CHAPTER XXIV

THE FALL OF THE CURTAIN

I suppose there are some supercilious mortals who will cavil at what they may be pleased to term the sensationalism of those doings in the London opera house and the Italian villa. There will surely be others ready to scoff at the fine rage into which Hooper and I worked ourselves in order to arrange the somewhat involved love affairs of a friend. Well, to the one set of critics, I can only reply that Karl did not die--in fact, if they turn back to the opening lines of this history, they will find his future career, a peaceful life blessed by an enchanted matrimony, set forth in the clearest words at my command. As for the others, the utterers of jibes, I have no such logical hammer with which to pound them to a jelly. There are those who have eyes and see not, ears and hear not; and who shall give them the additional senses the lack of which was thus deplored by the Evangelist Mark?

Indeed, I must not expect a host of believers. Some few will understand me when I say that it is possible for a man or a woman to love at first sight, instantly, absolutely, and forever. But--goodness me!--that doctrine will not go down with the multitude, and my natural candor impels me to admit that it would be a very troublesome and evil thing for the multitude if it did.

Nevertheless, I wish to explain, for the benefit of the elect (and we, dear fellow-visionary, you who are blessed with the full heart and the dreaming brain, we are the elect--of that there can be no manner of doubt in _our_ minds), why it came about that Nora Cazenove and Maggie Hutchinson actually knew that Karl was suddenly stricken out of consciousness, a state which, to their overladen souls, was equivalent to his death.

Karl, locked in the suite of rooms at the Pall Mall Hotel, awoke from his restful sleep about eight o’clock. He was surprised to see by the shadows and the appearance of the streets that the hour was really as late as a glance at a clock revealed to his incredulous eyes. He wondered why and where Hooper had gone. Thinking that his friend, having evidently dressed for dinner, was dining alone rather than disturb him, he rang for the valet, and then came the explanation of the locked door.

It was the easiest thing for Karl to discover what Hooper was doing. The additional demand on his telegnomic sense made by such a quest was infinitesimal. But, probably because he was exceedingly run down and weak from want of food and sufficient rest, he yielded to a quick anger, determinedly set himself against any inquiry, and ordered the attendant to open the outer door immediately.

Of course, he was obeyed.

He could not change his clothing, but he laved his face and hands in cold water. This was refreshing in itself, but thenceforth he became aware of a steadily increasing strain on his magnetic energies. His nervous system was a delicate organism vastly more sensitive than the finest instrument known to science, though some have reached such perfection that a suspended needle in England can scratch on a prepared plate a record of the direction and magnitude of a ten seconds’ earthquake at the Antipodes. He did not fear immediate dissolution as the result of the added burthen. He had devoted himself continuously, during many days, to maintaining the mental poise, so to speak, of the two human beings whose lives were so intimately linked with his own. He knew the exact strength of magnetic current needed for the task, and the perceptible growth of the tension now puzzled but did not alarm him.

The slight feeling of irritation against Hooper was succeeded by a species of teeth-setting, a back-to-the-wall attitude, which hardened his resolve not to seek any information but simply to devote his dynamic powers to the new and strange tax made on them.

In a mood which may almost be termed one of bravado, he went down-stairs and entered the restaurant.

“Have you seen anything of Mr. Hooper?” he asked Jules, the head waiter.

“Mais non, M’sieu’. He hass not been here at all.”

“Perhaps he will turn up soon. Ask the chef to prepare us a _poulet en casserole_. That will give the wanderer twenty minutes’ grace.”

Jules, an acute observer of men, eyed his young patron covertly.

“You don’d look ver’ well,” he hinted. “Let me bring you a leetle pick-you-up--_un fortifiant_--shall it be a vermouth and Angostura?”

“It shall not,” said Karl, a smile chasing the weariness from his face. “Don’t worry about me, Jules. I am neither bull nor bear, backer nor layer. Nor has my best girl proved fickle. What I really do lack is that chicken.”

Jules did not understand. But he knew that the trouble, whatever it was, was not to be removed by the revivers of general acceptance.

