CHAPTER XV

*

*THE REENTRANT ANGLE*

Blanchard Cayley strolled into the Mercantile Library, one afternoon, and, nodding to the clerk at the desk, walked to an alcove in the corner of the main hall. He stopped at a shelf and sat down on a stool. He had done this several afternoons a week for years, going through the library as a business man takes account of stock, examining every book in order. Of some he read only the titles, glancing perhaps also at the date of the edition; of some he looked over the table of contents. Others he read, nibbling here and there. A few he took home. He had, by this time, almost exhausted the list. He read, not like a bookworm, with relish and zest, nor like a student desirous of a mastery of his subject; he read, as he did everything, even to his love-making, deliberately, accurately, with an elaborate scientific method that was, in its intricacy, something of a game, whose rules he alone knew. He had, indeed, specialized, taking up such subjects as jade, Japanese poetry, Esperanto, higher space, Bahiism, and devil-worship, and in such subjects he had what is termed "lore," but his main object was the conquest of the whole library in itself.

This afternoon he did not read long. Looking over the top of his book, as was his custom from time to time, to discover what women were present, he caught sight of Clytie Payson in the alcove containing the government reports. He replaced his volume and went over to her.

She was in high spirits, and welcomed him cordially, as if she had but just come from something interesting and stimulating; another man's smile seemed still to linger with her.

"Why, how d'you do, Blanchard?" she said. "I haven't seen you here for a long time. What has happened? Have you finished the library yet?"

"Oh, no, not quite. I've still a few more shelves to do, but I've been studying psychology on the side."

She looked at him with an indulgence that was new to him. "In petticoats, I presume, then?"

He shrugged his shoulders. "No, I've been studying a man," he said. "What are you doing?"

She overlooked the purport of his question and answered lightly, "Oh, only looking up some statistics for father. I've been coming here quite often, lately, but I'm almost finished, now. Is there anything in the world duller than a statistic? I always think of the man who went for information to a statistician at Washington and was asked, 'What d'you want to prove?'"

"How is your father getting on with the book?"

Clytie grew a little more serious. "Why, father's queer lately. I can't understand him at all. He's taken up with some spiritualists, and I'm rather worried about it."

"He's talked to me about them. But I should hardly think you'd be surprised at it. You're as much interested in palmistry as he is in the spooks, aren't you?"

Clytie flashed a glance at him. "Didn't you know that Mr. Granthope had given up palmistry?"

Cayley smiled and smoothed his pointed beard. "Oh, yes. I've heard considerable about it. Nobody seems to understand it but me. Very clever of him, I think."

"What d'you mean?" Clytie was instantly upon the defense.

"I like his system. It's subtle."

"His system?"

"Yes. You don't mean to say you still think he's sincere, do you?"

"I don't think it's necessary to discuss Mr. Granthope," said Clytie carelessly. "Of course I do believe he's sincere, or I wouldn't call myself a friend of his. He has given up a good paying business because he was sick of that way of earning a living."

"And also in order to make more money by quitting."

"How?"

"By marrying you."

She winced. "Blanchard," she said, "if you weren't an old friend, I couldn't forgive you that. But because you are, I can't permit you to think it."

"It was because we are old friends that I permitted myself to speak so plainly. You'll count it, I suppose, merely as jealousy. But I hate to see you taken in so easily."

Clytie looked up at him calmly, folding her hands in her lap. "Now, Blanchard, please tell me exactly what you mean, without any more insinuations."

"Why, Granthope has been for two months trying to marry you. He's after your money."

"Thank you for the implied compliment," she retorted dryly.

"Oh, well, you know perfectly well what _I_ think of you, Cly. I was thinking of what I know of him, not what I know of you. He's made a deliberate attempt to get you, and this reform business is only a part of the game."

She smiled and turned away, as if she were so sure of Granthope that it was hardly worth her while even to defend him.

