CHAPTER XIX
THE HORUS STONE
An hour later Phadrig, the poor curio dealer, had disappeared, and MrPhadrig Amena, the wonder-working Adept, clad in evening clothes and alight overcoat, alighted from a hansom at the great entrance to theRoyal Court Mansions. The huge, gorgeously uniformed guardian of theGilded Gates was saluting at his elbow in an instant, for a friend ofPrinces is a very great man in the eyes of even such dignitaries as he.
"The Prince expects you, sir," he said, loud enough to make the titleheard by those who were standing by. "Will you be good enough to walkin? I will discharge the cab."
He stood aside with a bow and another salute, and Phadrig walked lightlyup the broad steps. Peter Petroff opened the door of the flat, bowinglow, and conducted him to his master's sanctum. Evidently he wasexpected, for the coffee apparatus stood ready on the Moorish tablebeside the cosy chair which he was wont to occupy. The Prince, who wasstanding on a white bear's skin by the mantel, motioned him to it,saying:
"Ah, Phadrig, my friend, punctual, of course; and equally, of course,you have something important to impart. Your wire just caught me intime to put off an engagement which, happily, is of no greatconsequence. There's the coffee, and you'll find the cigars you like inthe second drawer. Now, what is the news?"
His guest filled a cup of coffee and took a cigar and lit it before hereplied. Then, turning to the Prince, he said in his usual slow, eventone:
"Highness, I regret to say that my news is both urgent and bad."
"It would naturally be urgent," said the Prince, turning quickly towardshim, "but bad I hardly expected. Well, all news cannot be good. What isit?"
"I fear that my warning was even more urgent than I thought it myself--Imean, in point of time. Your Highness is already being watched."
"What! A Prince of the Empire, the man whom they call the ModernSkobeleff, an intimate of Nicholas! What should I be watched for?"exclaimed the Prince, half angry and half astonished. "The thing isridiculous; another of your dreams!"
"Ridiculous it may be, Highness," replied Phadrig, quite unruffled, "butit is no dream; and, moreover, the eyes which are watching you are keenones--and they are everywhere. You are under the surveillance of theInternational Police."
These were not words which even a Prince of the Holy Russian Empirecared to hear. Oscarovitch was silent for a few moments, for theearnestness, and yet the calmness, with which they were spoken made itimpossible for him to doubt them. As he had asked, what could such a manas he be watched for by this thousand-eyed organisation of which hehimself was one of the supreme Directors? It was impossible thatthese people could suspect his great scheme of treachery andself-aggrandisement. That was known to only three persons in theworld--himself, Phadrig, and the Princess Hermia; and the Princess, thewoman who had willingly sacrificed her brilliant young husband to herguilty love and her boundless ambition--no, she could be no traitress.It must be something else: and yet what?
He took two or three rapid turns up and down the room, chewing andpuffing at his cigar, until he stopped before Phadrig, and said quietly,but with angry eyes:
"Very well, we will grant that I am watched by the International. Tellme how you came to know it."
The Egyptian took a few sips of his coffee, and then related almost wordfor word his interview with Josephus. He ended by saying:
"Your Highness may believe or not now as you please, but I presume youwill when you read in your paper to-morrow morning of the suicide of arespectable Hebrew merchant named Isaac Josephus at the address which Ihave mentioned."
Oscarovitch had pretty strong nerves, and he was well accustomed toregard any kind of crime as a quite proper means of furtheringpolitical ends: but there was something in this man's uttersoullessness and the weird horror of the crime which he had justaccomplished--for by this time his victim would be already lyingself-slain on the floor of his own spider's lair--that chilled him,cold-blooded as he was. He looked at him lounging in his chair andcalmly puffing the smoke from his half-smiling lips as though he hadn'ta thought beyond the little blue rings that he was making.
"That was a devilish thing to do, Phadrig!" he said, a little above awhisper.