Left to himself, Karl’s thoughts began to wander. He asked himself how Hooper and I were speeding on our missions, because, by this time, he knew what Frank was doing. It is no matter for surprise that he followed me rather than the American in his musings. He was aware of that which I only suspected--that Maggie had deliberately shut him out from the sanctity of her presence until her edict was burnt up in the electric ardor of the new conditions set in motion by Karl’s proposed marriage to Nora and the mere suggestion of her own union with the Italian.

Still fully alive to that ever-growing strain, which, of course, was caused by the opposing influence Hooper and I were establishing, he strove to keep his faculties within bounds. He shut his spiritual eyes, guarded his ears against the far-off sounds which might have troubled them, and endeavored to take a passive interest in the other people in the restaurant.

Notwithstanding his marvelous self-control, he was restless. He wished Hooper would return and put an end to the suspense by his agreeable rattle. He strove to eat some of the tempting _hors d’œuvres_ set before him, but, like any sick child, he fancied he could touch nothing except the dish he had ordered, and it seemed to be unreasonably long in the cooking.

Then he looked at his watch, Constantine’s gift, and, after noting the hour, 8.40 P.M., he idly read the inscription inside the gold cover. By a queer trick of memory, his mind went back to the starlit sky and the black waters of the Bay of Bengal. He heard again the plash of the oars, saw the Armenian clinging to the buoy and plunging frantically, and renewed his childish awe at the long rows of shining lights in the ship’s hull and the way in which her huge, dark bulk towered above the tiny boat when the sailors pulled alongside.

Then the black mass seemed to topple over on to him, there was a blaze of vivid light, and Karl lost consciousness.

What had happened was this. Steindal, vengeful as an infuriated ape, entered the restaurant just as Karl opened his watch. His dark eyes contracted and darted a lambent glare at the stalwart figure seated, as it transpired, at the very table where the Jew had indulged in his antics a few nights earlier. There came to him the maddening knowledge that many of those present exchanged nods, and winks, and inaudible asides, the moment he appeared. It may be that some subtle influence, some weakened inductive current, leaped out at him without Karl being either responsible for or aware of its action. The exact motive will never be known, but its result was lamentably evident. Steindal snatched a full bottle of champagne from the ice-pail in which it rested beside a neighboring table, and dealt Karl a murderous blow with it on the back of the head.

Maggie, who actually saw and heard what took place, gave a far clearer account of it than the horrified witnesses in the restaurant.

“Steindal’s face assumed a demoniacal expression,” she said, when, long afterwards, she was able to speak calmly of the unnerving spectacle. “I have read of the lust of murder, but I never knew what it meant until I saw his black eyes emitting a dull, red light, and his lips parting with an animal snarl. He leaped forward at Karl in a peculiar way. He seemed to bring down the bottle with an awful force just as his feet touched the ground. The bottle burst, and its fragments flew on all sides, some of the bits of glass cutting Steindal’s forehead. With an activity I would not have credited in a man of his corpulence, and which he certainly did not exhibit in his normal life, he turned and ran out of the room, upsetting two tables and some chairs, and disappearing through a narrow doorway. Some gentlemen rushed after him, and others helped to raise Karl, who had fallen as one dead headlong on the table. I cannot say why it is, but my last sight of Steindal, bounding across the floor in the effort to escape, reminded me of that dreadful orang-outang described by Edgar Allan Poe in the ‘Murders of the Rue Morgue.’”

Nora Cazenove knew nothing of this. She was only acutely aware of the snapping of the invisible link which held her fast. Hence, it is easy enough to understand the different cries of horror and bewilderment with which each girl announced her dread discovery.

A policeman, strolling past the Pall Mall exit from the hotel through which Steindal gained the street, supplied a succinct narrative of subsequent events so far as the would-be murderer was concerned. At the kerb was standing an empty hansom, the driver of which was fastening the nose-bag on its accustomed hook beneath the “dicky.” Steindal sprang into the vehicle, leaned over the splash-board, seized the reins and shook the horse into a fast gallop.

The animal, a Londoner by adoption, was accustomed to this frenzied leap into activity when a whistling fare was to be secured from a rival. Being a careless beast, it kept on the right side of the road, which, in England, is the wrong side, and after a brief career in comparative safety, encountered a heavy ’bus crunching round the corner from Waterloo Place.