"It's not pleasant to say it," he went on; "but you spoke of being distrustful of these mediums your father knows, and my point is that Granthope's tarred with the same brush. He has worked with them and plotted with them."

She was as yet unruffled; the spell of her happiness was still upon her, and she answered mildly. "I can hardly blame you for thinking that, perhaps. I suppose I might myself, if I didn't know him so well. But I do happen to know something about his life, and I'm sure you're mistaken. He's told me a good deal, and I have my own intuitions besides."

Cayley was as serene. "Do your intuitions tell you, for instance, that he has a definite understanding with these mediums--in regard to you?"

"No, they do not!" she answered calmly, looking him fair in the face.

"It's true, nevertheless." Cayley, with sharp eyes, noted her flush. Her eyes were well schooled, but her quivering mouth betrayed her trouble.

She took up her book as if to dismiss the subject.

Cayley watched her with impassive eyes. "You may be his friend, as you say, but there are a lot of things about Granthope that you don't know yet."

"No doubt," she replied without looking up.

"And there are things which you ought to know."

She looked at him now, to say: "Do you fancy that you are helping your own chances any by attacking him?"

"Will it help his chances any if you find that he has given away

## particular facts that he's discovered about you and your father?"

She had begun to be aroused, now, and she showed fight. "I don't believe it!"

Still unperturbed, he went on in his mechanically precise way. "I've made it my business to find out about Granthope, Cly. It shouldn't surprise you--you know I'm in earnest about wanting you. I'm as earnest, too, in wanting to protect you. I don't propose to hold my tongue when I find that you're trusting in a man that's knifing you behind your back."

Her voice rang with pride and scorn as she rose, saying, "I don't care to discuss the matter further, Blanchard."

"Not when I say that I have seen notes in Granthope's own handwriting that were given to a medium as a part of a deliberate scheme? These notes were on definite things he had learned, I'm sure, from his conversations with you. Some of them are personal matters that I'm sure you wouldn't at all care to have made public. You could easily prove it if you saw them."

She had lost courage again, and hesitated, staring at him.

Then she said, freezing, "Let me see them, then. If you're determined to have a scene, you may as well follow the rules of melodrama."

"I can't show them, because this medium wouldn't let them out of his possession. But I can get him to let you see them, if you like."

"You say they are about things we--that I talked about?"

"Yes."

"Things--about--_me_?"

"Yes. I forget all of them. I had only a moment's glance."

For some moments she stood silent. Then she spoke swiftly. "I don't believe it. He couldn't do such a thing!"

"My dear Cly, you must remember that one's whole mental evolution is merely the history of the conflict between reason and instinct, and reason is bound to win in the end. That's the way we develop. The fact is, he _could_ do it and _did_ do it. He's a charlatan and he has used a charlatan's methods. I said he was clever. This giving up his studio was merely a kind of gambit. But he made a mistake when he tried to use a lot of cheap fakirs to help him out with you."

"Oh!" She clenched her fists. "Don't! I won't stand it!" Her head dropped as if she were weary. Her eyes burned.

"Oh, there's good in everybody, the copy-books say," he returned. "But the fact is, Cly, he isn't in your class, and never was. You should have seen that!"

She looked at him without seeing him, her eyes caught meaninglessly by the garnet in his tie, clinging to it, as if it were the only real thing in the world. Her lips parted, the color was leaving her cheeks, she looked as frail as a ghost. Suddenly she threw off her reverie, and placing her hand on his arm, said, "Let me see them--the notes--Blanchard. There must be some horrid mistake. I want to clear it up immediately."

"Very well, I'll take you now, if you like. It isn't far."

She followed him out of the library as if hypnotized. They spoke little on the way. Cayley tried his best to arouse her, but finally gave it up as impossible. He watched her, preserving his usual phlegmatic calm. She walked with head erect, her chin forward, with her long, graceful gait, beside him, but never seemed two human beings further apart in spirit.

