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Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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Build thou more stately mansions, O my soul—
THE post bag of the nursing home was always sent to the village when the gardeners departed at six, so if any belated letter-writer desired to communicate with the outer world at a later hour, he had to walk to the pillar box at the cross roads with his own missives. As I had little time for my private letter-writing during the day, the dusk usually saw me with a cigar and a handful of letters taking my after-dinner stroll in that direction.
It was not my custom to encourage the patients to accompany me on these strolls, for I felt that I did my duty towards them during working hours, and so was entitled to my leisure, but Winnington was not quite in the position of an ordinary patient, for he was a personal friend of Taverner's, and also, I gathered, a member of one of the lesser degrees of that great fraternity of whose work I had had some curious glimpses; and so the fascination which this fraternity always had for me, although I have never aspired to its membership, together with the amusing and bizarre personality of the man, made me meet half way his attempt to turn our professional relationship into a personal one.
Therefore it was that he fell into step with me down the long path that ran through the shrubbery to the little gate, at the far end of the nursing home garden, which gave upon the cross roads where the pillar box stood.
Having posted our letters, we were lounging back across the road when the sound of a motor horn made us start aside, for a car swung round the corner almost on top of us. Within it I caught a glimpse of a man and woman, and on top was a considerable quantity of luggage.
The car turned in at the gate of a large house whose front drive ran out at the cross roads, and I remarked to my companion that I supposed Mr. Hirschmann, the owner of the house, had got over his internment and come back to live there again, for the house had stood empty, though furnished, since a trustful country had decided that its confidence might be abused, and that the wily Teuton would bear watching.
Meeting Taverner on the terrace as we returned to the house, I told him that Hirschmann was back again, but he shook his head.
'That was not the Hirschmanns you saw,' he said, 'but the people they have let the house to. Bellamy, I think their name is, they have taken the place furnished; either one or other of them is an invalid, I believe.'
A WEEK later I was again strolling down to the pillar box when
Taverner joined me, and smoking vigorously to discourage the
midges, we wandered down to the cross roads together. As we
reached the pillar box a faint creak attracted our attention, and
looking round, we saw that the large iron gates barring the
entrance to Hirschmann's drive had been pushed ajar and a woman
was slipping softly through the narrow opening they afforded. She
was obviously coming to the post, but, seeing us, hesitated; we
stood back, making way for her, and she slipped across the
intervening gravel on tip-toe, posted her letter, half bowed to
us in acknowledgement of our courtesy, and vanished silently as
she had come.
'There is a tragedy being worked out in that house,' remarked Taverner.
I was all interest, as I always am, at any manifestation of my chief's psychic powers, but he merely laughed.
'Not clairvoyance this time, Rhodes, but merely common sense. If a woman's face is younger than her figure, then she is happily married; if the reverse, then she is working out a tragedy.'
'I did not see her face,' I said, 'but her figure was that of a young woman.'
'I saw her face,' said Taverner, 'and it was that of an old one.'
HIS strictures upon her were not entirely justified, however,
for a few nights later Winnington and I saw her go to the post
again, and although her face was heavily lined and colourless, it
was a very striking one, and the mass of auburn hair that
surrounded it seemed all the richer for its pallor. I am afraid I
stared at her somewhat hard, trying to see the signs from which
Taverner had deduced her history. She slipped out through the
scarcely opened gate, moving swiftly but stealthily, as one
accustomed to need concealment, gave us a sidelong glance under
long dark lashes, and retreated as she had come.
It was the complete immobility of the man at my side which drew my attention to him. He stood rooted to the ground, staring up the shadowed drive where she had disappeared as if he would send his very soul to illuminate the darkness. I touched his arm. He turned to speak, but caught his breath, and the words were lost in the bubbling cough that means haemorrhage. He threw one arm round my shoulders to support himself, for he was a taller man than I, and I held him while he coughed up the scarlet arterial blood which told its own story.
I got him back to the house and put him to bed, for he was very shaky after his attack, and reported what had happened to Taverner.
'I don't think he is going to last long,' I said.
My colleague looked surprised. 'There is a lot of life in him,' he said.
'There is not much left of his lungs,' I answered, 'and you cannot run a car without an engine.'
WINNINGTON was not laid up long, however, and the first day we
let him out of bed he proposed to go to the post with me. I
demurred, for it was some little distance there and back, but he
took me by the arm and said: 'Look here, Rhodes, I've got
to go.'
I asked the reason for so much urgency. He hesitated, and then he burst out, 'I want to see that woman again.'