Steindal, yelling hysterically in Spanish (he went back to his Mexican mother’s tongue, you see, when the lightning struck him), urged the horse to charge the oncoming Colossus. But the horse knew better than that, and swerved into the open space in front of the Duke of York’s column. The unoccupied square was traversed at full speed. Ere the steed, far wiser than the man, could check his wild progress, he was flying down the long flight of steps into St. James’s Park.

Most happily, the Jew’s lunacy involved no further tragedy. At that particular hour, even on a summer night, central London is fairly empty. Therefore, the few privileged spectators of this unparalleled feat by a horse, cab, and man, saw the mad descent and heard Steindal’s incoherent shrieks without being called on to tend some other unhappy sufferer from the escapade.

The horse, thoroughly frightened now, lost his coolness when the level ground was reached once more. He dashed on blindly, caught the vehicle against a tree, and the policemen and startled passers-by who then came on the scene extricated the insensible Jew from the ruins of the cab. He had been badly injured by the plunging hoofs, and fully six months elapsed before he was restored to health and Paris. In that time a great many things had happened. Steindal thenceforth passed out of Karl’s life. No action was taken against him for the attempted murder. The mad act was attributed to sudden mania, but he was warned that he must avoid England in future, if he would not undergo the _peine forte et dure_.

Hooper was the first to restore order out of chaos. The manner in which he rushed Nora Cazenove out of the box and into her own brougham astonished the opera-goers and made the “front of the house” gasp.

Did he take her to Sandilands’ House? If ever you meet him, ask him, and you will hear an expressive Americanism.

Somewhat unjustly, he rated Nora all the way from Covent Garden to the hotel. His indignation was pardonable. Karl was his friend, and Nora he had seen for the first time half an hour earlier. If Karl were really dead, Hooper held that Nora’s unreasonable passion was the chief cause of his death. Perchance, the masterful spirit he showed during that turbulent drive went a long way towards taming the impulsive nature of a very lovable and beautiful woman, for, queer whirligig of a world that it is, Nora is now Mrs. Hooper, and a very dear friend, indeed, of Maggie’s. Don’t imagine, for an instant, that Frank smirched the fair fame of all American husbands by “bossing” his charming wife. Next to Karl, and myself, he is a model Benedict.

Well, the anguish of that night in Como has long passed away, so I will not attempt to harrow your feelings by describing the heart-broken grief of Maggie, the scarcely less frenzied anxiety of her mother, the turmoil and worry and wild guessing at eventualities which racked us during three weary hours. When Steindal vanished from the restaurant so did Maggie’s perceptiveness fade away. She strove, with a fierce longing, to follow the little _cortège_ which carried Karl up-stairs. It was useless. The veil had fallen. She moved and spoke with the hopeless air of a woman beaten to her knees. I think she was overborne by the experiences of that trying period. Had Karl died, I am sure she would not have survived him long.

I quitted the castle at ten o’clock. Some English-speaking servant told the vetturino to drive slowly. Yet, an hour later, I needed his daring, because a lame horse brought me back all too slowly to show Maggie a second telegram from Hooper:

“Karl lives. Doctors predict recovery.”

By some miracle it reached me that night. Be sure I pounded hard on the lion’s head knocker of the Castello Rondo to convey the glad news.

Other messages to hand in the morning rescued our journey to London from the misery which must have attended it otherwise. The Italian count saw us off from Como. I did not grudge him that happiness. It was his parting glimpse of his divinity--and her fortune.

Slow as the mail train seemed to us in its scurry through Italy, Switzerland, and France, we passed many a weary hour in England before Karl recovered his five senses, to say nothing of the sixth. During four days he lay prone at the gate of death, his breathing slow, labored, and stertorous, the pupils of his eyes dilated unequally.

But splendid surgery saved him. The injury was so serious that a prompt operation, carried out before his parents were even aware of his condition, alone pulled him back from the void. Steindal’s blow, delivered on the side rather than the back of the head, caused a depressed fracture of the skull, a tiny bit of bone being driven into the temporo-sphenoidal lobe. The resultant concussion, too, passed rapidly into a compression of the brain arising from effusion of blood. It was the breaking of the bottle which delivered Karl from instant death. Had such a heavy implement retained its solidity, the shock must necessarily have been fatal.

