Works of Robert W Chambers

by Robert W. Chambers

  “You mustn’t think of remaining,” he said. Whereupon she seated herself.

  “I suppose I ought to try to amuse you — till Ferdinand returns with a plumber,” she said.

  He protested: “I couldn’t think of asking so much from you.”

  “Anyway, it’s my duty,” she insisted. “I ought.”

  “Why?”

  “Because you are under my roof — a guest.”

  “Please don’t think — —”

  “But I really don’t mind! If there is anything I can do to make your imprisonment easier — —”

  “It is easy. I rather like being here.”

  “It is very amiable of you to say so.”

  “I really mean it.”

  “How can you really mean it?”

  “I don’t know, but I do.” In their earnestness they had come close to the bars; she stood with both hands resting on the grille, looking in; he in a similar position, looking out.

  He said: “I feel like an occupant of the Bronx, and it rather astonishes me that you haven’t thrown me in a few peanuts.”

  She laughed, fetched her box of chocolates, then began seriously: “If Ferdinand doesn’t find anybody I’m afraid you might be obliged to remain to dinner.”

  “That prospect,” he said, “is not unpleasant. You know when one becomes accustomed to one’s cage it’s rather a bore to be let out.”

  They sampled the chocolates, she sitting close to the cage, and as the box would not go through the bars she was obliged to hand them to him, one by one.

  “I wonder,” she mused, “how soon Ferdinand will find a plumber?”

  He shrugged his shoulders.

  She bent her adorable head, chose a chocolate and offered it to him.

  “Are you not terribly impatient?” she inquired.

  “Not — terribly.”

  Their glances encountered and she said hurriedly:

  “I am sure you must be perfectly furious with everybody in this house. I — I think it is most amiable of you to behave so cheerfully about it.”

  “As a matter of fact,” he said, “I’m feeling about as cheerful as I ever felt in my life.”

  “Cooped up in a cage?”

  “Exactly.”

  “Which may fall at any—” The idea was a new one to them both. She leaned forward in sudden consternation. “I never thought of that!” she exclaimed. “You don’t think there’s any chance of its falling, do you?”

  He looked at the startled, gray eyes so earnestly fixed on his. The sweet mouth quivered a little — just a little — or he thought it did.

  “No,” he replied, with a slight catch in his voice, “I don’t believe it’s going to fall.”

  “Perhaps you had better not move around very much in it. Be careful, I beg of you. You will, won’t you, Mr. Vanderdynk?”

  “Please don’t let it bother you,” he said, stepping toward her impulsively.

  “Oh, don’t, don’t move!” she exclaimed. “You really must keep perfectly still. Won’t you promise me you will keep perfectly still?”

  “I’ll promise you anything,” he said a little wildly.

  Neither seemed to notice that he had overdone it.

  She drew her chair as close as it would go to the grille and leaned against it.

  “You will keep up your courage, won’t you?” she asked anxiously.

  “Certainly. By the way, how far is it to the b-basement?”

  She turned quite white for an instant, then:

  “I think I’d better go and ring up the police.”

  “No! A thousand times no! I couldn’t stand that.”

  “But the car might — drop before — —”

  “Better decently dead than publicly paragraphed.... I haven’t the least idea that this thing is going to drop.... Anyway, it’s worth it,” he added, rather vaguely.

  “Worth — what?” she asked, looking into his rather winning, brown eyes.

  “Being here,” he said, looking into her engaging gray ones.

  After a startling silence she said calmly: “Will you promise me not to move or shake the car till I return?”

  “You won’t be very long, will you?”

  “Not — very,” she replied faintly.

  She walked into the library, halted in the center of the room, hands clasped behind her. Her heart was beating like a trip hammer.

  “I might as well face it,” she said to herself; “he is — by far — the most thoroughly attractive man I have ever seen.... I — I don’t know what’s the matter,” she added piteously.... “if it’s that machine William made I can’t help it; I don’t care any longer; I wish — —”

  A sharp crack from the landing sent her out there in a hurry, pale and frightened.

