The Tyranny of the Dark Part 21

Clarke's eloquent hand fell to his side. Something in Kate's calm, matter-of-fact speech reached his shrewder self. He perceived here no mean antagonist. "You need not take the trouble, madam. I am guarding her. _They_ are guarding her."

It was plain that both Mrs. Lambert and her daughter were profoundly in obedience if not in terror of this wild young evangel, and Kate, to test her divination, said, "Suppose she refuses?"

"She dare not refuse. Her 'control' would cut her down where she stands. She has no choice where they are concerned. The hands are upon her this moment," he ended, triumphantly.

A shudder of despair went over the girl. "It's true; I feel them here." She touched her throat. "They are all against me--the living and the dead," and she fell into her chair with a moan of despair, her beauty, her shining garments adding to the pity of her fate. Kate's heart went out to her without reservation as she knelt beside her.

"I am for you, my dear, and so is my brother; we will help you, I give you my word. Be brave. You must see Morton and Dr. Weissmann. They will know what to do."

Viola turned upon her mother with a wail of supplication. "Take me home, mother, take me home!"

Mrs. Lambert herself was weeping now. "I dare not, dearie, not till _they_ consent. Be patient--they have promised to release you after this test."

Over the girl's face a stony rigidity spread, her eyelids drooped, her head rolled from side to side, a pitiful, moaning cry came from her pinched lips, and then, at last, drawing a long, peaceful sigh, she slept.

Kate, in terror, stood watching, waiting till the lines of struggle, of pain, smoothed out, and the girl, doubly beautiful in her resignation, lay like one adorned for the angel of death. Then Clarke said, solemnly: "She has ceased to struggle. She is in good hands, in the care of those who love her and understand her; when she wakes she will be newly consecrated to her great work. Come."

Kate, awed and helpless, permitted him to lead her from the room, but when fairly outside she turned upon him fiercely: "Don't touch me. I despise you. You are all crazy, a set of fanatics, and you'd sacrifice that poor girl without a pang. But you sha'n't do it, I tell you--you sha'n't do it!"

And with that defiant phrase she swept past him down to the street, forgetting Dr. Britt in her frenzy of indignation and defeat.

VI

SERVISS LISTENS SHREWDLY

Meanwhile Morton, with an armful of the publications of "The Society for Psychical Research" before him, was busied with the arguments of the spiritists and their bearings on Viola Lambert's case.

The thing claimed--that the dead spoke through her--he could not for a moment entertain. Such a claim was opposed to all sound thinking, to every law known to science--was, in short, preposterous.

He had acquired all the prejudices against such a faith from Emerson's famous phrase, "rat-hole philosophy," down to the latest sneer in the editorial columns of _The Pillar_, to the latest "expose" in _The Blast_. Upon the most charitable construction, those who believed in rappings, planchettes, materialized forms, ghosts, messages on slates, and all the rest of the amazing catalogue, were either half-baked thinkers, intellectual perverts, or soft-pated sentimentalists, whose judgment was momentarily clouded by the pa.s.sing of a grief.

"And yet," said one author, "go a little deeper and you will find in the very absurdities of these phenomena a possible argument for their truth. A manufactured system would be careful to avoid putting forward as evidence a thing so childish and so ludicrous as a spirit tipping a table, writing in a bottle, or speaking through a tin horn.

Who but a childlike and trusting soul would expect to convince a man of science of the immortality of the soul by causing a message from his grandfather to appear in red letters on his arm? The hit-or-miss character of all these phenomena, the very silliness and stupidity which you find in the appeal, may be taken as evidence of the sincerity of the psychic."

To this Morton took exception. "I don't see that. There has never been a religion too gross, too fallacious, to fail of followers. Remember the sacred bull of Egypt and the snake-dance of the Hopi. The whole theory, as Spencer says, is a survival of a more primitive life and religion."

Finding himself alone with Weissmann during the afternoon, he said, carelessly:

"If you were called upon to prove the falsity or demonstrate the truth of the spiritualistic faith--how would you set to work?"

Weissmann was a delicious picture as he stood facing his young colleague. He was dressed to go home, and was topped by a low-crowned, broad-brimmed, black hat, set rather far back on his head, and floating like a shallop on the curling wave of his grizzled hair. His eyebrows, gray, with two black tufts near the nose, resembled the antennae of a moth. His loose coat, his baggy trousers, and a huge umbrella finished the picture. He was a veritable German professor--a figure worthy of _Die Fliegende Blatter_.