Flora Flint opened the door to Vixley's flat. She acted quite as if she belonged there and invited them in cordially, with an up-and-down scrutiny of Clytie as they passed in. Then she disappeared down the long, tunnel-like hall. Cayley took Clytie into the office where, refusing a chair, she stood like a statue, her eyes fixed on the door.

Vixley entered, currying his beard with his long fingers. "Well, Mr. Cayley," he said, "what can we do for you? Like a sitting?"

"Professor, you recall telling me something about some memoranda Granthope gave you, don't you?"

"I been thinkin' about that, Mr. Cayley, and I don't know as I ought to have said anything. I'm rather inclined to regret it."

"You _have_ said something, and I've brought this lady down to show the memoranda to her," said Cayley.

"H'm!" Vixley looked her over. "It ain't exactly customary to show things like that, you know."

"We've had all that out before. I'm here to see those cards."

Vixley drew up a rocking-chair for Clytie, and seated himself on the edge of the revolving chair in front of his desk, putting the tips of his long fingers together. "Francis Granthope is a bright young man," he said, "a very bright young man. Very painstaking, and very thorough. I won't say he ain't a _leetle_ bit unscrupulous, however. A man who ain't got no psychic influence behind him has got to do some pretty good guessin'. Now you go to work and take me, with my control, Theodore Parker, and his band o' spirits, I don't need to bother much. I can get all I want out of the other plane. I ain't sayin' nothin' against Granthope, except maybe that he uses methods, sometimes, that ain't _exactly_ legitimate, such as what I was tellin' you about."

"How did he happen to give you these notes?" Clytie asked.

"Why, I s'pose he expected me to give him an equivalent in return. I will say I have helped him out, at times, feelin' rather predisposed toward him, and him bein' a likely chap. But Lord, _I_ don't need his help! And so I told him. In this case I didn't feel called upon to give away none of my client's affairs. Naturally he got a little huffy about it, and he's acted so that I'm inclined to resent it. I can't bear anything like ingratitude."

He opened his desk and took from a pigeonhole two cards. He handed them to Clytie.

"I was tellin' Mr. Cayley, here, I knew about Granthope and his methods. It'll show you what a poor business this palm-readin' reely is. Lord, they ain't nothin' in it at all! If anybody wants to know anything about the future the only way to do is to establish communications with the spirit-plane through the well-known and well-tried methods of spiritualism."

Clytie was not listening. Her eyes were upon the cards. She looked and looked, reading and re-reading, her face set in tense lines, the notes in Granthope's fine, closely written hand. There it was, as he had set it down:

Oliver Payson, b. Oct. 2nd, 1842. b. d. present from dau., bound copy of 'Montaigne' 1900. Tattoo mark anchor on right arm, near shoulder. Writing a book. Economics (?) Knew Mad. Grant (?) Wife visited Mad. G. x. v. p.

Clytie Payson. Engaged to Blanchard Cayley (?) Mole, left cheek. Ring with "Clytie" inside. Turquoises. Claims psychic power. Clairv. Goes to Merc. Lib. afternoons at 3. Buried doll under sun-dial in garden.

As she came to the last line she dropped the card from her fingers. She had become a woman of ice.

Vixley picked up the card and smiled, showing his yellow teeth. "Kind of a give-away, ain't it? _I_ call his work lumpy."

"I hope you're convinced now," Cayley added.

She turned her head slowly, deliberately, to the Professor. "When did Mr. Granthope give you this card?"

"Oh, I dunno, exactly, he's gave me so much, one time or another. About two weeks ago, I should judge. Why?"

"I'm very much obliged to you." Her voice came as if from an immense distance. Then she nodded to Cayley, who rose.

"Nothin' more I could do, is they? Wouldn't you like to try a sittin', Miss?" Vixley asked with urbanity.

"Thank you, no." Clytie walked out slowly, without another look at him, like a somnambulist. Vixley hastened to escort her to the front door, and opened it.

Cayley gave him a look. It was returned. Vixley bowed. Clytie went out.