"Devilish, possibly, Highness, but necessary, of a certainty," was thequiet reply. "You will agree with me that Nicol Hendry is a dangerousantagonist even for you, and as for me--no doubt he thinks that he cancrush me under his foot whenever he chooses to put it down. I shouldlike to know his feelings as he reads of his spy's suicide when he hadonly just got to work."
"It will certainly be somewhat of a shock to him and his colleagues, andfor that reason I am inclined, on second thoughts, to agree that it wasnecessary, and ghastly, as I confess; it seems to me, I think, that youtook the best means to give them a salutary warning. After all, the lifeof an individual, and that individual a Jew, does not count for muchwhen the fate of empires is at stake. What puzzles me is how thesefellows came to suspect me, and what do they suspect me of. I supposeyou have no idea on the subject, have you?"
He looked at him keenly as he spoke, but he might as well have looked atthe face of a graven image. Then, like a flash of inspiration, theZastrow affair leapt into his mind. Had his connection with that, by anyextraordinary chance, come to the knowledge of the International? Thethought was distinctly disquieting. Phadrig had helped in this with hisstrange arts. He would discuss this phase of the matter with himafterwards.
Phadrig replied, returning his glance:
"Highness, I have only one explanation to offer, and that you havealready refused. Were I to speak of any other it would only be vaininvention."
"You mean about Professor Marmion and his mathematical miracles?" saidthe Prince somewhat uneasily.
"I do," replied the Egyptian firmly. "I say now what I thought when Isaw him work them. I did not believe that any man could have done whathe did unless he had attained to what we styled in the ancient days thePerfect Knowledge, or, as they term it to-day, passed the border betweenthe states of three and four dimensions. If Professor Marmion hasachieved that triumph of virtue and intelligence--and in the days that Ican remember there were more than one of the adepts who had doneso--then Your Highness's Imperial designs must be as well known to himas to yourself: nay, better, for, while you can see only a part, thebeginning and a little way beyond, he can see the whole, even to theend; for in that state, as we were taught, past, present, and future areone. Now, only three persons know of the project, and treason among themis not within the limits of reason, wherefore I would again ask YourHighness to believe that such information as the International may havehas been given them directly or indirectly by Professor Marmion."
"But," said the Prince, who was now evidently wavering in hisscepticism, since Phadrig's explanation of the mystery really seemed tobe the only feasible one, impossible as it looked to him, "granted allyou say, what possible interest could Professor Marmion, whether he'sliving in this world or the one of four dimensions, have in interferingin such a project, even if he did know all about it, especially as everyeducated Englishman admits that the state of affairs in Russia couldhardly be worse than it is? I cannot see what conceivable interest hecan have in the matter."
"But, Highness, his interest may be a private and not a public one."
"What do you mean by that, Phadrig?" asked the Prince sharply.
"As I have said," replied the Egyptian slowly, "it may be that hisdaughter, who was once the Queen, has also attained to the Knowledge. Inthat case the love which Your Highness so suddenly conceived for herwould instantly bring you within the sphere of his and her influence andpower. Now, she, as Nitocris Marmion, the mortal, is betrothed to theEnglish officer, Merrill. She loves him, and therefore, since you aregreat and powerful in the earth-life, your ruin, or even your death,might seem necessary to remove you from her path."
Oscarovitch shivered in spite of all his courage and self-control. Theidea of fearing anything human had never occurred to him after his firstbattle; but this, if
true, was a very different matter. To be threatenedwith ruin or death by a power which he could not even see, to contendagainst enemies who could read his very thoughts, and even be present ina room with him without his knowing it--as Phadrig had assured him morethan once that they could be--was totally beyond the power of thebravest or strongest of men. No, it was impossible: he could not, wouldnot, believe that, such a thing could be. His invincible materialismcame suddenly to his aid, and saved him from the reproach of fear in hisown eyes.
"No, Phadrig," he said, with a gesture of impatience, "that is not to becredited. To you it may seem a reality: to me it can never be anythingmore than a phantasy of intellect run mad on a single point--which, Ineed hardly remind you, is a by no means uncommon failing of thegreatest of minds. Another reason has just occurred to me which wouldneed no such fantastic explanation."
