, "and in the morning I wrote to him and told him so. He came straight round to the house and asked to see me. I refused, for I knew that if I saw him I should be right back in his power again. He then sent up a message to say that he would not leave until he had spoken to me, and I got in a panic. I was afraid he would force his way upstairs, so I slipped out of the back door and took the train down here, for somehow I felt that you understood what was being done to me, and would be able to help. Of course, I know that he cannot put a pistol to my head and force me to marry him, but he has so much influence over me that I am afraid he may make me do it in spite of myself."

 

"I think," said Taverner, "that we shall have to deal drastically with Master Anthony Mortimer."

 

Taverner took her upstairs, and allowed her and Martin to look at each other for exactly one minute without speaking, and then handed her over to the care of the matron.

 

Towards the end of dinner that evening I was told that a gentleman desired to see the secretary, and went out to the hall to discover who our visitor might be. A tall, dark man with very peculiar eyes greeted me.

 

"I have called for Miss Hallam," he said.

 

"Miss Hallam?" I repeated as if mystified.

 

"Why, yes," he said, somewhat taken aback. "Isn't she here?"

 

"I will enquire of the matron," I answered.

 

I slipped back into the dining-room, and whispered to Taverner, "Mortimer is here."

 

He raised his eyebrows. "I will see him in the office," he said.

 

Thither we repaired, but before admitting our visitor, Taverner arranged the reading lamp on his desk in such a way that his own features were in deep shadow and practically invisible.

 

Then Mortimer was shown in. He assumed an authoritative manner. "I have come on behalf of her mother to fetch Miss Hallam home," said he. "I should be glad if you would inform her I am here."

 

"Miss Hallam will not be returning tonight, and has wired her mother to that effect."

 

"I did not ask you what Miss Hallam's plans were; I asked you to let her know I was here and wished to see her. I presume you are not going to offer any objection?"

 

"But I am," said Taverner. "I object strongly."

 

"Has Miss Hallam refused to see me?"

 

"I have not inquired."

 

"Then by what right do you take up this outrageous position?"

 

"By this right," said Taverner, and made a peculiar sign with his left hand. On the forefinger was a ring of most unusual workmanship that I had never seen before.

 

Mortimer jumped as if Taverner had put a pistol to his head; he leant across the desk and tried to distinguish the shadowed features, then his gaze fell upon the ring.

 

"The Senior of Seven," he gasped, and dropped back a pace. Then he turned and slunk towards the door, flinging over his shoulder such a glance of hate and fear as I had never seen before. I swear he bared his teeth and snarled.

 

"Brother Mortimer," said Taverner, "the dog returns to its kennel tonight."

 

"Let us go to one of the upstairs windows and see that he really takes himself off," went on Taverner.

 

From our vantage point we could see our late visitor making his way along the sandy road that led to Thursley. To my surprise, however, instead of keeping straight on, he turned and looked back.

 

"Is he going to return?" I said in surprise.

 

"I don't think so," said Taverner. "Now watch; something is going to happen."

 

Again Mortimer stopped and looked around, as if in surprise. Then he began to fight. Whatever it was that attacked him evidently leapt up, for he beat it away from his chest; then it circled round him, for he turned slowly so as to face it. Yard by yard he worked his way down the road, and was swallowed up in the gathering dusk.

 

"The hound is following its master home," said Taverner.

 

We heard next morning that the body of a strange man had been found near Bramshott. It was thought he had died of heart failure, for there were no marks of violence on his body.

 

"Six miles !" said Taverner. "He ran well!"

 

**********************

 

A Daughter of Pan

 

Taverner looked at a card that had been brought to him. "Rhodes," he said, "if the County take to calling, I shall put up the shutters and write `Ichabod' upon them, for I shall know that the glory is departed. Now what in the name of Beelzebub, Asmodius, and a few other of my friends to whom you have not been introduced, does this woman want with me?"

 

Taverner, his methods and his nursing home, were looked upon askance by the local gentry, and as he, for his part, did not care to prescribe for measles and influenza, we seldom came into contact with our neighbours. That my colleague was a man of profound learning and cosmopolitan polish would have availed him nothing at the local tea parties, which judge a man by his capacity to avoid giving offence.

 

A narrow-hipped, thin lipped woman was ushered into the room. The orderly waves of her golden hair and the perfection of her porcelain complexion bore evidence to the excellence of her maid and the care that was devoted to her toilette. Her clothes had that upholstered effect which is only obtained when the woman is made to fit the garment, not the garment the woman.

 

"I want to consult you," she said, "about my youngest daughter, she is a great source of anxiety to us. We fear her mind is not developing properly."

 

"What are her symptoms?" asked Taverner with his most professional manner.

 

"She was always a difficult child," said the mother. "We had a great deal of trouble with her, so different to the others. Finally we stopped trying to bring her up with them, and got her special governesses and put her under medical supervision."

 

"Which I suppose included strict discipline," said Taverner.

 

"Of course," said our visitor. "She has been most carefully looked after; we have left nothing undone, though it has been a great expense, and I must say that the measures we took have been successful up to a point; her terrible outbreaks of wildness and temper have practically ceased, we have seen nothing of them for a year, but her development seems to have been arrested."

 

"I must see your daughter before I can give an opinion," said Taverner.

 

"She is out in the car," said her mother. "I will have her brought in."

 

She appeared in the care of her governess, who looked the excellent disciplinarian she was reported to be. As a Prussian drill sergeant of the old regime, she would have found her metier. The girl herself was a most curious study. She was extraordinarily like her mother. There was the same thin figure, though in the case of the mother the angularities had been padded out by art, whereas in the daughter they came glaringly through her garments, which looked as if she had slept in them. Lank, mouse-coloured hair was wound round her head in heavy greasy coils; a muddy complexion, fish-like eyes, and general air of awkwardness and sprawling limbs completed the unpleasing picture.

 

Huddled up on the sofa between the two women, who seemed to belong to another species, and who discussed her before her face as if she had been an inanimate object, the girl looked a typical low-grade defective. Now, defectives fill me with nothing but disgust, my pity I reserve for their families, but the girl before me did not inspire me with disgust, but only pity. She reminded me of a caged lark in some wretched animal dealer's shop, its feathers dull with dirt and frayed with the bars, apathetic, unhealthy, miserable, which will not sing because it cannot fly. What nature had intended her to be it was impossible to say, for she had been so thoroughly worked over by the two ardent disciplinarians who flanked her that nothing of the original material remained. Her personality displeased them, and they had effectually repressed it, but alas, there was nothing they could put in its place, and they were left with an unensouled automaton which they dragged off to alienist after alienist in the hopeless attempt to get the damage repaired while maintaining the conditions that had done the damage.

 

I awoke from my abstraction to hear the mother, who evidently had a taste for economy where the ugly duckling was concerned, bargaining shrewdly with Taverner with regard to fees, and he, who was always more interested in the human than the commercial aspect of the work was meeting her more than half way.

 

"Taverner," I said as soon as the door closed behind them, "what they are paying won't cover her board and keep, let alone treatment. They're not paupers, look at the car. Hang it all, why don't you make `em fund up?"