'That's Mrs. Bellamy,' I said. 'You had better let her alone; she is not good for you. There are plenty of nice girls on the premises you can flirt with if you want to. Let the married women alone; the husbands only come round and kick up a row, and it is bad for the nursing home's reputation.'
But Winnington was not to be headed off.
'I don't care whose wife she is; she's the woman I—I—never thought I should see,' he finished lamely. 'Hang it all, man, I am not going to speak to her or make an ass of myself, I only want to have a look at her. Any way, I don't count, I have pretty nearly finished with this sinful flesh, what's left of it.'
He swayed before me in the dusk; tall, gaunt as a skeleton, with a colour in his cheeks we should have rejoiced to see in any other patient's, but which was a danger signal in his.
I knew he would go, whether I consented or not, so I judged it best we should go together; and thereafter it became an established thing that we should walk to the cross roads at post time whether there were letters or not. Sometimes we saw Mrs. Bellamy slip silently out to the post, and sometimes we did not. If we missed her for more than two days, Winnington was in a fever, and when for five consecutive days she did not appear, he excited himself into another haemorrhage and we put him to bed, too weak to protest.
It was while telling Taverner of this latest development that the telephone bell rang. I, being nearest the instrument, picked it up and took the message.
'Is that Dr. Taverner?' said a woman's voice.
'This is Dr. Taverner's nursing home,' I replied.
'It is Mrs. Bellamy of Headington House who is speaking. I should be grateful if Dr. Taverner would come and see my husband, he has been taken suddenly ill.'
I turned to give the message to Taverner, but he had left the room. A sudden impulse seized me.
'Dr. Taverner is not here at the moment,' I said; 'but I will come over if you like. I am his assistant; my name is Rhodes, Dr. Rhodes.'
'I should be very grateful,' replied the voice. 'Can you come soon? I am anxious!'
I PICKED up my cap and went down the path I had so often
followed with Winnington. Poor chap, he would not stroll with me
again for some time, if ever. At the cross roads I paused for a
moment, marvelling that the invisible barrier of convention was
at last lowered and that I was free to go up the drive and speak
with the woman I had so often watched in Winnington's company. I
pushed the heavy gates ajar just as she had done, walked up the
deeply shaded avenue, and rang the bell.
I was shown into a sort of morning room where Mrs. Bellamy came to me almost immediately.
'I want to explain matters to you before you see my husband,' she said. 'The housekeeper is helping me with him, and I do not want her to know; you see the trouble—I am afraid—is drugs.'
So Taverner had been right as usual, she was working out a tragedy.
'He has been in a stupor all day, and I am afraid he has taken an overdose; he has done so before, and I know the symptoms. I felt that I could not get through the night without sending for someone.'
She took me to see the patient and I examined him. His pulse was feeble, breathing difficult, and colour bad, but a man who is as inured to the drug as he seemed to be is very hard to kill, more's the pity.
I told her what measures to take; said I did not anticipate any danger, but she could phone me again if a change took place.
As she wished me goodbye she smiled, and said: 'I know you quite well by sight, Dr. Rhodes; I have often seen you at the pillar box.'
'It is my usual evening walk,' I replied. 'I always take the letters that have missed the post bag.'
I was in two minds about telling Winnington of my interview, wondering whether the excitement into which it would throw him or his continued suspense would be the lesser of the two evils, and finally decided in favour of the former. I went up to his room when I got back, and plunged into the matter without preamble.
'Winnington,' I said, 'I have seen your divinity.'
He was all agog in a minute, and I told him of my interview, suppressing only the nature of the illness, which I was in honour bound not to reveal. This, however, was the point he particularly wished to know, although he knew that I naturally could not tell him. Finding me obdurate, he suddenly raised himself in bed, seized my hand, and laid it to his forehead.
'No, you don't!' I cried, snatching it away, for I had by now seen enough of Taverner's methods to know how thought-reading was done, but I had not been quick enough, and Winnington sank back on the pillowless bed chuckling.
'Drugs!' he said, and breathless from his effort, could say no more; but the triumph in his eyes told me that he had learnt something which he considered of vital importance.
I WENT round next morning to see Bellamy again. He was
conscious, regarded me with sulky suspicion, and would have none
of me, and I saw that my acquaintance with his household was
likely to end as it had begun, at the pillar box.
An evening or two later Mrs. Bellamy and I met again at the cross roads. She answered my greeting with a smile, evidently well enough pleased to have some one to speak to beside her boorish husband, for they seemed to know no one in the district.
She commented on my solitary state. 'What has become of the tall man who used to come with you to the post?' she enquired.
I told her of poor Winnington's condition.
Then she said a curious thing for one who was a comparative stranger to me, and a complete stranger to Winnington.