"And that, Highness?" queried Phadrig, looking up with an almostimperceptible shrug of his shoulders.
"The Zastrow affair. Unlikely as it seems, it is not impossible thatthere has been treason there. I have many enemies in both Russia andGermany, and it is well known that Zastrow and I were rivals once. Yes,that is it: it must be so, and therefore we must prepare to fight theInternational; and with such weapons as you are able to use there is notmuch reason why we should fear them."
He dismissed the subject with an imperious wave of his hand, andcontinued in an altered tone:
"And now, _apropos_ of your weapons. Tell me something about thiswonderful gem with which you hypnotised the Jew."
"I will not only tell you about it, Highness, I will show it to you, ifyou desire to see it," replied Phadrig, who now fully recognised thehopelessness of overcoming the blind materialism which was, of course,inevitable to the life-condition in which the Prince had his presentbeing.
"What! you have brought it with you! Excellent! Now I think we shall beable to talk on pleasanter subjects than conspiracies and such phantasmsas the Fourth Dimension!" exclaimed Oscarovitch, who, like all Russians,was almost passionately fond of gems. "Fancy asking a Russian if hedesires to see such a thing as that!"
"Your Excellency must be careful not to look at it too long or closely,"said Phadrig, putting his hand down inside his waistcoat and drawing outa wash-leather bag. "As I have told you, it possesses certain qualitieswhich are not to be trifled with. You are, of course, aware that manyEastern gems are credited with hypnotic powers. This one undoubtedly hasthem."
As he spoke he drew out the emerald, and held it by the clasp under acluster of electric lights.
"What a glorious gem!" exclaimed the Prince, starting forward to look atit more closely. "There is nothing to compare with it even among theImperial jewels of Russia."
"Have a care, Highness," said the Egyptian, raising his left hand,"unless you wish to fall under its influence. Once it seized your gazeyou could not withdraw it without the permission of its possessor, andmeanwhile he would have complete mastery of you. I am your faithfulservant, and therefore I warn you."
Was there just the faintest suspicion of a sneer in his voice as he saidthis? If there was, Oscarovitch did not notice it. He was already toomuch under the charm of the Horus Stone. Phadrig suddenly put his handover the gem and went on. "The story of this jewel, Highness, is thatmany ages ago, before the beginning of the First Dynasty, a little raftof a strange wood, as white as ivory and shaped like a river-lily, camefloating down the Nile at full flood-time and drifted to the shore infront of the house of a wise and holy man who was reputed to holdperpetual communion with the gods. On the raft was a cradle of whitewicker-work lined with down, upon which lay a man-child of suchexquisite beauty that he could scarce have been born of mortal parents.His body was bare, but round his neck was a glistening chain ofmarvellously wrought gold, fastened to which was this gem lying on hisbreast. This was doubtless the origin of the Hebrew fable of the findingof Moses, who, as all scholars know, was not a Hebrew, but an Egyptianpriest in the House of Ra.
"The holy man took him into his home, burying the chain and gem, lest itmight bring temptation to those who saw them; and as the boy grew tomanhood he taught him all his lore, until he, too, was wise enough to beadmitted into the communion of the gods, which afterwards was called bythe adepts the Perfect Knowledge. On the gem are engraved the threesymbols by which the Trinity--Osiris, Isis, and Horus; Father: Mother,and Child, the antetype of Humanity--became known and worshipped. Theholy man divined that the boy was the incarnation of Horus sent thus toearth to teach men the way of knowledge, which is the onlyrighteousness, since those who know all cannot sin. Where his housestood was built the first Temple of the Divine Trinity, and of thisHorus became High Priest. He crowned the King in the land, and hung thisgem round his neck as the symbol of his kingship and the approval of thegods.