"I can't say exactly," he replied, thoughtfully. "In general I would bring to bear as many senses as possible. I would see, I would hear, I would touch. I would make electricity my watch-dog. I would make matter my trap."

"But how?"

"That, circ.u.mstances would determine. My plan would develop to fit the cases. I would begin with the simplest of the phenomena."

"Do you know Meyers's book?"

"Bah! No."

"And yet they say it is a careful and scientific study."

"They say! Who say?"

Serviss smiled. "The spiritualists." Then lightly added: "What would you and the rest of the scientific world do to me if I should go into this investigation and come out converted?"

The old man's eyes twinkled and his mustache writhed in silent enjoyment. "Burn you alive, as we did Bent and Zollner."

"Of course you would. What you really want me to do is to go in and smash the whole thing, eh?"

"That's about it."

"Clarke, that crazy preacher, said we men of science were just as dogmatic in our way as the bishops, and I begin to think he's right.

We condemn without investigation--we play the heretic, just as they did. Could you--could any man--go into this thing and not lose standing among his fellows?"

"No." The old figure straightened, and his mustache bristled sternly.

"No; he who goes into this arena invites a kind of martyrdom--that is also why I say you, a _young_ man--you might live to see your vindication, but I would die in my disgrace as Zollner did."

So they parted, Serviss admiring his chief's blunt honesty and vast learning, Weissmann busy with the thought that his eyes were failing, and his work nearly done, "and so little accomplished," he sadly added.

Kate met her brother at the door in a kind of fury. "Something must be done for that girl. I have had a perfectly nerve-racking time. We must get her out of that house before they drive her crazy."

The sincerity of her rage froze the smile on his face. "Is it as bad as that?"

"It is as bad as you can imagine. That man Clarke has some kind of baneful influence over her. He seems able to control her by just waving his hand at her. And the mother is such a dear old silly--she trusts to him completely. But go and dress and we will talk it all over. I'm all of a-tremble yet with what I've seen. I feel as if I had been to an insane asylum and witnessed a strangling."

He went away to his room, deeply perturbed, resentful of all this ill-regulated human nature which could so upset his sane sister and come between his own mind and his work. He believed in orderly and humorous human life. Why should this teasing, tormenting girl from the mountains come with her trances and tricks to make life furious and antic where it had been amusing and accountable? To what would a closer acquaintance lead? What would become of his studies if he gave himself to her case? "To disillusionment, I sincerely hope," he said.

As he joined his sister at dinner, he began, "Well, now, sis, I'll listen."

Kate had lost a little of her excitement under the influence of her toilet-table, but she was still tense and flushed, as she hesitated, her heart overflowing with sisterly admiration, so handsome, so strong, and so very established did Morton appear at the moment. His tone still further calmed and rea.s.sured her, and she began:

"In the first place, I like the girl very much; she is very pretty and much more _au fait_ than you had led me to suppose. Her manner is extremely good. The mother is dear and sweet, but deluded. Clarke and that old man Pratt ought to be in an asylum--or the calaboose."

Morton laughed harshly. "Your succinct statement puts me in complete possession of the case. They're all fakirs together."

"No, I didn't mean that. They're all fanatics. You should see the spirit-paintings and the slate-writings in that house! It was like a journey to a far country. Really, Morton, it staggers belief to think that within twenty blocks of where we sit such a man and such a home can exist. They _do_ exist, and it only makes me realize how small a part of the city we know, after all. And some things I heard there to-day make me wonder if science _isn't_ shutting its eyes--as these people say--to a world right under its nose. Morton, those people _believe_ what they talk. That girl is honest; she may be self-deceived, but her sufferings are real. I can't believe that she is wicked."

"Weissmann practically advised me to go into a study of these morbid conditions."

"He did? Well, that from Rudolph Weissmann, after what I've _seen_ to-day, unsettles my reason. Maybe those people really have a message.

But, Morton, you really must do something for that girl. Her condition is pitiful. One of the plans of that lunatic Clarke is to issue a challenge to the world of science and to throw that girl into the arena for you scientists to tear."