'Is he likely to die?' she asked, looking me straight in the face with a peculiar expression in her eyes.
Surprised by her question, I blurted out the truth.
'I thought so,' she said. 'I am Scotch, and we have second sight in our family, and last night I saw his wraith.'
'You saw his wraith?' I exclaimed mystified.
She nodded her auburn head. 'Just as clearly as I see you,' she replied. 'In fact he was so distinct that I thought he must have been another doctor from the nursing home whom you had sent over in your stead to see how my husband was getting on.
'I was sitting beside the bed with the lamp turned low, when a movement caught my notice, and I looked up to see your friend standing between me and the light. I was about to speak to him when I noticed the extraordinary expression of his face, so extraordinary that I stared at him and could find no word to say, for he seemed to be absolutely gloating over me—or my husband—I could not tell which.
'He was standing up straight, not his usual stoop.' ('So you have been watching him tool' I thought.) 'And his face wore a look of absolute triumph, as if he had at last won something for which he had waited and worked for a very long time, and he said to me quite slowly and distinctly: "It will be my turn next." I was just about to answer him and ask what he meant by his extraordinary behaviour, when I suddenly found that I could see the lamp through him, and before I had recovered from my surprise he had vanished. I took it to mean that my husband would live, but that he himself was dying.'
I told her that from my knowledge of the two cases her interpretation was likely to prove a true one, and we stood for some minutes telling ghost stories before she returned through the iron gates.
WINNINGTON was slowly pulling round from his attack, though as
yet unable to leave his bed. His attitude concerning Mrs. Bellamy
had undergone a curious change; he still asked me each day if I
had seen her at the pillar box and what she had had to say for
herself, but he showed no regret that he was not well enough to
accompany me thither and make her acquaintance; instead, his
attitude seemed to convey that he and she were partners in some
secret in which I had no share.
Although he was over the worst, his last attack had so pulled him down that his disease had got the upper hand, and I saw that it was unlikely that he would ever get out of bed again, so I indulged his foible in regard to Mrs. Bellamy, feeling sure that no harm could come of it. Her visits to the pillar box, what she said, and what I said were duly reported for the benefit of the sick man, whose eyes twinkled with a secret amusement while I talked. As far as I could make out, for he did not give me his confidence, he was biding his time till Bellamy took another overdose, and I should have felt considerable anxiety as to what he intended to do then had I not known that he was physically incapable of crossing the room without assistance. Little harm could come, therefore, from letting him daydream, so I did not seek to fling cold water on his fantasies.
ONE night I was aroused by a tap at my door and found the
night nurse standing there. She asked me to come with her to
Winnington's room, for she had found him unconscious, and his
condition gave her anxiety. I went with her, and as she had said,
he was in a state of coma, pulse imperceptible, breathing almost
nonexistent; for a moment I was puzzled at the turn his illness
had taken, but as I stood looking down at him, I heard the faint
click in the throat followed by the long sibilant sigh that I had
so often heard when Taverner was leaving his body for one of
those strange psychic expeditions of his, and I guessed that
Winnington was at the same game, for I knew that he had belonged
to Taverner's fraternity and had doubtless learnt many of its
arts.
I sent the nurse away and settled myself to wait beside our patient as I had often waited beside Taverner; not a little anxious, for my colleague was away on his holiday, and I had the responsibility of the nursing home on my shoulders; not that that would have troubled me in the ordinary way, but occult matters are beyond my ken, and I knew that Taverner always considered that these psychic expeditions were not altogether unaccompanied by risk.
I had not a long vigil, however; after about 20 minutes I saw the trance condition pass into natural sleep, and having made sure that the heart had taken up its beat again and that all was well, I left my patient without rousing him and went back to bed.
NEXT morning, as Winnington did not refer to the incident, I
did not either, but his ill-concealed elation showed that
something had transpired upon that midnight journey which had
pleased him mightily.
That evening when I went to the pillar box I found Mrs. Bellamy there waiting for me. She began without preamble:
'Dr. Rhodes, did your tall friend die during the night?'
'No,' I said, looking at her sharply. 'In fact he is much better this morning.'
'I am glad of that,' she said, 'for I saw his wraith again last night, and wondered if anything had happened to him.'
'What time did you see him?' I enquired, a sudden suspicion coming into my mind.