"From the first king it was handed down from monarch to monarch throughall the changes of dynasties, until it hung from the royal chain of thegreat Rameses; and by him it was given to his daughter Nitocris, therebymaking her Queen of Egypt after him; and she wore it on that fatalnight of the death-bridal when, rather than wed with you, who were thenMenkau-Ra, Lord of War, she flooded the banqueting hall of Pepi anddrowned herself and all her guests--which, Highness, is an omen that itwere well for you not to forget should you persist in your pursuit ofthe daughter of Professor Marmion."
Oscarovitch was a man of vivid imagination, as all great soldiers andstatesmen must be, and so the story of the Horus Stone appealed stronglyto him; but what interested him perhaps even more was the spectacle ofthis man, who had just been guilty of a peculiarly ghastly form ofmurder, sitting there and telling with simple eloquence and evidentreverence the sacred Myth out of which what was perhaps the most ancientreligion in the world had evolved. He heard him with a silence of bothinterest and respect until his last sentence. Then he got up andstretched his arms out and said with a laugh:
"Omen, Phadrig! Your tale of the stone has interested me deeply, but Ibelieve no more in the omen than I do in the story. Ay, and even if Idid, I would dare all the omens that wizards ever invented for their ownprofit in trying to make Nitocris Marmion what I want her to be, andwhat she shall be unless she is the cause of my first failure to achievewhat I had set my heart upon. But you have not finished your story. Tellme now how the stone came into your possession, seeing that it was sweptout into the Nile hanging on the breast of the Royal Nitocris."
"The next season of Flood, so the records ran, Highness, the skeleton ofa woman was washed up to the foot of the river stairs of the House ofPtah, and the stone and chain were found among the weeds which filledthe cavity of the chest. They were taken with all reverence to the HighPriest, who bore them to the Pharaoh, and, amidst great rejoicing, hungthem round his neck. Then from Pharaoh to Pharaoh it came down throughthe centuries until it fell into the possession of her who wrought theruin of the Ancient Land. She gave the stone to her lover, and from hisbody it was taken by a priest of the Ancient Faith who once wasAnemen-Ha, and is now Phadrig Amena, the degenerate worker of meanmarvels which the ignorant of these days would call miracles did theynot take them for conjuring tricks.
"Since then it remained hidden, seen only by the successors of him whorescued it from the plunderers of the body of Antony, until, seeminglyin the way of trade, yet doubtless for some deep reason which is notrevealed to me, it came back into my hands again. Such so far, Highness,is the end of the story of the Stone of Horus."
"And doubtless more yet remains to be written or told," said the Princeseriously, for he was really impressed in spite of his scepticism. Then,after a little pause, he continued: "Phadrig, you have said that thestone is dangerous to any but its possessor. I wish to possess it. Nameyour price, and, to half my fortune, you shall have it."
"The stone, Highness," replied the Egyptian, with the shadow of a smileflickering across his lips, "never has been, and never can be, sold formoney, so I could not sell it, even if money had value for me, which ithas not. There is only one price for it."
"A
nd what is that?"
"A human life--perchance many lives--but all to be paid in succession byhim or her who buys it, unless he or she shall attain to the PerfectKnowledge."
"Give it to me, then!" exclaimed Oscarovitch, holding out his hand. "Thelife I have I will gladly pay for it in the hope of laying it on thebreast of the living Nitocris. As I do not believe in any others, I willthrow them in. Give it to me!"
"It is a perilous possession, Highness, for one who has not evenattained to the Greater Knowledge, as I have. Let me warn you to thinkagain, for once you take it from me the price must be paid to theuttermost pang of the doom that it may bring with it."
"I care nothing about your knowledges, Phadrig," laughed the Prince,still holding out his hand. "It is enough for me to know that it is themost glorious gem on earth, and that it shall help me to win thedivinest woman on earth. So, once more, give it to me!"
"Take it, then, Highness," said the Egyptian, with a ring of solemnityin his voice. "Take, and with it all that the High Gods may have instore for you!"