"Are you going over to North Beach?" Cayley inquired. "I'll walk up to the car with you."

"I'll go alone, I think."

"Oh, very well--but--"

"Good afternoon. You'll have to excuse me, Blanchard."

"All right. Good day."

She strode off, leaving him there.

She walked all the way home, and walked fast, her head held high, looking straight ahead of her. She took the steep hills with hardly a slackening of her speed, breasting the upward inclines energetically, leaning forward with grace. Up Nob Hill and down she went, along the saddle, up Russian Hill and over, without her customary pause to enjoy the glorious outlooks. Under her arm she still carried the book from the library which she had forgotten to put down when first Blanchard Cayley spoke to her. She held it automatically, apparently not knowing that it was there. With it she gripped her glove; her right hand was still bare, clenching her skirt.

She turned into her street at last, and climbed the wooden steps, into the garden. As she went up the path, her eyes lighted upon the sun-dial. She stopped and looked at it for a moment fixedly. Then into the house, up-stairs to her room, to throw herself upon the bed...

The wind had risen and blew gustily about the house. Her shutter banged at intervals. The noise kept up till she rose, opened the window and fastened back the blind, and went back to her bed. There she lay, staring, with her eyes wide open...

Her father did not come home that evening. At half-past seven she got up again, washed her face, arranged her hair, and went down-stairs to eat dinner alone. Afterward she stepped out into the garden. The wind billowed her skirts, fretted her hair into a swirl of tawny brown, cooled her cheeks. For an hour she walked up and down in the dark. The harbor was thick with mist. The siren on Lime Point sobbed across the Gate intermittently ...

Later, she went into the library and sat down with a book beside the fire. For a half-hour she did not turn a page, but remained quiescent, gazing at the flames...

At ten she went up to her workroom, lighted the gas, and took out her tools. For two hours she sewed leaves on her frame, working as if automatically. Her gaze was intent; one would have said that she was completely absorbed in her task. Slowly the sheets piled, one on another, each stitched to the back with deft strokes. Finally the whole volume was completed. She bound up the loose threads and put the book away. Then she heated her irons, got out her gold-leaf and spent an hour tooling a calf cover, pressing in roses and circles and stipples while her lips were sternly set. She arose, then, and looked out into the night...

She undressed at last and went to bed. Long after midnight there was a sound below of her father coming in. His footsteps went to and fro for a time, then they came up-stairs. His door was closed softly. There was no sound, now, but the ticking of her little clock, and, occasionally, the far-away echo of a steamer's whistle, and the dreary note of the siren. She tossed uneasily. The clock struck one, two, three, four. Then the wind began to sing round the corner of the house as the gale rose. The noise was soothingly monotonous, hypnotic, anesthetic...

At breakfast she was cool, serene, quiet, showing no traces of her emotion. She talked with her father, laughed with him, as usual, flying from one topic to another, never serious. As he got up to go, she remarked:

"Father, I think I'll go up to Sacramento to visit Mrs. Maxwell at Lonely a few days. I've put it off so long, and she's been after me again to come. She's up there all alone."

"All right, Cly. I saw her down-town, day before yesterday, and she told me she was going to ask you."

Clytie frowned. "You did? Why didn't you tell me?" She looked at him for a moment curiously. He seemed to wish to evade her question. Then she asked, with emphasis, "Did you ask her to invite me?"

Mr. Payson hesitated. "Why, I told her that you would probably accept--"

She bit her lip, still frowning. "I understand. On account of Mr. Granthope, I presume?"

"Well, I thought it would be just as well for you to take a little vacation."

Clytie said nothing. Mr. Payson lingered, ill at ease in the face of her implications. At last he looked at her over his spectacles and said petulantly: "I've been surprised at you, Cly, really. I have been considerably worried, as well. I'm afraid you've compromised yourself seriously by having been seen so much with Granthope. I haven't spoken of it, before, because I had already said all I could to you. You knew very well what my wishes were in the matter and it seems you've seen fit to disregard them."