'I don't know,' she replied; 'I did not look at the clock, but it was some time after midnight; I was wakened by something touching my cheek very softly, and thought the cat must have got into the room and jumped on the bed; I roused myself, intending to put it out of the room, when I saw something shadowy between me and the window; it moved to the foot of the bed, and I felt a slight weight on my feet, more than that of a cat, about what one would expect from a good-sized terrier, and then I distinctly saw your friend sitting on the foot of the bed, watching me. As I looked at him, he faded and disappeared, and I could not be sure that I had not imagined him out of the folds of the eiderdown, which was thrown back over the footboard, so I thought I would ask you whether there was—anything to account for what I saw.'
'Winnington is not dead,' I said. And not wishing to be questioned any further in the matter, wished her good night somewhat abruptly and was turning away when she called me back.
'Dr. Rhodes,' she said, 'my husband has been in that heavy stupor all day; do you think that anything ought to be done?'
'I will come and have a look at him if you like,' I answered. She thanked me, but said she did not want to call me in unless it were essential, for her husband so bitterly resented any interference.
'Have you got a butler or valet in the house, or is your husband alone with you and the women servants?' I enquired, for it seemed to me that a man who took drugs to the extent that Bellamy did was not the safest, let alone the pleasantest company for three or four women.
Mrs. Bellamy divined my thought and smiled sadly. 'I am used to it,' she said. 'I have always coped with him single-handed.'
'How long has he been taking drugs?' I asked.
'Ever since our marriage,' she replied. 'But how long before that I cannot tell you.'
I did not like to press her any further, for her face told me of the tragedy of that existence, so I contented myself with saying:
'I hope you will let me know if you need help at any time. Dr. Taverner and I do not practise in this district, but we would gladly do what we could in an emergency.'
As I went down the shrubbery path I thought over what she had told me. Taking into consideration that Winnington had been in a trance condition between two and two-thirty, I felt certain that what she had seen was no phantasy of her imagination. I was much puzzled how to act. It seemed to me that Winnington was playing a dangerous game, dangerous to himself, and to the unsuspecting woman on whom he was practising, yet if I spoke to him on the matter, he would either laugh at me or tell me to mind my own business, and if I warned her, she would regard me as a lunatic. By refusing to admit their existence, the world gives a very long start to those who practice the occult arts.
I decided to leave matters alone until Taverner came back, and therefore avoided deep waters when I paid my evening visits to Winnington. As usual he enquired for news of Mrs. Bellamy, and I told him that I had seen her, and casually mentioned that her husband was bad again. In an instant I saw that I had made a mistake and given Winnington information that he ought not to have had, but I could not unsay my words, and took my leave of him with an uneasy feeling that he was up to something that I could not fathom. Very greatly did I wish for Taverner's experience to take the responsibility off my shoulders, but he was away in Scotland, and I had no reasonable grounds for disturbing his well-earned holiday.
About an hour later, as I had finished my rounds and was thinking of bed, the telephone bell rang. I answered, and heard Mrs. Bellamy's voice at the end of the line.
'I wish you would come round, Dr. Rhodes,' she said, 'I am very uneasy.'
In a few minutes I was with her, and we stood together looking at the unconscious man on the bed. He was a powerfully built fellow of some 35 years of age, and before the drug had undermined him, must have been a fine-looking man. His condition appeared to be the same as before, and I asked Mrs. Bellamy what it was that had rendered her so anxious, for I had gathered from the tone of her voice over the phone that she was frightened.
She beat about the bush for a minute or two, and then the truth came out.
'I am afraid my nerve is going,' she said. 'But there seems to be something or somebody in the room, and it was more than I could stand alone; I simply had to send for you. Will you forgive me for being so foolish and troubling you at this hour of the night?'
I quite understood her feelings, for the strain of coping with a drug maniac in that lonely place with no friends to help her—a strain which I gathered, had gone on for years—was enough to wear down anyone's courage.
'Don't think about that,' I said. 'I'm only too glad to be able to give you any help I can; I quite understand your difficulties.'
So, although her husband's condition gave no cause for anxiety, I settled down to watch with her for a little while, and do what I could to ease the strain of the intolerable burden.
We had not been sitting quietly in the dim light for very long before I was aware of a curious feeling. Just as she had said, we were not alone in the room. She saw my glance questing into the corners, and smiled.
'You feel it too?' she said. 'Do you see anything?'
'No,' I answered, 'I am not psychic, I wish I were; but I tell you who will see it, if there is anything to be seen, and that is my dog; he followed me here, and is curled up in the porch if he has not gone home. With your permission I will fetch him up and see what he makes of it.'
I ran down stairs and found the big Airedale, whose task it was to guard the nursing home, patiently waiting on the mat. Taking him into the bedroom, I introduced him to Mrs. Bellamy, whom he received with favour, and then, leaving him to his own devices, sat quietly watching what he would do. First he went over to the bed and sniffed at the unconscious man, then he wandered round the room as a dog will in a strange place, and finally he settled down at our feet in front of the fire. Whatever it was that had disturbed our equanimity he regarded as unworthy of notice.