The expert surgeon who carried out the requisite trephining gave me these details after one of his visits. Karl was yet unconscious, and this was the fourth morning after the attack!

Maggie, frail ghost, waylaid us in the corridor.

“Doctor,” she whispered, “may I see him?”

Medical men are telegnomists in their way. He had noticed her on the previous day, soon after our arrival, in fact, and his professional eye was attracted by her ethereal beauty.

“Yes,” he said. “That will do no harm. But you must promise to keep quiet.”

“I promise,” she answered.

He led her to the room where Karl lay, tended by hospital nurses. None hindered, so I went with them. Maggie was braver than I thought. She moved noiselessly to the head of the bed and stooped over the recumbent form. Karl was restless, almost fretful. The light was dim, yet I distinctly caught the unspoken question on Maggie’s lips as she turned and looked at the surgeon. He nodded.

She bent and kissed Karl lightly on the forehead, where the bandages left a little space. Then she murmured, ever so tenderly:--

“Karl, _mera piyárá_, I am here!”

What heaven-sent inspiration moved that “maiden with the meek, brown eyes” to utter those Persian words of endearment? Many a year had passed since Karl and she spoke Hindustáni to each other. She had almost forgotten the language, yet the first gush of impulse renewed the fount, and here was she calling him her sweetheart as she was wont to do in the lisping childhood of far-away Darjeeling.

The doctor told me that it was coincidence--blessed explanation!--that consciousness frequently returned on the fourth day in such cases--but, however it may be, Karl looked up at Maggie in the most natural way and said quite rationally:

“I thought you would come, dear. Don’t leave me again.”

He _thought_ she would come! And when had he done the thinking? Oh, that wonderful, misunderstood brain of ours! How little do we appreciate its awful mystery!

Were I writing a mere novel I would, of course, dwell on the joys of convalescence--describe in touching phrase the quiet content of those two turtle doves, when one might sit and read the other bits of news of the outer world, pausing ever and anon to ask, with the love-light in her glance, if he was sure she was not tiring him. What between Mrs. Grier, and Maggie, and two of those human angels who wore the uniform of some great hospital, never was man so waited on. Plenty of good fellows of my acquaintance have come a cropper at polo, scrunching their craniums on a maidán hard as iron, without a quarter so much fuss being made over them. Yet, seeing that I embarked on a semi-scientific voyage with the pen, so must I end my quest in similar strain. The surgeon who described Karl’s injuries so lucidly became curious as to the meaning of certain hints dropped by Hooper and myself, more especially when he chanced to hear the elder Grier denouncing telegnomy and all its arts.

Gradually, feeling my way with the wariness of a mole, I led him along the underground paths of the sixth sense so far as I could track them. He listened with increased interest. Ultimately, he asked me to introduce him to Sir William Macpherson. They discussed learnedly for a long time, and they agreed, at last, in a mild definition:

“The upper temporo-sphenoidal lobe contains the cortical auditory center,” they said. “The functions of the middle and lower lobes are not definitely ascertained. Karl Grier is stated to have exhibited abnormal manifestations of unrecognized cerebral activities, and, as these seem to have ceased since he received the blow, it is advisable to point out that the resultant fracture of the skull caused a lesion of the two lobes in question.”

They would go no further than that in writing. But they went a long way further in speech, and, if any encouragement on the part of those eminent specialists could have induced Karl to recover his lost faculties, that encouragement was certainly forthcoming.

He has unhesitatingly declined to attempt any such thing. He is happy in his wife, his children, and his surroundings, and he is not willing to tempt the fates again. He has admitted to me that he is still aware of tidal influence (which, be it remembered, affects the solid earth as well as the unstable water), and he believes he has the power, if he chose to exert it, of seeing and hearing far more of other people’s business than he desires to know.

But he refuses to face the unknown again. He carried the experiment far beyond the bounds of present scientific investigation. I have described some part of the inquiry and its outcome. Both of us are content to allow others to take up the threads of knowledge where they have fallen from our hands.

TRANSCRIBER’S NOTES:

Italicized text is surrounded by underscores: _italics_.

Perceived typographical errors have been corrected.

Inconsistencies in hyphenation have been standardized.

Archaic or variant spelling has been retained.