He dropped the more than priceless gem into his hand with as littlereluctance as he would have given him a brass trinket. Then he turnedaway to take another cigar, leaving Oscarovitch gazing in silent ecstasyat, as he thought, his easily-come-by treasure. Then the Prince went toa large panel picture fixed to the wall on the left-hand side of thefireplace, touched it with his finger, and it swung aside, disclosingthe door of a small safe built into the wall. He unlocked this, placedthe stone in an inner drawer, closed the safe, and put the picture backin its place.
When he sat down again, he said:
"My good friend, I know that it is useless for me to thank you, for evenif you wanted thanks I could not do justice to the occasion, as they sayin speeches: but I want to ask you just one more question, and then Iwon't keep you any longer from that delightful Oriental Club of yourswhich I suppose you are bound to. Now that I have got the stone I am, asyou may well believe, more than anxious to find the lady to whom itshall belong--again, as I suppose you would say. To my great disgust,the Professor and his daughter have disappeared from the sphere ofLondon society for a holiday _a deux_, and have, apparently with intent,left all their friends in ignorance of their destination. Have you anyidea of it? I know that that Coptic woman whom you employ has beenordered to keep a sharp watch on the movements of Miss Nitocris."
"Yes, Highness," replied Phadrig, "and she has obeyed her orders. Theday before they left she waylaid that pretty maid of Miss Marmion's onthe Common, and told her fortune. Of course, she talked the usual jargonabout lovers and letters and going on a journey, and the maid quiteinnocently let out that she was going with her master and mistress bysteamer to Denmark and up the coast of Norway, and then over to Icelandby the passenger steamers, and that she did not like the idea at all,because she knew that she would be very seasick."
"Excellent! the very thing!" exclaimed the Prince. "It couldn't bebetter if I had arranged it myself. My yacht is down in the Solentwaiting for Cowes Week. I'll be afloat to-morrow. Give that woman aten-pound note from me with my blessing. Now, I shall leave everythingelse to you. Do what you think fit with regard to our friends of theInternational. Kill as many of their spies as you can with safety, andmake the chiefs believe that they are fighting the Devil himself. Andnow, good-night."
When Peter Petroff brought him the papers the next morning, the Princetook up the _Telegraph_, and turned to the page devoted to the minorevents of the previous day. His eye was almost immediately caught by aparagraph headed:
"SUICIDE IN THE WATERLOO ROAD
"Shortly after seven last evening the passers-by on the eastern side of this thoroughfare were startled by hearing the report of a firearm, apparently coming from the office of Mr Isaac Josephus at 138a. Constable 206 Q., who was on point-duty near the spot, had seen Mr Josephus enter the office with his key only a few minutes before, walking in a rather curious way, and staring straight before him. As the door was locked, the officer thought it his duty to force it. The door of the inner office was also locked, and when this was opened, the unfortunate man was found lying across the desk with a bullet wound in his temple. His right hand still clutched a cheap revolver which was loaded in five chambers. There appears at present to have been no reason for the rash act. Mr Josephus was a broker dealing chiefly in curios and antique jewellery. Although not in a large way of business, his affairs are understood to have been in a prosperous condition. What makes the tragedy all the more strange is the fact that suicide is almost unknown among persons of the Jewish faith."
Oscarovitch felt a little shiver run down his back as he read thecommonplace lines. The man who had done this had been in this room withhim a few hours before, and one of the means of murder was now in hissafe. It would have been just as easy for Phadrig to have caused him tolook upon the fatal gem, left a bottle of poison with him, and told himto take it as medicine on going to bed. The only difference would havebeen that there would have been a very much greater sensation in thepapers.
Nicol Hendry was reading the paragraph about the same time. His eyescontracted, and he stroked his beard with slow motions of his hand. Thehand was steady, but even his nerves quivered a little. He divinedinstantly how the suicide-murder had been brought about, and this veryfact, coupled with the absolute impossibility of proving anything, madethe affair all the more disquieting.
"So that is the sort of thing we've got to fight, is it? I don't likeit. Still, it goes far to prove that the Professor was perfectly rightwhen he told me to keep a sharp eye on Mr Phadrig Amena."
The Mummy and Miss Nitocris: A Phantasy of the Fourth Dimension Page 20