He slept peacefully till Mrs. Bellamy, who had brewed tea, produced a box of biscuits, and then he woke up and demanded his share; first he came to me, and received a contribution, and then he walked quietly up to an empty arm chair and stood gazing at it in anxious expectancy. We stared at him in amazement. The dog, serenely confident of his reception, pawed the chair to attract its attention. Mrs. Bellamy and I looked at each other.
'I had always heard,' she said, 'that it was only cats who liked ghosts, and that dogs were afraid of them.'
'So had I,' I answered. 'But Jack seems to be on friendly terms with this one.'
And then the explanation flashed into my mind. If the invisible presence were Winnington, whom Mrs. Bellamy had already seen twice in that very room, then the dog's behaviour was accounted for, for Winnington and he were close friends, and the presence which to us was so uncanny, would, to him, be friendly and familiar.
I rose to my feet. 'If you don't mind,' I said, 'I will just go round to the nursing home and attend to one or two things, and then we will see this affair through together.'
I raced back through the shrubberies to the nursing home, mounted the stairs three at a time, and burst into Winnington's bedroom. As I expected, he was in deep trance.
'Oh you devil!' I said to the unconscious form on the bed, 'what games are you up to now? I wish to Heaven that Taverner were back to deal with you.'
I hastened back to Mrs. Bellamy, and to my surprise, as I re-entered her room I heard voices, and there was Bellamy, fully conscious, and sitting up in bed and drinking tea. He looked dazed, and was shivering with cold, but had apparently thrown off all effects of his drug. I was nonplussed, for I had counted on slipping away before he had recovered consciousness, for I had in mind his last reception of me which had been anything but cordial, but it was impossible to draw back.
'I am glad to see you are better, Mr. Bellamy,' I said. 'We have been rather anxious about you.'
'Don't you worry about me, Rhodes,' was the reply. 'Go back to bed, old chap; I'll be as right as a trivet as soon as I get warm.'
I withdrew; there was no further excuse for my presence, and back I went to the nursing home again to have another look at Winnington. He was still in a state of coma, so I settled down to watch beside him, but hour after hour went by while I dozed in my chair, and finally the grey light of dawn came and found his condition still unchanged. I had never known Taverner to be out of his body for such a length of time, and Winnington's condition worried me considerably. He might be all right, on the other hand, he might not; I did not know enough about these trances to be sure, and I could not fetch Taverner back from his holiday on a wild goose chase.
THE day wore itself away, and when night found Winnington
still in the same state I decided that the time had come for some
action to be taken, and went to the dispensary to get the
strychnine, intending to give him an injection of that and see if
it would do any good.
The minute I opened the dispensary door I knew there was someone there, but when I switched on the light the room stood empty before me. All the same, a presence positively jostled my elbow as I searched among the shelves for what I required, and I felt its breath on my neck as I bent over the instrument drawer for the hypodermic syringe.
'Oh Lord!' I said aloud. 'I wish Taverner would come back and look after his own spooks. Here, you, whoever you are, go on, clear out, go home; we don't want you here!' And hastily gathering up my impedimenta, I beat a retreat and left it in possession of the dispensary.
My evil genius prompted me to look over my shoulder as I went down the passage, and there, behind me, was a spindle-shaped drift of grey mist some seven feet high. I am ashamed to admit it, but I ran. I am not easily scared by anything I can see, but these half-seen things that drift to us out of another existence, whose presence one can detect but not locate, fill me with cold horror.
I slammed and locked Winnington's door behind me and paused to recover my breath; but even as I did so, I saw a pool of mist gathering on the floor, and there was the creature, oozing through the crack under the door and re-forming itself in the shadow of the wardrobe.
What would I not have given for Taverner's presence as I stood there, helplessly watching it, syringe in hand, sweating like a frightened horse. Then illumination suddenly burst upon me; what a fool I was, of course it was Winnington coming back to his body!
'Oh Lord!' I said. 'What a fright you gave me! For goodness sake get back into your body and stop there, and we'll let bygones be bygones.'
But it did not heed my adjuration; it seemed as if it were the hypodermic syringe that attracted it, and instead of returning to its physical vehicle, it hung round me.
'Oh,' I said. 'So it is the strychnine you are after? Well then, get back into your body and you shall have some. Look, I am going to give your body an injection. Get back inside it if you want any strychnine.'