  “Something snapped somewhere,” explained the young man with forced carelessness, “some unimportant splinter gave way and the thing slid down an inch or two.”

  “D-do you think — —”

  “No, I don’t. But it’s perfectly fine of you to care.”

  “C-care? I’m a little frightened, of course.... Anybody would be.... Oh, I wish you were out and p-perfectly safe.” “If I thought you could ever really care what became of a man like me — —”

  Killian Van K. Vanderdynk’s aristocratic senses began gyrating; he grasped the bars, the back of his hand brushed against hers, and the momentary contact sent a shock straight through the scion of that celebrated race.

  She seated herself abruptly; a delicate color grew, staining her face.

  Neither spoke. A long, luminous sunbeam fell across the landing, touching the edge of her hair till it glimmered like bronze afire. The sensitive mouth was quiet, the eyes, very serious, were lifted from time to time, then lowered, thoughtfully, to the clasped fingers on her knee.

  Could it be possible? How could it be possible? — with a man she had never before chanced to meet — with a man she had seen for the first time in her life only an hour or so ago! Such things didn’t happen outside of short stories. There was neither logic nor common decency in it. Had she or had she not any ordinary sense remaining?

  She raised her eyes and looked at the heir of the Vanderdynks.

  Of course anybody could see he was unusually attractive — that he had that indefinable something about him which is seldom, if ever, seen outside of fiction or of Mr. Gibson’s drawings — perhaps it is entirely confined to them — except in this one very rare case.

  Sacharissa’s eyes fell.

  Another unusual circumstance was engaging her attention, namely, that his rather remarkable physical perfection appeared to be matched by a breeding quite as faultless, and a sublimity of courage in the face of destruction itself, which ——

  Sacharissa lifted her gray eyes.

  There he stood, suspended over an abyss, smoking a cigarette, bravely forcing himself to an attitude of serene insouciance, while the basement yawned for him! Machine or no machine, how could any girl look upon such miraculous self-control unmoved? She could not. It was natural that a woman should be deeply thrilled by such a spectacle — and William Destyn’s machine had nothing to do with it — not a thing! Neither had psychology, nor demonology, nor anything, with wires or wireless. She liked him, frankly. Who wouldn’t? She feared for him, desperately. Who wouldn’t? She ——

  “C-r-rack!”

  “Oh — what is it!” she cried, springing to the grille.

  “I don’t know,” he said, somewhat pale. “The old thing seems — to be sliding.”

  “Giving way!”

  “A — little — I think — —”

  “Mr. Vanderdynk! I must call the police — —”

  “Cr-rackle — crack-k-k!” went the car, dropping an inch or two.

  With a stifled cry she caught his hands through the bars, as though to hold him by main strength.

  “Are you crazy?” he said fiercely, thrusting them away. “Be careful! If the thing drops you’ll break your arms!”

  “I �
� I don’t care!” she said breathlessly. “I can’t let — —”

  “Crack!” But the car stuck again.

  “I will call the police!” she cried.

  “The papers may make fun of you.”

  “Was it for me you were afraid? Oh, Mr. Vanderdynk! What do I care for ridicule compared to — to — —”

  The car had sunk so far in the shaft now that she had to kneel and put her head close to the floor to see him.

  “I will only be a minute at the telephone,” she said. “Keep up courage; I am thinking of you every moment.”

  “W-will you let me say one word?” he stammered.

  “Oh, what? Be quick, I beg you.”

  “It’s only goodbye — in case the thing drops. May I say it?”

  “Y-yes — yes! But say it quickly.”

  “And if it doesn’t drop after all, you won’t be angry at what I’m going to say?”

  “N-no. Oh, for Heaven’s sake, hurry!”

  “Then — you are the sweetest woman in the world!... Goodbye — Sacharissa — dear.”

  She sprang up, dazed, and at the same moment a terrific crackling and splintering resounded from the shaft, and the car sank out of sight.