Clytie still kept silent, listening to him calmly. He had worked himself up by his own words to an irascible pitch, but her non-resistance balked his temper, and it oozed away, as he continued.

"I hope this trip will give you a chance to think it well over, Cly, and I have no doubt that you'll come to see it as I do."

"Oh, I'll think it over," she replied listlessly.

Mr. Payson, having won his point in getting her out of town, shook his head without replying, and prepared to leave the room.

But Clytie continued. "At least, I am sure he was sincere in warning you against those mediums you are going to, father."

He turned to her, his irritability rekindled by her remark. "That's exactly what I most dislike about the man," he exclaimed. "If he hadn't attempted to prejudice me against them I might believe in his own change of heart, or whatever it was. But he went back on the very people with whom he's been associated for years. Isn't that suspicious?"

"Didn't he do that to save you from their tricks?" Her voice was low and evidently troubled; she seemed to be attempting to convince herself, rather than her father.

"I notice he didn't explain how they managed to give me my tests," Mr. Payson retorted, shaking his head emphatically. "He seemed to consider me the most simple and credulous person in the world. His statements, at least those he dared to make, were all general ones, and they implied that I was not old enough, or else, perhaps, too old to sift the evidence for myself. They were positively insulting. These mediums have given me proof enough to convince any one. They've told me things that couldn't possibly have been found out by any tricks. Take that about your giving me a copy of _Montaigne_ for my birthday, for instance. How could they have found that out? You hadn't told any one about it, had you?"

"No," said Clytie faintly.

"There you are, then!" Mr. Payson wagged his head solemnly. "What did I tell you?"

"What else did they say?" Clytie asked anxiously.

"Plenty of things. Things I myself didn't know the truth about till I investigated. Things about my personal affairs, about my past life--oh, so much that I can't help feeling that there's something in this business that we don't understand. Oh!"--he paused for a moment, looking at her--"there was one thing I wanted to ask you about--I forgot to speak of it. It sounded like nonsense, at the time--you know that even spirits are sometimes frivolous and inconsequent--and there were so many other more important communications at the time that it slipped my mind. Vixley's control said something once about a doll that was buried underneath--"

"Oh, I forgot to ring up Mrs. Maxwell," Clytie interrupted, springing up. "I _must_ tell her I'm coming. If I don't do it right away now I may not catch her--it takes so long to get a long distance connection."

She went up to him and putting her arms round his neck, kissed him. "Don't wait, father, if you're in a hurry. Good-by!"

She walked to the door.

"Well, then, I'll go along down-town," he said. "Be sure and write when you get up there."

She left him hurriedly and ran up-stairs.

At ten she was at the ferry, waiting for the boat which connected with the Sacramento train. There was a crowd going, coming and waiting in the long arcade outside. As she approached the ticket office a man was at the window. He was tall, dark-haired, distinguished. At sight of him, Clytie withdrew out of sight, and let him finish his business and leave. Then she approached, bought her ticket, and, watching sharply, dodging behind groups here and there, she succeeded in passing the ticket collector and losing herself in the assembly in the waiting-room without being observed. She wormed her way forward near the gate, and with the first rush of passengers, after the gate was raised, hurried on to the boat and went, immediately into the ladies' room.

On the other side she acted as cautiously. She remained till almost the last passenger had left the boat, then walked swiftly through the train-shed to her car. For an hour, as the train sped on, she scarcely looked to the right or the left.

The train slowed up at Stockton, and stopped. Clytie looked carelessly out of the window. Just as the train started again, Granthope appeared on the platform. He went up to a cab-driver and began talking. Clytie, flushing deeply, watched him so intensely that at last, as if attracted by some mental telepathy, he looked round and caught sight of her. His hat came off to her immediately. He gave a quick glance at the now rapidly moving train, as if intending to board it, then he gave it up as impossible. Clytie's eyes lost him, and she was carried on. It was a long time before the color faded from her cheeks.

*