The grey wraith hung for a moment over the unconscious form on the bed, and then, to my unspeakable relief, slowly merged into it, and I felt the heart take up its beat and breathing recommence.
I went to my room dead beat, for I had had no sleep and much anxiety during the past 48 hours, so I left a note on my mat to say that I was not to be disturbed in the morning; I felt I had fairly earned my rest, I had pulled two tricky cases through, and put my small knowledge of occultism to a satisfactory test.
But in spite of my instructions I was not left undisturbed. At seven o'clock the matron routed me out.
'I wish you would come and look at Mr. Winnington, Doctor; I think he has gone out of his mind.'
I wearily put on my clothes and dipped my heavy head in the basin and went to inspect Winnington. Instead of his usual cheery smile, he greeted me with a malign scowl.
'I should be very glad,' he said, 'if you would kindly tell me where I am.'
'You are in your own room, old chap,' I said. 'You have had a bad turn, but are all right again now.'
'Indeed,' he said. 'This is the first I have heard of it. And who may you be?'
'I'm Rhodes,' I replied. 'Don't you know me?'
'I know you right enough. You are Dr. Taverner's understrapper at that nursing home place. I suppose my kind friends have put me here to get me out of the way. Well, I can tell you this, they can't make me stop here. Where are my clothes? I want to get up.'
'Your clothes are wherever you put them,' I replied. 'We have not taken them away; but as for getting up, you are not fit to do so. We have no wish to keep you here against your will, and if you want to be moved we will arrange it for you, but you will have to have an ambulance, you have been pretty bad you know.' It was my intention to play for time till this sick mood should have passed, but he saw through my manoeuvre.
'Ambulance be damned,' he said. 'I will go on my own feet.' And forthwith he sat up in bed and swung his legs over the edge. But even this effort was too much for him, and he would have slid to the floor if I had not caught him. I called the nurse, and we put him to bed, incapable of giving any further trouble for the moment.
I was rather surprised at this ebullition as coming from Winnington, who had always shown himself a very sweet-tempered, gentle personality, though liable to fits of depression, which, how-ever, were hardly to be wondered at in his condition. He had not much to make him cheerful, poor chap, and but for Taverner's intervention he would probably have ended his days in an infirmary.
WHEN I went down to the pillar box that evening, there was
Mrs. Bellamy, and to my surprise, her husband was with her. She
greeted me with constraint, watching her husband to see how he
would take it, but his greeting lacked nothing in the way of
cordiality, one would have thought that I was an old friend of
the family. He thanked me for my care of him, and for my kindness
to his wife, whom, he said, he was afraid had been going through
rather a bad time lately.
'I am going to take her away for a change, however, a second honeymoon, you know; but when we get back I want to see something of you, and also of Dr. Taverner. I am very anxious to keep in touch with Taverner.'
I thanked him, marvelling at his change of mood, and only hoping for his wife's sake that it would last; but drug takers are broken reeds to lean upon and I feared that she would have to drain her cup to the dregs.
When I got back to the nursing home I was amazed to find Taverner there.
'Why, what in the world has brought you back from your holiday?' I demanded.
'You did,' he replied. 'You kept on telepathing S.O.S. messages, so I thought I had better come and see what was the matter.'
'I am most awfully sorry,' I said. 'We had a little difficulty, but got over it all right.'
'What happened?' he enquired, watching me closely, and I felt myself getting red like a guilty schoolboy, for I did not particularly want to tell him of Mrs. Bellamy and Winnington's infatuation for her.
'I fancy that Winnington tried your stunt of going sub-conscious,' I said at length. 'He went very deep, and was away a long time, and I got rather worried. You see, I don't understand these things properly. And then, as he was coming back, I saw him, and took him for a ghost, and got the wind up.'
'You saw him?' exclaimed Taverner. 'How did you manage to do that? You are not clairvoyant.'
'I saw a grey, spindle-shaped drift of mist, the same as we saw the time Black, the airman, nearly died.'
'You saw that?' said Taverner in surprise. 'Do you mean to say that Winnington took the etheric double out? How long was he subconscious?'
'About twenty-four hours.'
'Good God!' cried Taverner. 'The man's probably dead!'
'He's nothing of the sort,' I replied. 'He is alive and kicking. Kicking vigorously, in fact.' I added, remembering the scene of the morning.
'I cannot conceive,' said Taverner, 'how the etheric double, the vehicle of the life forces, could be withdrawn for so long a time without the disintegration of the physical form commencing. Where was he, and what was he up to? Perhaps, however, he was immediately over the bed, and merely withdrew from his physical body to escape its discomfort.'