  Faint, she swayed for a second against the balustrade, then turned and ran downstairs, ears strained for the sickening crash from below.

  There was no crash, no thud. As she reached the drawing-room landing, to her amazement a normally-lighted elevator slid slowly down, came to a stop, and the automatic grilles opened quietly.

  As Killian Van K. Vanderdynk crept forth from the elevator, Sacharissa’s nerves gave way; his, also, seemed to disintegrate; and they stood for some moments mutually supporting each other, during which interval unaccustomed tears fell from the gray eyes, and unaccustomed words, breathed brokenly, reassured her; and, altogether unaccustomed to such things, they presently found themselves seated in a distant corner of the drawing-room, still endeavoring to reassure each other with interclasped hands.

  They said nothing so persistently that the wordless minutes throbbed into hours; through the windows the red west sent a glowing tentacle into the room, searching the gloom for them.

  It fell, warm, across her upturned throat, in the half light.

  For her head lay back on his shoulder; his head was bent down, lips pressed to the white hands crushed fragrantly between his own.

  A star came out and looked at them with astonishment; in a little while the sky was thronged with little stars, all looking through the window at them.

  Her maid knocked, backed out hastily and fled, distracted. Then Ferdinand arrived with a plumber.

  Later the butler came. They did not notice him until he ventured to cough and announce dinner.

  The interruptions were very annoying, particularly when she was summoned to the telephone to speak to her father.

  “What is it, dad?” she asked impatiently.

  “Are you all right?”

  “Oh, yes,” she answered, carelessly; “we are all right, dad. Goodbye.”

  “We? Who the devil is ‘We’?”

  “Mr. Vanderdynk and I. We’re taking my maid and coming down to Tuxedo this evening together. I’m in a hurry now.”

  “What!!!”

  “Oh, it’s all right, dad. Here, Killian, please explain things to my father.”

  Vanderdynk released her hand and picked up the receiver as though it had been a live wire.

  “Is that you, Mr. Carr?” he began — stopped short, and stood listening, rigid, bewildered, turning redder and redder as her father’s fluency increased. Then, without a word, he hooked up the receiver.

  “Is it all right?” she asked calmly. “Was dad — vivacious?”

  The young man said: “I’d rather go back into that elevator than go to Tuxedo.... But — I’m going.”

  “So am I,” said Bushwyck Carr’s daughter, dropping both hands on her lover’s shoulders.... “Was he really very — vivid?”

  “Very.”

  The telephone again rang furiously.

  He bent his head; she lifted her face and he kissed her.

  After a while the racket of the telephone annoyed them, and they slowly moved away out of hearing.

  VIII

  “IN HEAVEN AND EARTH”

  The Green Mouse Stirs

  “I’ve been waiting half an hour for you,” observed Smith, dryly, as Beekman Brown appeared at the subway station, suitcase in hand.

  “It was a most extraordinary thing that detained me,” said Brown, laughing, and edging his way into the ticket line behind his friend where he could talk to him across his shoulder; “I was just leaving the office, Smithy, when Snuyder came in with a card.”

  “Oh, all right — of course, if — —”

  “No, it was not a client; I must be honest with you.”

  “Then you had a terrible cheek to keep me here waiting.”

  “It was a girl,” said Beekman Brown.

  Smith cast a cold glance back at him over his left shoulder.

  “What kind of a girl?”

  “A most extraordinary girl. She came on — on a matter — —”

  “Was it business or a touch?”

  “Not exactly business.”

  “Ornamental girl?” demanded Smith.

  “Yes — exceedingly; but it wasn’t that ——

  “Oh, it was not that which kept you talking to her half an hour while I’ve sat suffocating in this accursed subway!”

  “No, Smith; her undeniably attractive features and her — ah — winning personality had nothing whatever to do with it. Buy the tickets and I’ll tell you all about it.”

  Smith bought two tickets. A north bound train roared into the station. The young men stepped aboard, seated themselves, depositing their suitcases at their feet.