'He was in the dispensary when I first saw him,' I answered, devoutly hoping that Taverner would not need any further information as to Winnington's whereabouts. 'He followed me back to his room and I coaxed him into his body.'
Taverner gave me a queer look. 'I suppose you took the preliminary precaution of making sure that it was Winnington you had got hold of?'
'Good Lord, Taverner, is there a possibility—?'
'Come upstairs and let us have a look at him. I can soon tell you.'
Winnington was lying in a room lit only by a night-light, and though he turned his head at our entrance, did not speak. Taverner went over to the bed and switched on the reading lamp standing on the bedside table. Winnington flinched at the sudden brightness, and growled something, but Taverner threw the light full into his eyes, watching them closely, and to my surprise, the pupils did not contract.
'I was afraid so,' said Taverner.
'Is anything wrong?' I enquired anxiously. 'He seems all right.'
'Everything is wrong, my dear boy,' answered Taverner. 'I am sure you did the best you knew, but you did not know enough. Unless you thoroughly understand these things it is best to leave them to nature.'
'But—but—he is alive,' I exclaimed, bewildered.
'It is alive,' corrected Taverner. 'That is not Winnington, you know.'
'Then who in the world is it? It looks like it to me.'
'That we must try and find out. Who are you?' he continued, raising his voice and addressing the man on the bed.
'You know damn well,' came the husky whisper.
'I am afraid I don't,' answered Taverner. 'I must ask you to tell me.'
'Why, W—,' I began, but Taverner clapped his hand over my mouth.
'Be quiet, you fool, you have done enough damage, never let it know the real name.'
Then, turning back to the sick man again, he repeated his question.
'John Bellamy,' came the sulky answer.
Taverner nodded and drew me out of the room.
'Bellamy?' he asked. 'That is the name of the man who took the Hirschmanns' house. Has Winnington had anything to do with him?'
'Look here, Taverner,' I said, 'I will tell you something I had not meant to let you know. Winnington has got a fixation on Bellamy's wife, and apparently he has brooded over it, and fantasied over it, till in his unconscious imagination he has substituted himself for Bellamy.'
'That may quite well be, it may be an ordinary case of mental trouble; we will investigate that end of the stick by and by; but, for the present, why has Bellamy substituted himself for Winnington?'
'A wish-fulfilment,' I replied. 'Winnington is in love with Bellamy's wife; he wishes he were Bellamy in order to possess her, therefore his delirium expresses the subconscious wish as an actuality, the usual Freudian mechanism, you know—the dream as the wish-fulfilment.'
'I dare say,' answered Taverner. 'The Freudians explain a lot of things they don't understand. But what about Bellamy, is he in a trance condition?'
'He is apparently quite all right, or he was, about half an hour ago. I saw him when he came down to the post with his wife. He was quite all right, and uncommon civil, in fact.'
'I dare say,' said Taverner drily. 'You and Winnington always were chums. Now look here, Rhodes, you are not being frank with me, I must get to the bottom of this business. Now tell me all about it.'
So I told him. Narrated in cold blood, it sounded the flimsiest phantasy. When I had finished, Taverner laughed.
'You have done it this time, Rhodes,' he said. 'And you who are so straight-laced, of all people!' and he laughed again.
'What is your explanation of the matter?' I enquired, somewhat nettled by his laughter. 'I can quite understand Winnington's soul, or whatever may be the technical name for it, getting out of its body and turning up in Mrs. Bellamy's room, we have had several cases of that sort of thing; and I can quite understand Winnington's Freudian wish-fulfillment, it is the most understandable thing of the whole business; the only thing that is not clear to me is the change in character of the two men; Bellamy is certainly improved, for the moment, at any rate; and Winnington is in a very bad temper and slightly delirious.'
'And therein lies the crux of the whole problem. What do you suppose has happened to those two men?'
'I haven't a notion,' I answered.
'But I have,' said Taverner. 'Narcotics, if you take enough of them, have the effect of putting you out of your body, but the margin is a narrow one between enough and too much, and if you take the latter, you go out and don't come back. Winnington found out, through you, Bellamy's weakness, and, being able to leave his body at will as a trained Initiate can, watched his chance when Bellamy was out of his body in a pipe dream, and then slipped in, obsessed him, in fact, leaving Bellamy to wander houseless. Bellamy, craving for his drug, and cut off from the physical means of gratification, scents from afar the stock we have in the dispensary, and goes there; and when he sees you with a hypodermic syringe—for an ensouled etheric can see quite well—he instinctively follows you, and you, meddling in matters of which you know nothing, put him into Winnington's body.'
As Taverner was speaking I realized that we had the true explanation of the phenomena; point by point it fitted in with all I had witnessed.
'Is there anything that can be done to put matters right?' I asked, now thoroughly chastened.
'There are several things that can be done, but it is a question as to what you would consider to be right.'
'Surely there can be no doubt upon that point? —get the men sorted back into their proper bodies.'
'You think that would be right?' said Taverner. 'I am not so certain. In that case you would have three unhappy people; in the present case, you have two who are very happy, and one who is very angry, the world on the whole, being richer.'
'But how about Mrs. Bellamy?' I said. 'She is living with a man she is not married to?'
'The law would consider her to be married to him,' answered Taverner. 'Our marriage laws only operate for sins of the body, they do not recognize adultery of the soul; so long as the body has been faithful, they would think no evil. A change of disposition for the worse, whether under the influence of drugs, drink, or insanity, does not constitute grounds for a divorce under our exalted code, therefore a change of personality for the better under a psychic influence does not constitute one either. The mandarins cannot have it both ways.'
'Any way,' I replied, 'it does not seem to me moral.'
'How do you define morality?' said Taverner.
'The law of the land—,' I began.
'In that case a man's admission to Heaven would be decided by Act of Parliament. If you go through a form of marriage with a woman a day before a new marriage law takes effect, you will go to prison, and subsequently to hell, for bigamy; whereas, if you go through the same ceremony with the same woman the day after, you will live in the odour of sanctity and finally go to heaven. No, Rhodes, we will have to seek deeper than that for our standards.'
'Then,' said I, 'how would you define immorality?'
'As that,' said Taverner, 'which retards the evolution of the group soul of the society to which one belongs. There are times when law-breaking is the highest ethical act; we can all think of such occasions in history, the many acts of conformity, both Catholic and Protestant, for example. Martyrs are law-breakers, and most of them were legally convicted at the time of their execution; it has remained for subsequent ages to canonize them.'
'But to return to practical politics, Taverner, what are you going to do with Winnington?'
'Certify him,' said Taverner, 'and ship him off to the county asylum as soon as we can get the ambulance.'
'You must do as you see fit,' I replied, 'but I am damned if I will put my name on that certificate.'
'You lack the courage of your convictions, but may I take it that you will not protest?'
'How the hell can I? I should only get certified myself.'
'You must expect your good to be evil spoken of in this wicked world,' rejoined my partner, and the discussion was likely to have developed into the first quarrel we had ever had when the door suddenly opened and the nurse stood there.
'Doctor,' she said, 'Mr. Winnington has passed away.'
'Thank God!' said I.
'Good Lord!' said Taverner.
WE went upstairs and stood beside that which lay upon the bed.
Never before had I so clearly realized that the physical form is
not the man. Here was a house that had been tenanted by two
distinct entities, that had stood vacant for 36 hours, and that
now was permanently empty. Soon the walls would crumble and the
roof fall in. How could I ever have thought that this was my
friend? A quarter of a mile away the soul that had built this
habitation was laughing in its sleeve, and somewhere, probably in
the dispensary, a furious entity that had recently been
imprisoned behind its bars, was raging impotently, nosing at the
stoppers of the poison bottles for the stimulants it no longer
had the stomach to hold. My knees gave under me, and I dropped
into a chair, nearer to fainting than I have ever been since my
first operation.
'Well, that is settled, any way,' I said in a voice that sounded strange in my own ears.
'You think so? Now, I consider the trouble is just beginning,' said Taverner. 'Has it struck you that so long as Bellamy was imprisoned in a body we knew where he was, and could keep him under control; but now he is loose in the unseen world, and will take a considerable amount of catching.'
'Then you think he will try to interfere with his wife and—and her husband?'
'What would you do if you were in his shoes?' said Taverner.
'And yet you don't consider the transaction as immoral?'
'I do not. It has done no harm to the group spirit, or the social morale, if you prefer the term. On the other hand, Winnington is running an enormous risk. Can he keep Bellamy at bay now he is out of the body? and if he cannot, what will happen? Remember Bellamy's time to die had not come, and therefore he will hang about, an earth-bound ghost, like that of a suicide; and if tuberculosis is a disease of the vital forces, as I believe it to be, how long will it be before the infected life that now ensouls it will cause the old trouble to break out in Bellamy's body? And when Bellamy the second is out on the astral plane—dead, as you call it—what will Bellamy the first have to say to him? And what will they do to Mrs. Bellamy between them, making her neighbourhood their battleground?
'No, Rhodes, there is no special hell for those who dabble in forbidden things, it would be superfluous.'
Roy Glashan's Library
Non sibi sed omnibus
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