  “Now what about that winning-looker who really didn’t interest you?” suggested Smith in tones made slightly acid by memory of his half hour waiting.

  “Smith, it was a most unusual episode. I was just leaving the office to keep my appointment with you when Snuyder came in with a card — —”

  “You’ve said that already.”

  “But I didn’t tell you what was on that card, did I?”

  “I can guess.”

  “No, you can’t. Her name was not on the card. She was not an agent; she had nothing to sell; she didn’t want a position; she didn’t ask for a subscription to anything. And what do you suppose was on that card?”

  “Well, what was on the card, for the love of Mike?” snapped Smith. “I’ll tell you. The card seemed to be an ordinary visiting card; but down in one corner was a tiny and beautifully drawn picture of a green mouse.”

  “A — what?”

  “A mouse.”

  “G-green?”

  “Pea green.... Come, now, Smith, if you were just leaving your office and your clerk should come in, looking rather puzzled and silly, and should hand you a card with nothing on it but a little green mouse, wouldn’t it give you pause?”

  “I suppose so.”

  Brown removed his straw hat, touched his handsome head with his handkerchief, and continued:

  “I said to Snuyder: ‘What the mischief is this?’ He said: ‘It’s for you. And there’s an exceedingly pretty girl outside who expects you to receive her for a few moments.’ I said: ‘But what has this card with a green mouse on it got to do with that girl or with me?’ Snuyder said he didn’t know and that I’d better ask her. So I looked at my watch and I thought of you — —”

  “Yes, you did.”

  “I tell you I did. Then I looked at the card with the green mouse on it.... And I want to ask you frankly, Smith, what would you have done?”

  “Oh, what you did, I suppose,” replied Smith, wearily. “Go on.”

  “I’m going. She entered — —”

  “She was tall and squeenly; you probably forgot that,” observed Smith in his most objectionable manner.

  “Probably not; she was of m
edium height, as a detail of external interest. But, although rather unusually attractive in a merely superficial and physical sense, it was instantly evident from her speech and bearing, that, in her, intellect dominated; her mind, Smithy, reigned serene, unsullied, triumphant over matter.”

  Smith looked up in amazement, but Brown, a reminiscent smile lighting his face, went on:

  “She had a very winsome manner — a way of speaking — so prettily in earnest, so grave. And she looked squarely at me all the time — —”

  “So you contributed to the Home for Unemployed Patagonians.”

  “Would you mind shutting up?” asked Brown.

  “No.”

  “Then try to listen respectfully. She began by explaining the significance of that pea-green mouse on the card. It seems, Smith, that there is a scientific society called The Green Mouse, composed of a few people who have determined to apply, practically, certain theories which they believe have commercial value.”

  “Was she,” inquired Smith with misleading politeness, “what is known as an ‘astrologist’?”

  “She was not. She is the president, I believe, of The Green Mouse Society. She explained to me that it has been indisputably proven that the earth is not only enveloped by those invisible electric currents which are now used instead of wires to carry telegraphic messages, but that this world of ours is also belted by countless psychic currents which go whirling round the earth — —”

  “What kind of currents?”

  “Psychic.”

  “Which circle the earth?”

  “Exactly. If you want to send a wireless message you hitch on to a current, don’t you? — or you tap it — or something. Now, they have discovered that each one of these numberless millions of psychic currents passes through two, living, human entities of opposite sex; that, for example, all you have got to do to communicate with the person who is on the same psychical current that you are, is to attune your subconscious self to a given intensity and pitch, and it will be like communication by telephone, no matter how far apart you are.”

  “Brown!”

  “What?”

  “Did she go to your office to tell you that sort of — of — information?”

  “Partly. She was perfectly charming about it. She explained to me that all nature is divided into predestined pairs, and that somewhere, at some time, either here on earth or in some of the various future existences, this predestined pair is certain to meet and complete the universal scheme as it has been planned. Do you understand, Smithy?”